Chapter 10 #2
She felt him watching her as she took her first tentative bite, then when it was obvious she wasn’t going to be sick again he went back into the house, returning a couple of minutes later with a mug of coffee for himself.
‘I guess you were hungry,’ he said, gesturing to the now empty plate she had on her lap.
‘I guess I was,’ she agreed, giving him a grateful smile.
‘Listen. We don’t need to rush off anywhere today, if you’re worried about that,’ he said, his expression sincere. ‘I’ll be very happy to hang out here until you feel more up to going out. Perhaps you could teach me how to play a board game or something.’
‘That would be great,’ she said, immediately perking up at the thought. Lazing around and recuperating whilst playing one of her favourite games would be her idea of heaven right now. ‘Except I didn’t bring one with me.’
‘No problem,’ Xavier said with a twitch of his eyebrows.
‘We have some here in the house. Apparently, they’re popular with holidaymakers who want to switch off their phones and get back to a screen-free existence for the duration of their stay, or so the interior designer told me the other day. It made me think of you actually.’
She blinked in surprise. ‘Well, that’s great. I guess the lure of board games isn’t dead after all.’
‘I guess not,’ he agreed, the corner of his mouth turning up. ‘I’ll go and fetch them and we can have a game now if you feel up to it.’
‘Great,’ she said, ‘but we should move to the table. I take my playing very seriously.’
‘I’d expect nothing less,’ he said with a smile.
So he went to the fetch the games that he’d had stocked in a cupboard in the living area for guests – as a reaction to her love for them? she wondered hopefully – while she went to get dressed.
They played happily for the next couple of hours, sipping coffee and feeling the warm sea breeze on their faces as they alternated between asking questions and answering them, each taking great pleasure in challenging the other’s knowledge of random facts.
‘I really appreciate you looking after me. It’s kind of you,’ Soli said after they’d finally called a halt to the game.
She’d been intensely aware of all the things they hadn’t said to each other since ‘the other night’ and wanted to clear the air so she could breathe properly again.
Even if it meant dealing with something she didn’t want to hear.
Which, from Xavier’s careful avoidance of touching her or maintaining eye contact for too long, she suspected might be that he believed they’d made a mistake in sleeping together.
Nausea rose from her stomach as she waited for his response, only this time it came about through nerves.
‘Well, I did agree to be there for you in sickness and in health, so I guess I’m just fulfilling my promise,’ he quipped, though she couldn’t help but notice how his whole body had tensed.
She shot him a sheepish smile. ‘Still, it’s good of you.’
He shrugged, clearly uncomfortable with her praising him. ‘You deserve to be looked after too,’ he said gruffly.
Letting out a low breath, she leant back in her chair and crossed her arms. ‘I guess I’m just not used to it any more. It’s been a while.’
‘Since your dad died?’ he asked, their gazes locking.
The sudden swell of emotion she experienced made her suck in a breath.
‘Yeah,’ she said, telling herself to pull it together. This was no time to go to pieces.
Xavier seemed to sense her discomfort and gave her an understanding nod. ‘Hey, I forgot to ask – how’s your sister doing at Oxford?’
‘Great! It sounds like she’s really enjoying herself,’ she said, grateful for the change in conversation.
‘Good for you for making that happen. I’m seriously impressed. I’m not sure many siblings would go to the lengths you did to make sure their sister was set up like that.’
She shrugged, but her face heated at the compliment. ‘It would have been a crime not to let her go to university. She’s so smart. The world is going to thank me one day.’
‘I’m sure it is.’ He sat back and studied her for a moment. ‘I guess I should thank you too. You saved me from losing my home. And perhaps my sanity.’ His smile was wry.
‘Well, you’ve been very generous. You’ve given me more than I asked for.’
He laughed, perhaps to cover his unease. ‘We seem to have turned into the Mutual Admiration Society.’
She smiled. ‘Yes, I guess we have.’
‘Well, why not? We are pretty amazing people, are we not?’
‘We are, I suppose.’
‘No! No “suppose” about it. We are.’
Their gazes locked and Soli got lost in a sudden flash of memory as she thought of how he’d looked into her eyes while they were making love.
‘Listen. About what happened the other night,’ he said in a careful tone that made her spirits plummet.
‘Yes?’
‘I don’t think it’s a good idea to let that happen again. Especially since we still have rather a long time to live together. It could make things tricky.’ He didn’t say, ‘if we end up falling out,’ but it was implicit in his manner.
‘Oh. Er… okay.’ She tried not to sound disappointed, but obviously failed because he said, ‘It’s for the best, Soli,’ in a tone that brooked no argument.
‘I’m not looking for you to fall in love with me or anything, you know,’ she said without stopping to think too hard about what she was saying. ‘We could keep it as a purely physical thing. No strings.’
‘I’m not sure those arrangements ever work,’ he said, his expression radiating extreme scepticism.
Even though her brain was telling her he might have a point, her libido didn’t want to listen.
They’d crossed the line now and there was no real way back, it pointed out.
In fact, it actually felt to her as if she’d turned a corner in her life after sleeping with Xavier – that she’d finally stepped into adulthood.
Now she’d pushed herself over the ledge and found her heart had survived it, she was confident she was mature enough to keep sex and love separate.
‘We’d make it work. We both know we’re not in this for the long haul.
It’s just temporary. And it’d make living together much more fun and much less frustrating.
’ She flashed him a smile, which he returned.
‘Especially since we agreed not to see other people during the time we’re married,’ she added.
There was a short pause while he appeared to consider this.
‘No. I don’t think it’s a good idea,’ he said eventually, and she could tell from the resolute look in his eyes that he’d made his mind up and was unlikely to change it.
The businessman was back.
Her heart sank.
‘Okay, whatever you think,’ she said brightly to cover her frustration. Perhaps he was right. It might make things more complicated.
But it didn’t stop her from hoping he’d change his mind.
* * *
The journey home was just as luxurious and comfortable as the one out there, except for a strange sort of stiffness between them that hadn’t been there previously.
They’d been really careful around each other ever since they’d had that conversation about not having sex again, as if they were tiptoeing around a bombshell that could trigger the second they relaxed and took a misstep, and it was making both of them act in an over-the-top, super-polite way towards each other.
So by the time they walked in through the front door to the Hampstead house, Soli was completely and utterly exhausted from nervous tension.
So much for having a relaxing holiday.
Xavier immediately excused himself and she found herself alone again in the kitchen, fixing herself a meal for one, wondering whether her life would ever be normal again.
She came to the conclusion that it was very unlikely.
Especially now she knew how wonderful it could be to be wanted by Xavier McQueen.
She’d so enjoyed being able to get close to him.
They’d been good together in bed. He was certainly a lot better than the men – well, boys really – that she’d slept with in the past. He’d known exactly what to do to give her the most pleasure and had been incredibly attentive to her needs.
She’d never experienced anything like it. And she wanted more. Much more.
The idea of living with him until the year was up, with this sexual tension throbbing between them the whole time, and not being allowed to act on it, made her stomach turn over with restlessness. They’d go insane, surely.
They’d be much better to give in to their physical urges and ride things out till the marriage was up. They’d probably be bored with each other by then anyway.
Refusing to listen to a niggling little voice that told her not to bank on that, she decided to keep herself open to the chance it could happen, but not push for it in any way.
Xavier was definitely the kind of man who needed to feel in control of his decisions – and his destiny – so if it was going to happen it would need to come from him.
It would be fine with her either way.
Absolutely fine.
To keep herself occupied, so she wouldn’t go crazy thinking about it all day, she went to see her mum, who seemed to be getting on well with the carer, then went into the cafe to check everything had run smoothly without her.
After being away for a while she found, to her shock and distress, that the place seemed shabby and cluttered to her now, and the warm, cosy atmosphere, that she’d been using as the excuse not to change a thing about it, was sadly lacking. It had all been in her head. A phantom of the past.
She’d been desperately hanging on to her father’s vision for the place, to try and keep a part of him alive, but it was actually holding the business back. Destroying it, in fact.
He never would have wanted that.
She knew now, with absolute clarity, that it was time to let go. She needed to stop being afraid of the future and allow herself to finally move on.
It was time to make some changes.
* * *
It took two more days of Xavier making himself scarce in the evenings and acting all stiff and formal with her again before Soli’s resolve to be cool and indifferent about how their relationship would go from now on snapped.
‘Are we really back to you treating me like a piece of furniture again?’ she bit out in frustration the morning of the third day, when Xavier swept into the kitchen, poured himself a coffee and gave her a polite nod before starting to retreat outside with it.
He turned back, then carefully put his mug down on the nearest work surface, the coffee slopping over the edge as if his hand had been trembling.
‘That’s not what I’m doing, Soli,’ he said quietly, his expression surprisingly tortured.
Her stomach flipped at the sight of it, but she held her nerve. They really needed to address this and the sooner the better.
‘Look, I get that you don’t want to have a physical relationship with me, but I’d really prefer it if you at least acknowledged my presence in the house. We can be friends, surely?’
The muscle in his jaw was working overtime. ‘It’s not that I don’t want a physical relationship with you,’ he ground out, taking a step towards her, his shoulders rigid and his eyes flashing with frustration, ‘it’s that I do.’
‘You do?’ she whispered, shocked by the passion in his voice and the intensity in his eyes.
‘Yes,’ he said, letting out a low, frustrated-sounding breath.
‘Oh. Okay. I see.’
‘And seeing you every day but not being able to touch you, when I know how good we can be together, is driving me insane.’ His chest rose and fell in rapid movements as if he was fighting for control and barely keeping it together.
The idea that she was doing that to him thrilled her to her core. Without thinking, she took a step closer to him, unable to fight the instinct to push him a little bit further to see what he’d do.
They stared into each other’s eyes, their breath coming fast and their bodies tense.
Xavier made the first move, closing the gap between them and sliding his hand into her hair, then pulling her towards him so her mouth met his. The kiss was rough and full of the longing they’d both been battling since the last time they’d given in to the need to touch each other.
He let out a low growl in the base of his throat as she wound her arms around him and pressed herself closer to him, feeling exactly how much he wanted her right then.
She pulled back from the kiss to look him in the eyes again, wanting to make sure they were both thinking the same way before this went any further, so they didn’t end up in an even more awkward position later.
‘I thought you said—’
‘I know what I said, but I decided not to listen to myself for once,’ he ground out, his brow pinched in a half-relieved, half-frustrated sort of frown. His eyes were alive with pleasure though, which her body responded to by sending a throb of pure desire through her.
She couldn’t help but grin at him. ‘Good decision. Let’s be wild. It’s a healthy life choice.’
‘I don’t know about healthy…’ His words tickled her lips.
‘Liberating, then. We’re grown-ups. We can handle it. Both of us know the score and we’re not looking for anything in addition to our agreement.’
‘You mean that, right?’ His expression was deadly serious now.
‘Yes,’ she said, matching his seriousness with her own. ‘I absolutely do. I promise.’
His hands had been tight on her back, holding her against him, but they relaxed a little as something seemed to occur to him. ‘Still, we need to be sensible, so we should use condoms too from now on, just to be extra-safe,’ he said.
She nodded. ‘Fine by me.’
And it was fine, because the last thing she needed right now was an added complication in her life.