Reach for the Stars Page 19

  Security taken care of, he wasted no time in helping her strip. The baggy trousers were first to go. She trembled as his hands tugged at the drawstring waist, untying it so the trousers skimmed her thighs and dropped to the floor.

  Still wearing the gorgeous green heels, she stepped out of the black-and-white-checkered heap. ‘Goodbye chef pants.’ She tossed the words out nonchalantly and tossed her head at the same time. As he went to remove her t-shirt she automatically raised her arms and in one quick move he pulled it off over her head.

  ‘Come with me,’ he said, his fingers touching hers lightly as he drew her into the room like a magnetic force. She didn’t know whether she was relieved or disappointed that he’d rejected her proposition back in the car, but he was driving her out of her mind now.

  Without turning on lights he led her to the chaise longue in the centre of the room. Her eyes adjusted to the shadowy darkness and she looked at it, assessing. It was set back far enough from the windows not to be visible from the dark street far below. She glanced out. Across the wide boulevard, above the tops of the dark trees, offices housed behind a belle époque façade stood empty, vacant desks and chairs and blank computer screens, faintly lit and ghostly. Rising up into the night behind the shadowy buildings the lights on the Eiffel Tower sparkled.

  ‘I’ll lower the blinds,’ he whispered.

  ‘Don’t. The lights are amazing.’ He radiated hotness and she couldn’t bear for their bodies to be parted. ‘Besides it’s totally dark in here. No one can see us, even if they are looking. Which I doubt they are. Nobody’s out there.’

  He kissed her deliberately and slowly, one hand at the back of her neck freeing her hair so it fell onto her shoulders, the other arm taut around her waist holding her tight against his hardness. Her breasts straining, she pressed closer and he strengthened his hold. Hooking his thumbs under her bra straps he slid them down over her shoulders, his fingers brushing her skin, melting her. Holding her close and kissing her provocatively, with one hand he pushed down the lace cup and rubbed his finger tip against her nipple. She moaned, buzzing, and aching to feel him inside her as he lowered the other lacey cup so that both breasts pressed against the soft layer of fabric between her skin and his.

  He turned her away from him and she grabbed onto the chaise long, its curved back soft beneath her hands, the sumptuous velvet a dark sheen in the barely-there light. He pressed tight against her and his hands cupped her breasts from behind until she virtually exploded with anticipation.

  She closed her eyes, leant into him and unable to bite back her urgency said brazenly, ‘Hurry up already.’

  His hand moved lower, smoothed over her stomach, slid under her silky underwear and pushed inside her. Sweet heat swirled inside her body, her desire for him immense. Their bodies were pure heat; Nick was so in tune with her reactions, it was rapturous, instinctive. He held her close, one arm banded around her waist, and she went with it, leant back into his body, pressed against his hard erection, giving herself up to his touch as he heightened her pleasure, enticing her until she almost screamed. The touch of his fingers was so compelling, she wanted to have him completely inside her, but the desire to let go outstripped the longing, and high on his touch she shattered, orgasm ricocheting through her body.

  All that pent up sexual energy spent, she was left with aftershocks of insecurity. She shouldn’t have gone looking for the guy behind the image. She couldn’t have the bad boy back. In his place there was an amazing man. And he did exquisite things to her.

  Composing herself, dying to get back control, she slowly bit her lip, making a stab at channeling a demanding and seductive temptress. She wriggled out of her silky, lace-edged underwear, leaving it in a tangle on the floor. She popped the fastening on her askew bra and slipped it off. Pinching one silky strap between two fingers she held it up. Making like a burlesque striptease, she dropped it.

  ‘I want to feel you. In me.’

  Scooped off her feet and into his arms she squealed with sudden disorientation and surprise. He carried her around the chaise longue and laid her down, the velvet soft against her back. Unrushed, he knelt on the floor and tauntingly slowly, he gently slid his hands down her legs, undid the tiny silver buckles at her ankles and took off her shoes, dropping each one on the carpet, his darkened eyes not leaving her face for a second.

  ‘What do you want from me?’

  No matter how desperately she’d tried to hide it, her feelings were out there, obvious. From the start they’d had instant connection and intense chemistry. Her heart trembled, but her goal to exude outward confidence remained unshaken. The feelings laid bare beneath this attraction could ruin everything.

  ‘I want a night of amazing sex.’ She threw the words at him, fearing he could read the truth on her face.

  ‘Coming right up.’

  Everything outside the room spun away – hints of lights, the sparkling tower, the distant thrum of a car engine – and her control collapsed. He smoothed his hands over her skin and parted her thighs, pleasuring her so deeply that she was powerless against her reactions to the scorch of his mouth moving softly, then plunging deep, his tongue touching her and a sweet ache rocketing through her. She moaned, blanking everything that had been skittering in her mind, and yelled in pleasure as orgasmic deliciousness shimmered through her once more.

  Nick stroked her thighs in the half-light. As her pulse settled and the world zoomed back into focus he stood up. A dark silhouette, she watched as he stripped.

  Taking both her hands, he drew her to her feet and pressed a soft, hot kiss to her lips. His naked erection pressed hard and tight against her. Turning her around, cloaking her with the muscled wall of his body, he steered her out of the sitting room and into the bedroom. The heat of his hardness against her skin drove her crazy.

  Nick closed the blinds and flicked a switch by the bed so low, warm lamplight lit the room. The bed was a gigantic four-poster, all shiny polished wood and cushions and billowy curtains, the mattress dreamily deep with the softest duvet and pillows as white as summer clouds.

  He swept the cushions away with one arm and together they tumbled onto the big, soft bed, the white cotton cool beneath her back as he rolled on top of her, the weight of him exciting and passionate as rock hard urgency took him over.

  She moaned, wondering how much more delay she could take as he lowered his head to her breasts. She tangled her fingers in his hair as he took her nipple into his mouth, twisting his tongue around it and driving her into a frenzy of need. Swapping breasts he caressed the one he’d pleasured first, overwhelming her with heat when he pressed his lips to the second. The touch of his mouth filled her with want.

  Pulling back, braced, chest and arm muscles tight, he looked down at her.

  ‘Have you any idea how much you turn me on?’ With a groan he rolled away and lay on his side, his head on the pillow watching her face.

  She laughed and ran a hand over his silky hard length. ‘I have an inkling.’ Rolled onto her side, lying facing him, absorbing the dark desire in his eyes, she smoothed the other hand over his shoulder and ran it down his muscled arms then brushed his thigh, his firm leg muscles. With a deep groan he wrapped his arms around her.

  ‘We need protection.’

  She sighed.

  Reluctantly he let go of her and slipped from the bed. Her heart, her mind, her body were all past the point of no return and she was turned on beyond patience waiting for him. She craved his arms and his mouth on her lips. Quickly he was back, sheathed, and wrapping her in his sensational body heat.

  The tip of his delicious erection connected with the fold between her legs and he entered her, pushing in and pulling out, slowly at first then driving deep, rhythmic thrusting. Heat wound through her body. Nick was perfect, filling her with more sensuous delight than she’d have believed possible. Moving in and out of her, taking her with him he rolled onto his back so that suddenly she was on top. Both in control and out of control. His hands sm
oothed over every part of her – her shoulders, back, the round curve of her bum, her thighs, calves. She picked up the rhythm, tight around his length. He caressed her breasts, thrusting into her until her body melded to his in a fusion of intense ecstasy. Holding her close now, his desire built deliciously and she climaxed bringing him with her so that they both let go in the exact same moment and she cried out, high on physical pleasure.

  Breathless, she stayed curled on top of him, head pressed to his chest, his heart pounding beneath her ear. Finally, she disentangled and lay back against the pillows. With one hand he gently brushed stray hairs off her face.

  ‘I don’t want tonight to end,’ she said. She whispered the words into the stillness of the night as if they meant nothing.

  ‘Don’t speak.’ His breath fluttered hotly against her ear and he kissed her there. For once, total silence didn’t feel ominous and uncomfortable. If she closed her eyes and felt him it was as if his body was speaking to her in a million mingled sensations. She was all blissed-out emotion, simultaneously calm and electrified.

  After he’d dealt with the condom, he came back and unfastened the ties which held back the bed curtains. He flicked off the light switch and drew the curtains around them as if closing out the world. They lay in the stillness, their breathing the only sound. Possessively, he gathered her, a limp, melted, hot mess, into his arms and kept her there tight all through the night.

  Once she woke up and tried to wriggle quietly out of his hold but even deep asleep he wasn’t about to let go.

  Chapter Twenty-Three

  ‘Eiffel Tower here we come!’

  He grimaced right on cue. ‘Yay.’ His tone was not enthusiastic. ‘The tower of doom.’

  Beneath a cheerful blue sky, Paris was at its sunniest and most splendid. They’d spent the morning at the Louvre wandering through the never-ending corridors and rooms, taking in as much as was humanly possible in a single morning. As they left, walking away from the central glass pyramid, a saxophonist busking under an archway played a hauntingly beautiful tune. Nick dug his wallet from his pocket and dropped a note into an upturned hat on the stone paving. The musician immediately upped the tempo in a burst of gratitude. Nick took her hand, spun her out on one arm and twirled her around. The spontaneity of the moment made Layla laugh, but the sad strains of the original melody stayed in her head all the way to the River Seine. They walked for a long time and wound up wandering the quais, checking out the stalls of old books, before picking a café where they could collapse at a pavement table under the welcome shade of a parasol and get a much-needed caffeine boost.

  Nick glued his dark shades to his suddenly tense, moody face. Her own sunglasses pushed up onto her head, Layla disliked looking at him and not being able to read anything in his eyes. It set her nerves on edge. He’d been avoiding her suggestion of a visit to the Eiffel Tower ahead of his shoot. But something else was wrong, it was more than an aversion to her relentlessly upbeat attempt to help him confront his phobia. The undercurrent of everything he had going on was hiding just below the surface. Studying him now from beneath evasively lowered lashes she warned herself to get real.

  She’d woken up with her heart flying, and right then, surfacing from the whirlpool of emotions she’d been spinning in before she fell asleep, she’d made up her mind to get her feet back on solid ground. Her feelings were all in her head. A fantasy. She was being swept off her feet with the romance of Paris.

  The reality was they were on course to fizzle out faster than a shooting star. They’d been nothing more than a time out for each other. At the outset she’d been clear that that was all she wanted. So how had she fallen so inappropriately for Nick? She opened her bag, pulled out a little notebook and pen and started furiously scribbling notes. She had a business to get off the ground. Starting now. The best thing would be to start focusing on the future, one that wouldn’t involve Nick.

  She itemized things she’d need to look into when she got home. ‘Van. Insurance. Materials. Small business loan.’ She added a long line of question marks.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘Planning. Making a list of everything I’ll need to set up my new business.’

  ‘Right now?’

  ‘There’s no time like the present.’

  ‘Can I see?’ Reluctantly she let him scrutinize her scrawl. ‘If you need money I could lend you some.’

  She shook her head. ‘That’s sweet, but no – thank you. I’ve saved – quite a bit really. And I got money back from my travel insurance. It’s not a massive amount but it should be enough to get me started.’ She shrugged. ‘After that I’ll see what happens. Maybe apply for a loan.’ Pulling her glasses off her head with twitchy fingers, she folded them and set them on the round bistro table. Its metallic surface shone in the sunlight. ‘Besides, this is something I have to do by myself.’

  The white-aproned waiter brought their order. ‘Deux cafés,’ he announced. ‘Un sandwich pour Monsieur, et une tarte au citron pour la demoiselle.’ He set a white plate and a small silver fork in front of Layla with a flourish.

  ‘Merci.’ Nick settled the bill right away, handing over euros and indicating with a thumbs up that the man could keep the change. ‘C’est bon.’

  Layla carefully sliced through her pie, spearing a piece and popping it in to her mouth, enjoying the sharp citrus zing on her taste buds.

  Nick picked up his phone and set it down again. Something was definitely bothering him. She fought the urge to ask what. She took a sip of coffee and silently ate a second mouthful of the mouth-watering pie. Untouched, Nick’s baguette sat wrapped on his plate.

  ‘Fran’s sent me another email,’ he said abruptly. ‘She wants me to call her.’

  ‘Beth’s mother?’ In silence he nodded. Her heart fluttered. He drank his coffee and she chased another piece of pie around the plate with her fork. The constant push and pull, getting close to Nick, letting him draw her into his heart, only to then feel that he was shutting her out was too draining. She’d been trying to keep things light, but whatever the deal with Fran and Beth was, it was cutting him up and the only thing for it was to offer a friendly ear. Besides, the silence got to her. She couldn’t stand the awkwardness of unspoken tension. ‘You want to talk about it?’

  ‘It’s complicated.’ Nick’s brows knitted into a frown.

  ‘That much I figured out already.’

  ‘I was nineteen. And she was thirty. She was talented. And ambitious. Assistant producer on a daytime hospital drama. I’d been shut away in a boys’ boarding school for what felt like half my life. I landed the part of a teenager badly broken up in a motorcycle accident. It was my first real acting job. This might sound foolish, but she was my first love.’ He paused and tension flickered in his cheek. ‘Or more specifically – first lover.’

  ‘Wow.’

  ‘Yes. Wow.’ His laugh had an acerbic edge.

  ‘I’m sorry. That comment wasn’t helpful.’

  ‘No. It’s me.’ He reached across the table touching the tips of his fingers to the tips of hers. ‘I shouldn’t put this on you.’

  ‘You don’t have to tell me. Not if you don’t want to. It’s really none of my business.’ It was horrible tiptoeing around like this. Everything that had seemed so easy at home in Cornwall was turning sour.

  ‘I want to.’

  She hated that he looked so troubled, but she hadn’t the foggiest idea how anything she could say would help. She snatched her fingers away like he’d given her an electric shock.

  ‘It was secretive and fun, a bubble in time.’ He downed his last sip of coffee. ‘Admittedly I had feelings, infatuation maybe. It didn’t last long, ultimately it meant nothing. At least it didn’t until now.’ He rubbed a hand over his stubbly chin. ‘I should have been more careful.’

  ‘What happened?’ She faked a sense of distance she didn’t feel. ‘Why didn’t she tell you at the time?’

  ‘Honestly. I don’t know. Fran was in a terrible s
tate when she contacted me. There wasn’t time to talk about the past.’

  ‘Why not?’ Layla was way past trying to hide her astonishment.

  ‘Because she had a health scare. She found a breast lump. She arranged tests straight away. And she contacted me.’ He sighed. ‘She was afraid. She figured that if the worst came to the worst Beth wouldn’t have to be alone in the world. She wanted me to promise that I’d be there for her. I went to see them right away, but Beth stayed in her bedroom the whole time and refused to come out.’

  Layla literally bit her tongue. Determined not to say anything tactless she stared at his granite profile.

  ‘I know what you’re thinking.’

  The tense muscle in his cheek twitched almost imperceptibly. Layla didn’t miss it. ‘I’m not thinking anything.’

  ‘Well I know what Alex thinks. He says get a paternity test and legal advice.’

  ‘No prizes for guessing you haven’t done either of those things.’ She lowered her eyes and fixed on the leftover pie as if she’d found a hair baked into it.

  ‘Correct. Beth’s my child. Fran says I’m the father and I believe her.’

  ‘Of course she is,’ she agreed. ‘She’s the spitting image of you.’

  ‘Fran’s test results are negative. She’s got the all clear. They did a biopsy. The lump is benign, but the doctor wants to schedule surgery and remove it – to be on the safe side.’

  ‘The news you said you were waiting for? That’s wonderful. You must be so relieved.’

  With a solemn nod of the head he pinched the bridge of his nose. ‘Here’s the thing. Fran wants to see me again. She feels bad about keeping me in the dark all these years. She wants to give me a proper explanation about what happened. And she’d like Beth to get to know me.’

  ‘That’s good, isn’t it?’ she said optimistically.

  ‘Beth didn’t want to have anything to do with me. I totally understand if she sees me as a sperm donor, something biological, unemotional. I haven’t got the best opinion of my own father. What a joy he turned out to be,’ he scoffed. ‘He drove my mother over the edge.’ He set his cup down and the saucer rattled. ‘Beth doesn’t need me. Nor does Fran. She runs her own TV production company, based in Manchester. They have a lovely life. A beautiful house, holidays in Florida and Greece, and Beth’s just about to start secondary school. The last thing she needs is a dad with a rubbish reputation. I think it would be best to go back to how things were. Without me in the picture.’