Starr Fated (38 page)

“Scott, you
will not add her to the list. I told you, Seraphina is with me.”
Liam’s face looked like thunder for some reason.

“For now, yes,
but I'm sure there’ll be a lot of interest, and I’ll certainly be
putting my name down,” Scott grinned, as he stared at me. What on
earth he meant by that I hadn't got a clue.

“I’m just
going to have a word with Scott about the paperwork, Seraphina.
I’ll be with you in a minute,” Liam said, as he indicated for Scott
to go into his office with him.

I guessed they
needed to fill in some forms for my membership application, as Liam
had said I needed a recommendation from him before I could join the
gym. But I'd already decided that whatever he said, I was going to
insist on paying my own membership fees, seeing as I was about to
take up a very well paid position in his company. I had to start
getting used to the idea that I could afford things like this out
of my own money, so I decided I’d have a private word with Scott as
soon as I got the chance when Liam wasn’t around.

While Liam was
with Scott in the office, I glanced around at all the state of the
art equipment, and decided to use just a simple running machine
that I could easily figure out for myself. So after completing a
few warm up exercises, I took my track suit off ready to start.

And then Liam
came back out of the office, took one look at me and threw a hissy
fit about what I was wearing.

“Put your
track suit back on. You look indecent. You’re to go out tomorrow
and fucking well get yourself some more appropriate clothing to
wear in here,” he came over and hissed furiously in my ear.

“I’ll be too
hot in my track suit. I am wearing appropriate clothing and I do
not look indecent.” I hissed back. I was wearing my favourite lycra
cropped top and shorts.

“What you’re
wearing is far too thin and brief. It leaves nothing to the
imagination,” he insisted. “That might be okay for you to wear in
the privacy of your own home, but I do
not
want every man in
here ogling you while you’re exercising in public wearing virtually
nothing.”

“Don’t be so
ridiculous, Liam. No one is interested in ogling me, they’re all
far too busy getting on with what they came down here for –
exercising.”

“Trust me,
Seraphina, the eyes of every man in here are riveted on you.”

I looked
around. It was quite busy, there were about half a dozen men and a
couple of other women. One of the men winked at me, and another
smiled, even as Liam was standing next to me.

“I'm only
wearing what the other women are wearing,” I pointed out. “Why
don’t you go for a swim to cool yourself down?”

“I'm not
leaving you here alone while you’re dressed like this.”

“Good job I'm
not going swimming with you then, because from the way you’re
acting you’d have me wearing one of those Victorian swimsuits
rather than my bikini, wouldn’t you?”

“No, of course
not. But…”

“You’re being
totally ridiculous, Liam. Now please, you brought me down here to
exercise, so that’s what I’m going to do.”

I put my ear
buds in, selected my favourite playlist on my iPod, and started
running on the machine, steadfastly ignoring Liam, who chose to run
on the machine next to me with a very grim expression on his
face.

That had put
him in his place. He needn’t think he was going to control what I
wore to the gym or anywhere else come to that, I told myself
smugly. He could just like it or lump it.

~*~

After the gym
episode, Liam seemed to have calmed down. We went out and had a
pretty decent meal at The Butler’s Wharf Chop House, which was only
a short walk from our apartments.

As usual, Liam
wolfed down his meal of chargrilled sirloin steak served with
horseradish and caper butter, homemade chips and mixed leaf salad,
washed down with a pint of one of their specialist beers, a
Meantime London Porter that he said was one of his favourites.

I had a
chestnut mushroom and goats cheese risotto, along with a bottle of
my favourite San Pellegrino sparkling water.

And boy, could
that man eat, because even after a huge main meal, he still had a
pear tarte tatin with a passion fruit sorbet, and seemed surprised
when I said I couldn’t fit in a dessert.

“You’re a
pretty cheap date,” he commented. “It’s not as if you need to watch
your weight, because there’s hardly anything of you as it is.”

“I really
enjoy good food, but I hate that feeling of being bloated when you
force yourself to eat more than you really want. Sorry if that
means I don’t measure up to your usual curvaceous tastes in women,”
I said witheringly.

“That’s not
what I meant. I like you just the way you are, and I'm glad you
have a healthy attitude towards diet and exercise. You seem to like
cooking as well?” I guessed he was referring to the fact that I'd
been more than happy to prepare us a meal the previous evening.

“Yes, I do,
but I don’t usually bother cooking anything too fancy. I can't be
doing with these recipes that call for dozens of fiddly ingredients
that you have to trek miles to find, and then never use again. I
prefer to stick to the simple good quality basics and let the
flavours speak for themselves. Do you cook at all, Liam?” I asked
curiously.

“I’m perfectly
capable of putting a reasonable meal together. But I don’t usually
have the time, so I either eat out, or my housekeeper provides me
with meals that I can heat up when I get in.”

“You have a
housekeeper? Now you mention it, that makes sense as I can't really
see you on your hands and knees scrubbing the loo or washing the
kitchen floor.”

“I wouldn’t
have a problem with either of those tasks if I had the time, but
it’s more efficient for me to employ
Agnieszka
as my housekeeper. She’s Polish but speaks
excellent English, and she comes in every weekday while I’m out at
work. I just leave her a copy of my upcoming schedule so she knows
which days to have a meal prepared for me. I hardly ever actually
see her in person, but she’s very good, she takes care of all my
laundry and cleaning as well as the food provision. I could ask her
to look after you as well if you want?”

“Good grief
no! I don’t need any kind of a housekeeper. I'm more than able to
look after myself,” I said, horrified at the idea.

“Yes, but once
you start working for my company, I can promise that you’re going
to be kept extremely busy with all the demanding projects I have in
mind. You’ll be working very long hours, so you might wish to think
about having some help, and I'm sure Aggie would be happy to take
it on.”

“No, I'm
sorry, but it just wouldn’t feel right to have someone else coming
in and doing things like sorting out my dirty undies. I’ve always
managed perfectly well, even when I've been working several jobs as
well as studying,” I insisted.

“Have it your
own way, Seraphina. Just remember with the level of income you’ll
be earning, you won’t have to struggle to make ends meet any
more.”

“Fair point,
Liam, but I really wouldn’t like someone coming in, it would seem
like an invasion of my privacy somehow. Anyway I'd probably be one
of those stupid people who clean up before the cleaner comes in, so
what would be the point?”

“Okay, but the
offer is there if you change your mind. Now, shall we head back to
your place, and I’ll show you how to use the espresso machine that
you were struggling with yesterday?

~*~

We were sat
together on the large white sofa in my place. I’d put a colourful
throw over it, as white was a totally impractical colour, but I'd
noticed Liam hadn't bothered on the similar white sofa in his
place. Perhaps he was never home long enough to actually sit on
it.

“So, what is
your schedule this week?” I asked, as I curled up against him.

“I’ll go into
the office on Monday morning for the Team Leaders meeting as usual.
Then Greg is dropping me at the heliport mid morning for me to fly
up to Birmingham. From there, I’m heading up to Edinburgh for a
couple of days. Thursday, I have back to back meetings in Bristol.
Then I’ll return to the office on Friday for another Team Leaders
meeting for me to pass all the follow up actions.”

“Do you always
do all the travelling yourself? Don’t you have a second in command
to delegate some of the responsibility to?”

“I’m the
pathfinder, sourcing out the leads and contacts for new openings
that I think are lucrative and worth pursuing – it’s my judgement
call. I never allow the business to stagnate. Just because my
business is thriving doesn’t mean I can afford to sit back and rest
on my laurels - I believe in being proactive rather than reactive.
That’s why the business went into decline when my father was in
charge – he just let things slide, and I'm not prepared to ever let
that happen again. But once I return, I delegate all the nitty
gritty to my Team Leaders for them to work through. Then I expect
regular reports on their progress. I’m doing more travelling than
usual at the moment to drum up new business, but once that’s all in
place I can ease back a bit,” he explained.

“Good, because
right now I'd say you don’t really have time for any kind of a
relationship,” I said.

Liam put his
arm around me to pull me onto his lap, pushed my hair away from my
neck to gently started nuzzling behind my ear. The closeness of his
powerful body was intoxicating and arousing, and I loved how he
looked this evening in his casual black jeans and T shirt, so he
was a totally irresistible package.

“In future, I
promise I’ll always make time for you, Seraphina. This week crammed
with so many meetings was organised long before I even met
you.”

I was wearing
a short flared red tartan skirt, a loose cropped cream blouse and
strappy red high heel shoes, which Liam insisted I keep on. The
weather had been sunny and warm, so I had bare legs. As I sat on
his lap, one of his arms was tucked around my waist, the other was
resting on my bare leg, and his touch on my skin literally made me
tingle.

“What
underwear did Jamie get to see you wearing?” he suddenly murmured
in my ear.

“What?”

“At the ball.
You said Jamie saw you in your underwear. I want to know what he
saw.” He continued to nuzzle my neck.

“Liam, I'm not
sure how this is helpful…”

“I want to
know. Tell me,” he insisted.

“He saw me in
a black corset, a black lacy thong, and hold up stockings,” I
whispered.

“Sweet Jesus,”
Liam groaned. “My little brother got to see you in stockings. Have
you still got that underwear?”

“Not the
corset. That came with the dress that Abbey lent me. The thong and
stockings were mine though.”

“Go and put
them on under the skirt your wearing. Keep those high heels on as
well.” Liam commanded, as he moved my legs off his lap and set me
standing. “Go on. And put your hair up. I like to see your
neck.”

I scuttled off
to my bedroom to do as he said, my heart racing in anticipation of
what effect this was going to have on him. My hands shook as I
smoothed the lacy topped stockings in place, and then slid the red
shoes back on, glad I'd made sure my legs were smooth and hair free
when I'd showered earlier. I replaced my boy shorts with the tiny
black lacy thong – it certainly wasn’t going to provide much of a
barrier between us, but it kept to Liam’s rule that we had to keep
our underwear on for now.

I went into
the ensuite shower room and quickly cleaned my teeth and gargled
with some mouth wash. As I glanced in the mirror, I saw that my
face was flushed and my eyes were glowing with what I knew could
only be sexual arousal. Liam had this effect on me with just a
light touch and a few words, because of the delicious anticipation
of what he was going to do to me. I twisted my hair up and clipped
it out of the way to expose my neck, just as he’d instructed. Right
at this moment, I knew I would do whatever he told me to because he
had me under some kind of thrall that I was totally powerless to
resist. No one had ever had this effect on me before.
Because he
is The One.

I took a deep
breath, adjusted my skirt and top, then walked back to where he was
sat waiting for me, his legs spread apart, his hands resting on his
knees.

“Come and
stand in front of me,” he ordered. “Closer. Between my legs. Lean
over and put your hands on my shoulders.”

He placed his
fingertips on my ankles, and slowly, very slowly, slid them up my
legs, stopping at the backs of my knees, where he lightly massaged
the highly sensitive skin there.

“You have such
sexy legs, Seraphina,” he whispered. “ I like seeing them bare, but
I like seeing them in stockings even better.”

“Th… thank
you,” I stuttered, my wits scattered by his touch.

“Bend over and
kiss me,” he instructed, as he slumped back on the sofa.

As I complied,
my skirt rode up at the back, and I nearly jumped out of my skin as
I felt his fingers slowly edging up the backs of my thighs as I
kissed him. Then he broke off the kiss.

“Do you want
me to continue? Remember, I won’t do anything you don’t want me to.
So tell me what you want, Sera. Do you want me to stop?”

“No, no, don’t
stop. I want you to carry on,” I pleaded in a breathless voice.

His hands
continued upwards under my skirt, caressing the lacy tops of my
stockings, then moving on to the bare flesh of my thighs, until I
finally felt him take the bare cheeks of my bottom in his
hands.

“Oh yes, now
I’ve got that sexy little bottom of yours,” he growled as he
squeezed and fondled me with his big hands. Suddenly, he lifted me
up onto his lap to straddle him, and my legs were wide apart as I
dangled between his legs. My skirt had ridden right up leaving me
feeling very exposed as he continued to feel my bottom with his big
warm hands.