Blackthorne: Heart of Fame, Book 8

by Lexxie Couper

  “This?”

  She lifted her attention to him, her smile wobbly. Uncertain. “This…interacting with men.”

  Josh’s lips curled. “You mean flirting?”

  A dry laugh fell from her. She shook her head, rolled her eyes and held out her hand to him, palm up. “We are not flirting. You are trying to seduce your way into my bed. I am trying to make it clear that’s never going to happen.” She wriggled her fingers. “Now cough it up. Twenty-two bucks fifty.”

  Drawing away from the bar, he patted his back pockets. “I don’t have my wallet on me.”

  Confusion and disbelief pulled at her eyebrows. “Then how the hell did you pay for all the drinks you bought for my patrons tonight?”

  Ducking his head, he offered her a sheepish grin. “Kidding.” He pulled his wallet from his back pocket, withdrew his credit card and held it out to her.

  She looked at it. Studied it for a long moment.

  Didn’t take it.

  A thick pressure wrapped Josh’s chest. “You know what I could go for right now?” he said, leaning back on the bar again as he tapped the edge of his credit card on the marble surface. “A Harry’s Tiger. Do they still serve those at Harry’s Café de Wheels down on the corner of Cowper Wharf Roadway? Those meat pies covered in mash potato, mushy green peas and gravy?”

  Expression unreadable, Caitlin nodded. “They do.”

  Josh smiled. “What do you think? Want to share one with me?”

  She frowned. Her teeth worried her bottom lip.

  “I’ll make you a deal,” he said. “You share a pie with me at Harry’s tonight, I mean, this morning, now, and you don’t have to make me lasagna later.” He let his smile stretch a little wider. “What do you think? It’s win-win for you. You can tell your uncle you fed me one night without lying and I’ll stop harassing you in a futile attempt to get into your pants. How’s that sound?”

  Pinching her bottom lip with her thumb and forefinger, she studied him, a contemplative light in her eyes. “I think that’s doable.”

  Excitement sheared through Josh, but he tempered it with a low chortle. “I’m all about doable.”

  She laughed. “Seriously?”

  He pulled a mock look of indignant shock. “What?”

  A smile played with her lips. “I’m just going to get my bag.”

  “Okey dokey.”

  She sniggered as she rounded the end of the bar and walked towards the private door on the other side of the dance floor. “What kind of rock star says okey dokey?”

  He preened. “This kind.”

  Her laugh wafted back to him, full of relaxed life and humour.

  It was her laugh that made Josh move. Made him propel himself from the bar and follow her across the polished wooden floor, despite the dull ache in his knee and her assurances she didn’t want him. Her laugh and the simmering passion for life he heard in it. It was the first time he’d heard such intoxicating emotion from her and it stirred him.

  “Well, okey dokey then,” she tossed over her shoulder, unaware he was close. “Try not to be too famous and doable while I’m—”

  He snared her wrist in a loose grip and tugged her to face him. He couldn’t do anything else.

  He had to kiss her. Now.

  “What the—” she began, a surprised smile curling her lips.

  Lips he claimed with his own.

  He cupped her face in his palms as he did so, resting his fingertips on her temples as he traced his tongue over the plumpness of her bottom lip.

  For a split second, she froze. Stiffened in his arms, her hips pressed to his.

  And then she groaned, a low, raw sound that sent liquid heat straight to his cock and he dipped his tongue into her mouth.

  She met him in his passion, sliding her hands up his chest to tangle her fingers in the hair at his nape. The painful tug ignited fresh pleasure in Josh’s body and he deepened the kiss, the subtle sweetness of her lip gloss teasing his taste buds. He moaned, undone already by the potency of her mouth and lips and tongue. By the hunger of her kiss.

  She pushed her hips harder to his, the curve of her sex a warm pressure against his cock. The organ pulsed in his pants, growing stiff and alert and long. Christ, he’d never reacted so quickly to a kiss. Nor with such urgent need.

  He raked a hand over her shoulder, down her arm. Smoothed it over her hip. Squeezed her arse. She whimpered into his mouth and fisted her hands in his hair, sliding her tongue against his.

  Another groan tore at his throat. The acoustics of the empty night club took the sound and amplified it. His cock responded, throbbing harder. He rolled his hips, rubbing his erection against the softness of her belly. Wanting more.

  As if hearing his urgency, Caitlin captured his lip with her teeth and raked her nails down the back of his neck. Sharp pain sank into his core. A shudder rocked through him. He kneaded her arse and yanked her closer still to his body. Fuck, he wanted to be inside her.

  He wanted to strip her naked, ram her to the wall and fuck her with his tongue and fingers and dick.

  He wanted to stretch her flat on her back on the bar, spread her legs and eat her out.

  He wanted to hear her moan his name, beg him to make her come.

  He wanted her.

  On a purely physical level. On a purely sexual level, he wanted her. And after the sex, after the raw, carnal want…then he wanted to get to know her. Because she did something to him, all of him. And this kiss was just the—

  With a choked cry, Caitlin broke their kiss.

  She staggered back a step, staring at him, her face white, her breath shallow. Rapid. “I…I can’t…”

  Josh stared at her. Every fibre in his body sizzled and thrummed. His body ached, on the edge of concentrated pleasure and denied pain. “Caitlin? What…”

  She shook her head, raised a trembling hand to her mouth and pressed it to her lips.

  A cold pressure wrapped around Josh’s chest. A heavy knot twisted in his gut. His balls throbbed, swollen with impatient need. “What’s going on? Didn’t you…I thought…” Christ, he had no clue what the fuck he was trying to ask. He’d taken her by surprise to start with, but she’d responded to him. She’d given back with equal passion. Explosive passion.

  Mutual passion.

  So why had she stopped? Why had she denied them both?

  Staring at him, eyes wide, she shook her head again. “I can’t,” she whispered against her palm.

  Icy shock licked through Josh. He frowned, his pulse a thumping hammer in his neck. “Can’t what? It’s too much? I didn’t mean to get that…that crazy that quickly, it’s just…”

  Hell, he was reeling. Not just from the abrupt cessation to their kiss, but because of the overwhelming sexual energy charging between them. He took a step closer to her, aching to pull her back against his body and reclaim her lips with his.

  Caitlin staggered back a step, holding out her hand—so recently buried in his hair—as if warding off an attack. “Please don’t,” she burst out. “We can’t…I…we can’t do that again.”

  “Why not?” He dragged his hands through his hair. They were shaking. He was shaking. He’d never been so stirred by a kiss. Ever. “You can’t deny how incredible that was. You can’t.”

  She closed her eyes, shook her head. She hugged herself, her breath rapid. Shallow. “I’m…I’m with someone else.”

  Numb disbelief turned the fire in Josh’s body to an icy ache. “You’re what?”

  Caitlin opened her eyes and fixed him in a haunted gaze. “I’m…I’m engaged. And I can’t let you kiss me again.”

  Chapter Five

  He had to be hearing her wrong. Had to be. There was no way she’d just said she was engaged.

  Skin prickling, chest heavy, he dropped his stare to her left hand. Nope. No ring. So he was hearing her—

  She raised her left hand to her chest, the fingers of her right hand circling her left ring finger. “I don’t have a ring.”

 
The statement, uttered on a husky murmur, jerked his stare back up to her face. “Why not?”

  It was a stupid thing to ask. He should ask why she would kiss him like she did if she was engaged. He should ask her when she was calling the engagement off.

  Jesus, Blackthorne, talk about ego. Call it off? Because of one kiss from you?

  Blue eyes met his. He couldn’t miss the guarded light in them. “Matt and I didn’t think it was important.”

  “Your fiancé’s name is Matt?”

  More with the stupid questions. Way to go, dickhead.

  She nodded. “Matt Corvin. He’s a doctor.”

  A fist slammed into Josh’s gut. She wasn’t just engaged. She was engaged to a doctor.

  “He works for Doctors Without Borders. He’s posted to Somalia.”

  Jesus. She’s engaged to Superman.

  The thought lashed at Josh’s sanity. Five years of life as a rock star rushed at him. Mocked him. Five years of being paid millions to do nothing else but sing a few songs. Five years of suffering nothing worse than a drink with too few cubes of ice, dodging the paparazzi and a stalker who, by the man’s own admission, just wanted to sleep with him.

  Five years of a cushy life with more money than he knew what to do with. Five years of a life with a penthouse apartment overlooking Central Park West, a bodyguard, a personal assistant, a personal chef, a personal trainer, a personal masseuse, a personal driver. Jesus, he even had a personal dog walker who took Doofus to the park for a play when Josh wasn’t in New York. Five years of an indulgent, cushy life and Caitlin’s fiancé was in Somalia being a doctor, risking his life for those who had little access to medical care.

  Josh swallowed, his throat tight. “When is he getting back?”

  “I…don’t know.” Grief filled Caitlin’s answer.

  Josh frowned. “What do you mean?”

  It shouldn’t matter. She was engaged and therefore off-limits. But it did matter.

  For reasons he couldn’t fathom, the one kiss he’d shared with Caitlin had shaken him to his core. Had left him not just aching for more, but needing it.

  How was he to walk away from this? What did he do? Find himself a hot little groupie and bang Caitlin out of his system? Call the Chaos Room’s more-than-willing barkeeper who’d shoved her number down the front of his pants? Take Mandy up on her offer and pretend she was Caitlin?

  The repugnant thought sent a wave of distaste through him.

  Catching her bottom lip with her teeth, Caitlin studied him for a moment, the fingers of her right hand worrying the ring finger of her left. “I…” Shaking her head, she looked away. “I’m sorry I let you kiss me. I shouldn’t have let that happen.”

  “Why don’t you know when he’s coming back?” he asked, hanging onto the uncertainty in her answer like a drowning man to a life preserver.

  With a short sigh, she returned her gaze to his face. “You really need to leave, Mr. Blackthorne. Now.”

  He stood motionless. His body refused to move. He wanted to demand an answer to his question. He wanted her to explain why she had let him kiss her, why she’d kissed him back with such ferocity and passion if she was with someone else. She didn’t seem like the kind of woman who would do that, be unfaithful. Not at all. He wanted to know why she had cheated on her fiancé with him, even if it had just been a kiss. He doubted it had anything to do with him being famous. In the short time he’d known her, his fame and celebrity status had been grounds for her disdain and contempt. So why had she kissed him back? Because she wanted to tick off an item on her Bucket List?

  Because she wanted to brag about it later?

  Because she was attracted to him?

  His heart slammed faster in his tight chest at that possibility. With the way she’d responded to him, surely it wasn’t just his ego doing the thinking on that last one, was it?

  He held her stare.

  An anguished frown pulled at her eyebrows. “Please go.”

  It was the pain in her voice that made him leave. Fuck knows, he didn’t want to. He wanted to stay there with her. Not to kiss her again, but because leaving her now, when she looked so lost, so broken, tore at something in his soul.

  But she wanted him to go, so he went.

  With a slow intake of breath and a single dip of his head, he crossed the Chaos Room’s dance floor.

  He forced himself not to look back at her as he opened the door and stepped out onto the sidewalk. He forced himself not to turn around and storm back in when the door closed behind him.

  Instead, he stood on the step, rubbing his aching knee as he pulled his mobile from his back pocket and then scrolled through his contacts until he reached the name he wanted.

  Gut clenching, he hit dial.

  Pressing his phone to his ear, he counted the rings, a hot pressure growing in his chest. Anger? Confusion?

  Jealousy?

  He scowled. Could he be? Jealous of a man he’d never met? Was that possible?

  “Reynolds,” a man answered after the fourth ring.

  Josh sucked in a slow breath. “You didn’t tell me your niece is engaged.”

  “Ah fuck,” Liev Reynolds said on the other end. “Sorry, Josh. I was kinda hoping you’d—”

  “What? Make her forget she was?”

  Josh didn’t expect Caitlin’s uncle to laugh. But he did. “Well, to be honest, yeah. Listen, it’s not…I mean, their relationship… Fuck, Josh, I wish I could explain.”

  Frowning at the street in front of him and the string of early morning cars and taxis journeying along it, Josh shook his head. “Okay, back up a step. I think I’ve missed something. Is her fiancé a dick? Why do you want her to forget him?”

  “Matt was never a dick,” Liev answered. Josh didn’t miss the harried exasperation in his voice. Nor the past tense of his statement.

  “Was never?” he echoed.

  A ragged sigh came through the connection, drawn-out and frustrated. Josh had spent enough time with Chris Huntley and Liev Reynolds to know Liev wasn’t a man who frustrated easily. “What has she told you?”

  Josh let out his own sigh, dragging his hand through his hair as he did so. On the footpath, a group of late-night partiers stumbled along, throwing up their hands and cheering at him in inebriated joy as they passed. “Not much,” he said, watching them lurch and laugh their way across the street between the slow-moving traffic. Even at three-thirty in the morning, Sydney never went to sleep. “That he’s a doctor with Doctors Without Borders, that he’s in Somalia, that they didn’t think an engagement ring was important and she doesn’t seem to know when he’s coming home. That’s it. Oh, and his name is Matt.”

  Liev hmmed, the sound ominous. Contemplative.

  “Is there more to know?” Josh prodded. “There must be, given that you gave me her number, the name of her club and told me to look her up. Told me she was alone. Not to point the finger, mate, but you’re partly responsible for the situation at hand here.”

  “What situation?” The tone of Liev’s voice told Josh the man was alert. On edge. “What’s happened?”

  Josh tracked the group of rowdy carousers as they weaved their way farther along the footpath on the other side of the road. A peculiar tension made his body thrum. A knot in his gut made him shift his feet. It had nothing to do with standing on a sidewalk without his bodyguard and everything to do with the woman he’d left alone inside the club at his back. The woman he’d instantly and undeniably felt drawn to. A woman who’d done everything she could to push him away even as her lips and body had spoken to him on a level of carnal desire and pleasure unlike any he’d experienced before. “There were definite sparks,” he finally answered, mindful of the fact he was talking not just to a friend, but to Caitlin’s uncle. Liev didn’t need to know how fucking horny he’d been from the second he’d laid eyes on her. “We flirted, in a feisty kind of way. We connected. I kissed her once. And later she kissed me back. A lot.”

  “A lot? Define a lot.”
>
  “I kissed her, Liev, and she kissed me back.” His cock pulsed at the memory. He forced his voice to stay calm. Steady. “We had a connection, and then she told me she was engaged and asked me to leave. Now I think you owe me an explanation, seeing as you put me on this path.”

  And damn, he wanted to follow that path. Wanted to follow it all the way to Caitlin’s bed. But he couldn’t. Not until he knew more about the not-a-dick fiancé. Not until he understood why Caitlin seemed so tormented and tortured when she spoke of him.

  A shaky breath rasped at Josh’s ear from the other side of the world. “Okay, this is all I can tell you. Honest. I wish…” A muttered curse filled the connection and then Liev said, “Matt’s Doctors Without Borders camp was raided by Somali militants, the Al-Shabaab just under eight months ago. He hasn’t been seen since. They butchered a doctor and three nurses in the attack, destroyed the facility—which was barely more than a few tents—and took two more doctors hostage. Matt wasn’t one of them. No one knows where he is or what happened to him. Seven weeks ago, the Australian government declared him officially missing. The Federal Minister for Foreign Affairs has warned Caitlin and Matt’s family they are only a few months away from declaring him officially dead.”

  Cold pressure constricted around Josh’s temples. He stared at nothing, his mouth dry, his gut clenching. “Jesus.”

  “Don’t think He’s helping us much.”

  The dark contempt in Liev’s blunt response caused Josh’s stomach to knot more. There was anger in the man’s voice. Anger and concern and bitterness.

  Josh dragged his hand through his hair again. Over his mouth. He dropped his stare to the toes of his boots, at a loss for a word to say.

  What did he say?

  “So that’s the situation on Caitlin’s side. Sort of,” Liev uttered, a wry sadness in the word. “She can’t say goodbye because there’s no one to say goodbye to, and she can’t move on without feeling like she’s abandoned the man she once loved. A good man. We’ve told her it’s time to let go, just as we’ve told her no one will blame her for moving on, but she can’t. She’s…. It’s a complicated situation.”