thought she hadn’t heard him correctly it was so quick. ‘Okay?’
‘Yes. Fine.’ He walked past her, his face expressionless, and started to dress again.
‘What…where are you going?’
‘Well, Maggie, as you’re not willing to share my bed yet…I’m going to go out. You’d better hope to be asleep by the time I return.’
And with that he was gone. Maggie had got what she wanted, so why didn’t she feel happy? Why did she want to run out of the door after him and say, Stop! I’m sorry, please come back, take me to bed? She cursed herself, she was only prolonging the pain, the anticipation, the misery. What had she done? Her brain was scrambled beyond all comprehension with him around. But the minute he was gone it was clear again. She had pushed him too far. And now he was gone, back to the function. It was the only place. Or maybe he’d go to a small smoky bar, seek out a kindred soul.
She sat down on a chair. He could have his pick of any number of the beauties who had been vying for his attention the past two evenings. Any number of the beauties in this place. He had gone, to take his pick. He was letting her know that she wouldn’t hold him back. But even with that knowledge, her weak body burned for his, ached for a deeper fulfilment than she’d experienced earlier. She changed, washed and climbed into bed, letting sleep obliterate her tortured imaginings.
The next morning Maggie woke and felt safe and secure. A cocoon of warmth surrounded her. She moved experimentally to try and keep it, deepen it, and then froze as she realised where she was. She was comprehensively tucked into the warm embrace of Caleb’s arms. Their bodies touched from head to toe. His chest against her back, his long legs spooning hers effortlessly, one almost thrown over her thigh. And he was completely naked. She realized that with burning alarm.
Arms held her an easy captive, one hand spread over her breasts, which she could feel coming to life, becoming engorged with rushing blood, her nipples becoming hard, pushing against the warm skin of his hand. If he was to move, just even slightly, curl that hand…She swallowed. Torture. She tried to move but his arms were like steel bands and, when she made a bigger movement, they tightened.
A sleep-rough voice growled in her ear, ‘Going somewhere?’
She froze. Again.
‘Too late for that. I know you’re awake.’
And so was her body. Spectacularly. Betraying her with its eager response to his proximity.
The hand at her breast left and made lazy progress down to her belly, feeling the soft swell under the satin of her negligée, then back up. Maggie’s breath came quicker as his hand hovered over the full mounds, the lace of her top chafing unbearably, and then let out a ragged sigh and closed her eyes tightly as it cupped, moulded and caught one taut peak, thumb and forefinger pinching gently, making it even harder until it was like a knife-edge of sensation running all the way down her body to between her legs.
And then, while his hand was busy stimulating one erogenous zone, she became aware of how her negligée had ridden up. He was sliding a hair-roughened thigh between her legs, opening her up, nudging past her resistance, and then she could feel the blatant hardness of his arousal there, against her, only a mere breath away from being inside, where she longed for fulfilment. She moved her bottom against him. ‘Caleb…’
‘What…what is it?’ His breath was driving her insane. She wanted…she wanted…
‘What do you want? This?’
He moved upwards and she could feel the head of him nudge against her moistness. Her muscles quivered and contracted in anticipation. This was going so fast but, in the heady half sleep limbo land, it was all Maggie could do not to turn and give herself completely.
‘Yes…oh, yes.’ She bit her lip in an effort not to plead any more.
And then, in a moment so quick and brutal she didn’t know which way was up, Caleb was out of the bed and standing there with a towel slung around his waist, hiding the extent of his erection, though she could still feel the size of it, imagine the length of it. His face was stamped with the lines that told her how hard it had been for him to stop. Waves of censure reached out to envelop her.
Confusion showed on her face. Her voice breathless, she said, ‘What’s wrong?’
‘Nothing, Maggie, that a signed contract won’t solve.’
He came down and rested on his hands over her, taking in her flushed face, dilated pupils, her still aroused body. ‘When we come together it’ll be like this, Maggie, so I can watch your face as you give yourself to me.’
So much for her grand announcements last night. Within moments she’d been ready to forget everything—her precious vulnerability swept aside by the burning ache that still pounded in her blood.
She shrank back against the pillows, more humiliated than she had been even that night in London. For at least that time she hadn’t tasted the total bliss he could evoke. They hadn’t gone so far that she couldn’t stop herself. But…he, she remembered uncomfortably, had been in a similar state to now. This time, however, he was the one calling a halt. Demonstrating her lack of control over him.
He was binding a silken thread around her, so tight that she knew she’d never be free of it. Even after he was finished with her. Pain made her lash out, her words clumsily inarticulate. ‘Wasn’t whoever’s bed you warmed last night not enough?’
He stopped in the act of straightening up from the bed, his body lithe and supple and heart-stoppingly beautiful. The thought of him with another woman was making her insides fizz with anger. Along with the ache that permeated every bone, betraying how much she wanted him.
He looked at her coldly. ‘I, unlike you, have a moral code. I don’t share myself around. Aren’t you lucky, Maggie?’ He gave a short, mirthless laugh. ‘I’m all yours. For now. And I won’t be made to wait again or, trust me, the agreement will be revoked and I will take a new mistress.’
A rush of elation surged through her—so he hadn’t slept with another woman. She was heedless to the incongruity of how happy that made her feel—despite the evidence of their shaky truce in tatters around them, despite the ache, the humiliation, Maggie was suddenly absurdly happy. He flicked her a dismissive glance before turning away. ‘We leave for Dublin in an hour.’
JOHN, Caleb’s driver, was waiting with the car at the small private airport. Maggie was glad of the distraction of having someone else to talk to as Caleb stood outside the car taking a phone call for a few minutes. In the course of their conversation, Maggie discovered that John had lost his entire family in a tragic accident some ten years previously. He had been working for someone else in the company, but when Caleb had heard the news he’d made John his own driver and now brought him everywhere.
‘To tell the truth, love, I don’t know what I would have done. He kept me going and there were times…’ He stopped and his eyes grew moist. Maggie stretched a hand out to his shoulder in sympathy.
‘Sorry, love, it’s still…’He recovered and cast a glance out of the car. ‘He’s a good man. He’ll look after you. Loyal to a fault, I’d say. Far too easy on some of them that’s tried to put one over on him…’
Caleb slipped back into the car at that moment and John winked at Maggie, lightening the atmosphere, before turning around to drive them into town. She went over his words. Well, Caleb certainly had a fan there. She couldn’t fault his behaviour with the man. But she didn’t want to know nice things about him; she wanted pettishly for everyone to hate him, to confirm that he was cynical and ruthless.
His voice broke into her thoughts. ‘John, drop me off at the office—I have some meetings lined up for the afternoon—then bring Maggie home.’
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