Just one kiss (The Ashcrofts Book 1)

by Anderson, Poppy J.

  Pulling her with him, Patrick cautiously rolled over onto his side. When he kissed her mouth gingerly, and then murmured in satisfaction as he gently stroked her naked back, she snuggled against him with a happy smile.

  ***

  Amy watched the naked man lying beside her sleeping. It was after two in the afternoon, and it had become unbearably hot, which is what had woken her from her slumber. For the first few seconds, she hadn’t understood where the naked man in her bed had come from, but then she remembered with a jolt how she had brought Patrick to her apartment.

  She didn’t usually sleep with practical strangers, men she hardly knew. She actually didn’t sleep with any men at all, at least not in recent months.

  She bit her lip as she pondered what Patrick must think of her, hopping into bed with him only a few days after they’d met.

  When he suddenly stirred in his sleep and emitted a grumbling sound, Amy held her breath. His hand moved to her belly. Her mouth went dry as she stared at him, lying in her bed, utterly unconcerned in his sleep. He took up the better part of the bed as he lay there, one hand on his chest, the other on her belly, his muscled legs stretched out.

  She was breathless as her eyes wandered over his naked body, deciding that there could be no better nude model than him. She scooted a little closer, so she could study him even better. She lightly touched his black hair, which curled at the back of his neck, looking gloriously tousled right now. His features were soft and relaxed, making him look much younger.

  She smiled and bit her lip again, before brushing a lock of his hair from his forehead. She placed a feather-light hand on his broad chest, feeling his heart beat strongly under her palm. Her own heart skipped a beat as she watched him, and her hand started to stroke his chest of its own accord. Her eyes were drawn down the line of hair that tapered down across his flat belly.

  She lifted her head gingerly, trying to follow the trail with her eyes, when he suddenly emitted a soft snort.

  “Mmh.” He frowned in his sleep and began to stir beside her, until he finally gave a big yawn and opened his eyes.

  Amy held her breath when he turned his head to look at her. She returned his gaze with a fiercely beating heart, and she suddenly felt like running. They were lying in bed, stark naked, after having the most fantastic, earth-shattering sex for most of the morning. How was she to know what was next, how she was supposed to act?

  He offered her a sleepy smile and snuggled closer, his hand caressing her belly. “Hi.”

  “Hi,” she echoed dumbly and swallowed.

  He merely smiled bigger and leaned in to kiss her. Amy closed her eyes and put a hand around his neck. His kiss made her forget all of her concerns immediately.

  “Did you sleep a little?” His voice was husky, heavy with sleep, and it made her tingle all over.

  “Mm-hm,” she murmured, nuzzling her face against his, which made the butterflies in her stomach begin to flutter again.

  “It’s hot in here,” he sighed, not moving.

  “Want me to turn on the fan?” she asked.

  But he didn’t seem to want to break the contact of skin against skin. In fact, he pulled her even closer to his own warm body and buried his mouth in the hollow of her throat. “No, don’t …”

  “Patrick,” she tried to say, but then he put a hand on her bottom and pressed her against his aroused body.

  “Stay right here,” he mumbled, still sleepy. “Don’t leave me.”

  Perplexed and surprised, she gave in to her own urge, nestling against him with a smile, despite the sticky heat in the room. “Okay,” she whispered with a private smile, as he wrapped his arms around her.

  “I was worried you were ready to kick me out,” he mumbled lazily.

  Amy shook her head gently. “I was just going to turn on the fan so you don’t get too hot.”

  “So I don’t get too hot.” He chuckled with glee. “I could make a joke now, but I’ll drop it.”

  “You better,” Amy replied with mock severity, and then poked him in the ribs, which elicited a chuckle of fright from him.

  He abruptly pulled her up on top of him and held her there, so tight that she couldn’t move. His eyes twinkled with laughter. “Don’t do that! I’m terribly ticklish!”

  “That’s good to know.” The intimacy of the situation, lying in bed with him in broad daylight, being pressed so closely against him that there was no space for a single sheet of paper between them—all of that made her restless and nervous. His green eyes were focused on her with a mixture of delight and sincerity. It left her giddy and breathless.

  “God, you’re so beautiful,” he murmured and lifted his head a little, so he could press a hot kiss to her lips. Amy felt a prickling heat pool in her core. “Can I stay with you tonight?”

  Her throat was dry as she feigned amusement and whispered against his lips, “It’s only afternoon.”

  “I’m planning on spending the rest of the day in bed with you anyway.”

  “Patrick,” she murmured breathlessly, not knowing what to do with his passion and eagerness.

  His arms gave her a little more room, but he kept holding her against his body. His fingers fluttered across the skin of her back, light as a feather.

  “What’s wrong? Would you rather be rid of me after all?”

  She shook her head and met his questioning gaze with a small smile. “Of course not.” She nervously licked her lips and focused on the tip of his nose, since that was easier than meeting his eyes. She would have given away all her secrets if she’d looked him in the eye just then. “It’s just that I … I’ve never done anything like this before.”

  “Anything like this?” he repeated.

  Amy swallowed and nodded. “I mean I’ve never invited a virtual stranger into my home to sleep with him.”

  “I didn’t think you had.” His serious tone made her lift her head and look him in the eye, in spite of herself.

  “Just what did you think?”

  He gave her a mischievous smile. “To be honest, I wasn’t thinking much at all.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Very funny.”

  “Jesus, Amy,” he whispered with a sigh, bringing his face close to hers again. “Are you worrying that I might think badly of you or something? It’s quite the contrary, I promise. I like you. I like you a lot.”

  Her heart started to beat a wild tattoo, and she was unable to look away from his bright-green eyes. “Oh.”

  His lips curved into a dazzling smile, while his hand ruffled her hair. “If it eases your conscience, we could say I made you so horny you couldn’t resist me any longer.”

  Amy couldn’t help but burst into a gleeful giggle.

  “We’re lying naked in bed,” he grumbled. “And you’re laughing?”

  “Did I just put a dent in your ego?”

  “A tiny one.”

  There was an anxious flutter in her chest as she leaned forward and whispered against his lips, “I didn’t mean to do that. How can I make up for it?”

  “Spending the rest of the day in bed doesn’t sound bad,” he answered softly and pulled her closer.

  When he started to caress her slowly and tenderly, Amy dissolved into pure bliss, placing both of her hands on his chest again. With a sigh, she lifted her face to his, and he let his hands dance down her back. Then he surprised her by grabbing her hips and rolling over with her, so that she was on her back, looking up at him. He took her face in both hands and kissed her again.

  He pushed between her legs and kissed her passionately. When his mouth left hers and sucked on her throat, she gasped, clinging to his shoulders, and uttered a small cry.

  His breath came heavy again. “I can’t help it, Amy,” he admitted in a hoarse whisper.

  Amy moaned and tried to blink through the haze to see his gaze, which was almost desperate. “Can’t help … what?” she panted.

  “This.” His gaze burned into hers as he entered her slowly.

  Chapter 6

>   “I’ve been trying to reach you for days, Patrick.” The male voice on the other end of the line sounded decidedly annoyed.

  Standing in his hotel room, the phone tucked between his ear and shoulder, Patrick rolled his eyes in irritation. There was a reason he’d kept his cell turned off the last few days. He’d wanted to spend time with Amy, without all the usual distractions, phone calls, and texts. It was probably karma, then, that Peter had managed to reach him just as he was collecting his stuff from his hotel room, ready to check out. Since he’d slept in Amy’s bed the last five nights, and had only visited his hotel to get some fresh clothes, he was going to cancel the rest of his reservation and stay at her place.

  That hadn’t been his suggestion, but hers.

  That morning over breakfast, Amy had shyly proposed that he move in with her for the rest of his stay in Rome. She had given him a blushing smile and argued that he shouldn’t be paying so much money for a hotel room he wasn’t using.

  Patrick had felt bad then. He should have told her long ago that a few nights in a hotel room wasn’t going to break his budget. He should have clarified that he wasn’t some middle-rung employee desperate for a raise, but that his family belonged to the moneyed gentry of the East Coast.

  Only last night, they’d gone grocery shopping together, which had ended with him putting a thirty-euro bottle of red wine in the shopping cart, earning a sideways glance on her part. Patrick had never wasted a second thought on the price of a bottle of wine, or anything else for that matter, but now he was learning firsthand how things went down when you had to economize.

  He didn’t like to admit it, but he was beginning to feel ashamed of his inheritance. He felt so guilty when he witnessed Amy barely getting by on three part-time jobs. He wasn’t exactly an ivory-tower sap who didn’t know the value of money, but it made him stop and think after his girlfriend put the thirty-euro bottle back on the shelf with a laugh and grabbed a carton of boxed Sangiovese instead.

  “Would you mind telling me why I haven’t been able to get a hold of you?” Peter broke into his thoughts.

  Patrick threw a pair of shoes into his suitcase. “Peter, may I remind you that I’m on vacation?”

  “Only if I may remind you that you’re still needed here from time to time. Even on vacation, Patrick, you can’t just disappear from the face of the earth. Your phone was off for several days!”

  “Jesus, Peter—”

  “All hell has broken loose here,” his best friend and division manager insisted. “If we don’t act now, the Hanson Industries takeover is going down the drain. They refuse to abide by the terms that were agreed on. They insist we honor all their employees’ contracts, even though we explicitly stated from the start that we would be introducing our own plans.”

  Patrick stepped into his hotel room’s bathroom and checked the digital clock. He was going to pick Amy up from work and take her to a cozy trattoria. If his cooking had been any better, he’d have made her dinner, but he’d rather not force that on her.

  “Patrick,” Peter whined in his ear. “Are you still there?”

  “Yes, of course I am,” he snapped. “What’s the problem?”

  “What’s the problem?” Peter sounded stunned. “Are you even listening to me? The whole deal is totally useless if we continue their contracts, Patrick! That would mean costs we didn’t add to our estimates. You need to come back and deal with Hanson. He can’t just change his mind and demand different terms. He—”

  “Peter,” Patrick interrupted his friend’s tirade. “I’ve only been gone for a few days, and I certainly won’t come home now because you guys can’t follow through on a transaction that was practically done and dusted. What do we have a legal department for?”

  “This is your deal,” Peter said. “You’re the one who needs to make Hanson see that he’s not in a position to demand new terms. The guy is in debt up to his ears, and he can’t pay back his mortgages. If he doesn’t sell, he’ll be on the street in a month or two.”

  “Exactly,” Patrick barked. “You know that, I know that, and I bet Hanson knows it even better. He’s just trying to get as much out of this deal as he can, but he can’t change the terms when we have far more pull. He’s only bluffing.”

  “How do you know that, Patrick? There’s a lot at stake here. If the board of directors—”

  “Peter,” he interrupted, his voice dangerously low. For an entire year now, he’d been forced to justify his every move, his tiniest decision to the damned board of directors. He was through with that. He was still mad at his father for stipulating in his will that Patrick, as his successor, would have to answer to the board for a full year, even though he was no rookie at twenty-eight, and even though he knew the entire enterprise better than anyone else. Recently, he’d finally become CEO and chairman of Ashcroft Enterprises, but he was still bitter that he’d been forced to act like an intern in a drawn-out probationary period for a full year.

  His mother had always tried to appease him, explaining this transitional period was a mere formality added to the will only because his father had not wished to put too much pressure on his oldest son right away. But Patrick knew better. His father had tried to exert control over him, even from beyond the grave.

  No wonder it had left a decidedly bad taste in his mouth.

  And this was the exact reason he disliked being hounded by Peter. The same reason he was paranoid about the board of directors.

  “And what happens if this deal really goes down the drain?” Peter asked quietly.

  Patrick threw his toothbrush and razor into his toiletry bag. “Hanson is bluffing. I need you to trust me.”

  Hi friend was silent a moment before growling reluctantly, “Alright, alright. I’ll talk to him.”

  “Thank you.” Patrick switched the phone to his other ear. “Any other news? Any more pending catastrophes I should know about?”

  Peter sighed heavily. “No. Apart from Hanson, things are running smoothly. But if you want to do me a favor, switch your phone on from time to time to see if anyone’s called you, okay? I’m really happy for you, that you’re having such a splendid time on your Roman holiday”—he snorted sarcastically—“but don’t forget that you also have a company to run.”

  Patrick made a face in the mirror. “You sound like my mom.”

  “And since your mom is the smartest woman I know, that means you should listen to me.”

  Now Patrick grinned at himself in the mirror. “My mom was the one who pushed me to take this vacation.”

  His pal ignored that. “How much longer do you intend to stay anyway?”

  Patrick rolled his eyes. “I’ve only just arrived.” He scanned the bathroom for any more personal items of his, then went back to the bedroom. “You could do with a little vacation to, buddy.”

  Peter barked out a disdainful laugh. “Oh, sure! You want the whole company to go down the drain?”

  Patrick thought he was wildly exaggerating, but since he knew how much this job meant to his friend, he stayed quiet. They’d known each other since kindergarten, going to school together, playing on the same polo team, and even going to the same college. But unlike Patrick, Peter hadn’t been able to walk into a job at his father’s company with the hope of someday inheriting it. No, his father had gone bankrupt just three years ago, and their fortune had been gone overnight. That meant his job with Ashcroft Enterprises was everything.

  Shaking away those thoughts, Patrick adopted the taunting tone he’d used with Peter for all of twenty years now. “I think you, my friend, overestimate your abilities.”

  Patrick chuckled. “No, I think my powers of estimation are working just fine. For example, I have a pretty good idea what the reason for your prolonged radio silence looks like.”

  Patrick laughed heartily. “Oh, really?”

  “Of course. She’s pretty, right?”

  Patrick shook his head at his friend’s clairvoyance but admitted, “Very pretty.”

  Pe
ter sighed into the phone. “When you broke up with Cynthia, you told me you were swearing off women.”

  “Ain’t a man allowed to change his mind these days?”

  He didn’t feel like telling Peter about Amy, because he knew quite well what kind of advice his best friend would give him. Unfortunately, Peter was a pessimist when it came to relationships. He would have reminded Patrick of all the times he’d almost fallen into the clutches of a gold digger. But this thing with Amy was so new and exciting that Patrick wanted to have it all to himself. He refused to let anyone spoil his current happiness.

  “You’re a grown man,” Peter grumbled. “You can do whatever you want.”

  “Thank you very much, Dad.”

  Ignoring Patrick’s sarcasm, Peter cleared his throat and became serious. “Look, I know you don’t want to hear this now, but think about—”

  “My battery’s running low,” Patrick interrupted.

  Peter snorted into his ear. “Message received.” He paused to sigh. “Sarah asked me how you’re doing.”

  Switching the phone to his other ear again, Patrick threw a book into his suitcase. “And how is your sister?”

  “She signed the lease on her new apartment. She’s planning a housewarming party.” Peter sighed, now completely focused on his “concerned big brother” role. “She’d love it if you came.”

  “Sure,” Patrick mumbled distractedly. He had just glanced at his watch. “Hey, I have to go now. Say hi to your parents, okay?”

  “Patrick—”

  “Bye.” Without another word, he ended the call and threw his phone on the bed.

  Then he took a few deep breaths, glad to be done with Peter for the moment. He’d had such a lovely time over the last few days, but now he felt like he had to gasp to get enough air into his lungs. The reminder of his duties in New York City had driven away the relaxation and ease of the preceding days.