His strong hand around hers felt immensely controlling but immensely comforting at the same time. if he could do this to someone like her, make her feel this way, then maybe he really was capable of protecting her from the ruthless enemies of her past, from the US government its secret services. Maybe she wouldn't have to be the strong one all the time, alone in the world except for an occasional voice at the end of a secure telephone line.
"This is your room Ms Maldon. Take all the time you need. I'll check back on you in thirty minutes. You can leave your old clothes in the laundry basket. All the clothing you'll need for the next twenty four hours will be in the closets in your bedroom."
"I hope you got my measurements right. I don’t like things too tight or too loose."
Clayton smiled.
"Don’t worry." He said. "They'll fit perfectly. Any complaints, just let me know."
Of course he would already have her measurements. Why wouldn't he? He had found out everything else about her.
He left her to her own devices and she instinctively locked the door behind him as he left. Not that it would matter. She presumed he would be able to get inside if he wanted to but at least she would hear him enter. The room was warm and inviting, just like the rest of the house and completely at odds with the obsessive sexual goals that dominated Clayton Hargrave's personal life.
She was dying to get out of her old sweats and headed straight to the bathroom. To say it was of five star hotel quality didn’t do it justice and obviously staff had been told to light candles, dim the lighting and make everything as comfortable as possible.
The king sized tub looked amazingly tempting but a shower would be quicker so she shed her clothes carelessly and headed straight inside. The powerful jet of water against her skin was immensely refreshing and for just a few moments, all of her worries disappeared, melting away with the grime and sweat of the most stressful, bizarre and weirdly exhilarating days of her life.
She finished her shower, dried off and then a thick, remarkably soft white bathrobe to wear while she explored the wardrobe that had been provided for her. Now that she felt clean and refreshed she was curious to see what kind of clothes a hardware engineer turned tycoon would have chosen for her. She pulled open the doors to reveal that it was a full walk in closet. She smiled. It was no surprise really; what else would a billionaire have? She found the light switch and walked inside but it seemed quite bare. In fact there was nothing there at all. She took a quick look around to make sure she wasn't missing something and then returned to the bedroom to look in the dressers and drawers but there was nothing there either.
"Great." She muttered. "What am I supposed to wear now?"
There was a light knock at the door.
"Is everything alright in there?" It was Clayton.
"Everything's just fine except for one thing. The closet's empty. There are no clothes in here for me to wear."
"Oh that." He said. "Can I come in?"
"Sure, why not. It's your house."
"The door is locked."
"Of course. Sorry."
She unlocked the door and it opened slowly, Clayton stepped cautiously inside and then stopped to look at her.
"Getting a good view?" She said.
"It's a perfect view."
"I thought you said all the clothes I would need were in the closets?"
"They are."
"There's nothing there. I don't… oh I get it. This is all I'll need for the next twenty-four hours, is that it?"
"I just want you to be as close to your true self as you can be for the next twenty-four hours." He pulled up a chair and sat down. "Is being yourself really such a bad thing?" He said.
Katy moved away from him and sat down on the king-sized, four poster bed.
"If by 'being yourself' you mean being deprived of clothing in a stranger's house, then no, it's not a good thing. I mean, how would you like it if the shoe were on the other foot?"
Clayton smiled.
"I wouldn't have a problem." He said. "On the other hand, I can’t quite imagine getting into that situation. Look, Ms. Maldon, there's nothing sinister here, clothes are on the way, it's a rare oversight on the part of my staff, after all, you are rather an unexpected guest, so I'd be grateful if you could cut then a little slack just this once."
"I guess I don’t really have any choice." She said. "So look, are we going to eat any time soon or do we talk business first?"
"We'll do both very shortly, but I have the feeling that if you're like me then you could use some strong coffee before either of those things. Would I be right?"
As if on cue the smell of excellent coffee wafted into the room.
"That smells so, so damn good." Katy said slowly, suddenly realizing just how caffeine deprived she had been since she had left the Cool Bean café earlier that day. She looked at Clayton and smiled.
"Okay Hargrave, at least you know enough about me to serve the coffee first. Bring it on and let's do it."
Clayton got up, opened the door and wheeled in a cart laid out with ornate coffee pots, glass coffee cups and a mouth watering selection of fresh fruit.
"It's Peaberry Blue Mountain." He said. "The one you so cruelly threw into the bushes earlier on this evening."
"You don’t miss a thing, do you Mr. Goldfinger."
Clayton smiled and gave her a disapproving look.
"Is that how I appear to you - an evil genius manipulating your actions?"
"At least Goldfinger didn't want to strip James Bond naked and take him to bed."
Clayton shook with laughter now.
"You're making it hard for me to stay serious Ms. Maldon. Here, have some of this Peaberry, I think you're delirious with fatigue."
Katy took the delicate cup with great pleasure. She was famished and exhausted but coffee was always, absolutely always her first port of call for sustenance and she had missed out on her all important afternoon cup. The smell of this one was excruciatingly delicious but nevertheless she knew to savor the moment.
Closing her eyes she drank in the aroma.
"Oh sweet Jesus." She murmured. "That is the hottest smelling cup of Joe in history."
Clayton nodded. "Too damn right it is. And you flung a whole bag of it into a bush! Did you know I hand wrapped that package?"
"You mean you didn't have a servant do it? My God, your poor hands must be chaffed from using scotch tape and scissors."
He pursed his lips and looked at her darkly from under his hooded eyes.
"You can be one snotty little bitch when you want to be Ms. Maldon." He paused. "I think I'm liking you more and more. Go on, taste it already. I love slow pleasure as much as anyone, but you're taking so long with this it's beginning to annoy even me."
She smiled and lingered a little longer, holding her nose just above the cup to draw in the perfectly balanced and delicately nuanced aroma.
"I have no other vices Mr. Goldfinger, coffee is my thing and I've never had occasion to cup a Peaberry." She said, using the official terminology for professional coffee tasting. "Let me enjoy myself a little."
"Cup a Peaberry? Are you serious now or are you just teasing me? Are you a coffee nerd as well as a technology geek?"
She ignored the insinuation, but took note; it was true what Angel had told her - he had a thing for nerdy girls.
"How was the coffee made?" She asked.
"Six ounces of hot water to two tablespoons of fresh grounds, sitting for," he checked his watch, "just over three minutes." He sighed. "You've already lost the moment Ms. Maldon."
"Let's not be too uptight about this Hargrave - it's just coffee after all." She brought the cup closer but Clayton put his hand to her forearm and the skin to skin contact was thrilling again this time as it had been every other time they had come together.
"It's not just coffee Ms. Maldon, it's handpicked and freshly ground Peaberry, brewed in the Jura Impressa J9--"
"Stop right there. You brewed this in a machine?"
/> "Not just any machine, the Jura is the Rolex of coffee machines producing the perfect cup every time."
"How much did this thing set you back?"
"Just under three thousand dollars."
Katy let out a loud, very unladylike guffaw. When she had finished laughing and looked at Clayton it was the first time since she had met him that he looked anything less than perfectly in control or the closest thing to a Greek sex God, but the look of disconcertion only made him more fuckable than ever.
Caution was slowly giving away to the powerful winds of temptation. She could just spin him some crap about her life as Nadia Komerov, have an almighty one night stand to end all casual encounters and then chalk it up to thrilling, unforgettable life experience.
"And just what, exactly, is so damn funny?" He said.
"You Hargrave - wasting that much dough on a machine to put hot water on coffee grounds. The French press you smashed at my place today cost fifteen dollars ninety nine and would have made a better cup than your Rolex coffee machine."
"I'll happily replace your French press. In fact, if you had looked in that package I sent you then you would have seen that I already have. Also, you haven’t tasted this coffee yet, so why don't you shut that smart, delicious mouth of yours and 'cup' this damn coffee already."
Smart, delicious mouth. The words lingered in her mind and drew her eyes unconsciously to the gorgeous man's mouth. An image of those lips plunging low between her thighs flashed through her head.
Fuck…
She broke eye contact and lowered her head to the cup, breaking the crust lightly with the tip of her nose - textbook coffee-cupping procedure - and let the aroma flow upwards. It was more than delicious; if the smell of good coffee was said to be an aphrodisiac then this was clearly what they were talking about.
Clayton watched her with intense focus, the sight of that delicate, pert nose dipping so elegantly into the glass gave him a hard on he was having immense difficulty getting to grips with. He waited, breathless, for those lips to part and to see the first sip disappear into that slender throat.
You better come clean fast you little tease or we'll have to skip the formalities.
He had lost control with this woman once before and it had unsettled him, making him feel unsure of his ability to hold himself back. Lack of control was his bugbear and she was the first woman to make him do that. Ever.
She parted her lips at last, just slightly, and allowed her tongue to slip out and into the glass. Clayton's cock pressed hard against his pants. The slow, delicate sip she made to cover her tongue almost made him lose it. She raised her eyes to him without lifting her head and a spike of pleasure peaked into the swollen tip of his manhood.
This was getting ridiculous.
Who the fuck exactly is in control here? He thought feverishly.
He wasn't a man who raised the 'flag' for any hot looking girl that passed through his bedroom and the women he took to his bed needed to perfectly match his ideal fantasy or there was no point in having them; there would be no physical reaction - but therein lay precisely the problem - she was the perfect match, down to an absolute tee.
"Ms. Maldon," he began with a strangled sound and then cleared his throat. "You better not be fucking with me here."
"Why not? Isn’t that what you wanted when you tried to tear my pants off on the kitchen counter top today?"
Katy felt increasingly uncontrollable sensations of warmth, pleasure and sexual responsiveness spreading out from her center in all directions. The combination of the coffee, the crazy day, the tantalizingly brief physical contacts with this impossibly sexy man and now his overpowering presence next to her; so close, staring at her, devouring her, wanting her….
"If you keep waving that pretty little nose of yours over that coffee cup and pretending to be in ecstasies of pleasure each time you dip the tip of your sharp little tongue over the rim, I am going to have a serious problem sticking to the program tonight."
She dipped the tip of her tongue onto the surface of the liquid again and reveled as the flavor ran through her. She threw back her head, closed her eyes and let out a long moan.
"Oooohhhh, God, is that good." She said and then opened her eyes with a slight grin on her perfectly parted lips to see the effect the performance had had on her rapt audience of one.
He was breathing heavily and sitting up straight with his long legs firmly crossed.
"You'll pay for that." He said. "Now please, for the love of God, hurry up and finish cupping that glass before I send you back out into the woods with Angel."
The mention of Angel was a slap-in-the-face reality check. Katy looked instantly serious again as she downed the rest of the cup and felt the exquisite flavors cross her palate, the warmth of the liquid enter her belly and the life fire back into her tired brain.
It was, without any doubt, the best and most thrilling cup of coffee she had ever tasted; better than a whole night of so-called hot passion with some of her ex-boyfriends.
"The coffee's alright." She said, as nonchalantly as she could. "Probably better made in a French press though."
"Screw you. You loved it. I've never seen anyone enjoy coffee like that before. That was better than...", better than a private booth and floor show, "better than drinking the damn stuff myself."
"I'm good at faking it." She said. "I'll give you a demonstration some time if you like."
He took a deep breath in, a demonstration of her faking ecstasy. It would be hot, incredibly hot, but not as hot as breaking her and hearing her scream out in true ecstasy.
When you play with best, why settle for less?
He rubbed his knees and considered the woman in front of him; no-one, but no-one had ever had this effect on him before. Her pleasure tonight had just become his Holy Grail.
Katy eyed the coffee pot - another one of those would be pretty damn good.
"This stuffs not bad, I'll give you that, you know something about coffee. Is this what you drink all the time?"
"Absolutely not. I never want to get used to it so I drink it maybe once a month or less. If I have a special guest then sometimes I invite them. Like you for instance."
The after effects of the strong, flavorful coffee on her empty stomach was began to kick in to her exhausted brain and all of a sudden she felt like a Christmas tree with all the lights turned on.
"What's so special about me?" She asked. The look he gave her revealed a flash of near desperation that went through her like a small hurricane. Instantly she felt how naked she already was before this man - only her bathrobe shielded her full nudity from his gaze; no underwear, no lingerie, no nothing.
Not even a suntan.
Clayton steadied himself.
"Before we talk Ms. Maldon I need to get a couple of things absolutely straight."
It was becoming an effort for him to speak at this point. The impression of a man barely on the edge of restraining himself made Katy feel incredibly turned on. She was well aware of her ability to control information, to outwit the media, electronic snoops and even the US government, but her direct and immediate over this man's powerful body left her with a heady feeling that her mastery of information technology lacked.
Give him what he needs. She thought. Maybe I should give him what I need…
"Shoot." She said and then raised her arms to slide her wet hair back into place behind her head.
Come on Mr. Billionaire. She dared him. Stop playing games and tell me what you really want.
"Number one, I need you to be totally honest with me about everything I will ask you tonight and about everything that we will do together, do you understand?"
"I hear you. But how will you know if I'm being straight with you or not? Are we going to use a lie detector as part of your little game?"
"Believe me Ms. Maldon, I don't need any special equipment; I will know. So just keep it simple and tell the truth. If the truth is too much, then just tell me that you can't answer. Agreed?"
>
"I can do that."
"Number two, you need to undergo a full physical inspection in order for me to feel reassured that you are not carrying any devices, electronic, nano, or otherwise, that could lead to this conversation being recorded or stored at another location."
"I'm naked under here." She said lifting the lapels of the bathrobe slightly, just revealing a hint of glistening cleavage. "What more do you want?"
"I'll need a whole lot more than that Ms. Maldon, after all, I only have your word and besides, appearances can be deceiving. What the average man considers to be naked might not be naked enough for me. I'll need to do a complete examination, electronic and physical or else you can leave right now. I've instructed Angel to be available for the next twenty-four hours. He can take you anywhere you need to go. I won’t ask him any questions when he returns, it will be as if you never existed in my world. That is the only conceivable way I could let you go. Any memories or traces of you in my mind would be…", he paused to consider, "intolerable."
Katy had begun to shake. Not visibly, but the tremor felt very real in her exposed condition. Was he threatening her? Did that mean Angel would make her 'disappear' somewhere, like into a hole in the ground in some deserted woodland?
"I don’t like Angel very much." She said, looking intently into Clayton's dark eyes for a clue of some kind.
"I didn't think you would. The kind of women I like, rarely do."
"Has he made other women disappear from your life?"
"Never one like you. But that's another story. Now do I get to examine you or are we going to say goodbye to each other right now, forever. And I mean forever."
Physical threat or not, the thought of leaving quite suddenly seemed 'intolerable' to her as well. In all her years alone no-one had ever come so close to her, expressed such a need for her or pursued her with such intense interest. It was intoxicating to feel so need by someone so quickly.
She had only met him a few hours ago and now here she was in his home, semi-naked, deciding if she should submit to a physical examination… it was crazy but also the sexiest crazy thing that had ever happened to her and if she were to leave now she would be plunged back into the terrible loneliness of her former life.
His Secret Desire Page 7
