“This is okay. This is...” She tried to shift her hips closer to his dick. “Am I...am I sexy?”
“Oh, babe,” he said. But he couldn’t answer her, not in words. So he fit his body to hers and thrust in.
“Matthew!” she gasped in the same breathless way she’d cried his name in the hall.
“Yeah, louder,” he ground out as he drove in harder.
“Matthew!” she cried again. Her legs tried to come off the bed, and she almost kneed him in the ribs.
“Oh, no, you don’t,” he told her as he grabbed her legs and tucked them up under his arms. Then he leaned down into her.
She was completely open to him, and he took advantage of that in every way he knew how—and a few he didn’t even know he knew.
“Is this what you want?” he demanded over and over.
“Yes.” Always, she said yes.
“Say it louder,” he ordered her, riding her harder.
“Yes! Oh, Matthew—yes!”
There was nothing else but the moment between when he slid out of her body and drove back in. No thoughts of family or message or public image. Nothing but the woman beneath him, crying out his name again and again.
Suddenly her body tensed up around his. “Kiss me,” she demanded. “Kiss me!”
“Kiss me back,” he told her before he lowered his lips to hers.
Everything about her went tight as she kissed him. Then she fell back, panting heavily.
Matthew surrendered himself to her body. He couldn’t fight it anymore.
Then he collapsed onto her chest. Her legs slid down his, holding him close. He knew he needed to get up—he didn’t want to lose the condom—but there was something about holding her after what he’d done to her...
Jesus—had he really tied her up? Made her cry out his name? That was...something his father would have done.
“Can you untie me now?” she asked, sounding breathless and happy.
Focus, he told himself. So he sat back and undid the tie from the headboard. He’d really liked that tie, too, but he doubted it’d ever be the same.
He started to get out of bed to get cleaned up and dressed, but she sat up and tackle-hugged him so hard it almost hurt. But not quite. After he got over his momentary shock, he wrapped his arms around her.
“Thank you,” she whispered. “It was...”
“Perfect?” He hoped so, for her sake.
At that, she leaned back and gave him the most suggestive smile he’d ever seen. He could take her again. He had another condom. He could loop his demolished tie back through the headboard and...
“I’m not sure. We might have to do it again later. Just to have a point of comparison, you understand.” Then a shadow of doubt crossed her face. “If you wanted to,” she hurried to add.
He pulled her back into his arms. “I’d like that. I’d like that a lot. You were amazing. Except for the kicking part.”
She giggled, her chin tucked in the crook of his neck. He grabbed one of her wrists and kissed where he’d had it bound.
Then, from the floor, his phone chimed Phillip’s text message chime.
And the weight of what he was supposed to be doing came crushing back down on him.
Why was he lolling away the afternoon in bed with Whitney? This was not the time to be tying people up, for crying out loud. He had a wedding to pull off—a family image to save.
An image that was going to be a whole hell of a lot harder to save when Byron got done with it.
Matthew had to keep the wheels from falling off. He had to take care of the family. He had to prove he was one of them. A Beaumont.
Then Whitney kissed his jaw. “Do you need to go?”
“Yeah.”
He didn’t want to. He wanted to stay here, wrapped up with her. He wanted to say to hell with the wedding, the message—he didn’t care. He’d done the best he could.
He cared about Whitney. He shouldn’t—her old image was going to keep making headaches for him and it’d been only twenty-four hours since he’d met her.
But that didn’t change things.
And yet it changed everything.
The phone chimed again. And again. Different chimes.
It sounded as though Byron had pulled his stunt.
“I’ve got to go bail out Byron,” he told her. “But I’ll see you soon.” He got off the bed, trashed the condom and got dressed as fast as he could. By now his phone sounded like a bell choir.
“When?” She sat on the bed, her knees tucked up under her chin. Except for the part where she was completely nude—or maybe because of it—there was an air of vulnerability about her.
“Lunch, tomorrow. You’ve got to choose where you want to have the bachelorette party. I’ll take you to all the places I’ve scouted out.” He picked up his phone. Jeez, that was a lot of messages in less than five minutes. “What a mess,” he muttered at his phone. “I’ll get you at eleven—that’ll give you time with Jo and it’ll give me time to fix this.”
He leaned down and gave her a quick, hard kiss. Then he was out the door.
He knew he shouldn’t be surprised that Phillip was standing in the living room—this was his house, after all—but the last thing Matthew needed right now was to be confronted by his brother.
Phillip looked at him with a raised eyebrow. But instead of asking about Whitney, he said, “Byron got picked up. He said to tell you he’s sorry, but the black eye was unavoidable.”
Matthew’s shoulders sagged. His little brother had done exactly what he wanted him to—but damned if it didn’t feel as though Matthew was suddenly right back at the bottom of the very big mountain he was doomed to be constantly climbing—Mount Beaumont. “What’d he do?”
“He went to a restaurant, ordered dinner, asked to see the chef and proceeded to get into a fistfight with the man.”
Matthew rubbed the bridge of his nose. “And?”
“The media is reporting he ordered the salmon.”
“Ha-ha. Very funny. I’ll get him.”
He was halfway to the door when Phillip said, “Everything okay with Whitney?”
“Fine,” he shot back as he picked up the pace. He had to get out of here, fast.
But Phillip was faster. He caught up to Matthew at the door. “Better than yesterday?”
“Yes. Now, if you’ll excuse me...”
Phillip grinned. “Never thought you had it in you, man. You always went for such...boring women.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
Denial—whether it was to the press or his family—came easily to Matthew. He had years of practice, after all.
“Right, right.” He gave Matthew the smile that Matthew had long ago learned to hate—the one that said I’m better than you are. “Just a tip, though—from one Beaumont to another—always wipe the lipstick off before you leave the bedroom.”
Matthew froze. Then he scrubbed the back of his hand across his mouth. It came away bright red.
Whitney’s lipstick.
“Uh...this isn’t what it looks like.”
“Really? Because it looks like you spent the afternoon sleeping with the maid of honor.” Matthew’s fists curled, but Phillip threw up his hands in self-defense. “Whatever, man. I’m not about to throw stones at your glass house. Say,” he went on in a too-casual voice, “this wouldn’t have anything to do with Byron telling me he’d done what you asked him to, would it? Except for the black eye, of course.”
Matthew moved before he realized what he was doing. He grabbed Phillip by the front of his shirt. “Do. Not. Give. Her. Crap.”
“Dude!” Phillip said, trying to peel Matthew’s hands away from his shirt. “Down, boy—down!”
“Promise me, Phillip. Af
ter all the messes I cleaned up for you—all the times I saved your ass—promise me that you won’t torture that woman. Or Byron won’t be the only one with a black eye at this wedding.”
“Easy, man—I’m not going to do anything.”
Matthew let go of his brother. “Sorry.”
“No, you’re not. Go.” Phillip pushed him toward the door. “Bail Byron out so we can all line up for your perfect family wedding. That’s what you want, isn’t it?”
As Matthew drove off, his mind was a jumble of wedding stuff and family stuff and Whitney. Zipping Whitney into the bridesmaid dress. Stripping her out of her clothes. Admiring her perfectly done hair. Messing her hair up.
He had to pull this wedding off. He had to stay on message. He had to prove he belonged up there with the other Beaumonts, standing by Phillip’s side.
That was what Matthew wanted.
Wasn’t it?
Ten
She checked her watch. Three to eleven. She’d gotten up at her regular time and gone out with Jo to look at the young mare she was working with. Jo hadn’t pressed her about Matthew, except to say, “You and Matthew...” there’d been a rather long pause, but Whitney hadn’t jumped into the breach “...do all right yesterday?” Jo had finally finished.
“Yeah. I think you were right about him—he seems like a good guy who’s wound a bit too tight.”
Which had to be the explanation as to why he’d tied her to the bed with a necktie.
Which did nothing to explain why she’d let him do it and explained even less why she’d enjoyed it.
And now? Now she was going to spend the afternoon with him again. Which was great—because it’d been so long since she’d had sex with another person and Matthew wasn’t just up to the task—he was easily the best lover she’d ever had.
But it was also nerve-racking. After all, he’d tied her to the bed and made her climax several times. How was she supposed to look him in the eye after that? Yes, she’d slept around a lot when she’d been an out-of-control teenager trying to prove she was an adult. Yes, she’d had some crazy sex. The gossips never let her forget that.
But she’d never had that kind of sex clean and sober. She’d never had any kind of sex sober. She’d never looked a lover in the eye without some sort of chemical aid to cover up her anxiety at what she’d done, what she might still do.
And now, as she adjusted her hat and sunglasses, she was going to have to do just that. She had no idea what to do next. At least she had Betty—the small donkey’s ears were soft, and rubbing them helped Whitney keep some sort of hold on her anxiety. It would be fine, she kept telling herself as she petted Betty. It will be fine.
At exactly eleven, Matthew walked through the door at Phillip and Jo’s house, cupped her face in his hands and made her forget everything except the way she’d felt beneath his hands, his body. Beautiful. Sexy.
Alive.
“Hi,” he breathed as he rested his forehead against hers.
Maybe this wouldn’t be complicated. It hadn’t seemed complicated when he’d pinned her to the wall yesterday. Maybe it would be...easy. She grinned, slipping her arms around his waist. “Hi.” Then she looked at him. “You’re wearing a tie?”
Color touched his cheeks, but he didn’t look embarrassed. If anything, he looked the way he had yesterday—hungry for more. Hungry for her.
“I usually wear ties.” Heat flushed down her back and pooled low. But instead of pulling that tie off, he added, “Are you ready?”
She nodded, unable to push back against the anxiety. This time, at least, it didn’t have anything to do with him. “We have to go, right?”
He leaned back and adjusted her hat, making sure her hair was fully tucked under it. “We’ll just look at the places. And after yesterday, I cut a couple of the other options off the list, so it’s only four places. We’ll park, go in, look at the menu and come back out. Okay?”
“What about lunch?” Because the going-in part hadn’t been the problem yesterday.
“I decided we’ll have lunch at my apartment.”
She looked at him in surprise. “You decided, huh?”
Thus far, she hadn’t actually managed to successfully make it through a meal with him. If they were alone at his place, would they eat or...?
He ran his thumb over her lower lip. “I did.” Then Betty butted against his legs, demanding that he pet her, too. “You getting ready to walk down the aisle, girl?” he asked as he checked his phone. “We need to get going.”
Despite the kiss that followed this statement—how was she going to make it to lunch without ripping his clothes off?—by the time they got into the car and were heading off the farm, she was back to feeling uneasy. She didn’t normally fall into bed with a man she’d known for a day. Not since she’d started over.
Matthew had said he knew she was Whitney Maddox...but had he, really? He’d admitted having a huge crush on her back in the day.
“You’re nervous,” he announced when they were back on the highway, heading toward Denver.
She couldn’t deny it. At least she’d made it into the car without stepping on him or anything. But she couldn’t bring herself to admit that she was nervous about him. So she went with the other thing that was bothering her. “How’s your brother—Byron?”
Matthew exhaled heavily. “He’s fine. I got him bailed out. Our lawyers are working to get the charges dropped. But his black eye won’t be gone by the wedding, so I had to add him to the makeup artist’s list.”
“Oh.” He sounded extremely put out by this situation, but she was pretty sure he’d told his brother to do something dramatic. To bury her lead. She couldn’t help but feel that, at the heart of it, this was her fault.
“The media took the bait, though. You didn’t even make the website for the Denver Post. Who could pass up the chance to dig up dirt on the Beaumont Prodigal Son Returned? That’s the headline the Post went with this morning. It’s already been picked up by Gawker and TMZ.”
She felt even worse. That wasn’t the message Matthew wanted. She was sure that this was exactly what he’d wanted to avoid.
“You’re quiet again,” he said. He reached over and rubbed her thigh. “This isn’t your fault.”
The touch was reassuring. “But you’re off message. Byron getting arrested isn’t rehabilitating the Beaumont family image.”
“I know.” He exhaled heavily again. “But I can fix this. It’s what I do. There’s no such thing as bad PR.”
Okay, that was another question that she didn’t have an answer to. “Why? Why is that what you do?”
Matthew pulled his hand back and started drumming his fingers against the steering wheel. “How much do you know about the Beaumonts?”
“Um...well, you guys were a family beer company until recently. And Jo told me your father had a bunch of different children with four different wives and he had a lot of mistresses. And he forgot about your sister and brother’s birthday.”
“Did Jo say anything else?”
“Just that you’d threatened all the ex-wives to be on their best behavior.”
“I did, you know.” He chuckled again, but there was at least a little humor in it this time. “I told them if they caused a scene, I’d make an example out of them. No one’s hands are clean in this family. I’ve buried too many scandals.” He shot her an all-knowing grin. “They won’t risk pissing me off. They know what I could do to them.”
She let that series of ominous statements sink in. Suddenly, she felt as if she was facing the man who’d caught her the first night—the man who’d bury her if he got the chance.
But that wasn’t the man who’d made love to her last night—was it? Had he offered his brother up as bait to protect her...or because that was still an easier mess to clean up than the one she�
��d make?
“Are your hands clean?”
“What?”
“You said no one’s hands in your family are clean. Does that include you?”
His jaw tensed, and he looked at her again. He didn’t say it, but she could tell what he was thinking. Not anymore. Not since he tied her to the bed.
Just then his phone chimed. He glanced down at the screen before announcing, “We need to keep to the schedule.”
Right. They weren’t going to talk about him right now.
He obviously knew a great deal about her past, but what did she know about him? He was a Beaumont, but he was behind the scenes, keeping everyone on message and burying leads.
“We’re here,” he announced after a few more minutes of driving. She nodded and braced herself for the worst.
The restaurant seemed overdone—white walls, white chairs, white carpet and what was probably supposed to be avant-garde art done in shades of black on the wall. A white tree with white ornaments stood near the front. It was the most depressing Christmas tree Whitney had ever seen. If a restaurant was capable of trying too hard, this one was. Whitney knew that Jo would be miserable in a place like this.
“Seriously?” she whispered to Matthew after reading the menu. Most of it was in French. She had no idea what kind of food they served here, only that it would be snooty.
“One of the best restaurants in the state,” he assured her.
Then they went to a smaller restaurant with only six tables that had a menu full of locally grown microgreens and other items that Whitney wasn’t entirely sure qualified as food. Honest to God, one of the items touted a kind of tree bark.
“How well do you even know Jo?” she asked Matthew as they sped away from the hipster spot. “I mean, really. She’s a cowgirl, for crying out loud. She likes burgers and fries.”
“It’s a nice restaurant,” he defended. “I’ve taken dates there.”
“Oh? And you’re still seeing those women, are you?”
Matthew shot her a comically mean look.
A Beaumont Christmas Wedding Page 10
