Melting Ms Frost (21 page)

‘Come on through,’ Aidan called out from the kitchen when he heard the cloakroom door close. Turning on the oven, he slid a flat square of rosemary focaccia bread into it to warm.

While Annabel had been changing, he’d taken the opportunity to swap his own leathers for a pair of jeans and had flicked the switch to ignite the modern gas-fuelled fire set into the wall.

She appeared through the doorway as he uncovered the serving plate of antipasto he’d had the little Italian deli down the road put together for him earlier.

‘Nice place,’ she said, wandering slowly through the living space towards the open-plan kitchen, eyes darting all over as she took everything in. From his position on the opposite side of the long central island separating the two areas, Aidan watched her. She was back in her skirt and little boots now, but he didn’t think he’d ever forget the way she’d looked earlier, striding out of Cluny’s in those leathers and heels with her red hair rippling behind her as she strode towards him. She’d been the living incarnation of every wet dream he’d ever had. And would no doubt be the inspiration for many more.

‘Glad you think so.’ Picking up his smartphone from the worktop, he set it into the speaker dock set at the far end of the island. ‘What music would you like?’

‘Anything which doesn’t feature a combination of the words “merry”, “white” and “Christmas”, or involves the jingling of bells, mommy kissing Santa, or rocking around any trees.’

Her sardonic tone made him grin. ‘Not a festive person?’ Scrolling through the menu on the touchscreen, he chose a nicely unobtrusive and chilled compilation to play in the background.

She did a visual sweep of the apartment. ‘No decorations, no tree. Seems you’re a bit bah-humbug yourself.’

‘Ah, but I’ve only been back in London for a matter of weeks after an extended time away,’ he explained. ‘I haven’t had time to get around to decorations, much to the consternation of my cleaning lady, who insists on putting the cards on display at the very least.’ He tilted his head in the direction of the window ledges and caught such an unguarded look of surprise as Annabel saw the forest of cards covering the deep surfaces, that he was left wondering how many well wishes she received at this time of year.

‘Do you live here alone?’

‘Yes.’

‘The rent must be extortionate,’ she muttered, almost to herself as she looked the place over again with a calculating eye.

‘I don’t rent. I own it,’ he told her, watching her react with surprise again. ‘A perk left over from my years working in the City.’

‘Oh,’ she said, giving a little grimace at his admission. It was a reaction he was more than used to. As a breed, bankers had hardly done much to inspire feelings of love and respect in recent years. ‘So, is Cluny’s part of some permanent change or just be a bit of a stop gap for you?’ she asked.

‘Still so eager to see me gone, Ms Frost?’ he teased. ‘To be honest, my plans are a bit loose at the moment, so you needn’t give up hope. Now, why don’t you sit down and tell me what I can get you to drink.’ He indicated she should take a seat at the closest end of the long dining table – although after having her thighs cradling his arse and hips all the way home what he really wanted was to lay her across the solid oak surface instead so he could see how good they felt wrapped naked around his waist or clenched tight around his ears.

‘Something soft,’ she said as she pulled out a chair and sat. ‘Water’s fine.’

Seeing as he was going to be taking her home again a little later, he decided to join her.

‘So, what about you?’ he asked over his shoulder, taking a couple of glasses from a cupboard and turning to use the ice and water dispenser set into the door of the big American-style fridge. ‘I gather you’ve been at Cluny’s for a while?’

‘Since it opened. I started as assistant manager.’

He turned to glance at her. That was roughly five years ago. She must have been young. ‘What were you then, about twenty?’

She nodded, although she wasn’t looking at him; her attention had been caught by the gentle flicker of the flames that danced up from a decorative bed of dark smooth pebbles in the fireplace. ‘Twenty-one.’

Impressive, but not really surprising given her formidable drive and single-mindedness. ‘And where does Cluny’s feature on the Frost career plan?’

‘What do you mean?’ Her suddenly sharper tone had him turning to look at her again. Her air of general distraction was gone. In its place was focused suspicion.

Aidan hid a sigh. Well it hadn’t taken long at all for the liberating effects of the bike ride to wear off. He’d hoped a spin on the big Triumph would serve as a bit of an ice breaker, and although he hadn’t been able to actually see her reaction at the time, he’d felt her whoops and shrieks of laughter reverberate against his spine and knew she’d been having fun. It was the first time he’d known her to truly let go – and knowing he’d been instrumental in bringing that release of elemental joy to the surface had felt almost as good as having her plastered against him. Almost. For all that she might now be looking to scurry back behind the protection of her hard outer edges and spikes, he had undeniable proof that Annabel Frost was made of soft curves.

‘I mean, do you still see yourself working there in ten years from now? You seem to be a very driven person.’

‘Oh, well, I’m very committed …’ She let her words dry up, obviously not wanting to be drawn on that particular topic of conversation. Hell,
any
topic of conversation. She really was the most guarded person he’d ever met. That only increased his determination to crack her open.

‘I know you are, Annabel. That wasn’t the question.’ He carried the glasses of iced water to the table and set them down, looking at her across the expanse of wood. ‘I’m not spying for my uncle.’

‘Then why do you want to know all this?’ she bristled, confirming that even this seemingly innocuous exchange of information was pushing against her boundaries, sending her into retreat.

‘I want to get to know you,’ he said, keeping it simple and straight to the point. ‘Is that a problem?’ If she wanted to keep trying to run and hide, keep trying to push him away, she needed to know that he refused to make it easy for her. ‘If it is, why did you agree to come here tonight? What did you think was going to happen?’

She hit him with a green gaze suddenly ripe with provocative intent. ‘I think you know the answer to that.’

‘Do I?’ He felt a tingle at the back of his neck. With supreme effort, he kept his tone level. ‘Why don’t you tell me, just so we’re clear.’

She raised her eyebrows as though surprised he had to ask, then she was on her feet, rounding the table towards him with deliberate steps. He turned to face her as she came to stand right up close, his whole being lighting up in response to her unmistakably seductive attitude.

‘I thought you wanted to fuck me,’ she said in a low, throaty tone he’d never heard from her before – one that went to work on his straining libido straight away. ‘Isn’t that what this whole thing has been about?’

Well, he’d asked for it, and it certainly didn’t get much clearer than that. Apparently Ms Frost had been making some decisions. Taking his cue from her bluntness, he returned it in style. ‘I do want to fuck you.’ God, how he wanted it. Right there, right then, with such a force that the effort it took to hold himself in check made even his teeth hurt. ‘When you’re ready for me, remember?’

‘I am ready,’ she proclaimed, boldly holding his gaze. ‘I’m here, and I’m ready.’

Ready to take control of the situation, yes – ready to let things happen on her terms. Which told him one thing.

‘You’re not ready, Annabel,’ he said. ‘Nowhere near, if you’ve come here prepared to get naked and sweaty, but unprepared to carry out a simple conversation.’

She looked at him as though he was crazy. And maybe she was right. ‘Most men like that I want to keep things simple, uncomplicated.’

‘I can imagine.’ And something about the thought of those faceless, emotionless men casually taking what she offered, taking the gift of her body without giving any thought to the nourishment of her heart and soul made him seethe. Was that how she’d conducted all her intimate relationships? Had she ever been romanced? There was no point in asking her, of course, not when she was balking at discussing something so innocuous as her career path. And why should he even care? His body screamed at him. Why not just take what she was so obviously eager to give?

Because it wasn’t enough. He didn’t want to be just a convenient tool she could use to satisfy her physical needs and then easily discard. She could use a damned vibrator for that. He shoved the urges aside. ‘But, that’s not going to happen here,’ he said, breaking eye contact and letting his gaze roam slowly, suggestively over her curves – curves that were so tantalisingly close. Most importantly he let her see the desire she aroused in him when he raised his eyes to hers again, to ease the sting of his necessary rejection. ‘You’re so beautiful,’ he told her. ‘I doubt you have any idea how badly I ache to touch you right now. How much I do want to fuck you. But I want to be the man who gives you more than that, who takes more than that. I want to make love to you, and for that we need to be more than convenient strangers.’

He caught a glimpse of unease slither across the back of her eyes, and she nearly jumped out of her skin as the timer on the oven sounded. As he’d suspected, even the thought of extending intimacy beyond the bounds of the purely physical was still enough to scare her.

‘I don’t want to fight,’ he said, gently, ignoring the digital beeps, keeping his attention and his will focused on her. ‘And I don’t want you to run. Let’s have something to eat and try taking this from the top again.’

He could see her indecision – took it as a good sign that on a deeper level the need generated by frustrated desire was warring with her life-long habit of protecting herself. He used it to press the point. ‘It’s the only way we’re both going to end up with what we want.’

She took a breath in. ‘OK.’

He let his out. ‘OK.’

Together they carried the makings of supper to the table – Annabel taking the platter of cold meats, cheeses and olives while he grabbed the warm bread, a couple of side plates and napkins. He’d purposely kept the meal super light, super casual – finger food to nibble on, to dip, to tear and share. Not only was it late, but the food wasn’t much more than another prop, a premise to get them sitting together, to get Annabel Frost talking. And despite her continued reticence, he would persevere. He would get her to open up to him. He would win this challenge and claim his prize.

‘So, where were we?’ he asked, careful to keep the thread of steely determination hidden and his tone light and easy. Instead of taking the chair directly opposite her, he went for the next one along, in the hope that the added space created by the diagonal offset would help her relax, make it appear less like they were facing off across an interrogation table. For much the same reason, he’d kept the lighting low and subtle – although he couldn’t say the idea of shining a spotlight in her eyes to force her secrets out of her didn’t hold a certain attraction. His patience wasn’t infinite. ‘Ah, yes. The working life and times of Ms Annabel Frost.’ He tore off a corner of the bread and helped himself to a paper-thin strip of prosciutto. ‘How did you manage to make assistant manager in an establishment like Cluny’s by the time you were twenty-one? I know how exacting Richard can be. Be honest now. Did you fudge your CV?’

The little goad was all it took to get her off the back foot of defence and onto the attack. She bit instantly, like she always did.

‘Of course not,’ she said with affront. ‘I’d had a good six years’ experience by then. I started working as a part-time kitchen hand at fifteen.’

‘That must have played havoc with your teenage social life?’

She shrugged and picked up a crumbled piece of the tangy parmigiano. ‘It was only my mother and me at that point. We didn’t have enough that I could’ve afforded a social life without the job. And I didn’t have any spare time for one with.’

Aidan nodded. He wondered if that answered the question of where all of Annabel Frost’s friends were. It appeared Tim’s observation had been right: there seemed to be no sign of anyone in her life apart from her mother. And that bastard Tony Maplin. If she’d had to sacrifice her youth for the sake of gaining some financial security, that would explain a lot.

He wanted to ask her. About that and so much else, but he knew he had to take things slowly, pick and choose very carefully what to push her on. So he went in the opposite direction from the one he wanted. ‘Well, that would explain why you’ve no head at all for drink. Missing out on all those formative drunken years meant you never built up your tolerance.’

It worked. She gave him a little smile. ‘And as you’re such an expert with hangover cures I take it you’re speaking from experience. Is that how you spent your formative years, then?’

‘Face down in the gutter? Of course. It’s practically the law in Ireland to start building a tolerance from birth, so it is,’ he told her, exaggerating his accent for effect. ‘And then to keep trying to increase it all through your adult years.’

That earned him a slightly bigger smile. He watched as she reached for the bread and tore off a pinch, dipping into the shallow dish of oil and balsamic before rushing the dripping mass to her mouth.

‘So washing dishes at fifteen led you to assistant manager at Cluny’s at twenty-one, and now manager by twenty-seven. You don’t need me to tell you that’s as far as you can go there. Somehow, given your age and your, ah –
character
, I don’t think you’ll be content sticking with that. All the hard work, all that determination and drive, has got to lead you on to something bigger. Surely you’ve thought of where you go from here?’

She looked at him for a moment. Looked as though she had something she wanted to say, something that was simply bursting to come out.

‘Ideally?’ she said in a rush, obviously having no choice but to release the pressure he’d seen building. ‘I’d like to run my own place.’ She looked as though she could barely contain her excitement, then looked quite horrified that she’d actually revealed it. ‘You, know. Eventually,’ she qualified.