Ripped (11 page)

I was breathless, desperate, but nothing compared to him. His eyes were fierce and he slammed his arms either side of me, caging me. Not that I needed to be caged. I wasn’t going anywhere. I could feel the cool, smooth tiles pressing against my back and the hard heat of his body. It was the best kind of trapped I’d ever felt.

Water clung to his forehead and turned his inky dark lashes to spikes. He was the hottest man I’d ever laid eyes on and I hooked my leg behind his hips, pressing him closer, not wanting any space between us. He lifted me easily and I wrapped my legs around him and my arms around his neck. Heat throbbed between us and his first thrust into my body made me cry out.

‘You feel incredible—’ His voice was raw, but at least he could still speak.

I was incapable of making any sound that wasn’t an animal moan and I simply clung to his wide shoulders, kissing him as he drove into me. We came together in a simultaneous rush of ecstasy.

He lowered me gently to the floor, but didn’t let me go, which was a good thing because my legs were like jelly.

The room was steamy and warm, presumably from the heat of the shower, but to be honest it could have been from us.

Still with his arm around me, he reached for another towel—he seemed to have an endless supply—wrapped it around me, kissed me gently on the mouth and led me through to the bedroom. My hair hung in a damp mass past my shoulders and he dried it carefully and then dropped the towel on the floor without looking at it. He was looking at me.

One thing I knew for sure—if this was emotionless sex, I was going to do it every single day for the rest of my life.

I knew it was late the moment I woke. The sun was blazing through the glass wall of his bedroom, bouncing off the river like a million tiny diamonds.

I rolled onto my side and saw the bed was empty.

Then I smelled bacon.

I sat up in bed and realised my clothes were probably still scattered across his living room. Feeling like a burglar, I walked into his closet and found a shirt. One of his perfect white ones. Smiling, I slipped it on and it fell past my bottom and over my hands. I rolled the sleeves back, raked my fingers through my hair and walked in the direction of the delicious smells.

He was standing with his back to me, but he turned the moment I entered the room. He’d pulled on his jeans but nothing else and I stared at his chest and wondered how I could possibly want to drag him straight back to bed after the night we’d spent.

I wasn’t any good at morning-after conversations and I gestured towards the door, conscious that I was naked under his shirt. ‘I should probably get going—’

‘Why?’

I tucked my hair behind my ear. ‘I thought you might have things to do today.’

‘I have.’ He flipped the bacon. ‘And I plan to do them with you.’

‘Oh.’ My stomach curled. A night with him hadn’t cured me of anything. I found myself staring at his shoulders and the lean, athletic lines of his body. He was the hottest guy on the face of the earth.

‘Unless you think Rosie needs you?’

I watched the way his biceps flexed as he reached for a plate. ‘She’s working today. Christmas Day is the only day of the year she doesn’t train. But I should text her.’ Dragging my eyes away from sleek male muscle, I wandered through to the living room. Light poured through the windows, reflecting off glass and polished surfaces. Outside the sky was a perfect winter blue and the sun sparkled on the surface of the river.

I found my phone, sent my sister a text thanking her for my Christmas ‘gift’, which I had no intention of returning for a refund, and then stood for a moment, distracted by the view, thinking about the night we’d spent.

‘Coffee?’ He had the sexiest voice I’d ever heard and I turned and saw he’d put two plates on the table and was now holding out a mug to me.

‘Thanks.’ I took it and curled my hands around the warmth, even though his apartment was a perfect temperature. ‘I love looking at the river.’

‘Me, too.’ He hadn’t shaved and his jaw was darkened by stubble. ‘That’s why I chose this place. Are you hungry?’

‘Starving.’ I hadn’t eaten since the turkey and we’d done some serious exercise. ‘So you can cook.’

‘I cooked for my sister for years. She’s still alive.’ He handed me a plate piled with fluffy scrambled eggs and rashers of crisp bacon and I carried it over to the glass table by the window.

My stomach growled. ‘If I had a view like this I’d never go to work.’

‘You’re not working this week?’

‘Officially my department is closed until January 2, but that doesn’t stop the emails.’

‘You’re still loving your work?’ He sprawled in the chair opposite me and suddenly the view had serious competition. I picked up my fork, cautious about answering. Thanks to Charlie I was programmed not to talk about my work.

‘It’s fine, thanks.’

‘I remember how excited you were when you got the job.’

And I remembered he’d been the only one to ask questions. ‘It’s exciting and the people are—’ I broke off, reminding myself he was probably just being polite, but then I realized he was still listening and looking at me, not at his watch or over my shoulder as Charlie had always done. And because of that I found myself telling him everything I was doing, and the more I talked the more enthusiastic I was until I realized I’d cleared my plate and must have bored him rigid. ‘Sorry.’

‘For what? That is the first time I’ve seen you that enthusiastic since that first night we met.’ And he didn’t look bored. He looked interested and he asked me a few questions that proved he was as bright as he was spectacular looking. ‘I’m pleased it’s working out. So NASA isn’t going to get you yet.’

I blushed, thinking about that awful dinner when everyone had talked about their hopes for the future and I’d confessed I wanted to work for NASA. Charlie had mocked me (I think his exact words were ‘Apollo Hayley—God help us all’). It wasn’t ladylike to be interested in rockets and jet propulsion (although frankly, since that hot encounter with Nico at the wedding I’d though of nothing but thrust, and not the sort taught by physics teachers.)

I changed the subject. ‘Tell me the history of the tattoo.’

He drank his coffee and for a moment I thought he wasn’t going to answer.

Then he put his mug down. ‘We moved from Sicily to London when I was ten. My English was terrible and—’ he dismissed it all with a shrug ‘—let’s just say school was hell, so I stayed away.’

‘Really? I imagined you being a straight-A student.’

‘That part came later. Back then, I was out of control.’

I eyed the tattoo wrapped round hard bulge of his bicep. ‘So that was that when—?’

‘That and other things.’ His tone was flat. ‘I was sixteen when my father died and Kiara was taken into foster care. I argued that I was her only family and that we should be together. Of course no one listened.’

I put my fork down, knowing how I’d felt when my parents had tried to separate Rosie and me. ‘What did you do?’

‘I grew up. I worked out what sort of job would make sure I got Kiara back and decided I had to be a lawyer because they earned good money and knew how to argue.’ His smile mocked himself. ‘I went back to school and worked every hour of every day. I got a scholarship to a top school. I was a social experiment—kid with a brain but no income, let’s give that a try.’

‘That must have been tough.’

‘Tough was seeing my sister in a foster home. But they were kind people and they helped both of us.’

‘And you did it. You made a life for both of you.’ I mentally compared him to my dad, who’d left us. ‘You did a great job. She’s confident and charming and thinks you’re the best.’ It explained the bond I saw and the respect she showed him.

‘It was hard letting her move into an apartment with her friends.’

‘Independence is a good thing. And I’m glad you did,’ I said softly, ‘or we wouldn’t be on our own now.’

His eyes met mine and then he stood up and pulled me to my feet.

‘Let’s make the most of it.’

We didn’t leave the apartment for five days. Most of that time was spent in bed having amazing sex, but also talking and laughing as we swapped stories.

I told him about the time I’d built a rocket in the kitchen and made a hole in the ceiling. He told me how he’d blown up the toilets in school using sodium taken from an unlocked chemistry lab.

I still couldn’t believe how much this cool, controlled guy had hidden in his past. I was thirsty to know more. Favorite band, favorite drink, best place he’d visited… ‘Tell me your most embarrassing moment ever.’

He rolled onto his side and looked at me from under those thick, dark lashes. ‘I once went to this wedding where the bridesmaid burst out of her dress—’

Laughing, I pushed him onto his back and straddled him. My hair slid forward, covering us both. ‘If that hadn’t happened we wouldn’t be here.’

‘Yes, we would.’ His hands were in my hair. ‘But I was planning to make my move
after
the wedding, not during. I was going to persuade you to cry on my shoulder.’

‘I’m not much of a crier.’ I lowered my head and kissed him, my mouth lingering on his. ‘You’re so sexy. Say something to me in Italian.’

‘
Pizza Margherita
.’

I giggled, but the crazy thing was he even managed to make
that
sound sexy.

My phone beeped. I ignored it.

‘Say something else.’

‘
Il mio vestito è strappato
.’

‘What does that mean?’

‘My dress has torn.’

And I was laughing. Laughing in bed with a guy I wanted to know more about. I wanted to know everything, and finally I reached across to read my text from Rosie:
five days in bed with the same guy isn’t emotionless sex
.

And I stopped laughing and realized with a flash of panic that I wasn’t supposed to want to know more. Emotionless, unattached sex should be exactly that, but somehow over the past five days I’d managed to form an attachment.

I was in trouble.

Chapter Nine

‘This is your fault.’ I stopped eating Nutella out of the jar and poked the spoon towards my sister. ‘You invited him here for Christmas.’

‘Yes. Christmas! I didn’t expect you to go home with him and stay until Easter. I was about to report you to the police as a missing person. What the hell did you do for five days?’

I grinned and she rolled her eyes.

‘Really? So he’s even hotter than he looks. Way to go.’

I abandoned the comfort eating and slumped back against the sofa. ‘I promised myself I was done with misery.’

‘Sex with him was miserable?’

‘No, it was incredible! But now I can’t stop thinking about him. Crap.’

And it wasn’t just the sex I was thinking about. I kept picturing the way he looked asleep—those lashes shadowing his cheeks, strands of dark hair sliding across his forehead. I thought about the hours we’d spent talking. The things I’d told him. Things I hadn’t told anyone else.

I’d discovered intimacy wasn’t just about getting naked with someone.

Bathed in panic, I sprang to my feet. ‘It was supposed to be just sex. Emotionless sex.’

‘Right. Emotionless sex that lasted five days.’

I paced across the living room and then turned to her, desperate. ‘What am I going to do? I need to forget him straight away and move on.’

‘Is that really what you want?’

‘Absolutely. Definitely. No emotional involvement.’ I didn’t tell her I was worried I was too late for that, but she probably knew because she stared at me for a moment and then sighed.

‘OK, well, the good news is that it isn’t New Year for another six hours, so you haven’t blown your resolution. You can start fresh at one minute past midnight. I’ve got VIP tickets to The Skyline. Tonight we are going to party.’

‘The Skyline?’ It was my turn to stare. ‘How did you manage that? Their New Year’s Eve parties are legendary.’

‘I meet a lot of people at the gym.’ My sister looked smug. ‘We will have a great time and you can forget all about him.’

I knew I wasn’t going to forget all about him.

I wanted to ask if she’d really forgotten He Who Must Not Be Named, but I didn’t dare. ‘Will anyone we know be there?’

‘Yes, a whole group of us and you are going to hold your head up high and wear your favorite black dress because it makes you look fabulous.’

‘Great. Let’s do it.’ I ignored the part of me that just wanted to be back in Nico’s apartment. ‘It will be my first public appearance since I exposed myself (I didn’t count Christmas). Might as well make it high profile.’

I did love my black dress. It had tiny crystals sewn into the fabric and shimmered when it caught the light. I’d found it in a charity shop in Notting Hill, otherwise I never would have been able to afford the label. It was brand new. Still had the tags on it. The owner told me that the woman who had brought it in had fallen in love with it and bought it, intending to slim into it. Fortunately for me, she hadn’t.

Rosie was right. It was the perfect dress for tonight.

I presumed my lack of excitement was caused by the prospect of meeting so many people who had seen me half-naked.

‘We’re going to get ready together like we always do, and while we’re doing that you can tell me everything.’

And because she was my sister and this was what we did, I did tell her everything. How it had felt. How
I
had felt. And how I felt now, which was totally crap if I was honest.

Getting ready to go out together should have been fun. Rosie opened a bottle of champagne left over from Christmas, but it reminded me so much of being with Nico.

‘Are you nearly ready?’ My sister was wearing a velvet skater dress with mesh at the sides and no back that looked perfect on her toned body. Her blonde hair was loose around her shoulders, a little messy, but that made it all the sexier. She wore a pair of vertiginous heels on the ends of those incredible, kick-boxing legs.

I blinked. ‘Wow.’

‘Wow yourself.’ She eyed me and smiled. ‘I predict emotionless sex will begin at five seconds past midnight. Let’s go. The cab is here.’