Priceless (13 page)

She s
hook her head at me and tossed her napkin down onto the table.  “I’m not—you’re mistaken about what you’re thinking I want from you.”

“And you’re one
terrible liar, Gabrielle.”  I lowered my voice so nobody could hear.  “I have a really good memory, and I remember how you were that night in that room.  With me.”  I nodded slowly.

“No…
please don’t.”  Her breath was coming fast and she kept shaking her head in denial, the soft ends of her mahogany hair just brushing the tops of her breasts as they rose and fell from the heavy breathing pouring from her.

I didn’t let up.  “How you flew apart when I made you come, the sounds you made
in my mouth, my fingers tight inside you…how your tongue felt wrapped around my cock.”

“Stop
!” she hissed, standing up and bringing a hand to her forehead.  “I have a migraine and I need to go,” she blurted before leaving the table, gaining her a few looks from the others seated around us.

“Feel be
tter, Gaby,” I called after her.  All for show.  “Let me know if I can do
anything
to help.”

She didn’t turn around.

The view of her arse in that tight skirt from behind was still magnificent, and I enjoyed it thoroughly as she walked away.

I know the signs
of passion in a woman’s body.  The flushed skin.  The faltering speech.  The breathing that begins in deep pulls and makes her tits heave deliciously.  The guarded posture of trying to remain aloof, but knowing she’s failing miserably.

My lovely obsession
—the delicious Miss Gabrielle Hargreave—had every one of those signs.  And I’d wager, probably an added ache up in between her thighs.

I can fix that ache for you, Gabrielle.

I’d gotten the first thing right with her tonight.

Finally.

A lethal crack in that hard shell she owned.

And for the first time in a very long while, I coul
d say that I felt really goddamn…happy for once.

BRYNNE
had been one hundred percent correct, not that I ever doubted her.  She was brilliant in her field.  The larger-than-life portrait hanging in the grand stairwell at Hallborough House was a Mallerton all right.  A stunning, supremely executed example from his middle period of works.  Sir Jeremy Greymont and Lady Georgina Greymont with their children.  God.  I took it all in and enjoyed every moment of the experience.

He stood behind her as she sat in an elegant
ly carved chair wearing a pale pink gown and pearls.  The children, a boy and baby girl, were done as children were usually presented for the times—wide-eyed and stoic.  This was early Victorian judging from the clothing.  I was well aware of Mallerton’s embracing of the camera obscura and figured he must have used it to paint the children and the many pets which often appeared in his works.  Babies, dogs, and horses didn’t stay still for long enough otherwise.

I’d have to talk to Hannah and Freddy Greymont about some archival photographs and an official cataloguing
of this into the Mallerton database.  I could ask Ben to take some quick prelims for me before he left.  I wondered if there were any more Mallerton paintings in this house—

“You know, I have a houseful of similar
portraits just waiting for you to look at them like you’re studying that one right now.”

I jumped at the sound of his voice right behind me.

“Oh, I know you do,” I said without turning around.  “I saw there were tons on the walls as I was making my escape, but I didn’t have time to spare them much more than a fleeting glance.”

What in the hell was he trying to do to me?  Lurking around and stalking my every move, startling the bejesus out of me.
  I thought I’d ditched him at dinner.  I really needed to stay out of his sights for the rest of the weekend as much as humanely possible.  Tomorrow at the wedding was unavoidable, of course, but there would be two hundred other people around us and I’d be able to figure out some way to avoid him.

The prob
lem with Ivan Everley was he continued to pursue me relentlessly and made that message very clear.  I’m not an idiot.  The man had said he wanted to fuck me when I’d been at his beloved Donadea, and it seemed nothing had changed in regards to that matter.

Had things changed for me?

You can’t be with him.  You can’t go down that road again.  Ever.

Despite his apologies and the crazy circumstances we’d both been thrown into, I just couldn’t go there with him.  And I wasn’t sharing
why
I couldn’t, either.  It was better this way, and he didn’t need to know my reasons.  I was in charge of my body and my choices.  

The hot breath of him tickled the back of my neck and I knew I was doomed
when my senses reacted.  That was the thing with him.  He infuriated me, but my traitorous body didn’t seem to be getting the memos.  I couldn’t help the shiver that shimmied down my spine any more than I could help how I’d been made.

I
squeezed my eyes tight in an effort to ward off the arousal.  To ward him off.

“It drives you crazy that you didn’t get a
very good look at my paintings, doesn’t it, Gabrielle?”

I just stood
frozen with my back to him until I felt his hands spin me around.

His eyes had a predatory gleam in them as they roved over me and he leaned in closer.
  I sucked in a breath.

He inhaled and gave me an eyebrow twist as if to say,
“I’m waiting for an answer.”

“You drive me
crazier than the loss of your paintings ever will,” I whispered, backing up a step, creating some needed distance between his hard body and my quivering one.  I seriously couldn’t handle him crowding me.

I had to get away from him before I lost my resolve—

His hand came up to under my chin and he held me to him, gentle yet firm.

“Is it bad that driving you crazy makes me feel
so fucking good?” he asked before hitting me with that devastating smile which put him into mythical god territory, and me into flight mode.

I
pulled myself away and ran up the stairs.  And I didn’t stop running until I’d reached my bedroom and could lock myself inside.

I panted behind the door
, holding myself still above the pounding of my heart at the affect he had on me.  I couldn’t allow myself the luxury of acting upon my obvious attraction to him.  Why did he continue to pursue me?  Why me, in the first place? I had to keep away from him.  I just had to.

It’s
so much safer that way.

MR.
and Mrs. Blackstone were a romantic vision at their wedding.  Brynne was always beautiful, and Ethan, well…he was too, but in a very male and rugged way.  Right now, he looked like he’d had enough of parties and guests and anything to do with being anywhere with Brynne that wasn’t private, to last him a lifetime.

I was happy for them, but I was also relieved this weekend was nearly over and I could get back to my life…and the harsh reality of a job and school.  And away from Ivan Everley.

Seriously, he was dangerous.

“
Simon is asking for the best man and maid-of-honor.  That’s you, darling,” Elaina called out as she walked up with her fiancé Neil, looking happy in love with her man.  They were next on the marriage circuit.  Elaina had told me last night that Ivan and I would be paired up again for their wedding in six week’s time.  I just couldn’t shake him it seemed.  “Simon’s making us do some crazy poses too,” she added with a laugh.

“Awesome,”
I said to Elaina, as I made my way over to the insanely non-traditional photographer Ethan had hired—one Simon Carstairs—in his shiny custom suit of retina blinding leaf-green.

“There she is,” Ivan said
, holding his hand out with that deadly serious expression he liked to use on me.

What choice did I have?  Be a massive bitch at my best friend’s wedding, or take his hand and let him lead me around like a poodle on a leash?

His hands did a good wandering job on me, too, as Simon shouted positions for us to pose in for these ridiculous pictures.  “I am not a model for Vogue,” I muttered under my breath.

“But you could be.  In fact, I’d even go one further and say you’re far more beautiful than most of the models that grace the pages of that magazine,” he whispered in my ear.

“You need to stop this…obsession…you have with me, Ivan,” I hissed back.

“Good word choice.  You are definitely an obsession.”

“Tilt her backward Fred and Ginger style,” Simon commanded.

Before I could respond Ivan had me swept beneath him, his strong arms the only thing between my ass and the garden cobblestones.  He brought his forehead within an inch of mine and held me there, suspended and at his mercy.

“How’s this?”  He answered the photographer but he spoke the words right against my lips.

“Gorgeous, my darlings.  Now bend your leg at the knee and point your toe like a dancer.  You have magnificent legs, Gaby, and I need this shot.  Ivan, stretch your back leg out behind you and keep it stiff.”

“Oh it’s definitely stiff,” Ivan said softly while looking devilishly into my eyes.

Simon giggled and snapped what felt like millions of shots.  “This is brilliantly luscious, you two.”  He kept directing us into position
s that required my body to be plastered up against Ivan’s tantalizing one.  God, he smelled so good to me, something that hadn’t changed from that first night at the National Gallery.  His hair fell forward when he dipped me this way and that, brushing along his jaw and sometimes over mine.  I couldn’t take much more of this.  It was too hard for me.

And
I was starting to hate Simon-the-photographer with a passion.

“He’s so right, you know
.”

“About?”

“Your magnificent legs.”  He brought his eyes down and over my bent knee and pointed toe, the effect of which had raised the wispy skirt of my dress so high he was probably seeing way more than he should.

Fuck my life.

I struggled to pull my skirt down but gravity has the ultimate say in such matters.  Ivan held me how he wanted to anyway, and I sensed he wouldn’t release me until he was good and ready.

“Please…Ivan, can we stop this?” I begged on a whisper.  “I don’
t want to—I can’t—please.”

His gaze flickered for a moment as he held me against him, and stared down at me, weighing my request possibly?

“That’s it.  We’ve had enough,” he told Simon firmly, before raising me up back to standing, his hands still holding me close, one at my lower back and the other gripping one of mine.

My dress floated back down to the floor.

“If you have a drink with me I’ll stop.”

“I shouldn’t.”
  I’d had several drinks tonight already but I didn’t tell him that.

“But you will.
  I’m calling a truce with you and it’s what I want.  It’s time for us to make friends, Gabrielle.”

“Fine.”
  He just didn’t give up and I was tired of fighting him at every turn.

When I agreed to the drink
he smiled at me again, this time just as devastating to my resolve as all of the other times.

I was in
very deep trouble with this man.

And he knew it as well as I did.