Dirty Little Secrets (12 page)

Megan scrunched her face up in question. “What are you talking about?”

James grinned, a wicked smile that spoke volumes about what he was thinking. “Yanks need so much explained. A wombat is a very simple creature; it eats, roots, and leaves. I suppose the analogy works better when you know
roots
is an Australian expression for sex. We are a poetic lot.” James winked down at her, the corner of his mouth rising in a half smile. “Your reaction was very wombat. It’s a pleasure to meet one of the female variety, after all these years thinking they are mythical.”

Megan stopped to consider his explanation. Was she a wombat? She liked emotional intimacy as much as any woman, just not with her sex. Sex was physical, there really wasn’t room for emotion in it. What did that say about her?

Nothing great, that was for sure.

She bit her lip as she considered James’ angle. He was trying to establish reasons why a straight woman would agree to marry a gay man. His assumption was she had to be flawed; little did he know. She was more flawed than he could imagine but she was not going to let him paint her in that light. He would never understand the complexities of her relationship with Ben because she was never going to try to explain it. He didn’t deserve to know. “No, I am not a wombat. I was upset because I was worried about protecting Ben.”

She turned again to look at the sun reflecting in the shallow length of water.

“So next time we have sex, you won’t freak out as soon as you come?”

Megan’s head whipped round to face him. She expected to see a grin or some evidence that he was joking. But his face was expressionless, except for the heat in his dark green eyes. He looked the way he had before he kissed her, before he fucked her. A sudden moistness brushed her panties. Her body was ready for him. If she was honest she would admit her body was always on the brink of arousal when he was near. All it took to push her over the edge was a few words or a look, any indication that his body was reacting to the same pull. Her hands instinctively went to the worn wooden planks of the park bench; a tactile reminder of where they were and why she could not close her eyes and let his lips merge with hers.

Megan cleared her throat and summoned her ice queen persona. The transition was difficult when she could feel her heart beat throbbing everywhere she wanted his hands, and his mouth, especially his mouth. His mouth was designed for pleasure, giving and taking. “Why would you assume I would want to have sex with you ever again?”

He leaned in and whispered, “You enjoyed being fucked as much as I enjoyed fucking you. There is no reason not to do it again.” His lips brushed against her ear with each syllable. She took in a sharp intake of air. She closed her eyes and imagined his mouth lower, his head between her thighs as she came hard and fast against those lips.

James straightened. “Just two wombats doing what wombats do best.”

“I just said I wasn’t a wombat.”

“And I have fucked you and have seen that you are,” he countered. “If nothing else, we have that in common. You haven’t had sex in years because you don’t want to get close to anyone. I get that. I avoid emotional intimacy by having loads of meaningless sex. As one wombat to another, my way is more fun.”

He had admitted something she suspected; the attorney in her pounced on it. “Why are you avoiding emotional intimacy? I have a legitimate reason. Nobody can know Ben is gay, but you don’t have an excuse.”

He shrugged his shoulders. “Why do I need an excuse?”

“You don’t need one. You just seem rather pathetic without one. And cliché.”

“I’m supposed to be asking you questions.”

She smiled. “I’m asking as the woman you slept with, not the woman you’re interviewing.”

“I’m not as good at compartmentalising as you.”

“Then that would make having sex with me highly unethical.”

“It’s only unethical if I pulled the story. And that’s never going to happen. The story is going to happen, one way or another, so we might as well get some good sex out of it. As far as avoiding emotional complications are concerned, we are perfectly matched. Neither of us wants more and at least one of us is not capable of more.”

Which one of them was he speaking about? She suspected he was talking about himself. Sadly, the point also applied to her. Ben was the only healthy relationship she had ever had. She had stopped trying to get anything from men past sex, long before she and Ben said “I do”. She had entered adulthood armed with the knowledge that men were more trouble than they were worth. She wished she had learned that lesson purely by watching her mom, but no, Megan had to make the same mistakes. At least Megan had stopped making them. She did not look to a man for fulfilment for anything beyond sex.

The idea of having sex with James again was beyond tempting. Not liking him had not made the experience any less pleasurable. If it was half as satisfying as the first time, she would be stupid to say no, she had had enough bad sex to appreciate the good stuff when it happened. But she would be even more stupid to say yes. “Someone would find out. I can’t take any more time in sex rehab. That place was soul destroying.”

“Really? It was flashier than the Ritz Carlton. I might check in there sometime. I can handle my soul being destroyed a little for that quality.”

She smiled. “You don’t have enough left of your soul to be so cavalier. Besides you would hate it. Hours on end talking about your childhood and your feelings. Torture.” She shivered as she remembered the experience.

“You said your childhood was off limits.”

“Oh trust me it is.” She rolled her eyes as she continued. “They got some quality fiction. I sleep around because my parents’ relationship was a disaster. I had a very privileged upbringing but mum was a doormat and dad slept around, yadda yadda yadda. Now I have no respect for either of them and I have the inability to be part of a nurturing couple so I reject true intimacy.”

James’ dark brows knitted together. “You just described my life.”

Megan laughed. “Seriously? You’re such a cliché. I was hoping you had some deep-rooted issues that made you a man whore.”

“Like yours?” James asked.

Megan shook her head. “Nice try, man-whore. I am not going to tell you anything about my childhood. I know you have this gorgeous make-me-forget-you-are-the-devil thing going for you, but it won’t work with me.”

“It worked well enough to get you into bed,” he countered.

Megan made a tut sound. “You say that like it was a challenge to get me into bed. Many men have accomplished that. No one has ever got me to relive my past.”

“Challenge accepted. I will get into your pants and your head.”

“Trust me, you don’t want in my head. It’s a scary place.”

James picked up his pen and scribbled something down on a fresh piece of paper.

“Don’t write that down!”

“I’m not. That is hardly new information. I would be shocked if you told me your mind was a magical place inhabited by unicorns and rainbows.”

“What did you write down then?” she asked suspiciously.

He ripped off the sheet of paper and handed it to her. Written across two lines was the number 7027.

Megan narrowed her eyes in question.

“That is my room number at the Four Seasons. I use it when I’m writing so I don’t get distracted by the world. No one will see us there. Hotels were invented for anonymous sex.”

She took a sharp intake of breath. This was for real. There must be reasons for her to say no, but she could not think of any at the moment. She stared down at the paper to stall for time. She did not know what to say. “How does our sex fit in with all the other meaningless sex you have?”

James smiled. “I prefer your transparency. If you want to ask if we would be monogamous, ask me.”

She considered her wording carefully. Monogamy was for relationships, which was the opposite of what she wanted. “I don’t care who you sleep with, just tell me before you sleep with me.”

“That is either an incredibly liberated view on sex or you have a kinky side that gets off on it.”

“Neither. I like having all the evidence. People can only give informed consent when they have all the information. So just tell me.”

“I would ask the same from you, but given your track record I reckon that it is a safe assumption I will be the only one you are fucking for the foreseeable future.”

Megan shook her head. Somewhere along the line, he had got the wrong impression of her. He seemed to think she held sex in higher regard than she did. “In the spirit of full disclosure, I have probably had as many sexual partners as you, if not more. I don’t want you operating under any illusions.”

“I’m impressed, my little wombat, considering you’ve been out of the game for five years. You must have been really going for it before you married the Senator.”

Megan’s back straightened. If he was being critical of her sexual history, the only action he was going to get was in the form of her shoving his notebook up his ass. “I told you before, I’m clean, so it shouldn’t matter.”

“And I told you before, it doesn’t. I don’t care. When I’m in bed with a woman, it’s just her and me. Everybody has a past.”

She looked away so he could not see her face. She was scared what he would see: admiration, lust, maybe gratitude. She was surprised his words affected her so much. She was so used to hiding everything about herself, it was nice to be able to share a little. She would not make a habit of it though. He wasn’t going to get any more of her mind, but he was welcome to her body.

“In this scenario how often do we have sex?” she asked, surprised she was even entertaining the idea, but then she looked at him and remembered why she would. Sexual chemistry that intense did not happen very often. The pleasure centre in her brain overrode every bit of logic she had.

He grinned. “As often as we can.”

“Until when? What is the expiration date? I don’t deal with openended scenarios or hypothetical. How long do you want this arrangement to last?”

“You are ever so romantic.”

“I wasn’t going for romantic. I’m going for practical.”

“Well then, congratulations. You nailed it.” He was smiling again.

She had never met anyone who smiled so often or so freely. She was always temporarily backfooted by the simple movement.

“Just so we are clear. You would like to enter an exclusive sexual relationship for an unspecified period of time.” She considered the statement and then shook her head. She shifted on the bench. She was so glad they were negotiating this in public so she would not be tempted to have sex and then hash out the details later. “No, that will never work. There has to be a stated period of time, something finite. I can’t enter into any agreement without an end date.”

“What about your marriage?” James asked pointedly. “Or did you plan on pretending for the rest of your life?”

“Are you asking as a journalist or the man I am considering entering into a contract with?”

He let out a puff of air as he considered the question. He ran his right hand through his tousled hair. “Both. I’m curious as your soon-to-be-contracted shag, and it’s an important detail for the story. How long was the charade meant to last?”

She opened her mouth to speak but he interrupted her by raising his casted hand. “You’re about to lie. I can see it. We both know we’re going to fuck again. If I slid my hand up your dress what would I find? You would be wet and hot, ready for me. We both know it, so don’t embarrass yourself by lying.”

Her breath hitched in her throat. He was right. She was ready for him. Without so much as a kiss or a touch, she was ready. She closed her eyes and enjoyed the awareness of him, the knowledge he was so close. His body, so large, so physically menacing, but she wasn’t afraid, because there was nothing he could do to her that her body would not welcome. The feeling was liberating, knowing that arousal could trump fear.

“The honest answer, is I don’t know how long Ben and I would have stayed married. At least long enough for him to serve two terms as Vice President, and hopefully another two as president.”

James shot her a dubious glance. “That would make you almost fifty before you could start a proper relationship. In that scenario you wouldn’t have a chance for a family.”

She shook her head. “Ben is my family.”

James looked unconvinced. “Fair enough, but what about a baby of your own? Doesn’t every woman want that at some level? How could he ask you to give all that up for his career?”

His antipathy for Ben was apparent. James used the same tone when he explained the situation with Seth Blair. James had him wrong. “Ben hardly robbed me of motherhood. I don’t want children. If I did, I would have them.”

“Never?”

Megan turned away. Her feelings were hard to understand unless she explained her past. And she wasn’t going to do that. “I did not enjoy being a child. I doubt I would enjoy raising one.”

“Fair enough. I myself can’t imagine a life without the possibility of a child. I want the opportunity to prove I won’t fuck it up as much as my father.”

“Your desire for progeny stems from the desire to outdo your dad. That is not a reason to drag a defenceless soul into existence.”

James rubbed at his chin with his casted hand. “Drag a defenceless soul into existence: that statement speaks volumes for your view on humanity. I may need to quote you on it.” He quickly scribbled down her words.

Her head snapped up. She didn’t want that printed. There was so much she didn’t want anyone to know. She needed to remember that James was a reporter but there was something about him that made her speak more freely than she did with anyone, maybe even Ben. “I am talking to the man I had sex with.”

James set down the notebook and turned so he could stare directly into her eyes. “Megan, I am going to fuck you. And I am going to make damn sure you enjoy it as much as I do. But I am running this story. Nothing will keep me from running it. If you’re operating under the illusion that I will soften towards you and pull the story, we need to stop right now. You think journalists are scum and maybe we are but this journalist has integrity and this man values honesty above all else. I want to have sex with you more than I have wanted anything in a very long time, but that is my private life and that will never impact my professional life.”