Besotted (6 page)

He takes off his long dark coat and stands in his funereal garments. His face is grim. I want to run to him and bury my face in his neck, but he seems unreachable. I stare at him without comprehension. He bewilders me, infuriates, makes me feel weak and vulnerable, and yet he is my hero and the strength that carries me through the day.

‘How was it?’ I ask instead.

‘As expected.’ His lips curl into an expression I have not seen before.

‘Everything went well, then?’

He nods. ‘Let’s get drunk together,’ he says.

I look into his eyes. He looks furious about something. ‘OK.’

He goes to the phone and orders up a bottle of Scotch.

They must have asked which brand.

‘Just bring your best,’ he says impatiently, and puts the phone back on the hook. I go to hold him and he puts his hand out as if to ward me off. ‘Don’t touch me,’ he says, and I freeze.

He runs his hand through his hair. ‘I just need a shower. Meet me in the bedroom,’ he says, and turning away goes to the bathroom.

The bottle arrives with two glasses and a bucket of ice while he is in the shower. I tip the man, and taking everything into the bedroom, pour two generous measures into the glasses. I can hear the sound of the shower. At any other time I would have gone into the shower and joined him, but I can see that today he is different. He seems like forbidden territory. I shudder. Something has happened that has affected him deeply. I pace the bedroom. Look at myself in the mirror. I look OK.

He comes out and leans in the doorway in a towel loosely hitched around his lean hips. Wow! Divine. I love this man with wet hair. The blood starts to pound in my eardrums. When will the half-naked sight of him cease to affect me this way?

‘You are still dressed,’ he notes with raised eyebrows.

I say nothing—simply, slowly, start undressing. First the blouse goes over my head, then the skirt ends up at my feet, the bra gets flung away, and finally the knickers go the way of everything else. The balcony windows are open and the slight breeze scatters goose pimples on my skin. I look at him as he approaches me. God! He’s so fucking delectable. I watch the muscles rippling as he loses the towel. He stops inches away and twirls my hair in his fingers. The nearness of him makes me want to lick that pulse beating at the base of his throat. That is the only real conversation we have. That pulse that never lies to me. When it beats, I know he wants me, bad.

‘Want ice cubes in your drink?’ I ask, huskily.

He smiles and shakes his head. ‘The ice cubes are for you.’

I smile back. ‘Really?’

‘Really,’ he drawls, and pulls me towards him until I feel his entire length and his hot, hard shaft presses into my abdomen. His mouth descends. My hands rise up and entwine around his neck and we kiss. We kiss. And we kiss. Both he and I know. This is the magic staircase by which he can climb back from whatever dark place he has been in.

He lifts me off the ground and lays me on the bed. I grab his thighs. He looks at me, surprised. I lift myself off the bed and take his beautiful cock in my mouth. He inhales sharply. I straighten my head so he can have a full view of my lips curled tightly around his thick meat. When I look up I meet his eyes. The intensity of his gaze hits me in the bones. I suck so hard my cheeks hollow in, and experience heady power when I see him surrender to pleasure, to me. I swirl my tongue around his shaft confidently.

‘Open your legs,’ he growls.

Obediently, I spread my legs and show him what he wants to see, but I do not stop sucking and pulling hard at his meat. He eyes my open sex avidly. His face contorts. His body buckles, and he spurts inside my mouth. Even when his eyes have turned languorous, I don’t take my mouth away. I hold the semi-hard cock in my mouth and I gaze up at him. He gathers himself, touches my face tenderly, and pulls out of my mouth.

Deliberately, I lick my lips.

He grins wickedly, and turns away. My eyes follow him as he prowls around, buck naked, over to the bottle of whiskey. Tipping it over the ice bucket he starts pouring it out. I rise up on my elbow.

‘What’re you doing?’

He looks at me over his raised arm. ‘Fixing myself a drink,’ he says, and continues wasting the whiskey until there is less than a quarter of the bottle left. He drops half a fistful of ice cubes into my glass and brings the bottle and the glass into the bed. He walks towards my body on his knees and holds out my glass. I take a sip—the alcohol is strong, but goes down smooth. I watch him swig straight from the bottle, his head thrown back, his throat strong and powerfully masculine, his skin glowing like polished bronze. What a sight he is. His manhood erect, his thighs rippling and powerful, his shoulders broad.

Always in moments like this he reminds of a Greek god.

He swings the bottle down to hip level, wipes his mouth with the back of his hand, and catches my eyes. His are hooded, dark and full of desire. There is something in him that is different. He looks into my eyes. I feel myself burn under his gaze. A fluttering in my belly. I am nervous. Why? But I am also turned on. Unbelievably excited by this new him.

‘Now what?’

He breaks eye contact and looks at the bottle. Very deliberately, he removes the metal ring broken off from the bottle cap and puts it on the bedside table.

He lies on his elbow beside me. The bottle touches my cheek. It is cold. I turn and look into his eyes. What is in them thrills me.

‘Do you know that far, far more erotic than a cock inside you is to have an ordinary household object put into you? My excited, scandalized eyes swivel to the bottle and back to him. What I see in his eyes electrifies me.

‘Yeah?’

He smiles slowly. ‘Yeah.’

I nod and he swipes the pad of his thumb along my bottom lip. Suddenly he is on my mouth, rough, rough… The bottle goes away from my cheek. I part my thighs and gasp into his mouth when he inserts it into me. Fuck me! Cold and hard and erotic. Very, very erotic. I gape at him.

He lifts his head and watches me as he puts his hand under my buttocks and lifts me off the bed so I feel the liquid gurgling into me. I want to cover my mouth. ‘Oh!’

‘Yes, “Oh”,’ he murmurs, but his breathing is ragged, his eyes liquid and locked on mine. I am riveted by the fiercely masculine flare in his eyes. The light of ownership. He knows that there is nothing he cannot do to me.

When the bottle is empty he tosses it away.

‘What does it feel like?’

‘It’s sexy.’ My voice is a hoarse whisper. 

He laughs wickedly. ‘All illicit trespasses are.’

Gloriously naked, he reaches for a handful of ice cubes. He runs them over the heated flesh of my sex and inserts them one by one into me, while I squirm helplessly. All of a sudden I feel shy and close my eyes.

‘Open your eyes,’ he orders.

I snap them open and he trains his stare on me.

‘This is my cunt,’ he states, his features harsh with lust.

I swallow and nod, my hands fisting the bed covering.

‘I love watching your face when you are like this: helpless, open, bare…mine.’

He possesses me with his eyes while he continues to stuff me full of ice cubes.

‘I want you everyway I can.’ Then he kneels between my legs and begins to drink from my pussy.

‘The process is a slow sensual assault. Lick, lick, suck, lick, lick, suck, suck as the cold liquid dribbles out of me. I arch my back.

‘Yes, right there… Yes.’

The sensations are so foreign, the numbing effect of the cubes, his searing tongue, sometimes teeth, the sloshing of the alcohol. It is tireless. It is decadent. It turns me boneless with blind need. I am so caught up in the intense sensations I hardly recognize the high-pitched animal sounds coming out of my mouth.

‘We’re going to take it one level higher.’ He lays down beside me. ‘Clench your muscles and come sit on my mouth.’

Very carefully I sit up and clenching hard I move over to his face and position myself over his mouth. Having to clench my muscles while he is slowly drinking the dribble is strangely unnerving, and filthy, but exquisite. As if there are no barriers between us. He wants everything I’ve got. Even my juices. Suddenly he swoops upwards and catching my sex in a hard suction pulls me down on top of him. He grinds my sex over his mouth.

I tense so all the liquid does not gush out, but it is impossible to keep control of my body—it starts contracting and spiraling out of control. I come in a gush. I look down and he is greedily gobbling all the liquids that are pouring out of me. I lift my sex away from his mouth and look at him: smeared with alcohol and all my juices. Then he pulls me back down and licks me clean.

‘My Lana,’ he says, his eyes glowing possessively.

Eight

I
return to England inspired by Carbone and decide to cook a feast of senses for Blake. He is given strict instructions to come home early. Two hours ago I fried some rabbit, pancetta, onions, garlic, sage in a pan and tipped a bottle of Sangiovese into it. Once the mixture was simmering I added rosemary, thyme, some sticks of cinnamon, and cloves.

Now the hare has started to collapse into the sauce, which has become as sticky as runny honey and will nicely coat the handmade rigatoni that Francesca brought in today. I plan to serve this rich, pungent dish with a whole artichoke, slathered in warm olive oil and lemon juice and sprinkled with chopped mint.

In the oven I have a fresh peach tart to be served with Italian gelato.

I glance over at Sorab. He is rubbing his eyes. We were down in the park all afternoon and he looks as if he could do with a nap, but I don’t allow him to sleep. This way he will sleep the night through. I hear Blake at the door.

‘Daddy’s home,’ I announce rapturously, and, scooping Sorab off the floor, I run out to the front door to meet him.

‘Hey,’ he says, pulling a large smile into his face.

Sorab begins to wriggle and lifts his arms in his father’s direction. Blake takes him from me and lifting him high into the air blows raspberries on his belly, while Sorab laughs, squirms, and kicks.

He turns his head to look at me and sniffs the air. ‘What’s that?’

‘That,’ I grin, ‘is your dinner.’

‘It smells amazing.’

Holding Sorab to the side of his body he bends and kisses me, bathing my body in a languorous, sensuous glow. There is delicious food waiting in the kitchen, my man is home, my son is in his arms: there is nothing more in this world I could possibly ask for.

Blake reaches for my hand and suddenly stills, his eyes narrowing. ‘What’s this?’ he asks softly, touching the plaster on my finger.

‘It’s nothing. I nicked my finger while I was cutting some vegetables.’

He frowns and envelops my hand in his. ‘I don’t want you cooking anymore. I’ll get Laura to sort a chef out for you tomorrow.’

‘No,’ I say immediately. ‘I don’t want a chef. I enjoyed cooking for us today. I don’t want a nanny either. I just want it to be the three of us.’

He looks at me, his jaw is tight.

‘Just for a while, Blake. Please.’

‘OK. For a while. We are moving to One Hyde Park Place next week anyway.’

‘What?’

‘It’s much better there. You will have access to the Mandarin Oriental’s chef.’

‘Can’t we just stay here for a little while longer? Everything has happened so fast and I’m still so confused about so much. This is like my home now. I feel comfortable here, and Billie’s just around the corner.’

He puts an arm around my waist. ‘If it makes you happy to stay here then we will stay here for a while longer. But we will have to move eventually.’

‘Thank you.’ I smile up at him. ‘I’ve got a surprise for you.’

‘Yeah?’

I give him the box. ‘Give me that child.’

He hands over Sorab to me, opens the box, and looks up at me quizzically. ‘Slippers?’

‘Yeah. It’s comfy. For around the home.’

‘Like a grandfather?’

I laugh happily. ‘You couldn’t look like a grandfather if you tried. Now try them on.’ Sorab takes the box and bites the corner while he takes off his shoes and puts on the slippers.

‘Well?’

‘Like walking on air.’

‘Excellent.’

He gazes into my eyes—his are dark and moist. ‘Do you know I have never worn slippers?

‘Never?’

‘Never. You’ve totally changed my life, Lana.’

‘I’m not finished,’ I say and pass him the next package.

He opens it. ‘Sweats?’

‘Hmmnnnn…’

I stand and watch him strip off his office wear and get into the dark blue sweats.

‘What do you think?’

‘Edible,’ I say, and I really mean it. Low-slung pants on slim sexy hips. A little bit of skin shows and I reach out and touch it.

Instantly, he looks deep into my eyes, his expression changing.

‘I’ve got other plans for you tonight,’ I tell him and retract my hand. ‘Here,’ I say and hand the baby over to him.