“Do you have protection?” Matt rasped.
“I’m on the Pill. We’re safe. I promise. No mistakes.” Rachel hastened to reassure him, squirming against his hand again.
“You’re wearing garters.” His voice thickened as he skimmed his hands across her hips and down her upper thighs.
“Yes,” she whispered in reply, reaching for him with her hands, guiding his straining erection to the heated core of her.
“I want to see you.”
Rachel bit back a moan of protest at his hesitation but took heart in the fact that in the glow of the soft light provided by the bedside lamp there could be no question of who he made love to. There would be no ghosts in this bed with them tonight.
“Beautiful.” Matt’s voice was strained and his hands shook as he reached for her again.
He wrapped her stocking-clad legs about his hips and positioned himself at her entrance, nudging her sensitive, slick flesh.
“Now, Matt. Please, now,” she implored him.
Matt buried himself inside her with a groan, unable to resist any longer. There were no more excuses, no more regrets. Only sensation, feeling, need. Excruciating need that accelerated as she opened her body to him, welcomed him into her fiery inner heat. He strained to hold himself back, to prolong the acute pleasure of skin-to-skin contact, but instinct took over at its basest level and he surged against her, faster and deeper with each stroke. Beneath him he felt her body begin to tremble, felt her inner muscles tighten and spasm around him, drawing his climax from him in a rush of pleasure so intense and yet so harsh at the same time that he collapsed into her welcoming arms as the shudders of release racked through his body with the force of an earthquake.
Dimly he became aware of her fingers stroking gentle, lazy circles across the backs of his shoulders, down his back and to his buttocks before trailing their path back up to his shoulders again. He shifted against her and felt the answering clench of her body.
“Don’t leave me yet,” she said softly against his ear. “Please, not yet.”
“I’m not leaving you, just making you more comfortable.”
He shifted them both on the sheets, rolling slightly to one side and hitching her outer leg over his thigh, remaining joined as intimately as a man and woman can be joined.
“Are you okay?” he asked, almost afraid to look into her hazel eyes in case he saw recrimination there. He’d never taken a woman so frenetically before in his life, but suddenly all the holding back had crashed through like a floodgate being opened. And he still wanted her; although this time he would take his time.
Rachel smiled. It started with her eyes, then slowly her lips curved in a sensuous curve of satisfaction.
“Yeah, you?”
In answer Matt flexed his hips against her. An unfamiliar teasing smile pulled at his lips as he watched Rachel’s eyes flare open in surprise, her pupils enlarging in response.
“So soon?” she asked. Her voice caught on a hitch in her breath and warm colour flooded her cheeks.
In answer he lowered his head and captured her lips, drinking of her generosity as he plundered the soft recesses of her mouth. He lifted himself from her body for only long enough to help her out of her robe, then he lay down on the bed, pulling her over him, tracing his hands over the soft mounds of her breasts as they remained restrained by the soft black lace of her bra. He could see the darkened points of her nipples semi-exposed at the tops of the delicate fabric.
Under his gaze Rachel reached behind her and unclasped her bra, letting the restraints fall from her and expose the lush globes of her breasts to his stare. She wriggled her arms free of the straps. As she met his gaze with heavy-lidded eyes, she ran her hands up over her rib cage and up farther to cup her breasts, rolling her nipples between thumb and forefinger, as if offering them in supplication for his pleasure. Matt’s hands coasted to her waist, holding her as he lifted himself up to take first one, then the other proffered nipple, in his mouth, giving each hardened bud a tiny bite after suckling it.
Rachel was a vocal lover and her moans and cries of pleasure drove his desire for her to new heights. How far they had come from that long-ago night when he’d taken her in the back seat of his car with no more finesse than a randy buck. Five years her senior, he should have known better, should never have given in to the torment and temptation she’d so blatantly offered him during the last dance. But take her he had, and then shattered her like a fragile creature when he’d spurned her afterwards.
This time there’d be no misunderstandings. This time was only for the here and now, as she’d said, and he’d make damn sure it would supplant her earlier memories. They were both adults now, he rationalized. Adults with a magnetism between them that needed to be addressed and resolved—and resolved it would be by morning. But in the meantime, they had the night.
Rachel sensed the change in him as he played with her breasts, laving attention on each one alternately and driving her to the brink of desperation. It was as if he’d reached a point of acceptance, where he no longer had to fight whatever it was that pulled them together yet kept them apart.
She tunnelled her fingers through his hair, holding his head to her, pressing her flesh deeper into his mouth, relishing the tiny jolts of electrified pleasure that spiralled through her body as he bit gently on her sensitised skin. When he dropped back against the pillows, she arched her back and rocked her hips slowly, undulating them with a promise of greater pleasure still to come to him.
She reached down and took him in her hand. His skin was velvet heat as she slid her hand along his length to the tip, trailing over his sensitive head with a featherlight touch—allowing him close to her entrance, yet still denying entry—before sliding her hand back down again. His grey eyes grew dark, almost black, as she repeated the movement. She expected at any moment that he’d take control, but he seemed content to allow her to take her time, to relish the sensations she felt quiver through him as she maintained her slow, steady pace.
Suddenly she could take it no longer, the pleasure of prolonging the inevitable surpassed by her need to feel him inside her, to feel his possession of her body, the connection she’d never stopped craving from him since the first time they’d made love. She lifted her hips and positioned him at her entrance, a tiny groan of hunger escaping her throat as she felt him nudge her with a tiny flex.
With a slowness that almost was her complete undoing she lowered herself onto his rigid length, relishing the stretch and pull of her muscles as she took him deeper and deeper still, until she felt him press against the entrance to her womb. A shudder ran through her and she waited for it to dissipate before clenching tightly with her inner muscles, drawing him up and inwards before slowly letting him go again. She rocked her hips ever so gently, and squeezed again, repeating the action over and over until she saw a hot flush of colour spread across Matt’s chest and felt his fingers clench at her waist.
She’d bear his marks with pride tomorrow. It would be all she’d have left. She knew without doubt this was their swan song. He wasn’t a man who let go easily of what he wanted, and he’d made it clear that he only wanted her for tonight. If she had it in her, she’d make sure he was left with the memory of powerful lovemaking that he’d never forget, never find anything to compare it to.
Her own climax was building as she felt Matt swell inside her. She tilted her hips forward, so she could press harder onto his pubic bone and find the relief she knew lay in store for the tightly bound bundle of nerve endings at her core. And then she felt him shatter beneath her, his hips heaving upwards in an uncontrolled surge, driving her to orgasm in a splintering mass of colour, light and sensation. Deep inside she felt the heat and force of his climax as he pumped inside her, over and over until he was completely spent.
She fell down against his chest, hearing his heart hammer against hers in the same crazy tattoo. Never before had she attained such heights of pleasure with any man. She fought to hold back the burning tears t
hat prickled behind her eyelids as she tried to accept that she had to walk away after tomorrow. Say goodbye to the man she loved beyond reason, to the hope that they could have made a new future, a new family together.
She swallowed against the sob building in her throat and buried her face instead in the strength of Matt’s heaving chest. She’d get through this, somehow.
Twelve
Rachel slid slowly from the bed, determined not to disturb Matt. After their second time together they’d taken a long, lingering shower, making love in the steamy confines of the shower stall before tumbling back into the bed to sleep. How much later, Rachel wasn’t sure, but he’d reached for her twice more in the night, each time subtly more intense than the last, until he’d fallen into a deep sleep.
She’d lain there for the past hour, watching him, unwilling to bring this episode to a close. Eventually reason had won out over emotion. She picked up her discarded underwear from the floor and scooped up her robe before quietly letting herself out of his room, softly closing the door and going to her own room.
There were matters she needed to attend to today. Matters that couldn’t wait a moment longer. She took a brief shower before dressing quickly in her usual trousers and long-sleeved T. Their private flight home was scheduled for later in the afternoon but if she could manage it she’d be on the first available commercial flight out of Sydney. She knew she had a responsibility to Matt for Blake’s care but she had no doubt that Kimberley Perrini would step into the breach and help for the short time before Matt’s expected return to New Zealand.
While Rachel accepted she couldn’t change Matt back to the kind of man he’d been before, maybe she could help him achieve his goal. It tore her heart apart to know that she could help him in this regard, but that by doing so would drive him away from her forever. She couldn’t, wouldn’t, love the man he’d become if he accepted what she was about to offer him before she left and returned to New Zealand.
She reached deep into the inside flap of her suitcase lid and drew out the envelope her share broker had forwarded her before their departure for Sydney the day before yesterday. With shaking fingers she drew out the single sheet of paper and skimmed its contents.
The share transfer form was simple enough. It was hard to believe that with nothing but her signature, and Matt’s, he’d finally have what he wanted most—control of Blackstone Diamonds.
Briefly she wondered whether he’d have looked upon their relationship any differently if he’d known she held his trump card all along. She grabbed up the hotel pen from the table in her room and quickly signed the Transferor section of the form before she could change her mind. This was what he really wanted above all else. Not her. Not ever.
A quick phone call to the airlines confirmed she could be on a flight as early as lunchtime, a good three hours prior to the private flight. As quickly as she could she jammed her things into her suitcase. She hesitated a moment as she grabbed up the underwear and stockings she’d worn yesterday, then stuffed them into the rubbish bin in her room. She could never wear that set again anyway. It was time to let everything from the past go.
A betraying click of her door heralded Matt’s entrance.
“What the hell do you think you’re doing?” he demanded.
Despite their torrid night he looked none the worse for wear. In fact, if the truth be told, he looked even better than before. The careworn lines about his eyes had gone; the deepening grooves that had furrowed his brow were softer now.
“I’m packing. I’ve arranged to go home on an earlier flight. I’m sorry that this leaves you in the lurch with Blake but I’m sure Kim will help you. It’s only for a few hours. I can’t stay any longer.” The words gushed from her lips like river water rushing over stones.
“Is this some bid to make me beg you to stay? Because it won’t work. I made it clear to you last night was one night only.”
Rachel zipped up her case and lifted it off her bed and to the floor before facing him.
“Matt, I’m perfectly aware of the conditions of our…our…” She searched for the right word but for the life of her couldn’t think of anything. She waved her hand in the air between them. “Whatever. You made that patently clear to me, and if you think I regret for even one minute what we shared last night you’re completely wrong. I loved every second of what we did together.
“That’s the difference between us, Matt. I couldn’t have made love with you last night that way if I didn’t already love you so much it’s killing me inside to be with you. I’ve always wanted you. I know you said it was just a teenage crush that first time, that girls often say they love their first. But with me it was always more than that. I’ve loved you for as long as I can remember and that will never stop, never go away. Why do you think I stayed away from New Zealand for so long? Why do you think I always timed my visits to Mum when you’d barely be around?”
“And you expect me to feel the same way? To declare my undying love for you because we had a night of great sex?” His voice was as hard as hailstones flung against glass.
“No, not at all. I know you’re completely incapable of loving another woman again. There’s only one thing that matters to you more than Blake, and even then I question which has priority in your mind anymore.” She snatched up the envelope she’d folded the share transfer form into and shoved it at him. “Here. I don’t want these anymore. Do what you want with them. I just hope you can live with yourself afterwards.”
Rachel grabbed the handle of her suitcase and wheeled it to the door. She turned back to Matt. “You’re not the man I fell in love with anymore. There’s a monster inside you now. One hell-bent on destroying your own family—and whatever you think, Matt, the Blackstones are your family, too.”
Matt watched in rigid, angry silence as she left the room, and listened as she opened the front door. The sounds of Blake and Kim at the door galvanised him into action. He shoved the envelope in his pocket and went through to the main living room.
Rachel was in the doorway, reaching down to give Blake a big hug. She lifted him into her arms and smothered him with teasing kisses, then put him back down again.
“So you’re heading back to Auckland now?” he heard Kim ask.
“Yes, I have a chance to make a connecting flight to London via Los Angeles tomorrow night and there’s a bit I need to clear up before then. I’d better get going. The concierge has arranged a taxi for me.”
Matt’s blood ran cold in his veins. She’d planned that far ahead? She was returning to the UK? Even from where Matt stood he could see the glimmer of tears in her eyes as she said goodbye to Blake and Kim. It struck at something deep inside him. She really was going through with it. It wasn’t some grandstanding trick to get him to say he loved her. She was leaving. For good this time.
He swallowed against the bitter taste in his mouth. He could stop her, prevent her from leaving. All it would take was three little words. Words he’d promised himself he’d never share with another woman again. Before he had a chance to second-guess himself the door was closed.
Kim covered the short distance to where he stood.
“What have you done this time, Matt? Can’t you see she loves you?” Kim asked, a worried frown creasing her forehead.
Matt snapped his gaze from the closed door and met Kim’s concerned look. “How did last night go with Blake? Everything okay?”
“I take it you don’t want to talk about it?”
Matt remained silent.
Kim’s short laugh lacked any humour. “Fine. Yes, everything went fine last night. Blake’s an angel, aren’t you, honey?” She reached down to ruffle the child’s dark hair and watched as Blake reached up for his father.
“Up, Daddy, up!” he demanded.
“Hey there, tiger. Did you have fun with Aunty Kim last night?”
Matt let his son’s prattle wash over him as Blake enumerated his activities since he’d left the hotel suite the day before. It felt good to have his so
n back with him again. Right. Although it would be years before Blake made his own way in the world, Matt suddenly wanted to slow down time so he could linger over every moment with his boy. It hit him anew how aloof he’d been with Blake since Marise’s death, how much he’d risked by removing himself both emotionally and physically from Blake. Sure, he’d convinced himself that he’d seen to Blake’s immediate needs and requirements. What parent didn’t? And in choosing Rachel to care for him over the past six months he’d ensured Blake would continue to receive the love and attention he’d deserved.
But nothing beat a parent’s love for a child. Nothing else was quite the same. Rachel had at least made him see the light in that regard. She’d pushed him and pushed him until the scales had fallen from his eyes. Made him find out the truth. His pride would never have let him do so if she hadn’t been so determined.
Blake started to squirm in Matt’s arms, ready now to be put down. As he scampered down to his room Kim spoke again.
“You know, Matt, you never used to be this closed, this angry. I was hoping now that the business with Marise and Howard has been resolved and you have all the Blackstone Rose diamonds back together again, we could begin to take down the wall that stands between us. I miss you, Matt. I miss our friendship. Are you ready to forgive me yet for leaving you like I did in January?”
Matt thought about how holding Blake in his arms had felt. How the bond between parent and child had formed and strengthened over the years. How he’d almost destroyed it before Rachel’s intervention. Suddenly he understood fully the inexorable pull that had taken Kim from his side and back into the folds of her family when Howard’s plane had been reported missing.
Her estrangement from her father had been hard on her. Howard had been a difficult man to love but there was no questioning his power over his family, or his intense pride in his children.
Jealousy & a Jewelled Proposition Page 12
