Harlequin KISS August 2014 Bundle (17 page)

EIGHTEEN

Claudia was
sitting cross-legged on her bed cradling a frosty glass of Milo looking at some designs for a new range of Tropicana uniforms that Avery had selected for her to vet. Avery, who had declared the current uniform an unnatural disaster, had been working on Claudia for months now about the need for an update. She’d insisted on a different uniform for the spa—there
was no way she was wearing polyester!—and Claudia had agreed.

But changing the Tropicana uniform wasn’t such an easy thing for Claudia. She looked down at the shirt she was wearing and at the trousers she’d discarded on the chair by the bed earlier. All she’d ever wanted to do as a girl was wear this uniform and she’d always been proud of it. It was difficult to let go.

But, she had
to admit, Avery’s choices were quite stunning, remarkably similar in style to the current range of uniform, just some funkier patterns and nicer fabrics.

It was time, she knew, for the Tropicana—and her—to move on.

As she flicked through the catalogue, going from one diligently marked colour-coded tab to the next, she tried not to think about what Luke might be doing next door. She was
aware, with the grand opening nearing, that their time was coming to an end.

That there would be nothing to hold him here soon.

The thought was depressing as hell. And what did that say about her? That she’d rather he be here making her miserable every day because she loved him and she couldn’t tell him and she couldn’t touch him, instead of on the opposite side of the world, which would
at least give her aching heart a chance to recover.

Love really was cruel.

She dug a spoon around in the glass, which was more Milo than milk, and stirred it listlessly. Her ultimate comfort drink. Some people chose vodka—she chose a kids’ chocolate milk drink. She reached over to the open tin she’d taken from the kitchen earlier and tipped two more spoonfuls into the glass and stirred,
watching it as it mixed in, the glass mainly just a thick chocolaty sludge now.

She loaded a spoonful into her mouth and shut her eyes as the sweet crunch appeased her hormones.

She’d been drinking a lot of Milo lately. If she didn’t watch it she’d be fat as a house. She looked down at her bare thighs. Was it just her funk or did she have more cellulite lately?

When a knock on the
connecting door thundered a moment later she nearly upended the whole glass in her lap from fright. Some of it splashed out and landed on her shirt and flicked onto her neck as the door opened abruptly to reveal a rather brooding-looking Luke.

‘I thought we were waiting for
permission
to enter
before
we entered?’ Claudia griped as she wiped at the milky chocolate sludge on her neck.

It had been a long time since he’d been in her room and, conscious of her state of undress—and her bare, Milo-cellulitic legs—it was hard not to think about the kiss that had happened last time he’d been here.

The kiss that had almost become so much more.

Luke’s breath seized in his chest for a moment. He couldn’t believe what she was wearing. Or wasn’t wearing, to be more precise. His
gaze automatically drifted to her legs, his memory automatically drifting to how good it felt to have them wrapped around his waist.

And not forgetting that sexy awful blue and yellow palm-tree shirt that he’d fantasised about tearing off almost every night for three months.

She had to be wearing that.

‘Sorry,’ he apologised. ‘I didn’t think.’ And he hadn’t. He’d just wanted to
come in and tell her he was leaving and get the hell out again.

But here she was. Not dressed to kill, not dressed to seduce, not dressed to attract.

But doing all three anyway.

For God’s sake, she had a
milk moustache
. A milk moustache
should not,
in any way, shape or form, be sexy. But, God help him, he wanted to lick it right off her mouth.

‘Well? What do you want, Luke?’
she asked and he could hear the exasperation and wondered if it was born from the same well of frustration as his was.

He dragged his gaze off her mouth. ‘I’ve booked a flight out lunchtime tomorrow.’

Something resembling a hammer blow hit Claudia fair in the chest at the unexpected news. Her heart beat painfully behind her ribs; a massive lump lodged itself in her throat making it hard
to swallow, hard to breathe. She’d known it was happening soon but not this soon.

Not tomorrow.

She gripped the glass and handle of the spoon tight. ‘I see.’

‘I have to go back for this presentation, for that client I told you about. He only wants me.’

Claudia knew how the mysterious client felt. ‘Okay.’

Luke had been prepared for tears and anger but not this quiet, calm
acceptance. ‘I wouldn’t skip out if I didn’t have to.’ More quiet, more calmness from Claudia. ‘It’s my career,’ he added.

‘I said okay.’

The response was snappier and Luke was grateful to see some spark. ‘You don’t need me here, Claude,’ he said gently.

Claudia looked at him, her heart really breaking now. Sure. But what about what she
wanted
?

This was it. He was really going.

‘You don’t know what I need.’

Luke sighed. She was right—he didn’t. And he sure as hell didn’t want to go there. It was dangerous territory for them both. ‘I’ll be back for the launch, I promise.’

Yeah, but then you’ll be gone again.
Claudia shrugged as she looked at him. ‘Don’t bother yourself.’

‘I want to.’

‘Really, there’s no need. We’ve always known where your priorities
lay.’

Luke felt lousy. ‘Come on, Claude...I don’t deserve that.’

Claudia shrugged. ‘Just calling it like I see it.’

The unfairness of her statement stung but he chose to plough on. ‘I’ll be back for the opening,’ he reiterated.

‘Fine.’

Luke looked at her. He didn’t like this cool and collected Claudia. He couldn’t decide if he wanted to kiss her or shake her—anything to
get some kind of reaction other than just sitting on the bed looking like his leaving was no big deal.

Saying okay and fine as if it were just another day.

‘Hell, Claude.’ He shook his head. ‘You’re hard on a man’s ego.’

‘Yeah, well, newsflash...I’m not here for your ego. I’m sure they’ll appreciate it back in
London
though.’

Luke shoved his hands on his hips, deciding that
shaking was looking like a good option. ‘Fine,’ he snapped. ‘Have it your way.’

And he turned on his heel and stormed out of the room, slamming the door behind him.

A well of anger lashed Luke’s insides as he strode into his room and began to pace up and down his floor. He knew what he was feeling was irrational. He’d made it clear all along that he was leaving and she was telling him
it was fine. Telling him to go.

Making it easy for him.

But he knew all about words like
fine
and how women used them. If she wasn’t fine with it, why didn’t she just bloody well say so? And would it have killed her to show some kind of disappointment? He hadn’t expected her to throw herself at his feet and beg him not to go; he hadn’t wanted her to cry or cling.

But they’d made
a good team, achieved a lot, dragged the Tropicana into the twenty-first century. Yes, there’d been tensions but they’d laughed and joked a lot too, reaffirmed a friendship that had fallen by the wayside.

Some
emotion might have been nice. Instead of sitting all calm and cross-legged like some sexy, half-dressed, milk-moustached freaking...yogi!

His stomach took a tumble as his head
filled with that vision and Luke clenched his fists. How was it possible to be so angry and want her so much at the same time? How was it possible to be so close to hating her and yet have a massive hard-on for her?

Goddamn it!

He stormed back into her room, not knocking at all this time. The spoon was halfway to her mouth and her eyes flew to his face. He braced his hands on his hips.

‘I can’t stand this any longer.’

She didn’t say anything, just put the spoon back in the glass and waited. And in two strides he was at the bed, he was whisking the glass away and shoving it onto the bedside table, he was pushing her back against the pillows, reaching for the bottom of her awful shirt and in one quick move he’d grabbed both the edges and ripped.

‘Luke,’ Claudia gasped
as buttons flew everywhere and her buttercup-yellow bra was exposed to his view.

‘I’ve been wanting to do that for three damn months,’ he growled.

Claudia knew she should be shocked, she should be scandalised, she should be outraged.

She
should
be trying to cover herself.

But the truth was he was eating her up with his eyes, burning up everything he touched with his gaze, and
she was so turned on she could barely think straight.

‘In about ten seconds I’m going to kiss you and then I’m going to go down on you and make you scream so loudly when you come, the whole hotel will be calling the cops, and if you don’t want that then you better tell me to leave now.’

Claudia knew she did not have it in her power to tell him to leave. Yes, she should have more self-respect.
He was leaving tomorrow and for him this was nothing more than slaking a thirst that had built and built and built over the months.

But she was pretty damn thirsty too and right now she’d take whatever she could get of him.

She didn’t answer him; she simply reached down and unclipped the front opening of her bra.

Luke watched her breasts fall free and groaned. He didn’t need any
more encouragement. He fell on her, covering her with his body and kissing her into oblivion. Kisses that pulled at his groin and sank talons into the muscles of his belly. Kisses that called to a primal rhythm somewhere inside him. Kisses that wrapped a silken fist around his heart.

Kisses that tasted of pent-up desire and chocolate milk. ‘You taste amazing,’ he panted against her mouth,
moving to kiss her neck. ‘God,’ he groaned, ‘here too,’ as his tongue found another sweet spot.

Claudia slid her hands up under his shirt, filling her palms with warm male flesh as she angled her neck to give him greater access. ‘Milo...spilt...’ she murmured, too far gone to string a coherent sentence together.

Luke groaned, wanting more of that. Wanting more Milo-flavoured Claudia.
He pulled away slightly, reaching for the discarded glass on the side table. Claudia mewed in protest as he levered himself up and straddled her body.

‘Shh,’ he said as he settled on the tops of her thighs, scooping up a spoonful of chocolate sludge. ‘I want to eat chocolate milk off you.’ And before she could protest he lowered the spoon to the hollow at the base of her throat and upended
it.

Claudia gasped, her back arching, not because it was cold or even particularly runny, but because her nipples beaded instantly into tight, almost painful points. And he went there next, scooping more Milo sludge from the glass and painting it on her nipples, stopping to suck it off thoroughly, reducing her to a whimpering mess before repainting them again, licking it off again and then
trailing the spoon down lower. To her belly button, where he played over and over, dousing the hard little button in thick chocolaty sludge, then licking it off, dousing, then licking, dousing then licking and all the while his fingers taunting the stiff points of her nipples until she was almost crazy with it.

He pasted her in Milo right to the edge of her matching yellow underwear and then
he was stripping her out of it and she heard the spoon tink against the glass one last time and then she felt the warm sticky ooze of it join the other slickness between her legs.

Somewhere she heard the dull thud of the glass being discarded and then Luke was settling between her thighs, using his big shoulders to push her legs wider and she opened for him shamelessly, bucking when his tongue
touched her.

‘Luke,’ she gasped.

Luke held her fast as he licked every last morsel of salty, chocolaty goodness from between her legs, circling and thrusting, teasing as he went. She was so close, panting and begging him for release, but this was going to be their last time and he wanted to savour every last drop of her. He wanted to feast here as he’d done that first time with her breasts.

He wanted her to remember this for as long as she lived.
He
wanted to remember it as long as
he
lived.

So he refused to give into her wild urgings, staying right where he was until even he couldn’t wait for her to come a second longer. And pushing her over the edge was so, so easy. A few quick flicks in the right place and she screamed—exactly as he’d predicted—her release, holding his
head to her and he didn’t stop, not even when she begged him to, he just held onto her hips harder and kept going until every last drop of pleasure had been wrung from her.

But even then he didn’t stop.

When he was satisfied she was thoroughly spent he was determined to give her more, revive the fire that he knew still flickered. Crawling back up her body, he reefed down his track pants
and underwear, his hardness nudging all her soft heat.

Claudia’s eyes flew open and she gasped as all his delicious thickness pushed against her. Even though she was limp and exhausted, her body recognised this need on a primal level. Her back arched and she reached for his buttocks, holding him there.

‘Yes,’ she said, wanting him inside her with a sudden ferocity. Wanting him to stay
in her for ever. Loving the loom of him. Loving the bulge of his biceps, loving the proximity of his chest, loving the closeness of his mouth.

Just plain old loving him.

She linked her arms around his neck. ‘God, yes, please.’

And when he thrust inside her in one easy move she cried out, knowing she’d never want another man like this.

That only Luke would ever do.

And
when he thrust again and again, groaning deep and slow in perfect time, building her quickly, she fought it off, pushed it away, hanging in there with him, desperate to be there with him at the end.