The Value of Vulnerability (21 page)

“I was named after my uncle Aaron,” she ventured, picking up from their earlier conversation. “I was supposed to be a boy.”

“May I mention that I’m glad that didn’t work out?”

“You may,” she replied haughtily, as if granting a boon, and
gave a surprised shriek as he tickled her. Laughing breathlessly, she continued. “I was my parents’ last-ditch effort for a boy, so ended up being largely raised as one. Sports and the like.”

“Which?”

“All of them. Baseball, hockey, volleyball—I made Varsity basketball in university. I haven’t played anything in years though. Not really. I mean, the occasional pickup game. And I coach basketball at a community centre. Volunteer for kids . . .”
Babbling. Not good.
“Anyway, I’m pretty out of shape, comparatively speaking. What about you?”

“This is out of shape?” he queried dubiously, thoroughly ignoring her question as he ran fingertips over her quad. “How did you get into IT?”

“I majored in Com Sci.” This was not the direction to go, talking about work and career. “Let’s not talk business. We did that at lunch the other day. Tell me about your family.”

His eyes glinted with calculation,
seeing through her thinly veiled attempt. “Nothing to tell. How many sisters do you have?”

“Two. One married
. One not. Gina and Liana. I’m an aunt, twice,” she told him sombrely.

“A great responsibility, I’m sure.”

“Jordy and Emmie. Gina’s kids.”

No response.

She tried again. “Your parents?”

“I have the conventional number.”

“Divorced?” Her sympathetic tone was met with a shrug. “How old were you?”

“Eight.”

She put a hand on his face. “You don’t want to talk about it, do you? The divorce?” she asked.

“It’s business,” he replied dryly, “and you don’t want to discuss business. We need wine.”

His expression was cool bordering on stony as he opened a bottle of red wine with expertise.

“How can one refer to divorcing parents as business?”

He sighed and rolled his eyes. “The Braxtons and Howards have been in business together since they teamed up to rook widows and orphans out of their pensions in Britain a couple of centuries ago. My parents’ marriage was a merger, bringing the families together personally as well as professionally. It was not a stable investment.”

“I see.” She smiled.
“But with you as the main dividend, it paid off in the end, eh?”

He sent her a wry, sidelong look as he poured plummy Okanagan pinot noir into crystal glasses
and handed her one. “Smooth, gorgeous.”

Grinning, she sipped the wine and looked around the kitchen, a massive room designed for gourmet cooking, the preparation of elaborate meals to serve dozens of guests. It was larger than her entire apartment. Ford lived here alone, aside from some live-in staff, she imagined. Everyone had fantasies of wealth—
hence buying lottery tickets. But this minor glimpse of real wealth was unsettling. She couldn’t conceive how it would be to live like this, with well-trained staff at one’s disposal, security people, private elevators, cars and jets and jewellery. Money to burn and the price of privacy high.

“Is this your, um, primary residence, Ford?”

He shrugged. “More or less. When I’m in Toronto.”

“Are you generally? In Toronto, I mean.”

“Mostly.” He fed her a juicy bit of roasted pheasant. “I have many homes.”

“A home is where you
live
,” she scorned with a smile. “Everything else would be a glorified hotel. Is this your home?”

Again
, a shrug. “I suppose.”

Silence fell.

“What do your parents do?” he asked finally, surprising her with another personal inquiry.

“My dad is a theoretical physicist and my mom an English teacher.”

“A
physicist
?”

The overreaction had her instincts on alert. “Wasn’t that covered in the background check?”

Without hesitation, “No.”

It wouldn’t be
, likely, in a simple check. But somehow, she
knew
he had already known it—and probably much more about her. Had he investigated her further?

It
didn’t matter, and yet it did. Paranoia was one thing. Lying was quite another. Yet the most interesting part of it all was that he had done it so badly, as if he was off his game.

But she didn’t
call him out on it.

“
At any rate, Dad’s a smart guy. Famous in a small way. Research grants keep him working, but Mom’s made him promise he’ll retire when she does in a couple of years, so they can spend time together. Travel and so forth.” She tilted her head. “Does a CEO of a multinational company ever retire?”

“My father did,” he returned coolly.

She was certain he hadn’t meant to say that. “Does he now fill his days with golf and fishing?”

“I don’t know.”

She noted the tension around his mouth, but pushed forward. “The discussion of your family is verboten, isn’t it?”

He sent her a surprised look. “No. Not exactly.”

“It’s all right.” She petted his hand.

That elicited an annoyed sound. “I don’t think we need to be too personal, do we?”

There was a long and pregnant silence.

“I suppose not,” she agreed evenly, at last. “
Why be personal with the person you just got naked with? The girl you just banged in your bed? Why bother?”

“Erin—”

“No, it’s all right.” She smiled wryly. “We can talk of other things, impersonal things, like art and travel and food. But those things get personal, too, don’t they? Art evokes emotion. Travel reveals personal experience. Food,” she slipped a sliver of apple-smoked cheddar into his mouth, “is sensual. Being mindful of keeping our distance ruins any conversation and we’d be best keeping to sex. But sex involves all that. Is discussion of sex taboo? Are we not to talk about anything because of what the words reveal about ourselves?”

*

She’s smart
.

He had not thought her dull-witted in the least, but her carefree nature
, sexy veneer, and dodgy grammar—not to mention those breasts and that ass—distracted one from paying too close attention to her brains.

Thoroughly annoyed with himself for such a grievous error
: “What is the point?”

“I want to know what you want of me,” she said gently. She put a
warm hand on his bare chest, slim fingers splaying over his heart. “You don’t want me in here.” Her hand moved to his forehead. “Will you allow me entry here? Even in the smallest sense?”

“Why do you want that?”

Her hand dropped. “Isn’t that what all people want? To be let in?”

“I do not know what
all
people want, in truth,” he retorted. “We have embarked on an affair. These are early days,” he finished, his tone softened but remote.

“Said like a man who’s said that
to himself many times.”

The charming façade slid into place. “Erin,” he teased, “
these
are
early days. Let’s enjoy them. Don’t you want to live in the moment? Whatever comes of our association, let it happen organically. You’re interesting. Beautiful. Sexy. I’m with you because it’s what I want. And if I told you all my secrets on our first night together, there would be nothing new for you to learn in the future.”

*

It was a reasonable assessment, and from anyone else, she would have bought it. But it wasn’t the
lack
of information that disturbed her, but the body language that said in no uncertain terms that questions were not to be asked, let alone answered.

She
tucked a lock of hair behind her ear. “I’m sorry. I’m not pushing for anything more. I’m sure you have many secrets, and I’m not demanding that you reveal yourself to me so soon.” She chewed her lip. “I suppose I’m wondering if you ever might.”

He shook his head in refusal, but said, “I don’t know. I don’t know you.”

“How will you learn of me?” she muttered.

Was that a sociopathic thing? Or just an antisocial thing? Privacy issue?
Trust issue? Whatever it was, it must be sensitive territory to bring Mr. Slick out to play.

At any rate, she needn’t breach those walls tonight. Or ever, even, if this was just a fling.

Unknown territory for a woman who didn’t have flings.

But this serious turn had not been her intention.
She reached out to him again, her palm turned up in supplication. “I’m sorry,” she said. “You’re right. We can just enjoy this and see where it goes. Please, Ford,” she said again, her hand still outstretched, waiting for him to take it. “I won’t ask again.”

He stared at her for a long, hard moment. Then, with an imprecation, he took her hand and hauled her off the counter, kissing her almost violently.

She kissed him back. Gradually, his aggressive passion gentled.

His
mouth slid down her throat. “Tell me what you saw.”

She frowned, confused, and then laughed shakily. “Up against the wall?”

“Yes. The discussion of sex is not taboo in the least,” he murmured hotly, and pressed his teeth against the pulse in her neck.

She whispered her vision to him even as she blushed through it, unused to such sexual openness. But it produced results, for he behaved as if she w
as giving him instructions, and she found herself pressed back against the smooth wall. As he leaned into her, she discovered they were at nearly the perfect height, given her high heels, and she wondered if he had imagined this in as much detail as she had. Was that why he suggested the shoes?

She laughed a little at the thought but he kissed her into silence, his hands gripping beneath the lower curve of her bottom. Fingertips caressed the inside of her thighs, applying slight pressure to part her legs, and then prodded her foot with his to widen her stance further.

Tearing her mouth away from his, she released a tremulous breath. “This is about as far as I got,” she confessed. “Well, the detail is blurry. And imagined with a lot more clothes to start.”

“Undo the shirt,” he commanded against her mouth, and she complied, her fingers straining and fumbling between their closely pressed bodies. He eased back slightly. “Open it.”

She parted the silk slowly, teasing him, and saw his mouth quirk with amusement.

“Very good,” he commended gruffly and bent his head to her breasts.

A sighing moan left her. Her nipples were tender from the unaccustomed attention they had received this night, but his mouth was gentle and damply soothing on her raw flesh. His hands smoothed down the backs of her thighs.

“Up,” she murmured huskily, her original vision recurring as she unzipped him.

Understanding this vague instruction, he lifted her slightly. She wrapped her legs around him, hooking her ankles as she slid a questing hand inside his trousers. He uttered a muffled oath against her skin as she took him in her hand, and she gloried in the sense of power his arousal—the arousal
she
produced—gave her.

There was the small matter of a condom.
There was no way she was having unprotected sex with him. She bit her lip in frustration, about to call a halt and at least wait until they returned to his bedroom and condom supply.

She cupped his face, lifting his head.

The grin he gave her was megawatt, and she inhaled sharply. Too charming, that smile was. Good thing he rarely employed it.

Balancing her carefully, he dug into his pocket, producing a condom.

“Oh, good thinking,” she breathed, not questioning his forethought.

“I’m bright,” he assured with a hoarse chuckle.

She giggled and gasped and groaned, all reactions to him, all pulled from her without thought. Her body was uncontrolled, her mind clouded as he sank into her, his breathing harsh against her throat as her flesh enfolded him. Compressing her muscles against his length was instinctive rather than planned, but instincts proved faultless as he shuddered convulsively.

He raised his head and she smoothed back the lock of hair. He thrust hard inside of her, and her lids drooped.

“Come here,” she mumbled, twining her arms around his neck, and he leaned into her, the weight of his body pushing her unrelentingly against the unrelenting wall.

Their loving was not gentle. It was erotic and wild, unthinking and carefree. She climaxed with a wordless cry that he captured in his mouth. The tension in him crested and his mouth left hers, expending his throaty verbal release on the sensitive skin beneath her ear. Her entire body flinched on his last strokes as he wrung one further eloquent burst of orgasmic joy from her.

They panted together through the slow repossession of their senses, his tongue lapping at her throat in uneven timing. She had never experienced sex this good. How many orgasms had she had tonight? She couldn’t count them—well, she might, if she thought about it, but she did not want to think, only to feel. She clung to him, wanting to stay like this forever.