All Work and No Play (6 page)

She had been engaged for eight months and had never felt even remotely this turned on. And after the hell of the past few days, after the habit and hard work of the past few years, this seemed too miraculous not to seize with both hands.

Jane lifted her free hand to Jay’s face. She touched his left cheekbone and ran her fingertips down over his skin, over the place where his smile dug grooves in his cheek, close to the side of his mouth. His skin was smooth and
almost shockingly warm. He tilted his head slightly, as if to press her fingers closer.

‘I don’t think I want dinner,’ she said, and heard that her voice had become husky.

‘Me neither.’

They stood at the same time, their hands still clasped. Jay dropped a note on the table and they walked out of the bar together, saying nothing. Jane was aware of every part of her body: the way her high heels made her hips sway, the brushing of her bare thighs together under her dress, the soft material of her skirt against her legs, the way her breasts moved slightly as she walked. Her fingers, twined with Jay’s, which were long and strong and sinewy.

She was aware of his body, too. He moved easily but she sensed urgency in his movements. He held her hand tight and kept her close so that her shoulder and hip grazed against him two or three times as they threaded through the tables. She could even sense his breathing, rapid and shallow.

He was about six inches taller than she was, even while she was wearing heels. She would have to stand on her tiptoes to kiss him.

Jay pushed open the bar door and as soon as they were outside on the pavement Jane tugged him to one side,
turned, and grabbed the lapel of his suit with her free hand to pull him towards her.

‘Great idea,’ he murmured, and she felt his strong arm curl around her waist and hold her close against him while she was standing up on her tiptoes, reaching with her mouth for his.

It was like no other kiss she had ever had in her life. His lips were warm and fitted against her mouth perfectly and they felt so new, strange and right. For a moment their mouths just pressed together and Jane felt as if she had taken a giant leap forward into a whole different world.

And then it was hunger. Jane tore her hands from his grip and his suit and grasped his head with both hands, burying her fingers in his soft, short hair and pulling him closer. Her mouth moved with his and the kiss changed from static to frantic. He nudged her lips open and she touched the hot, slippery tip of his tongue. She heard herself groan in her throat and that seemed to urge Jay on because he pulled her tighter and kissed her harder.

She slid her hands down his neck and gripped his broad shoulders. Somewhere in the back of her mind she remembered Jonny’s description of kissing on the pavement, touching every bit of flesh that was possible, and she slipped the fingers of one hand between the buttons
of his shirt. His chest was smooth and firm and his heartbeat hammered under his ribs and muscle.

It wasn’t enough. With her other hand she pulled at his shirt at the back under his jacket. She tugged it out of his suit waistband and spread her hand against the small of his back, moulding it to his muscle and feeling the strength of his spine.

‘Jane,’ Jay muttered roughly into her mouth, closing his teeth gently on her top lip and then kissing it before he dipped his head to kiss her neck. He still held her up against him with one arm, but the other hand stroked up her back and came round to rest on her throat and collar-bone. The tips of his fingers just edged beneath the neckline of her dress and she felt his chin and mouth underneath her ear, downwards onto the base of her neck. She could feel everywhere that he wasn’t touching, the inches of skin between his hand and where her breast began. His tongue tasted her and she shuddered and let her head fall back to give him better access.

People were walking past, they were in the centre of Chelsea, but she didn’t care, because she had never felt this free before. Jane closed her eyes and shut out London. She concentrated on this man, who knew just how to touch her and what she wanted, who seemed more full of passion than any man she had ever met.

Strength and sinew. Her body was pressed full-length
against him; his leg between her thighs, his arm wrapped round her. The rigid length of his erection against her belly told her he wanted her as much as she did him.

But beneath his ardent kisses, the clasp of his hands and the rapid pace of his breathing she could sense a tenderness in his embrace. His hands were careful. His lips were gentle even when devouring her. Quite unexpectedly, she thought of the words he had used to describe how his father had treated his mother:
he adored her.

She felt sexy, and adored.

Jane opened her eyes, suddenly desperate to look at Jay and see the expression on his face as he kissed her. She straightened her head, and blinked as she realised she was looking straight into the lens of a camera.

Click.

‘Um—we’re being watched,’ she said, her voice unsteady. Jay stopped kissing her and straightened, still holding her tight.

The camera clicked again. It was held by a man dressed in an anorak and shorts, wearing a floppy hat and carrying an orange backpack. Jane took in the street for the first time and noticed a group of people just past them, all carrying identical backpacks and cameras.

Tourists. And it seemed that she and Jay were suddenly a major attraction.

‘Excuse me, mate,’ Jay said, ‘but do you mind?’

The man lowered his camera. ‘You don’t see that in Oklahoma City,’ he said, apparently by way of explanation, and walked off after the rest of his group.

Jane tilted back her head to look at Jay’s face. He was watching the man retreat, incredulity in his features. He glanced down at Jane and then both of them were laughing, holding onto each other, sharing breath again.

‘I’d have thought you were used to cameras by now.’ Jane giggled.

‘I’m a model, not a porn star,’ Jay said, and then he smiled down into her face. ‘You’re incredible, Jane. What next?’

She tucked his shirt back in and smoothed her other hand over the wrinkles she had made in the front of it. ‘I think we need to go somewhere more private,’ she said. ‘Let’s get a cab.’

‘How private?’ His expression became less playful, more serious. ‘It turns out I’m only staying a few streets from here, but if you’d rather go somewhere else—’

‘We don’t need a cab, then.’ Swiftly Jane bent down and removed her high heels. She took his hand, dangling her shoes from the other. ‘Come on, let’s run to your hotel.’

Jay didn’t hesitate. He took off down the pavement, with Jane running beside him as fast as she could. Her bare feet slapped on the asphalt and her hair flew out
behind her and she wondered,
When was the last time I ran like this?

With Jay’s hand in hers, she flew over the kerbs, ducked between pedestrians, rounded corners like a Formula One racer and heard her breath coming out in sure, rapid pants of laughter.

They were at the door of the hotel almost before she was ready and they spilled through it laughing and gasping for breath. It was a boutique hotel, newly renovated, modern and airy. Jay brought her straight to the lift.

‘I assume you want to go to my room,’ he said, stroking her hair back from her flushed face and combing through its tangled waves with his fingers.

She stood on her toes and whispered into his ear. ‘I can think of some things we can get up to in the lift.’

He raised his eyebrows at her and seemed to be opening his mouth to say something when they were joined by a man in tweed. The door dinged and the man came into the lift with them.

Jane held Jay’s hand and nestled close into his side.
Curses
, she mouthed at him while the other passenger was pressing his floor button, and she was rewarded with Jay’s sexy smile.

First floor. Second floor. Jane watched the numbers on top of the lift door, felt Jay’s thumb circling the inside of her wrist, and tried not to go insane with anticipation.
At the third floor the doors slid open and Jay led her out into the hallway.

‘Not far, I hope,’ she said.

‘Just here.’ He removed a card key from the inside pocket of his suit jacket and opened the door. Without a single iota of hesitation Jane walked into this near-stranger’s hotel room and felt as free and young as she had ten minutes before when she’d been sprinting full-tilt with him down the King’s Road.

The room was high-ceilinged and painted in light colours, furnished in sleek modern pieces. She spotted a pair of jeans over a chair, a laptop on the desk, and a big, smooth bed.

Jay closed the door behind her and she faced him.

Aside from his breathing, the rustle of his suit, and her heartbeat in her ears, the room was absolutely silent. Jane realised, with a twist of her heart, that for the first time she and this man were alone together. Actually acting out the intimacy they’d adopted from the start.

Jay reached out with a hand and pushed a lock of her hair back with his finger. Then, slowly, he dropped his arm to his own side.

‘So, Jane,’ he said quietly, ‘what do you want to do?’

CHAPTER FOUR

T
HIS
was it. Jane’s chance to say no, to go back to her normal life, back to thinking about nothing but work, back to playing it safe.

She didn’t hesitate. ‘I want you,’ she said and stepped back into Jay’s arms.

Their kiss was, if anything, more passionate, although Jane wouldn’t have believed that was possible. But this time they were alone and there was an inevitability about what was going to happen that fuelled her desire. They kissed in hungry bites. Jane’s hands clutched Jay’s clothing, pulling his lithe, muscular body as tight as she could. He held her with one broad hand spread across the small of her back, and his erection pressed into her, even more insistent than before.

She had to break her mouth from his for a moment
to catch her breath. When she did he stepped back, just a little bit, his hands still on her, and looked her up and down. His dark blue gaze felt like hands on her body.

‘Jane, you are beautiful,’ he said.

Silly as it was, honesty compelled her to shake her head. ‘You’re the beautiful one.’

He had a face that looked both sensual and intelligent, and a body made to wear clothes, tall and lean and hard. Although she was sure he would look even better out of his clothes. She licked her lips in anticipation and tasted him on them.

‘You’re beautiful,’ he insisted. ‘More than I could have imagined you. Look.’

He turned her so she could see their reflection in the full-length mirror that covered the bathroom door. Her dress was plain, but slim and black and flattering; one of the straps was slipping off her shoulder. Her brown hair looked as if she’d just got out of bed—or run a quarter of a mile. Her cheeks were flushed with desire and excitement, her eyes were smoky and heavy-lidded, and her lips were pink and slightly swollen with Jay’s kisses.

She wasn’t sure about beautiful, especially when she compared herself to the perfection standing beside her. But she did look wanton, impulsive, sexy. Not really herself, but someone better.

The thought made her even more determined. She
caught Jay’s gaze in the mirror and held it. Slowly, deliberately, watching Jay’s eyes the entire time, Jane reached beneath the hem of her dress. She hooked her fingers into the waist of her G-string and slid it down her legs. Then she stepped out of it, leaving the scrap of black lace on the carpeted floor.

Jay actually growled.

In a split second he had turned her again to face him, had grabbed her and pressed her back against the wall near the entrance door and was kissing her with even more urgency than before. He stood between her legs and with one hand lifted one of her thighs so it wrapped around his hip. The pose pushed her dress upwards and she felt the soft cloth of his suit and his hard muscles rubbing against the sensitive skin of her inner thigh.

She’d been thinking about it too long, and she was desperate to touch his naked skin after the teasing sample between the buttons of his shirt. She pushed his jacket from his shoulders, and as he shrugged it off to fall behind them she tore at his shirt. Smiling a little at their impatience, Jay helped her to remove it and she dropped it, too, on the floor.

She couldn’t breathe for a minute.

He was even more perfect than she’d imagined.

All lean muscle and taut, tanned skin. His chest was smooth, and a thin line of dark hair ran from his navel
down under the waistband of his trousers. Jane tore her gaze away from him to look in the mirror to her right, and saw the strong line of his shoulder and back, the way his ribs made a gentle ripple down his side.

She saw herself reach out and touch him. And then she had to look away from the mirror, back to real life, and watch her hands travel eagerly over his naked chest. His skin was hot. She rested her right palm on him and felt the point of his nipple under her hand, and his heart beating rapidly. The fingers of her other hand explored his right nipple; it was flat against his chest, but hard in the middle where it stuck out.

She wondered if his nipples were as sensitive as hers were; she rolled the tip experimentally between her finger and thumb and was rewarded by his sharp intake of breath.

‘I need to touch you, Jane,’ he muttered roughly and ran his hands up the inside of her thighs, pushing her dress up even further towards her hips. His fingers brushed the curls between her legs. Jane shuddered and gripped his bare shoulders. She was held up only by his body and the wall; her own legs were suddenly boneless.

Slowly, much more slowly and gently than she would have expected after the hunger in his voice and his kiss, Jay’s fingers stroked her, parting her. She could feel that she was slippery against him, and she squirmed a little in
embarrassment. He had to know she was turned on, but maybe not quite how turned on, how aroused she’d been all evening.

‘You’re so wet, darling,’ he whispered, ‘it’s wonderful. Let me please you.’

‘You’re pleasing m—’ she started, but then one of his fingers stroked across her clitoris, and the pleasure was so sudden and so great that she yelped.