by M. J. Lowell
After three hours, we took a break for hot chocolate. We’d managed to restore some semblance of order, though there was still a ways to go. As far as we could tell, nothing was missing, but the thoroughness with which every drawer and cabinet had been emptied, dumped out on the floor, suggested the intruders definitely had been searching for something.
“Maybe they wanted to make sure we didn’t have anything that could prove my dad had the formula for CF-64 first,” I said to Nico as he handed me a mug of cocoa.
“Maybe.” He shrugged. “I just hope they don’t come back.”
“Are you going to be okay here? Do you want to stay at my place?”
“That’s nice of you to offer, but I like it here. It reminds me of your dad.”
“Me, too,” I said.” It makes me happy to think of you here.”
His phone rang. He held it up for me to see. “Val. She’s supposed to come for dinner.”
“What are you going to tell her?”
“About the fact that there’s no dinner or about this?” he asked, gesturing to the bandage.
“You can always order a pizza, but I think she’ll want to know why you’re suddenly a walking wounded.”
“Chemistry experiment turned minor chemical explosion?” he suggested.
“That should work,” I said, laughing. People who didn’t work in labs tended to imagine lots of mad scientist antics. A small explosion would be just a regular day at the office.
It was getting dark when I left him primping for his dinner with Val. I felt shredded, raw from the threats and the destruction, and exhausted from cleaning up the mess. But as soon as I stepped onto the street, my thoughts flew to Rhys. I’d done my best not to think about him while I was with Nico, not to replay every moment, every sensation, but in the fresh air it all came flooding back.
More than anything, I wanted to go to him. To touch him and smell him, fill my senses with him. Forget about everything, for just a little while.
And that’s when I realized – I’d been with Rhys while the people behind my father’s death were beating up Nico.
Of course, he could have sent someone to do his dirty work for him. But that wasn’t Rhys. I remembered what Davies had told me, about Rhys fighting his own battles. Recalled Rhys’s comment that afternoon at the opera about it not being fair that God had someone else do his dirty work. Rhys couldn’t have fought this battle, done this, not when he’d been with me the entire time.
Which meant that whatever else Rhys might be, he wasn’t a murderer. I could cross him off the list of suspects, once and for all.
“Come to me later,” he’d said. And now I could, without any hidden agenda of my own.
I was looking for the card Rhys had given me when the OPEN light clicked on in the window of Fortelli’s Pizza across the street and I had an idea.
Fortelli’s had topped every Best Pizza list for over a decade, and as I stepped inside the aroma was intoxicating. Mrs. Fortelli was behind the counter and gave me a huge welcoming grin as I joined the line that formed the moment the doors opened – the line at Fortelli’s was part of the ritual of the place. I waved back at her and dialed the number on Rhys’s card.
Davies answered the phone on the first ring. “Yes, miss,” he said. “Mr. Carlyle said you might call. Where shall I pick you up?”
It seemed like a lot to ask him to come all the way to Red Hook from Manhattan. “If you just tell me where to go, I can take the subway. There’s no need for you—”
“Are you trying to get me fired, miss?” he asked gruffly.
That stopped me in my tracks. “No,” I answered. “Of course not.”
“Then you’d better let me come get you.”
By the time I hung up, I’d reached the front of the line. Mrs. Fortelli gave me another huge grin and said, “Finally, you have a new boyfriend.”
“No.”
“Our Lucy has a new boyfriend,” she sang to her husband who nodded but didn’t look up from the dough he was rolling out. “I can tell. You have the look.”
“There’s no new boyfriend,” I told her.
“Excuse me,” the guy behind me said, “Is she going to order or—”
“She orders when she wants,” Mrs. Fortelli told him with a furious glare. “But people with bad manners don’t order at all. Get out.”
“What?” the guy said, stunned. “You can’t kick me out. I’ll write you up on Yelp.”
“If you can still use your fingers,” she hissed. She pointed at a pizza box on the counter. “Best in New York. Says it on the box. I don’t need any yelp. Scram.” Then her gaze returned to me as though none of that had happened. “What would you like, cara?”
I ordered a large pizza to be delivered to Nico and two to go and spent the next ten minutes dodging the questions Mrs. Fortelli lobbed at me – “How tall is he?” “He comes from a good family?” “He takes you nice places?” – while I waited.
The pizzas were just out of the oven when the Bentley arrived. I thought Mrs. Fortelli’s eyes would pop out of her head. “If this one is not your boyfriend,” she said, “you’re crazy.”
She watched through the window as Davies came around and opened the door for me. He looked a little disheveled – I hoped I hadn’t intruded on his time off. I held out the pizza I’d gotten for him. “I didn’t know what you liked so I asked for everything.”
He gave the box and then me an odd look, but he thanked me, taking the pizza and placing it on the front seat next to him. The silence as he merged into traffic felt strained. Had I offended him? What was I thinking, anyway, bringing pizza to a millionaire’s chauffeur, not to mention a millionaire? I bet Marina Essex-Jones had never done anything like that. I was supposed to be sophisticated and polished and instead I was acting like—
I didn’t even know what. Myself?
A half-hour later Davies was pulling up to the boat basin on West Seventy-ninth Street. “Mr. Carlyle’s yacht is at berth four,” he told me as he helped me out of the car. “The Playtime. You can’t miss it, it’s the largest in the marina.”
“Naturally,” I said.
Davies chuckled. Then he hesitated, as if he was trying to decide whether to say something.
“What is it?” I asked.
He shifted uncomfortably, and his eyes went to the pizza I was carrying. “It’s just— you watch out for yourself, won’t you? I love Mr. Carlyle like my own son, I do, but he can be a bit hard on the female heart.”
“I’ll be okay,” I told him with an assurance I didn’t quite feel.
He eyed me closely and gave me a small smile. “I think you just might.”
In spite of his reassurance, my legs were suddenly shaky as I made my way toward the large white yacht. I might not have a hidden agenda any more but there was still a lot I should tell Rhys. And there was a good chance that once he knew the truth about me, he’d never want to see me again. I should tell him right away, I decided. Make a clean breast of it.
But when Rhys stepped onto the deck and saw me, his eyes lit up. “I’ve been going out of my mind waiting for you.”
My doubts vanished. My mind vanished. I said the only thing I could think of. “I brought pizza. It’s the best in New York. It says so on the box.”
For a moment he just stared at me. And then he picked me up and carried me on board.
Chapter Twenty-Eight
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have come like this,” I said as he carried me into the cabin. “I should have gone home and changed, but—”
He put a finger to my lips. “You’re perfect. Is your friend all right?”
I couldn’t explain what had happened without breaking my promise to Nico, so I only said, “He had an accident at his place, and it was sort of a mess. I helped him put everything back in order.”
We moved through a sitting room that was all brass and teak into a galley that was twice as big as the kitchen in my apartment. Rhys paused long enough to point with his chin to where I shou
ld leave the pizza box on a white marble counter before continuing through another doorway with me still in his arms.
“We’ll want to wash up before dinner,” he said as we entered a bathroom. He set me down on the tiled floor. “I’m afraid the bathing facilities here are rather primitive compared to the Bowery.”
By Rhys Carlyle standards, primitive meant there was no swimming pool of a bathtub – only an enormous steam shower with a half-dozen showerheads angled in various directions. He turned to me with a roguish smile. “Take off your clothes.”
“I feel like we’ve done this before,” I said, laughing as I flashed back to that night at the Bowery. “I have the strangest sense of déjà vu.”
He reached around me to unzip my dress. “If I remember correctly, the first time was relatively uneventful.” He leaned down to whisper in my ear. “We won’t make that mistake again.”
He spun the taps on the shower and steam immediately began filling the glass-enclosed space. I slipped quickly out of the Saint Laurent dress and my panties and bra and stepped under the spray. The warm water tumbling down on me was delicious, and I watched through the open door as Rhys undressed, unselfconscious as he removed each piece of clothing and folded it carefully, leaving everything in a precisely squared-off pile on the counter.
His body was a marvel, like the work of a master sculptor, with perfectly carved muscles and everything in proportion – except his cock, which looked oversize even next to his powerful thighs. A coil of excitement tightened within me.
I glanced up. He was looking at me, his expression bemused.
“You’re very, uh, tidy,” I said, embarrassed.
He chuckled. “Is that what you were noticing? My tidiness?”
I nodded solemnly, hoping the steam hid the blush staining my cheeks.
“Neatness was drilled into me at a formative age,” he said, stepping into the shower. His eyes swept over me appraisingly. “I think you’re in need of my assistance.”
“I am?”
“Certain spots can be challenging to reach on one’s own,” he said, spinning me around and reaching for a bottle of shampoo. He squeezed a dollop into his hands and began massaging it into my hair.
The feel of his strong fingers moving slowly against my scalp was heaven, purely sensual. I leaned back against him, felt the length of his body against mine, his smooth chest against my back, his cock stiff but not yet insistent against the curve of my buttocks.
His hands moved from my scalp to my neck and shoulders, his thumbs kneading the tightly knotted muscles there. I sighed with pleasure and tried to turn toward him, to face him, but he wrapped an arm around my waist, holding me in place. With his free hand he reached for a sea sponge, squeezing soap onto it. The air grew thick with the scent of sandalwood.
He smoothed the sponge down my body, soaping my breasts, tracing lazy circles across my stomach. I closed my eyes, luxuriating in the exquisite sensation of the sponge caressing my skin, the spicy fragrance of the soap, the clouds of swirling steam.
“No,” he said, turning me slightly. “Open your eyes. Watch.”
He’d positioned us so that we were reflected in the mirrored wall opposite the shower. Through the steam, I could see his hands reaching from behind me, one cupping my breast, the thumb flicking softly over the nipple, while the other continued its exploration with the sponge. He guided it across my hips, lower and lower, until it arrived at the wet tangle between my legs. Our eyes met in the mirror.
He dragged the sponge between my thighs, stroking me with it. I arched my back against him, pressed myself toward his hand, our every movement reflected in the mirror. Watching him watching me, watching him touch me, intensified every sensation.
Without warning, he let the sponge drop. The sudden absence of its touch, of his touch, left me aching with longing. I couldn’t stifle the small moan that escaped.
“Patience, my sweet,” said Rhys, his lips curving in a smile. “We need to make sure we get all the soap off.”
He lifted one of the handheld showerheads from its cradle and moved it between my legs, tilting it upward. I gasped. The spray felt like hundreds of tiny wet tongues, exquisitely delicate but relentless in their persistence. He moved it in closer, concentrating the stream of water to play over my swollen inner lips, then pulling back to let it cascade over my clit.
His eyes never left mine in the mirror. “You like that, don’t you? You like to watch me pleasure you.”
I was too far gone to do anything but nod. His body behind my body, his eyes locked on mine, and the dancing water were whipping me into a frenzy. I writhed against him, wanting to touch him as he was touching me, but he held me firmly in place.
He bent his head over my shoulder and I thought he was going to kiss me, but his mouth kept moving, down to my nipple. He closed his lips over it and I felt the first silvery shimmer of an orgasm. He brought his lips down around it, tugging it outward, and in the mirror I could see the flashing white of his teeth on me. My knees buckled. If his arms hadn’t been holding me tight I wouldn’t have been able to stand.
He lifted his head, his eyes meeting mine in the mirror once more. “Come for me, sweetheart,” he said.
For a moment I hovered on a precipice, every cell in my body thrumming. Then I hurtled over the edge, blasting from one orgasm into another, each exploding inside me in a series of glittering bursts.
I was left clutching at Rhys, my breath still coming in short wondrous gasps. “That was—” But I didn’t have the words to describe it. I’d have to show him. “I want to make you feel the way you made me feel.”
He grinned. “I think that can be arranged.”
I reached for him, but he put a hand on my wrist, turned it face-up, and drizzled a puddle of shampoo onto my palm. “Now grab my cock,” he instructed.
I wrapped my hand around him, moving it along his length tentatively, then gripping more firmly.
“Slowly, love,” he said, his jaw tight. “Gently at first.”
I did as he said, my hand slippery from the shampoo as it glided over him in long, slow strokes, up and down, marveling at the its heft. “Now squeeze harder,” he said, his voice husky. I complied and was rewarded with a moan. “Oh, yes,” he said. “Just like that.”
His breathing grew heavier, faster. “Now your other hand,” he said, bracing himself against the shower wall. I brought my other hand to circle the base of his rod, and let the top hand slide from the middle toward the tip. “You really want to make me come?” he asked, gazing down at me, the cobalt hazy with pleasure.
I nodded, relishing the power. I felt invincible.
“Then use both hands, fast and hard.” I moved my hands from the base of him to just under the tip in quick, abrupt motions, tugging as I squeezed, up and down. “Perfect—” he started to say and gasped as I increased the speed of my bottom hand and moved my other hand up to enfold the tip.
He gave a sudden shout, his eyes going huge. With a tremendous shudder, he began spilling out into my hands, pouring over my fingers.
When it was over he leaned against the glass, his chest still heaving. His expression was almost stunned. “That wasn’t supposed to happen, not so…soon.”
I was jubilant – I couldn’t control my smile. “Why not?”
He laughed, a wonderful warm bear hug of a laugh. “It wasn’t what I had planned.”
“Does everything have to be planned?” I teased as we stepped out from under the spray.
“Planning means fewer surprises,” he said, reaching for a fluffy white towel and beginning to dry me off. “That just now was a nice one – a very nice one –but usually surprises involve too much trickery for my taste.”
His words made a tiny knot in my stomach. What I’d done was far beyond trickery. I should tell him, come clean about everything now I knew there was no chance he was involved in my father’s death. But before I could speak he’d circled my waist with his arm and was guiding me into a plush bedroom. It was al
most entirely filled with a king-sized bed scattered with multi-colored cushions covered in an array of rich fabrics.
He picked me up and tossed me onto the bed. I landed in the soft sea of pillows and he turned to the door.
“Where are you going?” I asked, enjoying the view. The back of him was as much of a masterpiece as the front.
“I’ll need sustenance if I’m going to keep up with you,” he said over his shoulder.
It would be better to wait until we’ve had something to eat, I thought. Hearing how I’d been lying to him since the night we met would probably ruin his appetite.
Or maybe there’s no need for him to know after all, said a sneaky voice in my head. I had no hidden agenda, not anymore. Maybe that could all stay in the past. How would he find out if I didn’t tell him?
I knew I was looking for excuses, trying to rationalize my own cowardice, but at that moment Rhys returned with the pizza, a bottle of Pellegrino tucked under one arm and a bottle of Krug under the other, and I was suddenly starving.
We picnicked on the bed, not bothering to dress. The pizza had cooled off a bit, but lukewarm Fortelli’s still beat any other pizza fresh out of the oven. The crust was just the right shade of golden brown and the sauce tangy with the secret ingredient Mr. Fortelli would never divulge. It all tasted extraordinary – every sense was still operating on a heightened level, as if I’d taken a marvelous drug.
There was something deliciously, startlingly intimate about our naked picnic dinner. Without one of his impeccably tailored suits, sprawled on the bed with his hair still damp and his toes pressing against my toes, Rhys seemed younger, freer. Not the enigmatic CEO but someone approachable, accessible.
With a pang, I wondered if Marina Essex-Jones had ever picnicked with Rhys on this bed, and how many other women he’d invited here. Don’t fall in love with me, he’d told me. That had been weeks ago, but it felt like it had occurred in an entirely different lifetime, as if the words had been uttered by another person altogether. Or maybe that’s what you want to believe.
He propped himself up on one elbow and ran an idle hand up my side, tracing the line of my hip. “You’re very…spare.”
