12 Men for Christmas

by Phillipa Ashley

  “I’m sure she likes her independence,” commented Emma, smiling inwardly at his well-meaning interference. Didn’t she try and do the same herself with her own parents?

  She paused, held her breath for a tiny moment, then dared some more. “Is that why you joined the rescue team? Because they tried to help your dad that day?”

  She saw the tiny smile curve his lips. “I was grateful to them…when I’d stopped being angry they didn’t reach him in time. Of course, it wasn’t their fault, but for a while, I needed to blame somebody. I was on my probationary year with the squad at the time. Everyone has to do it, to prove they can cut it with the team. I joined because—well, I just wanted to use my skills to help other people. Corny but true. I’d been climbing since I was a lad, and I know these hills like the back of my hand.”

  He took a sip from his glass and then set it down, leaving her waiting for more. He looked her full in the face. “Believe it or not, I like helping people, Emma.”

  He paused, leaving Emma unsure if he was referring to his reluctance to support the calendar or his behavior in her office—or neither. She tried not to react and took a sip of wine.

  Will carried on. “You see, sometimes people get hurt, even when you don’t mean them to—when it’s ultimately for their own good. It’s like on the hillside when someone’s in pain and we have to move them or treat them. Sometimes we know it’s going to hurt before we can make things better for them. It’s the part I hate, but I’m afraid that’s the way it is.”

  Emma was puzzled and a little disturbed by his words. She was wondering what he meant. Was he trying to justify the way he’d behaved toward her? No, she reasoned, she was reading way too much into things. She knew that the team often had to make some difficult decisions when they were on rescues, and it must be upsetting, no matter how much of a brave face they tried to put on it.

  As if reading her mind, Will reached for the bottle. “Now. This isn’t a very nice subject,” he said, smiling. “Let’s talk about something else. Do you want some more wine?”

  She put her hand over her half-full glass.

  “No thanks. And, Will, even if it hurts, I—I’d rather know the absolute truth.”

  “The absolute truth?” he echoed. “I’m not sure anyone wants to hear the absolute truth. An approximation maybe, a sanitized version…”

  “I always want to know everything. However unpalatable.” She was amazed at her daring.

  “What makes you think you don’t know everything? What else is there to know?” He paused, waiting for his nose to grow or to be struck down by a thunderbolt. Nothing worse happened than a gust of wind flapping the sails. He looked up at the darkening sky. “So go ahead. Ask me another one. I think I can guess your specialist subject by now.”

  Not really, she thought. Not if I asked what I really want to. Why did you jilt your fiancée on your wedding day? Why don’t you want a real relationship? And what do you want from me other than a night in bed?

  “I’m waiting,” he teased.

  “The calendar,” she blurted out, then caught his exasperated look. “I know you don’t agree with it—even though you did offer to sponsor it, though I’m not convinced that was entirely altruistic…”

  He suddenly seemed to be studying a bar of clouds over the darkening mountains.

  “It’s not because you’re worried about people seeing you naked, is it?”

  He threw back his head and laughed at that. “We’ve already been through all the reasons why I didn’t—still don’t—agree with it…but I’ll tell you this much. Being seen in the nude is definitely not one of them. On the other hand,” he added, moving a little closer to her in the gathering twilight, “are you?”

  “Am I what?”

  “Bothered about me being seen naked by the women of Bannerdale?”

  Her laugh of derision sounded hollow even to her own ears. Oh God, she hadn’t thought of that. He was right; she couldn’t bear the thought of it.

  “Or do you think most of them have seen me already? That’s what you think, isn’t it?”

  “Don’t be ridiculous!” she exclaimed, her cheeks flaming. “As if I care whether they have or haven’t.”

  “How would you like it, then?” he persisted, ignoring her fierce blush.

  “Like what?”

  “Like to have all the men in Bannerdale admiring your breasts?”

  Her mouth dropped open. “That’s different.”

  “I don’t see how.”

  “Because a woman…she’d be viewed as a sex object. With you, it’s more…well, a bit of a joke.”

  “Thanks. You sure know how to boost a man’s confidence.”

  “I didn’t mean it like that. I didn’t mean you personally…”

  “So you would view me as a sex object, huh?”

  “Stop it!” she cried, but she was trying to stifle her laughter. “Stop trying to twist everything I say. I know you hate—hated—the idea, and I’m…um…very grateful to you for taking part against your better judgment. It is going to be a success, and it is going to raise a lot of money for the base. Even you can’t argue with that.”

  “You’re right, and I don’t want to argue with you. You don’t honestly think I want you to fail, do you? Because if you do, we may as well go home right now.” He took her hands in his and rubbed his thumbs gently over the palms, caressing the skin where she’d grazed it after her fall. “I only wish good things for you. I would never want you to be hurt.” He lifted his eyes to hers and looked into them unflinchingly. “I would never want to do that, Emma. No matter what else you think about me, you must know that.”

  Her stomach somersaulted. The sky was indigo now, lights twinkling on both sides of the lake as she heard the rattle of the anchor being raised. The splash of the water against the bow told her they were moving again. He still had her hands in his; his mouth was inches away from hers. She wanted him so much, and it was no use now, trying to deny the absolute truth: she was falling in love with him.

  Chapter 10

  Will’s mouth had barely reached hers when Emma heard the noise behind them. A figure emerged from the gloom and coughed softly. “Sorry to disturb you both, but we need to know. Where are we going, Will? Back to Bannerdale or over to Ghyllside?”

  It was Charles Stanton, hovering by the door to the cabin. Will was still holding her hands in his. “Thanks, Charles. We haven’t decided yet, have we, Emma? Can you give us a few more minutes?”

  The older man nodded. “Right you are, then. Let me know as soon as you can.”

  As soon as they were alone again, she dared to ask him, “How can we get to Ghyllside from here?”

  “You’ll find out,” he answered softly, smiling and squeezing her fingers. “If you really want to, that is.”

  Her legs felt like cotton batting, and she was glad, so glad, she was sitting down.

  “It’s your choice,” he murmured. “I won’t try and make you do anything you don’t want to.”

  She could feel her heart racing as she contemplated the step she was about to take. She couldn’t see his face properly in the twilight, but she knew what he was saying clearly enough.

  He was asking her to let him make love to her. To undress her and explore her body with those rough and tender hands…and no matter how gently, how carefully he phrased it, he wanted to take her.

  And she wanted to be taken. She wanted to spend the night with him so much, she was aching all the way from her heart to her womb. But not just one night—she wanted every night. Now and forever.

  But this might be the only night she’d ever have.

  She felt dizzy with desire and longing, the reply catching in her dry throat.

  “Emma, it’s time. I need to know, sweetheart. Is it back to where we started, or are you coming home with me?”

  She gave his hand the
lightest of squeezes and whispered, “Home with you.”

  As soon as the words left her lips, Will dropped her hand and left her alone on the deck. Shivering in the damp night air, she pulled her shawl tighter. Her heart thudded. She couldn’t say he’d put any pressure on her. He had asked, and she had said, clearly, yes. She wouldn’t be able to complain if, in the morning, she woke up to an awkward silence and a hasty departure.

  Or if she got hurt.

  The yacht pressed onward toward the opposite side of the lake, where the dark shadows of trees were looming in the dim twilight. Splotches of light from a house glimmered between the branches. In the darkness, she heard him return to her side and felt his arm circle firmly around her shoulders. “Where are we going?” she murmured, already knowing the answer but wanting to hear him say it out loud.

  “To bed.”

  Never had two such little words had the power to turn her body molten from the core.

  “I’m taking you home to bed, sweetheart.”

  He got to his feet, pulling her up with him and pressing her hard against his body. Then he began to satisfy the hunger she’d endured ever since he had left her so empty on the hillside. His mouth was on hers, and this time…this time…he flicked his tongue gently inside her mouth, giving her a taste of the long, sweet night that was surely to come.

  As his soft kiss deepened, became harder and more urgent, she dared to explore his mouth the way she’d longed to do, knowing that this time, he was going to finish what he’d started. She felt his thumb skim her nipples, and instantly, they hardened to his touch.

  “Cold?” he whispered.

  She shook her head defiantly.

  “Good. Then you won’t need this.” He pulled the shawl from her shoulders and let it fall onto the deck. He bent his head and trailed his tongue along the top of her cleavage. She arched her back, pressing her pelvis against his body, and felt the hard length of him pressing against her stomach through the flimsy silk of her dress.

  “Still not cold?”

  “No,” she murmured, pushing her hands inside his jacket, tracing his spine and the taut muscles of his back through his shirt. As she stood on tiptoe to reach his mouth again, a soft bump made her look up as Artemis nudged a black jetty jutting out into the lake. Now there really was no going back.

  She had no problem now with letting him help her over the rail and onto the jetty in front of a large house. Light from the windows revealed the wooden slats leading from the lake onto a gravel drive. She gazed up at the house where the soft light was spilling out from some of the downstairs rooms and one of the upper ones. She didn’t need to ask him. This was his home—Ghyllside Cottage.

  The yacht’s engine faded into the darkness as she heard Will calling goodbye to the crew. The wooden boards were damp and cool under the soles of her feet. Her bare feet.

  “Wait!” she cried, dashing to the end of the jetty and grabbing his arm. “My shoes. They’re still on board, quick!”

  “It’s too late, Emma. It’s gone.”

  “No!” she wailed. “What am I going to do without them?”

  “Stay in bed all day?” he offered. “Look, I’ll drive you home via the marina tomorrow, and we’ll get them. In the meantime, I’ll carry you to the house.”

  “No,” she protested, suddenly shy. “I…I can’t have that.”

  “Fine by me. As long as you don’t mind walking along the jetty, but I warn you, there are splinters in it as well as the odd slug or snail…”

  “Carry me,” she squealed, putting her arms around his neck.

  “Good decision.”

  “But don’t drop me!”

  “Emma, what do you think I spend half my life doing?”

  Being carried off to bed by him should have felt like a cliché. It didn’t. It felt more sexy and exciting than she could ever have imagined. She could still feel the tension in his arms as he carried her along the jetty to the lawn in front of the house.

  She wasn’t a waif, and just thinking of how strong he was to carry her all that way turned her on even more. His shoes crunched on the gravel drive as they neared the house. Even in the darkness, she could see it was massive. A white rendered house with leaded windows. “This isn’t a cottage,” she said as he set her down in the canopied porch, and she felt the sudden chill of the tiles under her feet.

  “That’s what it was called when I bought it. The Edwardians must have liked picturesque names.” He took a key out of his pocket and unlocked the oak door. “In you go,” he said, urging her into the hall, his fingers lingering unashamedly on her silk-clad bottom.

  “That’s outrageous…”

  “Couldn’t resist it,” he replied, patting her backside unrepentantly. Ignoring her shriek of indignation, Will just smiled. “Now get inside,” he ordered. She was ready to combust with fury and, she had to admit, lust.

  Stepping onto the polished floor of the hall, her eyes were drawn to an oak-paneled staircase rising to the second floor. Her skin tingled as his fingers brushed her bare shoulders, pulling off her shawl and dropping it on a chair.

  “Do you want coffee?” he asked, dropping a kiss on the back of her neck that made the downy hairs rise in anticipation. “Or can I take you straight up to bed?”

  “I don’t want coffee.”

  “Good, because I’m not making any. Now—up to bed,” he said, picking her up again without asking permission. “It doesn’t have to be mine, you know,” he told her as he carried her up the stairs, his eyes sparkling. At the top of the landing, he paused. “I’ve got a spare room if you want…”

  Her eyes took in the doors leading off the landing, resting on the one at the end, soft light escaping through the half-open door.

  “Were you expecting me?”

  “No.”

  It sounded very unconvincing.

  “What if I took you at your word about the spare room?” she asked.

  “I hope you don’t, because you know what? I might have to ignore you,” he answered, carrying her to the end of the landing and nudging open his bedroom door. “Because every day and every night since I saw you on that hillside, I have wanted to take you to bed. But since I promised this could be a no-strings day, if you still want it to stay that way, just say the word.”

  “Will,” she murmured as he put her gently down on her feet in his bedroom, “don’t be so…” He stopped her mid-phrase with a kiss. While he deepened it with his tongue, she slipped the jacket off his shoulders, letting it fall to the floor. The bow tie followed, a rustle of silk against the collar. Her fingers were fumbling at the buttons of his shirt in her haste to get at his body. She hauled out his shirt, then dragged the sleeves down his arms, almost ripping off the cuffs. She wanted him—wanted him so badly she didn’t care what happened tomorrow.

  Then her hands moved lower, flicking open the button of his trousers, the zip slithering halfway down. Slipping her hand inside his boxer shorts, she echoed his gasp of pleasure with a moan of delight, unable to believe how hard he was.

  “That’s outrageous,” he groaned as she wrapped her fingers around him. His hands closed on hers, gently but firmly. “No. Not yet.”

  “No?”

  “Very, very soon, I promise. First, there’s something that I’ve wanted to do for so long. That I’ve got to do,” he murmured. As he held her in his arms, her legs seemed to have lost their bones and turned to unsupported flesh.

  She wanted to melt like butter and let him slice through her.

  He turned her around to face an antique, full-length mirror, and then she saw herself. She was leaning back against him, her cheeks flushed with desire, her nipples straining against her dress. She could feel him against the small of her back, and what he said made her legs feel very wobbly indeed.

  “It’s my turn to undress you. Your turn to feel what it’s like to have nothi
ng between you and me. No protection.”

  No protection? She’d never felt so safe or protected in her life, with those strong arms around her.

  “Look at yourself,” he ordered.

  Over her shoulder, she saw him, holding one hand against her lower stomach so she was pressed firmly against him. The other hovered above the zip of her dress.

  “I want this off right now.”

  His fingers lingered on the skin above the zip for a moment, sending a shiver of anticipation down her spine. Then she heard the sound of the zip being drawn down agonizingly slowly. The black silk parted to reveal her naked back and the waistband of the tiniest thong she owned.

  “Will…oh…”

  “You bad, bad girl.”

  “Don’t tease m—”

  He put a finger on her lips and kissed the top of her head. His hands were on her shoulders now, strong fingers sliding under the wispy straps and slipping them down. She couldn’t believe someone so big and so powerful could be so gentle. And yet, of course, it was his job to be gentle and strong. He had been on the mountain that day. As he’d dressed her hands, as he’d hurt her while he was helping her. He had been as gentle as he could, as he knew how to be.

  He was a man used to being in control, and she knew that. Accepted now, the brisk tenderness that was Will. Like now, as he freed her of the tight restraint of her bodice. As he peeled the black silk from her breasts, as he took them in his hands and held their weight and let out a breath that told her exactly how beautiful he found them.

  Turning her to face him again, he pressed her aching nipples against his hair-roughened chest, then traced a molten arc along her shoulders and spine with his long, strong fingers. Power with sensitivity, that was what Will had more than any man she’d ever known. It was a mind-blowing combination that was overwhelming her mind and body.

  Will truly believed the ache between his thighs couldn’t possibly get any fiercer as he caressed the slender yet ripe curves he’d dreamed of for so long.