by Kitty French
Abel half laughed. ‘Put your leg warmers away, green eyes. This isn’t the Kids from Fame. This is real life, and in two months this place will be mine.’
‘Over my dead body,’ she said, her eyes blazing. ‘Or preferably, over yours.’
He could tell she meant it with every fibre of her being. ‘Why don’t you just let it go, Beauty?’ he asked, surprising himself more than Genie. He’d intended his words to come out as scathing, not gentle. He saw her jaw work as she swallowed, confusion narrowing her eyes for a second as she slowly shook her head.
‘And make it easy for you to rip the heart right out of my home?’ she said, and he didn’t miss the emotion that thickened her voice. ‘Go to hell, Kingdom.’
She stalked away from him into the auditorium, leaving him feeling as if she’d somehow claimed victory in that particular battle. Not that it mattered, because dance troupe or no dance troupe, she didn’t stand a chance of winning the war.
Genie glanced up at the clock later that afternoon. It was a little before four, a few hours until she was due on stage for her second time as the Genie of the Lamp. Performance days always set her nerves into a pleasurable jangle, a heady anticipation that made her pulse quicken and her heart bang. She loved being out there on stage, more brave and powerful and unafraid than she was day to day. Right now, she needed those feelings more than ever, because none of those adjectives seemed to apply to her regular life.
Knowing that her Uncle Davey wasn’t just across the hall any more felt as if someone had ripped away her comfort blanket, and knowing that Abel Kingdom was there instead felt as if someone had rigged her safe sanctuary with a grid of trip wires. The man confused the hell out of her, and the fact that he was outlandishly beautiful made it far harder not to fall into his traps. How could it be that her head hated him and her body wanted him?
He’d called her Beauty again earlier, and it had sounded even more intimate in the midst of their disagreement. Almost as if he hadn’t intended to say it at all. She’d been tempted to call him on it, yet she hadn’t, because somewhere deep inside she thrilled to it. Calling him on it might mean he didn’t say it again.
Was she so easily seduced? She wouldn’t have said so before the arrival of her antipodean neighbour. How the hell was she supposed to sleep tonight knowing that he was sleeping under the same roof?
Shaking her head, she headed for her bedroom, shedding her clothes as she went. Ritual formed a big part of performance day, and Genie’s particular ritual involved an afternoon rest to steady her mind before showering and heading down to her dressing room to begin preparations. She kept the two parts of her life consciously separate: downstairs she was Genie the showgirl with her stage make-up and rhinestone-encrusted costumes, while upstairs she kept her civvy clothes and private belongings.
She’d decorated her apartment with thrift shop bargains and vintage furniture from flea markets, serene and feminine in a neutral palette of ivories and greys with nude pink and palest lavender accessories. The bleached-out floorboards and tall windows lent the space the ambience of a New York loft, while the large, ivory and glass chandelier added a dash of opulent glamour. Genie adored the whole place, from her big brass bed to the overstuffed couches with their velvet cushions. It was a distinctly female lair, and a direct and purposefully peaceful contrast to the bright feathers and sparkling sequins of her on-stage persona.
Naked, she lay down on the bed, sighing with pleasure as the plump, dull silver silk eiderdown gathered her in. Being positioned at the top of the building made for warmth in the winter, and stifling heat in the summer. Right now it was just about perfect, the late May sunlight shafting in through the high windows and warming Genie’s skin and the room around her. She closed her eyes and breathed in deeply through her nose. In. And out. In, and out. Concentrating her thoughts on her breathing, she let her limbs go heavy on the bed and relaxed for what felt like the first time since she’d laid eyes on Abel Kingdom on Sunday evening. She was warm, and oh so comfortable, and pleasurably drifting towards sleep.
And that was when the music started. Loud, thumping music coming from across the hall. Her uncle had always been a considerate neighbour; it seemed that Abel wasn’t similarly inclined. She snapped her eyes open and sat up. Did he realise she was up here too? Was he goading her? If he was, it was working.
She swung her feet down and grabbed her robe from the hook on the back of the door. As she tied the sash belt, the dove grey silk of her robe - an opulent and much loved birthday gift from her uncle - swished pleasurably around her ankles. Tracking barefoot across the hallway, she rapped her knuckles against the door.
He didn’t hear her, probably because his music was so damn loud, so she banged again, only harder.
He swung the door wide a couple of seconds later. His eyes swept down her robe to her pink painted toes and then back up to her face as he lounged against the doorframe with his arms folded over his chest.
‘Come to invite me to a pyjama party?’ His tone was insolently mocking.
How did he have the knack for making her instantly furious? Genie swallowed down the words she’d really have liked to say and tried to arrange her face into a polite smile.
‘Could you please turn down your music? I’m trying to sleep in there.’ She jerked her head towards her own door.
‘Sorry,’ he frowned, clearly intent on winding her up. ‘I can’t hear you. Music’s too loud.’ She watched him head back into the apartment to turn the volume down, wishing she had something to throw at him and trying not to notice the way his faded jeans sat on his hips or the hard-muscled outline of his shoulders through his tee shirt.
‘Is this what you do in the afternoons around here?’ he said when he returned a few seconds later.
She arched her eyebrows at him. ‘Meaning?’
‘You, prancing around in your nightie and harping on about my music. Is this gonna happen every afternoon?’
‘I just need a little bit of quiet on performance days. That’s all.’
‘You’re performing tonight?’ Genie saw the flare in his eyes that he didn’t hide quickly enough.
‘Yes.’
‘With the lamp?’
What was this? ‘Yes. Why? Want a front row seat?’
He pushed a hand through his dark hair and laughed softly at her, and Genie’s treacherous gaze flickered to the band of tanned skin exposed beneath the hem of his shirt.
‘No thanks. Seen one stripper, you’ve seen ’em all.’
‘I’m not a stripper. And while we’re on the subject, I’m not a prostitute either.’
‘You justify it to yourself however you like, darlin’. Whatever helps you sleep at night.’
‘I’m not justifying myself, to you or anyone else. I’m damn proud of what I do,’ she retorted furiously.
He nodded. ‘Figures. Go get your beauty sleep, then.’
The look on his face told her that she was wasting her breath arguing the point with him any more at that moment. She’d got what she wanted; he’d turned the music down.
‘Thank you,’ she muttered, her eyes flashing as she turned away. As she pushed her own door open, he spoke again, very quietly.
‘You work what your mamma gave you while you still can, Beauty, because one day you’ll be old and no one will want to watch you take your clothes off any more. You ever wondered what happens to strippers when they’re past their sell by date?’
She turned back angrily, and the look on his face chilled her bones.
‘Just what the hell is your problem, Abel?’
He shrugged and held his hands wide. ‘No problems here.’
‘Liar. You hate what I do. Tell me why.’
He shook his head, his face shutting down her enquiry, changing tack smoothly. ‘About that pyjama party…’ His eyes moved over her body. ‘I don’t own any.’
That game again. Chicken.
‘Good. Me neither,’ she said. ‘I sleep naked.’
‘Thin
k about me while you’re lying there, baby,’ he murmured silkily with the ghost of a wink.
‘I need sleep, not nightmares,’ she shot back, then slammed her door before he had a chance to say anything more or notice how her nipples had stiffened beneath the thin silk of her robe.
Abel closed his door and leaned his head back against it. Genie fucking Divine. The girl was killing him with her bravado and her naked afternoon naps. She hadn’t closed her door anywhere near fast enough for him not to see her nipples standing proud against her robe. Were they still stiff now? Had she taken that robe off to lie down naked on her bed again? He’d seen neither her bedroom nor her naked body, but his imagination had no trouble filling in the gaps. White cotton sheets… Red hair flung out over her pillows… Rose pink, puckered nipples just begging to be sucked…
Fuck. He needed a cold shower.
Genie leaned against her closed door, her hand on her throat as her heart hammered. Abel fucking Kingdom. The man was killing her with his blinkered views and smart mouth. Christ, he had an amazing mouth. Lush, full and sexy. She hated the words that came out of it, yet still she couldn’t stop herself from imagining it all over her body. What was he doing over there right this minute? She walked slowly back through her apartment, shedding her robe once more and settling on her bed in the quiet, sun-warmed room.
Closing her eyes, she tried to concentrate on her breathing again, to recapture her earlier peace. Breathe in. Breathe out. In. Out.
The movement of her rib cage lifted her breasts and her fingers settled lightly over them, testing their soft fullness in her palms with a sigh. Her nipples ached, still stiff for the dark-eyed man across the hall. How would his mouth feel on them? Her fingers tightened on her nipples at the thought, and she arched instinctively into his imaginary hold. Would he cup her breasts in his big tanned hands while he kissed them? Would he lick her nipples slowly, or suck them hard into the heat of his mouth? Genie couldn’t suppress a moan, her hands full of her own flesh, her head full of images of Abel’s dark head bent over her. He was shirtless, and she could see his mouth closing over her nipple as he knelt between her thighs on the bed…
Abel stepped under the shower, glad that Davey Divine had expensive tastes in plumbing. The powerful jet of water sluiced over his head, and he turned his face up into the fierce spray as the water soaked down his body. Genie lingered behind his closed eyes, her body still naked against her sheets, her nipples still stiff and waiting for his attention. She’d be soft, and warm, and she’d exude that same clean, irresistible scent that she’d tasted of in the lift the other night. His cock stiffened at the memory, and his hand moved involuntarily down the wetness of his torso to wrap around his erection. Fuck, he’d been two minutes away from screwing her.
Was she sleeping now? He imagined her cheeks flushed, her body bared and spread on the bed. Would she hear him if he opened her door now and went to her? Would she wake if he stood beside her bed and watched her sleep? His hand slid along the solid length of his cock as he conjured the length of her nude body in his head. The fullness of her tits, begging to be sucked. The subtle outline of her ribcage, the slopes and curves of her stomach, the feminine swell of her hips. He leaned back against the tiles in the shower enclosure with a low moan. Would her legs be closed, or splayed? Splayed. In Abel’s mind at least, they were, one knee bent out on the sheets to let him see between them, inviting him closer…
Genie’s hands moved over her body, imagining Abel’s doing the same. His mouth, hot and open on her neck. The hard weight of his body over hers. She opened her legs as her hand moved between them, remembering how amazing he’d been in the lift the other night. The way his fingers had opened her, explored her… Her own fingers moved into the slickness, wet for him now as she’d been wet for him then. Jesus, he’d been good. He’d had the measure of her in seconds, fast and filthy one moment, slow and seductive the next. Genie pushed her shoulders back into the mattress as she spread her legs wider and touched herself, her breath coming in short gasps as her fingers worked. He’d used his thumb, flat like this… he’d slid his fingers inside her, like that… Genie lifted her hips into her hand, greedy for the beginnings of her orgasm as it sizzled in her veins. She needed him now, here, she wanted him naked between her thighs, filling her right there… she crooked her fingers inside her body, groaning, massaging herself as he had, her other hand working her clit… oh God… Abel… so good, so much… Genie gasped, her forehead damp and her teeth clenched, right on the delicious edge… make me come, Abel… please make me come…
Abel moaned, pumping his hand over his shaft harder at the thought of Genie’s splayed legs. Fuck, he wanted to bury his head between them, to lick her inner thighs, to open her folds wide with his fingers until he could see her clit begging for him to lower his mouth over it… he could feel the swell of it against his tongue, feel her fingers gripping his hair when he licked her. Christ, he was so hard it was painful. He rubbed himself faster, the water drumming his face as he tipped his head back to rest against the tiles. He could almost hear her moaning his name, feel her like hot silk in his hands as he pushed her knees wider apart, the friction, the delicious tightness of fucking into her body as she bucked under him. A ragged gasp. Genie. Her nails raking down his back. Fuck… fuck… oh fucking hell yes. Abel’s knees almost buckled as his hips jerked, the sensation too fierce to hold it back any more. His orgasm slammed him back against the wall as he came in hot, hard bursts over the clenched muscles of his stomach, one arm flung over his eyes, his bottom lip caught between his teeth so tightly it hurt.
Genie clamped her thighs around her hands, gasping to breathe through the pleasurable intensity of the second best orgasm of her life. Christ, she was shaking. Afterwards, as her heart banged in her chest, she pulled the softness of her eiderdown over her body and closed her eyes, not even trying to make sense of what was happening to her when it came to the off-the-scale hot Australian across the hallway.
Abel washed his body clean as the lust ebbed, cursing Genie for making him want her, and cursing himself for thinking that coming back to England had ever been a good idea.
Chapter Eight
Trying to concentrate on work with a full scale theatre production going on two floors below proved too much of a challenge for Abel a few hours later. Davey Divine was on stage down there, warming up the crowd for Genie, their laughter almost shaking the rafters that Abel’s apartment rested amongst. He rooted through Divine’s cupboards, on the hunt for headphones to attempt to drown out the noise, and returned to the table with a bottle of Jack Daniels and a tumbler to drown his sorrows instead. At least the man had decent taste in liquor, Abel reflected sourly as he poured a drinker’s measure into the bottom of the glass.
He closed his laptop. The noise levels made work nigh on impossible, and the knowledge that Genie was due on stage soon had him restless. There were a million and one careers she could have chosen to pursue. Why did she have to choose this one? Why would any woman choose to take her clothes off for money when she had other options? He knocked back half of the whisky, closing his eyes as the hit of heat and spice warmed his throat.
What kind of guys did she think sat out there watching her? Decent men? Potential dates? Because Abel knew better. He knew better, because he’d grown up around this scene, or else a grubbier, less glittery version of it. A child in a very grown up world, he’d seen things no child should ever have to see and he’d heard things no child should ever have to hear. Genie was wrong to defend the world she chose to live in. It attracted low lifes and no-hopers, and her inability to see that told him all he needed to know about her.
The slide of trumpets ratcheted up and thunderous applause told Abel that showtime had arrived for the star turn downstairs. He slugged back the rest of the whisky and refilled his glass, cradling it in his hands as the sultry music drifted around his ears. Closing his eyes, he could almost see her down there now, her body appearing out of that glittering lamp for them all t
o feast their eyes on.
Scraping his chair back, he paced the floor. He should leave, get out of the building until the show was over. He made for the door, not even registering that the whisky was still in his hands until he reached the bottom of the stairs and opened the door that led directly into the side of the stalls. There was no need for him even to look at the stage. He could make his way around the back of the auditorium and out into the street to suck down clean night air. It was what he told himself, even though he wasn’t ever destined to get further than the doorway at the bottom of the stairs. It was a perfect vantage point from which to view the stage, and he was a lost cause as soon as he set eyes on Genie up there on the stage.
Leaning his shoulder against the doorframe, he folded his arms over his chest and rested his head on the wood with a sigh that sat somewhere between frustration and longing. She was utterly fucking stunning. Still in the early stages of her act, peeling off her long gloves, throwing glances over her shoulder at the crowd, the sweet curves of her ass turning on every man in the place.
This wasn’t the spunky girl he’d argued with earlier. This wasn’t the sensual woman he’d fantasised about in the shower, either. This was Genie the consummate showgirl, a woman of the world with a killer body and no morals.
Which was real? How could the same woman have so many faces? And how could they all be beautiful in their own way? She beguiled him even though he didn’t want her to, she made him want to be the guy who screwed her when she came off that stage tonight. Her fingers moved to unlace her corset and he wanted to do it for her, to strip her for his private pleasure rather than see her offer herself to this paying, excited crowd. His eyes moved over the shadowed faces watching her, all of them willing her to take everything off for their titillation. Men. Women. Turned on, every last one of them.
