The humiliating shame of her previous dates made her cringe on a daily basis. It had stopped her from venturing further into the dating world out of fear of further embarrassment. She’d had five dates and given up accepting any other invitations. Five dates! How pathetic was that? She didn’t know why she had become so sensually locked down but, ever since she’d hit puberty, the thought of sharing her body with someone had paralysed her with fear.
What if they didn’t like her body? What if she wasn’t the right shape or size? What if she didn’t do or say the right thing and they thought her a freak? What if she fell in love and got rejected like her mother had got rejected by her father?
Every time she went on a date those fears would flap through her brain like a swarm of frenzied bats. What if? What if? What if? It made it impossible to think of anything else but escaping as soon as she could. Not exactly the best way to find the life partner you’d been dreaming of finding since you’d been a little girl.
But her plan to get Louis to help her was a master stroke of genius. He was exactly the right person to help her overcome this hurdle of intimacy avoidance. Then she would be free to search for Mr Right.
One of her flatmates, Millie, peered round Ivy’s bedroom door. ‘Woo-hoo. You look gorgeous. Are you going on a date?’ She waggled her eyebrows meaningfully.
‘Don’t get too excited. It’s not really a date.’ Ivy put her lip-gloss back in her cosmetics bag. ‘I’m going out for dinner with Louis Charpentier.’
Millie came further into the bedroom, eyebrows raised. ‘Your brother’s friend? The four-times-and-counting hot bachelor of the year? For dinner? How is that not a date?’
Ivy adjusted her little black dress over her hips. ‘We’re just...catching up.’
Millie’s gaze ran over Ivy’s outfit and make-up. ‘Mmm, methinks you’ve gone to a lot of trouble for a simple catch-up with a friend. Are you sure nothing’s going on?’
Ivy flicked an imaginary piece of lint off her shoulder. ‘Of course, I’m sure. It’s not a big deal. Louis likes to check up on me now and again now that Ronan’s living in Sydney.’
Millie gave a light laugh. ‘Gosh, I would love someone as hot as Louis Charpentier to check up on me every now and again. What do you two talk about when you get together?’
‘Just...stuff. Movies, books, work—that sort of thing.’ A trickle of fear slithered its way down Ivy’s spine. What had she got herself in to? She was actually going to have sex. With her brother’s best friend. Eek. Ivy felt bad about not being totally truthful with her friend. Why should it matter if she told Millie about her plan? But surely the less people who knew, the better? It was a one-off thing with Louis. No point allowing her friends to think it was anything else.
Millie leaned down and peered into Ivy’s face. ‘Why are you blushing?’
‘I’m not blushing.’ Ivy might as well not have bothered with using blusher, the way her cheeks were feeling.
Millie straightened and folded her arms. ‘Come on. Fess up. What is going on with you and Louis?’
Ivy should know it was virtually impossible to keep a secret from Millie. Her friend was like a sniffer dog for secrets. The trouble was, she wasn’t so good at keeping them. Ivy met her friend’s gaze and released a sigh. ‘He’s helping me with something.’
Millie frowned. ‘What something? Has your mum been leaning on you for money again?’
‘No. It’s about me. About my...problem.’
Millie’s eyes widened to the size of light bulbs. Football-stadium light bulbs. ‘The V problem? Seriously—you’re asking him to do what, exactly?’
‘I’m going to have a one-night stand with him. Then my problem will be solved.’
‘And he’s agreed to that?’
‘Not in so many words, hence dinner tonight. But I’m not going to let him talk me out of it. He’s the only person who can help me. The only person I want to help me. I’d be too embarrassed or shy with anyone else.’
Millie’s expression was etched in concern. ‘But what if you develop feelings for him? I mean, different from what you have for him now?’
Ivy laughed, picked up her hairbrush and began stroking it through her hair. ‘You mean like fall in love with him? Not a chance. He’s not the settling down type. It would be stupid to fall in love with him, knowing he doesn’t want the same things in life that I do. Louis only has one-nighters. I want someone who’s there for the long haul. Someone who’ll stick around no matter what—unlike my father. Not that Louis is anything like my father, but you know what I mean. Once a playboy, always a playboy.’
Millie’s expression was so sceptical she could have been keynote speaker at a sceptics’ conference. ‘What your father’s done really sucks, but have you actually looked at Louis lately? I mean, really looked at him? The man is traffic-stopping gorgeous.’
‘I know, but I don’t think of him that way,’ Ivy said, spraying perfume on her pulse points. She wasn’t sure why she didn’t see Louis the way other women did...although there had been a strange little flicker of something when their hands had touched that afternoon. A tingle travelled up her arm like a current of electricity. And when he’d used a French term of endearment, well, what girl wouldn’t have got a shiver down her spine? But her preference had always been for blond men and Louis, with his Anglo-French ancestry, had pitch-black hair. Not her type at all.
‘You might think of him that way once you get naked with him.’
Get naked with him. The words made her skin lift in a delicate shiver. Ivy put the perfume bottle down with a definitive clunk. ‘Not going to happen. This is just about sex, nothing else.’
‘So how long are you going to be sleeping with him?’
‘Just for one night.’
Ivy picked up her evening bag and smoothed her hand over her fluttering stomach. If I can convince him and then have the guts to go through with it.
‘Wish me luck?’
Millie gave her a long, searching look. ‘You’re going to need more than luck. You’re the last person on earth—apart from me, of course—who’s a one-night stand sort of person. People are always telling me to move on from losing Julian but it’s too hard these days to find someone who doesn’t expect you to put out before you even get to know them.’
Millie had tragically lost her fiancé, Julian, to brain cancer only weeks before their wedding three years ago. His battle to fight it had been long and gruelling and it was heartbreakingly sad Millie hadn’t got to marry her childhood sweetheart before he died. Apart from a disastrous blind date set up by another friend a couple of months ago, Millie had point-blank refused to think of finding room in her heart for anyone else.
Ivy took Millie’s hand and gave it a squeeze. ‘What you had with Jules was really special, and I don’t blame you for finding it hard to think of moving on. But don’t you see? I want that sort of love one day too, but I won’t find it spending yet another weekend at home alone watching box sets.’
Millie touched Ivy on the arm, her expression serious. ‘Are you sure you’re doing the right thing? This might change your relationship with Louis for ever. Are you prepared to risk that?’
Ivy straightened her shoulders. ‘I have to do this, Millie. I want to be able to date a guy without my inexperience hanging over me and this is the best way to do it.’ She leaned forward and kissed her friend on the cheek. ‘But thanks for being concerned about me.’
The doorbell sounded at that moment and Ivy’s stomach pitched. ‘That’ll be Louis.’ She waved a hand on her way out of the bedroom. ‘Don’t wait up!’
Louis had lost count of the number of times he’d taken a woman out to dinner, so there was no reason why this time he should be feeling as if this date was something special.
Date? Is that what this is?
No. It. Was. Not. He hadn’t committed to anything. One part of him was d
etermined to talk Ivy out of her plan to have him initiate her into the joy of sex, the other part of him was mentally stockpiling condoms and scented candles. What had got into him? Where were his set-in-stone boundaries?
Louis adjusted his tie and then pressed the doorbell on Ivy’s flat. The sound of heels click-clacking on floorboards sent his pulse up. Was it his imagination or could he already smell her perfume? The door opened and Ivy stood there in a little black dress that clung to every delicious curve on her body, the vertiginous heels she was wearing showcasing her slim legs and ankles. Her hair was loose around her shoulders, and his fingers itched so much to reach out and touch it, he had to shove his hands into his trouser pockets.
‘Hiya.’ Her lips curved around a smile and desire coiled hot and tight in his groin. Her smoky eye make-up made her periwinkle-blue eyes look all the more stunning, and her shimmering lip-gloss highlighted the perfect shape of her mouth. Her utterly kissable, sexy-as-hell mouth. Heaven help him.
‘Good evening.’ Louis stretched his mouth into one of his carefully rationed smiles. ‘You look amazing.’
Amazing, sexy, gorgeous, stunning, beautiful... The words piled into his brain as if he had swallowed a thesaurus. She didn’t look like his friend’s sister any more, which was a problem, because he needed to get those boundaries firmly back in place. And fast.
‘Thank you.’
There was a funny little silence.
‘Right. Well, then.’ Louis took his hands out of his pockets and gestured towards the street where his car was parked. ‘Shall we go?’
Ivy stepped down the three steps to the footpath but almost stumbled on the last one and Louis shot out one of his hands to stabilise her. ‘Whoa, there. Take it easy in those shoes. How on earth do you walk in them?’ His fingers moved from grasping her wrist to curl around hers and another punch of lust hit him in the groin.
‘I like wearing heels. It makes me taller. Otherwise I’d end up with neckache trying to look up at people all the time, particularly people as tall as you.’
He kept hold of her hand on the way to his car. Her fingers were soft as silk and her hand so small it was completely swallowed up by his. ‘I’ll have to get you a stepladder or something when you’re with me. I don’t want you to break your ankle on my behalf.’
She gave a tinkling-bell laugh and playfully shoulder bumped him. ‘Don’t be silly. So, where are we having dinner? I’m starving.’
‘A French restaurant.’
She grinned up at him. ‘So you can dazzle me with your fluent French?’
‘Something like that.’ Louis was the one being dazzled. Big time. He knew he was crazy even to take her out to dinner, let alone contemplate anything else. She was exactly the type of girl he avoided—the type who wanted the husband, the house and the sleepy hound in front of the cosy fireplace. He’d missed out on the settling-down gene, or had had it pummelled out of him through witnessing the marital misery of his parents. These days the sense of claustrophobia at being in a relationship longer than twenty-four hours was suffocating. He enjoyed sex for the physical relief it gave but, since his stalker, the thought of a longer relationship made him break out into hives.
In his opinion, long-term commitment was a dirty word.
Louis helped her into the passenger seat and tried not to notice how her black dress revealed a tiny shadow of cleavage and a whole lot of her shapely thighs. Tried to ignore the way his pulse shot up and his blood thickened.
He strode to the driver’s side and gave himself a stern talking to.
It’s just dinner. Nothing else. You’re going to talk her out of her crazy plan, remember?
‘Louis?’
He flicked her a quick glance as the engine turned over. ‘Yes?’
Her fingers were fiddling with the clasp on her evening bag, her cheeks a faint shade of pink. ‘Do you carry condoms with you all the time?’
He stared blankly at her for a moment. ‘Ah, well, yes, but we’re not going to need them tonight.’
‘But why not?’
His hands gripped the steering wheel so hard his knuckles threatened to burst out of his skin. And that wasn’t the only part of his anatomy fit to burst. The stirring in his groin sent hot tingles down his legs at the thought of making love to her. He met her gaze. ‘We’re not going to have sex, Ivy. Not tonight, not tomorrow, not—’
‘Why not? I bet you have sex with other women on the first date.’
‘This isn’t a date,’ he said through tight lips. ‘It’s a meeting to discuss your...situation.’
‘My situation is that I want you to take my virginity. Why are you being so...so difficult about this?’
He sent her a sideways glance. ‘You’re not the one-night-stand type. You’ve got no experience of how to do this sort of hook-up.’
‘Which is why I want you to give it to me.’
Louis clenched his jaw so hard, he thought he was going to crack his mandible. ‘Look, I think we should talk about it some more before we go rushing into something with so many pitfalls. If we sleep together, it will change everything. We will never look at each other the same way again.’
‘Does it matter? I mean, you have sex with heaps of women and it doesn’t seem to be a problem.’ She let out a whooshing sigh. ‘Maybe it’s me that’s the problem. I’m so undesirable you can’t bear the thought of touching me.’
If only it were that simple. He’d been fighting the temptation to touch her since she’d come into his office that afternoon. He was fighting it now. She was the most desirable woman he’d met in a long time. ‘Feeling desire for someone doesn’t mean I’ll act on it. Not unless I’m convinced it’s the right thing to do.’
‘How else can I convince you? Do you know how embarrassing it is for me to be the only person in my circle of friends who’s still a virgin? I can’t imagine asking anyone else to help me. I would be too embarrassed—or at least more embarrassed, because it certainly wasn’t easy asking you this afternoon. Hence the brandy. Imagine if I had to ask a stranger!’
His gut roiled at the thought of her going out with a stranger. Doing anything with a stranger. Louis forced himself to relax his grip on the steering wheel. ‘I don’t think we should rush into this without some proper checks and balances done first.’
‘Fine. But let’s not take too long about it—because I turn thirty in a month and no way am I going to celebrate my birthday as a flipping virgin.’ She blew out a breath and continued, ‘I know this has come as a shock to you, but I’ve been struggling with this for years. I hate it that I can be so confident at work but this area of my life is so stuffed up. I need to get past this in order to move on with my life. It’s like there’s a big fat pause button on my future. Solving this will press the go switch, I’m sure of it.’
Yes, but it was the ‘go’ switch he was most worried about. Worried about removing the boundaries he had set up. Relaxing his self-control. Doing things with her he had only done in his most wicked dreams.
She suddenly flashed him a teasing smile. ‘Are you worried you might fall for me? Is that where your reluctance is coming from?’
He gave her the side-eye. ‘I know how to keep my feelings in check.’ He’d been doing it most of his life. Controlling his reaction to his father’s acid tongue and overly critical eye. Ignoring his father’s repeated digs about his choice of career and how he had let everybody down by not joining the family accounting business as expected. Ignoring his mother’s incessant nit-picking over every aspect of his life, knowing deep down it was her way of compensating for her lack of power in her marriage, and her bitter disappointment at only having one child after several miscarriages.
He had witnessed way too many of his parents’ fights in which bitter words had been exchanged, but one in particular had stuck in his mind as a ten-year-old child, so too the harrowing aftermath. His mother’s admission
into a mental health clinic for months on end after a suicide attempt. Louis had shut down his feelings at seeing his mother inside the walls of a locked mental-health unit. Her blank, flat look—as if someone had pulled out the power cord to her personality. He had suppressed his own despair in order to cope with his father’s. When his mother had finally come home, his father had grovelled, begged, over-adapted and promised things he could never deliver.
That was forever love? Louis wanted nothing to do with it.
‘I sometimes wish I could keep my feelings in check...’ Ivy’s tone contained a self-deprecating note. ‘Ronan’s always telling me I wear my heart on my sleeve. Both sleeves, actually.’
Louis glanced at her. ‘Have you heard from your father lately?’
She sighed and looked down at her hands in her lap. ‘No. I think he’s blocked me on his phone. It’s much worse for Ronan. The things Dad said to him were unforgiveable. I was really worried about him there for a bit.’
‘Yeah, so was I.’ Louis pulled into a parking spot near the restaurant and turned off the engine. ‘But he seems happy now with Ricky.’
She swivelled in her seat to look at him. ‘Louis?’
‘Yes?’
Her eyes went to his mouth and a small frown settled on her forehead. The tip of her tongue came out and licked her lips, and scorching heat flooded his groin. The air tightened and the space between them shrank, his self-control wavering like a slab of concrete on a building site held by a gossamer thread. It would be so easy to reach for her hand, to stroke the creamy curve of her cheek, to lean forward and press his lips against the plump ripeness of hers. He could feel the magnetic pull of attraction drawing him closer, every cell in his body poised, primed for contact. In his mind he was already doing it—kissing her until they were both breathless, his tongue tangling with hers, his blood pounding like a tribal drum.
Go on, do it. You know you want to.
Her gaze met his and she gave one of her dazzling, dimpled smiles. ‘Hey, for a moment there I thought you were going to kiss me.’
One Night On The Virgin's Terms (Mills & Boon Modern) (Wanted: A Billionaire, Book 1) Page 3
