About Last Night (19 page)

He narrowed his eyes at her, then rose and complied, stretching out on his side so he had a good view. “May I speak?”

She considered. “Yes.”

“Thank you.”

The unexpected courtesy broke the tension that had been building between them, making her smile. Nev smiled back, relaxing into the quilted counterpane with his head propped on one elbow. He wasn’t her enemy. She didn’t know what he was, but he wasn’t that.

Whatever he was, she was going to screw him blind in a few minutes.

Leaning into the wall, she spread her legs and smoothed her hands over the soft skin of her stomach, then down to skate across her satiny panties. All morning, she’d been aware of the garters stretching tight up the backs of her thighs and over her ass. Such complicated,
unnecessary underwear, existing for the sole purpose of giving men something sexy to look at. Teasing them with what they could and couldn’t see. Promising and denying access at the same time.

“You look so bloody hot, Cath,” Nev said, his voice low and graveled. “If I could get my hands on you right now, I’d put them on your arse so I could feel the lace under my fingers while I sucked your nipples through your bra.”

The thought of his hands on her ass produced a rush of moisture between her legs, and her fingers rose to her breasts, stroking and teasing through the fabric. Her hips rocked back and forth against the wall. Gently. Then harder. She started to pinch. She could hear him breathing just a few feet away, shallow and fast, and she knew she was making his heart race. She’d never done this for him before. She’d never done it for anyone.

“Take it off. I want to see you.”

She reached behind her and unhooked the bra, letting it slide down her arms and drop to the floor. He shifted uncomfortably on the bed, and she glanced between his legs. He was fully aroused. His cock would be hard enough to hammer spikes with. Nev got harder than she’d ever known a man could get, and he would pound into her, fast and rough, even a little mean. She wanted him mean. She wanted him desperate and honest inside her. They were playing a game here, but it wasn’t what it looked like. This wasn’t about sex. It was about telling the truth.

“You’re getting wet, aren’t you?” Still smirking. “You want me.”

“Yeah.”
God, yeah
.

“Touch yourself.”

She dropped one hand to her stomach and slid it past the tight waistband of the garter belt and into her panties, letting her finger glide over her clit. Her eyes drifted closed, and she pressed against the wall, not sure how long her legs would support her. She could feel his eyes on her skin. Feel the blood rushing through him.

She dropped her hand lower.

“Look at me,” he commanded, and she met his gaze as she pressed two fingers inside
herself and moaned, her hips tilting up to meet the invasion. His eyes were as hot and hungry as she’d ever seen them. “I would do it better,” he said in a deep rumble. “I would use my tongue. First through those pretty knickers, and then when I had you soaking and thrashing round, I’d rip them off and spread your thighs wide and hold you open while I made a banquet of you.”

Another rush of moisture around her hand. Shouldn’t have let him talk. She didn’t know who was in charge anymore.

She flicked her clit with her thumb, moaning again, her fingers moving in and out as she imagined Nev’s mouth on her. He could make her come any way he liked. Fast or slow, long and drawn-out or quick, sharp, and hard. He loved to give her pleasure, the taste of her orgasm a drug that made his eyes glaze and his dick throb. She’d seen it on his face as he moved into her afterward and sank his salty, hot tongue into her mouth.

Oh, God
.

Her stomach tightened as her climax signaled its imminent arrival.

“Get your knickers off. I want to watch you make yourself come.”

She unclipped the garters with one clumsy hand and shoved her panties down, wriggling until they dropped to her ankles.

“After I finish with my mouth, I’m going to raise your arms above your head and hold them there, and then I’m going to be inside you so fast and so hard, you’ll scream and clench tight round me. You’re so tight, Cath, it drives me mad, and the sounds you make when I’m inside you make me want to nail you harder until I send you right round the bend.”

Her fingers were flying now, pushing deep inside her wet channel, her thumb flicking, pressing, retreating. “Nev, I’m going to come,” she gasped. “Oh my God, Nev.” She dropped her head back against the wall with a thud. The orgasm slammed through her, ripping a cry from her throat and making every muscle in her body tighten fiercely and hold. It wouldn’t let go, wouldn’t let go, and then it did, leaving her slumped there, limp and exhausted.

His hands were on her. He lifted her up and eased them both onto the bed. He’d broken a sweat, his skin slick and hot against hers. “Fucking hell, that was the sexiest thing I’ve ever
seen.”

She could only lie there, too lust-wrecked to move.

“My turn now,” he said. “We’re a long way from finished.”

After shucking his jeans, he knelt above her. “I think I’ll leave the stockings on.” He fingered the loose elastic of her garters. “They make you look like a right tart.”

“They’re hot,” she complained.

“Damn right they are.” He straddled her hips and lowered himself onto his elbows, brushing his chest over her bare breasts.

“I’m going to kiss you now, Mary Catherine. And then I’m going to make you say my name some more. I rather liked that.”

“I won’t.” She probably would.

“We’ll see.”

His kiss was forceful and possessive, telling her how much her performance had turned him on and how badly he wanted her. Fingers tangled in her hair, he thrust his tongue into her mouth, matching the motion of his hips where he pressed hard into the swollen flesh between her legs. It hurt, almost. She deserved it. She welcomed it.

She started pushing back.

He kissed her again, shoved her knees up, and moved roughly inside her, making her dig her nails into his back with the pain and pleasure of it. Nev had taken charge, and she loved it. She’d expected retribution for teasing him. She’d wanted it. Half the point had been to make him wild and reckless with wanting her.

But once he was inside her, he didn’t take his revenge. Instead, he rose, bracing both hands on the mattress, and he looked at her. His eyes were outrageous—full of desire and determination, vulnerability and pain. She didn’t know what to make of it. Didn’t know if she’d done something to him or if it was just being in this house, with his family, that made him like this. It didn’t matter. He needed her. She held his gaze, wrapped her legs around his hips, and said, “Come on.”

He closed his eyes with a groan. Then he started to move.

At first, he took it slow, and she watched them, focusing all of her attention on the erotic sight of Nev disappearing inside her, then reemerging. In and out. His stomach taut. Arms taut. Jaw taut. He was beautiful. They were beautiful.

She knew why she was here. It had been pointless to pretend she didn’t. She was here because he wanted her here. She was here because she loved him. Fool that she was, she’d loved him from the first morning in his flat, when she’d learned his name and seen both sides of him. Nev and City. Hot and cold. Pink cheeks and three-piece suits. Hers.

“Harder,” she said.

“I want to make it last.”

“No. Don’t.”

So he thrust harder, and he stared down at her, his pupils black holes rimmed with green. She took him in. She accepted him. This was where he’d come from, this house, this bed. These people. Nev was the man in the parlor and the painter in his studio, the banker and the rugby player. The boyfriend who bought her prawn crisps and rubbed her back when she cried. The tender lover. The caged beast who came out to play when they got naked together. He could be any of them. She’d fallen in love with all of him.

“Nev.”

“That’s right, love. Say my name.”

She said it. She said it more times than she could count.

Chapter Fifteen

Nev poured the whiskey, measuring it out neat into each of three heavy-bottomed glasses. He made his a double. Dinner had been that bad.

Cath had done well. Better than he might have expected, given the way Mother and Winston had gone after her. They’d asked her more personal questions in the course of a single meal than Nev had dared to ask in a month. He wondered how much of what she’d told them was true—and what she’d chosen to conceal.

For his part, he’d only had to lie a bit, and that had been easy enough. It was no stretch to imagine himself married to Cath. In some ways, the lie came as a relief. He’d held off expressing the depth of his feelings for weeks, afraid he’d frighten her away. In front of his family, he could speak from the heart, safe in the knowledge that she wouldn’t believe a word of it. He’d told them all he loved her, that he and Cath belonged together, and she’d smiled dismissively, as if she’d heard it dozens of times before.

He did love her. They did belong together. Seeing his rings on her finger gave him a deep, possessive satisfaction, no less strong for having no real foundation.

He didn’t want to go on pretending. He wanted Cath to belong to him, always. But he hadn’t a clue how to bring that about. Back in London, after she’d agreed to play along with his plan, they’d returned to his flat. He’d made love to her, and just as he’d been drifting off to sleep afterward, she’d said into the darkness, “You’re really pushing it, City. You know that?”

Of course he knew. It worried him how far out on a limb he’d dragged them both. In the safety of the routine they’d established in Greenwich, Cath had begun to open up to him, to tell him some of her secrets and her dreams. Here, all bets were off. Anything could happen.

None of it likely to be good.

He’d feel better if she were with him now, but tradition held firm. After dinner, Nev and
Winston joined their father in the library for a drink, while the women went to the drawing room and did whatever it was they did in there. Rosemary would no doubt be silent as the grave. He could only hope Mother would go easy on Cath. He’d seen the panic in Cath’s eyes when she’d realized she was about to be parted from him.

He poured a dab more whiskey into his glass, then distributed them and took his customary seat. His father offered a toast. “To Nev and his lovely wife. May they enjoy many years of happiness.” Winston tipped his hand in Nev’s direction, and they drank.

She
was
lovely, he mused. She’d worn a conservative black dress to dinner with a neckline high enough to hide her phoenix tattoo. She ought to have looked drab, but the dress fit her well, and she somehow managed to make it sexy. He longed to get through this interminable evening and take her back to bed. She’d been so defiant this afternoon, her irritability arousing him beyond reason. His arm still throbbed where she’d bit him, the slight discomfort a continual reminder of the way she’d looked in her stockings and garters, the way she’d thrown her head back against the wall when she made herself come. The sound of his name on her lips as he pounded into her.

“Neville?”

His father was looking at him curiously, and Nev realized he’d lost track of the conversation. “Pardon?”

“Winston tells me he’s going to recommend your promotion at the next board meeting. Congratulations.”

His hand tightened around the whiskey glass. The announcement startled him, though it shouldn’t have. Winston and Mother would assume he’d married Cath for purely mercenary reasons. He’d played his part, and now he’d get his reward. It wasn’t as though he didn’t deserve it. He’d more than earned this promotion. Still, it galled him to have it handed to him this way.

But wasn’t that why he was here, at least in part? To be sure, he’d seen a way to help Cath, but he’d also seen a way for Cath to help him. He’d accepted the devil’s bargain, intending to get the board’s stamp of approval on the promotion and then tell his family the marriage had
been a ruse from the start. He would beat his mother at her own game. In a few months, the board would be informed of his divorce. Simple. No one would get hurt, and he and Cath could both have what they wanted.

So why did he feel like a complete git every time he let himself dwell on the plan?

“Thank you, Dad. I’m honored, of course.”

“Come now, Nev, you’ve earned the right to crow a bit,” Winston said. “You met the terms, and now you deserve your reward. Though I have to say, I’d no idea you’d go so far as to marry
her
.”

Nev clenched his teeth and bit back an insult, the action reflexive after all these years. It never did help to get angry with Winston; he’d carry on baiting you with a bland smile on his face until you snapped. Better to keep out of it.

“I’m afraid I don’t understand,” Richard said. “What’s this about terms?”

“Sorry, Father,” Winston answered. “It was an internal matter. The board members agreed to offer Neville the promotion, but only if he would marry. We felt a married man would be better suited to the demands of the position.”

Richard had stepped away from the bank six years earlier, saying he wanted to give Winston an opportunity to run things. He was well out of the loop now, but far from ignorant about bank procedures. “That’s … unusual,” he said. “And you’re saying your brother married simply to— Nev, is that right?”

“It’s true the board made me the offer, but that’s not why I married Cath. The timing is a coincidence.” He wanted his father to understand, but even as he said the words, he knew the protest was pointless. Dad couldn’t possibly believe him after what Winston had just said, and even if he did, it would become obvious soon enough that the marriage was a fraud, and that the entire purpose of the ruse had been to manipulate the board into promoting him and strong-arming his father into making the donation Cath needed.

Christ. Viewed from that perspective, it was a thoroughly despicable plan.

“Of course it’s a coincidence,” Winston said, his false, cheerful tone exactly the one
Mother used. “Fantastically good timing. Come to think of it, you’d met Cath even before you knew about the offer, hadn’t you? She was at your flat the day I came over to speak with you. It looked like the two of you were already fairly well acquainted.” His smirk spoke volumes, and Nev had to close his eyes for a moment to stem the tide of rage moving through him in response to his brother’s casual lechery. He downed the remainder of his drink in one swallow, holding his breath as the slug burned down his throat.