My New Year Fling: A Sexy Christmas Billionaire Romance (Love Comes Later Book 2)

by Serenity Woods

  But with some surprise, I realize that the intense hurt that had made me feel as if Alastair had reached into my chest and squeezed my heart has vanished. Maybe it’s sleeping with another man, or maybe it’s just that last night I finally accepted it was over, but I feel as if I’ve crossed a bridge that’s crumbled behind me, and now I’m on a new path. I’m old enough and wise enough to know it’s not going to be paved with gold, but different is good, at the moment. I may be jobless, and there’s not exactly a flourishing job market out there, but I’ll find a way of making a living—I always do.

  “I’m hungry,” I say. “Shall we rustle up something to eat?”

  He hesitates as if he’s about to say something, then just says, “Sure.”

  We rise, and Rich pulls on a pair of boxers and hands me one of his T-shirts. I tug it on shyly, smiling at the way it falls to my thighs, the sleeves to my elbows.

  We check out his kitchen and take out a large tin of hearty vegetable soup. I run over to my bach and bring back some cooked chicken and the last of the sticks of bread, and Rich cuts it up and butters it as I heat up the soup with the chicken. When it’s ready, I pour it into two bowls, and we take them into the living room and sit on the sofa looking out of the open door while we eat.

  The sky to the east is already dark, a beautiful deep maroon threaded with dark blue. “It makes me want to pick up my paints,” I tell Rich, pointing at the horizon.

  He dips his bread in his soup and then eats it. “Maybe what’s happened to you over the past few months is a sign that you should try to make a living from it.”

  “I don’t believe in signs.”

  “Yes, you do.”

  “All right, I do,” I concede. “But even I know that it’s hard to make it as an artist unless you’re really good.”

  “It’s about finding your USP. Your unique selling point,” he clarifies at my blank look. “You’re right in that there are a million people out there who paint pictures and try to sell them. But your synesthesia makes you special. I’d be interested to see paintings reflecting your condition. You could build up a portfolio and take it into a gallery to see if they’ll do an exhibition of your work. Or use the designs to make interesting bowls out of clay and sell them at the local farmers’ market.”

  I stare at him, my jaw dropping. “I couldn’t do that!”

  “Why not?”

  “I wouldn’t know where to start. I don’t know anything about running a business.”

  “It’s not that hard,” he says, reminding me that he runs some sort of game design company with his friends. “You start small and build up.”

  “I’d never make enough money to live on.”

  “Maybe not at first. But if you wanted to try, you could take a part-time job to give you security. Work in a cafe in the mornings, paint in the afternoons.” He shrugs and stirs his soup with his spoon. “I’d could talk you through some bits and pieces, give you some help.”

  I stare at him. I’ve done nothing for this man apart from give him five minutes of physical pleasure, and he’s offering to help make my dream come true. I can’t believe it. I love my creative work, and the thought of making a living selling my art makes me feel as if the sun has come out. I’ve never considered it before because I really don’t know where to start, and it’s so difficult when you’re alone to believe in yourself.

  Or maybe it’s just difficult for me. Maria helped me climb out of the pit of darkness I’d sunk into, where I was certain I wasn’t worth anything—that I was a lost cause. She convinced me that I had potential, and that Fate hadn’t marked me as doomed, but that my present situation was just one of the many stations out of which an infinite number of trains would be leaving bound for various destinations, and it was up to me which one I jumped on. But even she hasn’t been able to make me believe I could do something like this.

  Rich is smiling now, and he reaches out and tucks a strand of hair behind my ear. “What?”

  I shake my head. “You’re very sweet.” My voice is husky with emotion.

  “I think you could achieve anything you put your mind to. You have an amazing inner strength, Jess, it just radiates out of you. Yeah, you’ve had a few unfortunate things happen, but you’ve pulled through, and you should be proud of yourself.” He returns to his soup. “How long are you staying here, by the way?”

  “Probably a day or two into New Year. You?”

  “Yeah, I thought I’d drive back the day after New Year’s Day.”

  That means we have six days here together. My heart swells. I’m not going to assume that he’ll want to spend all that time—hell, any time—with me, but he’s looking at me now with warmth in his eyes, and suddenly, shockingly, excitingly, I know that this… whatever it is—one-night stand? fling? affair?—is far from over.

  Chapter Eleven

  Rich

  “Is there anything you’d like to do this evening?”

  It’s mid-afternoon on my birthday, the twenty-seventh, and Jess and I are floating in the ocean as if we haven’t a care in the world. I glance over at her to see her looking up at the gannets preparing to dive into the sea for fish.

  “I don’t know,” I admit. “I don’t normally celebrate my birthday. Or not for the past few years anyway. It’s a treat just to wake up without a screaming hangover.”

  She laughs. “I’m glad I’ve been able to do that for you, if nothing else.”

  I smile. She has no idea how she’s saved me from myself. I have trouble explaining it to her because I can’t put it into words. She would argue that all she’s done is provide me with a diversion, some hot sex to distract me from my musings. She’ll never understand that she’s been so much more than that. And yet, I can’t think what, exactly. She’s not come out with some amazing epithet that’s banished all my grief in one fell swoop. She’s not a social worker or a psychologist; she’s not done anything except provide quiet company and a warm body I can hold against me as the sun sets. But that was exactly what I needed, and although she would argue that any girl who’d occupied the bach next to mine might have done the same, I’m a smart enough guy to realize how special she is.

  “I know,” I say as an idea comes to me. “Why don’t we go out for dinner?”

  She tips upright, treading water, and her eyes widen. “What, like a date?”

  I shrug. “If you like.” She blinks at me, and I feel a twinge of doubt. “Or not,” I add. “Nothing heavy, Jess. Just dinner.”

  “Okay.” She twists onto her front. “Let’s swim down the beach a bit.”

  I follow her, wondering why she’d looked so alarmed. As much as I like her, I know there’s no chance of this going anywhere. Is she worried I’m going to want more than she’s willing to give?

  I ponder on that while we swim parallel to the beach, then turn and make our way back. I suppose it must be to do with Alastair. He must have really hurt her, and it’s made her even more cautious than she would usually be.

  “Was there anyone special before Alastair?” I ask her, parting the cool water with my hands and kicking forward.

  She thinks about it. “There’ve been guys over the years. Some lasted longer than others. Some I guess I thought I loved, and then afterward I thought maybe I didn’t.”

  “Did you love Alastair?”

  “I don’t know. I suppose. I was starry-eyed with happiness until I found out he was married. Now, though, I think back and remember how I felt whenever he made excuses for not seeing me, and it makes me wonder whether love is a spell we cast on ourselves that’s so blinding we can’t see all the problems. Do you think there’s such a thing as a perfect relationship?”

  “Not in my experience. Teddi has told me that love’s going to come later for me, but I can’t see it.” I clench my jaw hard.

  She swims a few strokes. “What’s Teddi like?”

  I don’t want to talk about Teddi to Jess, but I don’t want to be rude either. “She’s lovely. Small, dark, warm-hearted, in spi
te of her disability. She’s had it tough.”

  Jess looks across at me, and suddenly I’m certain she can see right through me, and that she knows what I’m feeling, and how much it hurts.

  But all she says is, “There’s someone special out there for you, and you’ll find her.”

  I turn onto my side and look at her as we swim. “You sound certain.”

  “I am. You’re far too lovely not to have your Mrs. Right search you out and hang on your every word.” She smiles.

  Her words warm me through, but I hesitate to say anything because of the look that had appeared on her face earlier when I’d suggested going out for dinner.

  I’ve never been the type of guy to bury his head in the sand—that’s Stratton’s domain—so I stop swimming and wait for Jess to face me.

  “We don’t have to go out tonight,” I clarify.

  Her expression turns cautious. “Right.”

  “Jess, I’m trying to say that I don’t want you to be worried that I’m expecting more of you than you’re willing to give. If you want to stop this now and go back to our baches and leave it at that, I’ll be disappointed, but I won’t push you for more.”

  “I’m not worried,” she says.

  “Oh.”

  “I like you,” she adds.

  “Oh.” I’m beginning to think I’ve got it wrong. Maybe when I said that we didn’t have to call it a date, she thought I was back-tracking.

  “We’ve done things a bit backward, haven’t we?” she says frankly. “It would have been nice to have met ten years ago, dated properly, progressed to bed, and then gone on to have a future. But I’ve not done anything in the right order so far, so I suppose it’s not surprising this has happened arse-about-face.”

  I want to tell her that she’ll find her Mr. Right and her happy-ever-after, but I can’t because I’m not certain of either of those things. Life hasn’t been a romantic movie for either of us, and I’m sure she won’t believe platitudes any more than I will.

  She turns onto her front. “Come on. I want a shower before we go out.”

  I might not be ready to tell her everything’s going to be all right, but I don’t want her to think that I’m not interested in seeing her while we’re at the beach, because I am. I don’t want to let her go, not yet.

  “I wouldn’t mind a shower either,” I tell her as nonchalantly as I can.

  She glances at me. I raise my eyebrows. She laughs, her eyes lighting up. “Come on, then.”

  We swim back to shore with more enthusiasm now, splashing each other in the shallows, then stumble up the sand to stand breathless between the baches.

  “Your place or mine?” she asks, and giggles.

  My shower is tiny, so I say, “Yours,” take her hand, and drag her across to her bach.

  Unfortunately—or fortunately, depending on how you look at it—it turns out that her shower cubicle is even smaller than mine, and we have to squash up close to be able to get the door shut. It transpires that it’s not a disadvantage. I press Jess up against the tiles as the hot water runs over us, and she’s so soft and slippery in my arms that it’s literally seconds before I have a hard-on.

  “Slow down,” I scold her as she starts stroking my eager erection. I push her hand away, ignoring her complaints, and reach for her shower gel. I pop the top and sniff it. It smells fruity, mango or pineapple, making my mouth water, although it could be Jess doing that, because she’s stroking me again, and I can’t stop thinking of how it’s going to feel when I slide inside her.

  “Turn around,” I murmur into her ear as I squeeze the gel onto a shower puff. She gives me a flash of her hot hazel eyes before she turns and leans against the tiles.

  There’s not much room, and my erection has to nestle between the cheeks of her bottom, which is a distraction I’m willing to put up with as I start to soap her back. I love her hourglass figure, how she narrows from her shoulders to her waist and then flares out again to her hips. My hands follow her curves as if I’m planing wood, following the gentle arch of her spine up, then down again. I circle the puff all the way to the dip at the base. Then I move it around her hips to her tummy, and wash up to the swell of her breasts.

  “You have a very interesting body,” I tell her. “It’s all curves and dips.” I illustrate by bringing the puff around and over her breasts, making sure the material brushes over her nipples.

  “Ooh.” She arches her back, pushing her breasts into my hands, and sighs. “Mmm, that feels good.”

  Steam curls around us, enclosing us in a humid, white world all of our own. I hang the puff up and tip some more gel onto my hands, then continue my exploration of her body.

  “Oh, Rich…” She tries to turn, wanting to touch me, but I make her stay facing away from me and lift her hands back onto the tiles.

  “Don’t move,” I instruct her, and run my hands down her arms and over her breasts. My fingers glide over her silky skin, and I groan when I discover her nipples have softened from the warm water. They’re like small pieces of velvet in my fingers, and yet when I flick them with my thumbs and squeeze them, they contract and turn into shiny wet beads.

  She dips her head, sighing, her wet hair darkening as the water soaks it. I squeeze more gel onto my hands and then smooth them across her ribs. Then I slide one over her tummy, and further down, my fingers slipping easily into her folds.

  “Aaahhh.” She widens her stance a little, and I stroke her, feeling the firm little button and teasing it with the tip of my finger. She’s quivering now, and I’m not going to last much longer, but I wish I could—I want to stay like this forever, in our private world, just me and Jess, and shut out everyone and everything.

  I squeeze some more gel onto my fingers and glide my hand down her back and between the cheeks of her bottom. She catches her breath and glances over her shoulder at me, and our gazes lock. I pause, my fingers just touching the puckered skin there, waiting to see if she objects, but she doesn’t. She holds my gaze, and her eyes are hot and bold, daring me.

  Jesus, this girl is more than a match for me. What fun we could have, if we had all the time in the world to explore each other. I have to make do with the short time we have, though, so I don’t waste it, and I tease the tight muscle beneath my fingers until she’s gasping, her knees buckling beneath her.

  “Hold on, sweetheart.” I lean briefly out of the shower to grab the wallet I’d left on the sink, take out a condom, rip off the packet, and roll it on. The whole process takes about five seconds because I can’t wait to get inside her. I move my erection beneath her, press back against the wall of the cubicle as much as I can, and pull back her hips so she’s bending a little at the waist. Then I slide the tip into her folds. In one smooth move, I’m inside her, balls deep.

  “Ah, fuck,” she says, her body reacting with a jerk.

  “Sorry.” I wait for her to stretch and adjust, holding her hips.

  She splays her fingers on the tiles, panting. “It’s okay. You’re quite big, that’s all. I’m not used to it.”

  I bend forward and kiss her back. “Wow, you really know how to say the right thing.”

  “It’s not a lie. You’re an impressive man, Rich…” She looks over her shoulder at me. “I don’t even know your last name. How embarrassing.”

  “It’s Wright. I’m just thrilled you know my first name.”

  She laughs. “So you’re my Mr. Wright?” She pushes back against me, and I grunt and begin to thrust, enjoying the sensation of plunging into her soft flesh, of sinking into her, this lovely girl who’s so warm and willing and sexy.

  The water pours over us, splashing on the tiles as we move. I sweep Jess’s hair over her shoulder, baring her neck, which displays a faint red mark where I sucked the night before. I touch my fingers to it, feeling a strange smugness at the thought that I’ve branded her, and then I wind her hair around my hand and hold it as I begin to thrust harder.

  “Yes,” she hisses, straightening. I pull her back int
o my arms and push her against the tiles, and now I’m thrusting up into her, and she’s gasping and crying out as I drive her ever closer to her climax.

  “Ah, Jess…” I slide my hand over her hips and around to her clit, and she rests her forehead on her arm as I tease the sensitive button, still moving inside her. “Come for me,” I whisper in her ear. “Squeeze me until I groan.”

  “Ohhh…” She places her hand over mine, pressing down, and then she comes, so tight around me I almost pass out with pleasure. Her breaths come in great gasps, and I feel the orgasm throughout her body, the tensing of her stomach, the curving of her spine, the contractions in her thighs, the pulses of her internal muscles that make her give those beautiful, sweet cries.

  When she’s done, I slide one arm around her waist and rest the other on the wall, and give into the urge to take her hard and fast until my climax slams into me, and I bury my face in her neck and just enjoy the sharp, powerful clenches that make me shudder with their ferocity.

  My chest heaves, and my heart hammers. The air’s so full of steam it feels as if I’m swimming under water. Jesus, that feels good.

  “Rich…”

  I come to with the realization that she’s sagging in my arms.

  “My legs have gone wobbly,” she says, panting.

  “That’s what you get for having a knee-trembler.” I slide out of her, holding her tightly, turn off the shower, and reach out for a towel. Wrapping it around her, I then sweep her up into my arms and carry her through to her bedroom.

  I toss her onto the bed, open up the towel, and lay on top of her.

  “Oh… you’re squishing me,” she complains, although she’s hooking her legs around me, so she doesn’t seem to mind too much.

  “Good.” I kiss her, taking time to sweep my tongue into her mouth as I enjoy the fizz of after-sex hormones that make me tingle all over.