Too damn long.
I needed her now.
Briefly the idea of dragging her behind the bushes and taking her fast and hard passed through my mind, but I tossed it aside just as quickly. I wasn’t averse to public sex—obviously—but the first time I was with Sophie was going to be different. I wasn’t going to act like a fucking animal with her. It needed to be special.
Alright then, an hour it is, I thought as I tried to reign in my lust. Stymied, I ran my hand through my hair and looked around for the nearest park exist when a realization, crystal clear, hit me. We were surrounded by hotels.
I grabbed Sophie’s hand and pulled. “Come with me,” I shot over my shoulder as she rushed to keep up with my brisk pace.
“Where are we going?” she called out. “I thought your place wasn’t nearby.”
“It’s not. I’m taking you to a hotel.”
Sophie stopped dead in her tracks. “What? No.”
Before she could protest further, I pulled her up against me, pushed my hand into her hair and wrapped the long, golden locks around my fist. Tugging her head back so that her eyes lifted to mine, I stated, “I’m taking you to the classiest fucking hotel in the city and I’m not letting you leave until you’ve had at least ten orgasms.”
When her eyes flashed emerald fire and narrowed, I knew I’d said the wrong thing.
“Is this how you normally do it?” she asked, her voice dripping with disdain. “You have a room ready and waiting at every hotel in the city so that whenever you want a quick fuck you just have to walk a few hundred yards?”
Angry over the accusation, I yanked on her hair harder but she didn’t make a sound beyond a tiny, quick exhale. It had to have stung, but so did her indictment.
“No, and if you say something fucked up like that again, I’ll have to punish you.”
At my words, her pupils dilated to inky black pools, the idea of me spanking that delectably sweet ass a huge turn on for her. Was she picturing the rosy red handprint I’d leave behind? My dick jumped, excited by the prospect.
“I want to take you to my house where no woman has ever been and get lost in you,” I confessed on a growl. “But neither of us can wait that long so I’m going to get us a room and for the next several hours I’m going to show you why giving yourself to me is the single best decision you’ll ever make.”
When she didn’t fight me anymore, the unspoken capitulation made my blood pump hot and fast through my veins.
A handful of seconds later, we exited the square and I pulled her impatiently along beside me to the front of The Georgian House Hotel. I’d been to a wedding there for one of my teammates, a rich fuck with supposedly aristocratic lineage, and knew it was as classy as it got.
I squeezed Sophie’s hand and led her up the steps, past the liveried doorman, and into the hotel’s expansive white marble lobby. A young blonde woman at the registration desk looked up from her computer, a polite smile pasted on her face. The smile turned predatory as she dragged her eyes down my body, barely sparing a glance for the woman at my side.
Ignoring Sophie’s presence entirely, she asked, “And how can I help you, sir?”
“We’d like a room please.”
She didn’t so much as blink and her lack of outward response made me wonder if people frequently marched in at random, demanding rooms.
“Of course sir. For how many nights.”
I glanced at Sophie, my eyebrow raised in question. We hadn’t talked about spending the night together. Shit, we hadn’t talked about any of this. As of this morning, I’d been under strict orders not to touch her, let alone kiss her. That we were about to fuck was a miracle.
Sophie straightened to her full height and spoke without shame. “One night please.”
“One night it is.” Agnes, the receptionist’s name tag read, smiled knowingly as she clacked away at her keyboard. Looking up from the screen, she said, “We have a standard queen room in the garden wing for €260.”
I would have gladly taken it until she smirked and I realized she was trying to foist a bad room off on us. It probably shared a wall with the laundry room or looked out over the garbage bins. Not good enough.
“What else do you have?”
“Just a second, sir.”
For a full minute, she typed away, studiously ignoring us.
“We have a deluxe king in the main house with a view of the gardens for €650.” Her smile was smug, as if she thought I couldn’t afford the astronomical sum.
Who could blame her though? While both Sophie and I were dressed stylishly, we didn’t necessarily look expensive even though the jeans I wore cost more than the first room she quoted, my jacket double that. But how many people in their mid-twenties could walk into a luxury hotel and plunk down well over 500 quid without batting an eyelash? Trust fund babies and celebrities, that was who. Fuck it all. Sophie did have a trust fund and I was a fucking celebrity.
Even so, when a man in an expertly cut three-piece suit and his wife, who rocked a diamond as big as an egg, walked past it was clear we were much younger than the hotel’s regular clientele. I didn’t care though. I had needs that needed seeing to.
“We’ll take it.”
“No, Declan. That’s too much money,” Sophie gulped, clasping my arm.
“Excuse us a moment.”
Towing her off to the side of the room, I told her, “Where you’re concerned, nothing is too much. I’d pay triple that for a chance to be with you.”
When she shot me a withering glare I realized my mistake: I’d made her sound like a prostitute.
“You know I didn’t mean it like that. I want you Soph, and at the risk of losing my man card, I want our first time together to be special.”
“I do too, but I don’t need an expensive hotel for it to be special. I just need you.”
One of the things I loved about Sophie was even though she came from money, she didn’t require the trappings of wealth to be content. I would be lying if I said it didn’t matter. A few of the lads on my team had struggled with gold diggers when they’d first come into their money. Even now one of them was going through a nasty divorce with a woman he’d knocked up the first year he’d made it big. But Mick’s problems were the least of my concerns right now.
“Look at it this way. The IRFU pays me a sizable sum to put my body on the line every week, and I’d like to use a small fraction of that cash on something to make my body feel good.” I moved in closer and pushed a lock of hair behind her ear. “Let me make your body feel good too.”
Sophie visibly shivered. On a sigh, she said. “You’re a persuasive man, Declan O’Shaughnessy.”
Victory!
I grinned back, happy as I’d ever been. “I know,” I answered, trailing my finger down her cheek before stepping away.
Hand in hand, we returned to reception. “We’ll take it,” I told Agnes.
“That’s wonderful,” she drawled, obviously not meaning it. “I’ll just need a credit card.”
I dropped Sophie’s hand and reached into my back pocket to pull out my wallet. When I slid my platinum American Express toward her, Agnes’s eyes widened in surprise before she glanced up at me, then back to the card in her hand. Setting it on the counter next to her keyboard, she started clacking away again at her computer. In the reflection of her glasses I could see she’d done a Google search and picture after picture of me in my Dublin and Ireland uniforms showed on her screen. When she looked up again to confirm what her computer was telling her, I smiled smugly.
“Of course, Mr. O’Shaughnessy. Let me just see which room we have available for you,” she continued, despite her having already offered me a room I’d agreed to take.
“It turns out our Oscar Suite is available. I’d be happy to offer you that room free of charge if that works for you? After all, it’s not often we’re lucky enough to have a servant of Ireland staying with us.”
That was because most of us actually lived in Dublin. And given that
, I could only imagine what Agnes thought about me bringing a woman to a hotel instead of taking her home. Chances were this would be all over the gossip press by morning.
Smiling tightly, I said, “That’d be fine.”
She’d said the room was free, but I wondered how many autographs it was going to cost me. I’d have been happy to pay but I was used to this game by now. I received a lot of things for free these days: my Range Rover, a gym membership (that I never used since the gym paled in comparison to the team’s facilities), meals, drinks, clothes. If a local company could give one of us something in return for a picture, autograph, or a mention on Twitter, practically anything was ours for the taking. But whatever Agnes (or her manager) asked for would have to wait.
“And thank you, Agnes, for all your help this afternoon. If you want anything signed, I’d be happy to on our way out tomorrow,” I said, stressing the tomorrow part.
No way was I getting caught standing here in the lobby glad-handing every hotel employee who happened to be working today.
Agnes’s face flushed pink with embarrassment. “Oh,” she said, clearly disappointed. “I was hoping to get a few photos with you now.”
“Just you?” I asked, needing to wrap this up soon.
“Yes!” she practically yelled. “Just a quick selfie,” she added, rushing out from behind the desk with her phone in hand.
Sophie stepped away while Agnes stood on her toes and I crouched down. A few clicks later, she scrolled through the pictures to make sure she’d gotten a good one. Her lips pursed, she turned to me. “Do you think we could get a few more? My eyes are closed in most of them.”
“Tomorrow, definitely.”
Impatience made my voice tight as I leveled a no-nonsense glare at her.
“Oh! Of course Mr. O’Shaughnessy.”
Rounding to the other side of the desk, she prepared our key cards and when she slid them my way, my heart quickened with anticipation. Eight-year-old Declan did a little jig while his adult Declan tightened all over, knowing what came next.
Chapter Twenty
Sophie
The elevator took forever. At least, that’s what it felt like given enough time had passed for me to ask myself a hundred times what the ever-loving-fuck I was doing on my way to a hotel room with Declan O’Shaughnessy.
It wasn’t that I was opposed to having sex with him—clearly—but I really had no clue how I’d gone from telling him “no touching, no kissing” to making my way toward an elegant hotel room where he’d do inelegant things to me. If those toe-curling kisses of his were anything to go by, he was about to prove why he carried himself with such a confident swagger.
When we finally reached our room, instead of tapping the keycard to the lock, Declan backed me up against the wall. When his eyes roved over my face and he stared down at me in wonder—like he couldn’t believe we were doing this—all rational thought fled.
His lips hovered over mine, teasing, and I held my breath, waiting for him to kiss me. His hand cupped my cheek and I leaned into him as he angled my mouth where he wanted it. He nuzzled me softly and then, after what felt like years had passed in the span of a single blink, he finally kissed me. A tangle of tongues and clashing lips, I whimpered into his mouth, wanting more. I pulled him tighter and ground my pelvis against his erection.
The lock clicked open and we fell through the door, a tangle of limbs and erratic breaths. With my wrists clasped in one hand over my head, the other glided down my curves. I moaned with want just before he brought his lips back to mine and kissed me deep.
Pressing his body to mine, he whispered, “Do you feel what you do to me?”
Could I ever!
I wanted that thick, hard bulge inside of me. But not yet. First we needed to talk, lay down some ground rules.
“Declan, wait,” I whispered as I strained to keep a hold on my reason. When he kept kissing me, I tugged my hands from his grip. “Stop.”
The force of my command breaking through his lust, he dropped my wrists and took a hurried step back. Exhaling, he laced his hands behind his head and held my gaze.
“I thought you wanted this?”
“I do. I wouldn’t be here if I didn’t.” The relief in his eyes was palpable. “I just want to …”
Want to what? I asked myself. Why was I delaying? I’d said I was up for this and I’d meant it. I wanted this, so what was I waiting for?
“I just want to set some ground rules,” I finished lamely.
He angled his head and stared at me for a few beats before asking, “Like what?”
“Well, for starters, we’re not doing this without a condom. I assume you have one?”
He scoffed and I realized what a naïve question that was.
“I never leave home without one.”
Logically speaking, I knew every sexually active man in the first world likely carried a condom in their wallets, but I wasn’t thinking logically. I was letting my emotions run this show and they were out of control. They did not like the idea that Declan always carried a condom because Declan was always having sex. Hot, dirty, anonymous sex.
Which, I reminded myself, was exactly why we needed the condom in the first place.
“Right, of course,” I answered, pushing aside my ridiculous thoughts.
Better than him not having a condom and our sexy time being put on hold, I told myself.
“So that’s me covered. You’re on birth control, yeah?”
“Of course I’m on the pill.”
“Good. That’s good,” he answered thoughtfully, rubbing his chin. “And you’ve been tested? You’re clean?”
Wait, what? Wasn’t I supposed to be asking him these questions?
I stared at him with narrowed eyes, my green-eyed monster taking over. Before I could stop this ugly person who lived inside of me, I spat, “Do you ask all your women that?”
It was the second time in less than an hour I’d brought up his past and I hated myself for it. I’d always thought I wasn’t a judgy person, but I was beginning to rethink that position. Because I judged him. Openly and bitingly.
He turned a few shades of red and dragged his palms down his face. “Jesus Christ, Sophie.”
“What? Am I killing the mood?”
Why are you doing this? my conscience screamed. This isn’t like you. Stop it!
Why in the hell had I brought up his past? It’s not like he’d hidden who he was. I’d thought I was okay with it. That all those women meant nothing to me because they’d meant nothing to him. But I couldn’t seem to help myself. Jealousy had reared its ugly head and demanded to be heard.
Declan marched across the suite to stare out the window. After a few tense moments he turned back to me, his eyes blazing. “I said no pressure and I meant it, but I think this was a bad idea. I can call you a cab or drive you home. Your choice.”
“Wait, no.” I took two steps toward him but stopped when he looked at me with contempt.
“I’m sorry. Really. That was rude of me. The only thing I can say in my defense is that when you asked if I was clean, all these angry, jealous, vile thoughts ran through my head and before I could stop myself, I lashed out.”
His anger had abated, but he looked at me now with weary eyes.
“Can we call it even?” I implored.
Bracing his hands on the window sill behind him, Declan crossed his feet at the ankles and studied me. A beat later, he shook his head and sighed. “I can’t change who I am Sophie. Who I was. But if my past bothers you that much, we shouldn’t do this.”
I dropped my eyes and stared at the floor. “I want you Declan. Really, I do, but I’m worried about being just be another notch on your bedpost.”
Pushing off the window, he crossed the room in three purposeful strides. Wrapping his large hands around my arms, he squeezed them gently. I raised my eyes to his.
“How can I make you see that’s not true?”
“I don’t know. Maybe you can’t.”
; When I looked away, he groaned and loosened his grip. Trying a different tactic, he asked, “What are you most afraid of?”
Man up Sophie, I thought to myself. If you’re not brave enough to have The Talk, you’re not mature enough to have The Sex.
I couldn’t help how I felt and if we didn’t get this out in the open, it might always be between us. And despite this being a difficult conversation, it was more important to tell him how I felt than to keep it bottled up inside and resent him in the future because I hadn’t been honest with him from the get go.
I took a deep breath and squared my shoulders. “The thing I’m most afraid of is you’re going to be with me today, then turn around and fuck someone else three days from now. I’m worried that if we do this, it’s not going to mean the same thing to you that it’ll mean to me.”
He closed his eyes and exhaled loudly as he pinched his fingers around the bridge of his nose. When he opened them, he dropped his hand and leveled an indecipherable gaze on me.
“How can you think that?”
“I know it’s not fair of me to judge you for your past, but you don’t exactly have a solid track record here. Tell me I’m wrong. Convince me that when we walk out of here you’re not going to think, ‘That Sophie, she was one hell of a lay. Who’s next?’”
“Is that really what you think of me?” he asked somberly.
“That’s what I was talking about earlier,” I answered sadly. “I don’t really know you, do I? What if you forget about me tomorrow?”
“That won’t happen.”
I continued as if he hadn’t spoken because if I didn’t, I’d never say what needed to be said.
“I know I’m leaving soon and less than an hour ago I told you we should just enjoy each other while we had the chance, but I think I’ve been fooling myself. I can’t be casual with you, Declan. If we’re going to be together, it has to be more than just sex.”
My eyes dropped to the patterned rug at our feet and I held my breath, waiting for him to laugh, scoff, or otherwise indicate I was being completely unrealistic with my expectations. Which is why I was taken by surprise when he lifted my chin with his finger and, staring into my eyes, chased away all my doubt and fear.
Trying Sophie: A Dublin Rugby Romance Page 19
