Chapter 19
Natasha
We lie in my bed contented and satisfied.
That was close, how I held him off from sex I will never know.
If he had pushed for it, I would have caved.
I told him that we were not being intimate, but the reality is I crave for it from him, ache for it.
I don’t have it in me to not let him touch me and he is heaven under my hands.
When I am here and in the moment with this man, nothing else matters.
This is where I am supposed to be, with my love in my bed.
Joshua has his head on my chest, my arms are wrapped around him as I gently run my fingers over his back, his hand is on my stomach and he intermittently kisses my chest as he lies close.
Something is going on between us, I can feel it.
There is a tenderness that I haven’t felt from him since my father died and ,God, I’ve missed it.
I’m exhausted, I need to go to sleep. I kiss the top of his head gently. “Baby,” I ask. “Hmm,” he replies.
“Can you be here when I wake up, please?” I ask. I can’t help myself.
“Yeah, okay.” He kisses my chest again and snuggles his head into my breast and breathes a deep contented sigh.
I am just drifting off. “Tash,” he whispers.
“Mmm,” I answer.
“You didn’t give me your closing argument yet.”
I smile broadly and kiss his head again. “Joshua,” I whisper. “Yes,” he answers.
“I missed you today,” I whisper.
I can feel him smile into my chest and I smile into the darkness. “Do you want to know something else I did today, Josh?” I whisper as I kiss the top of his head again and rub my hand over his short hair.
“What?” he answers.
“I loved you today.” I feel him smile and he kisses my breast as he links our hands together.
“You really should be on the debating team, Tash, you do give a great closing argument,” he sighs.
I smile broadly and after a few minutes of silence in the darkness I hear him speak.
“Goodnight, Tash,” he whispers.
“Goodnight, Josh.
I wake to the sound of someone quietly knocking on the front door. Joshua answers it. “Thanks man. I will be leaving here in about an hour.”
“Ok, Max is downstairs. What do you want me to tell him?” a male voice replies.
“I want to speak to him so I will be down a little earlier.” “Okay thanks.” The door closes.
Joshua walks back into my room with an overnight bag and a suitcase. He puts it on the chair at the end of my bed. He opens the drapes, and I am blinded by the blazing light. “Are you making me breakfast?” He grabs my foot out from the bottom of my blanket and starts to twist my toes.
I frown as I rip my foot from his grip. “Mmm,” I groan. “Up.” He smiles as he runs his stubble up my neck.
“Mmm,” I groan again. Why does he have to be so damn perky in the mornings?
“I mean it, you wanted me here in the morning. I am here, so get up.” He slaps my behind.
Oh God…so annoying. I lean up onto my elbows. “What time is it?” I frown.
“I have usually been in the gym for two hours by this time, lazybones.” He smiles.
“That’s great, coffee and eggs on toast,” I mutter as I flop back onto the bed.
He smirks and exits the room. I lie and try to wake up as I hear him fussing in the kitchen. Five minutes later he comes back in with a cup of coffee.
“Here you are.” He passes me the coffee.
“Thank you.” I smile. He leans in and tucks a piece of hair behind my ear.
“I have to work for the next four nights.”
I frown. “Huh?”
“The company’s computers we are doing the upgrade for
need to be worked on after hours for the first week. I start at five and then will be working all night on them.”
I frown as I take a sip of my coffee. “That’s annoying,” I mutter.
“Tell me about it. I want you to stay at your mother’s while I am working,” he says matter of factly as he stands and takes his suit out of its bag.
I screw up my face. “Huh. What for?”
“I just do.”
“I’m just not,” I reply.
“Yes, you will be. Don’t start your shit,” he snaps.
I drink my coffee again. Here it comes, I forgot about this side of his personality. Hmm, funnily enough I haven’t missed it at all.
“I live here on my own, Joshua. I think I am safe.”
He shrugs. “I don’t care what you think, you are not staying here alone.
End of story.” He turns and walks back out of the room.
I lie in bed as I fume. What the hell is this about?
He is acting all boyfriendy when he has specifically told me that he doesn’t want to get back together.
I would love to throw that in his face, but I don’t want to push him and get the wrong answer. He’s so damn confusing.
I walk into the kitchen where he is making me breakfast. This domestic version of Joshua Stanton is simply delicious, and I smile broadly.
He raises his eyebrows in question. “Yes,” he murmurs.
“A girl could get used to this.”
“Could she now?” he smirks as he puts my breakfast on the counter.
I cuddle him from behind. “Yes, she could.” He turns to make his protein shake.
I sit at my breakfast counter. “Thank you,” I smile.
He smirks and takes a sip of his shake. “So, will you go home with your mother tonight straight from the hospital?” he asks.
I take a bite of my food and shake my head. “No, I told you I am staying here.”
He raises his eyebrows. “And I told you that you are not.”
I chew my food and swallow so I can speak. “You are not the boss of me, Joshua. You can’t tell me what to do.”
He drinks his shake as he glares at me. “Seeing as I had my hands on the back of your head and my cock in your mouth for half of the night, I am the boss of you and you will do what I say.” I glare at him, of all the nerve.
The words booty call rattles around in my empty head.
“Maybe tonight when that cock is in my mouth, I just might bite it off,” I snap.
He smiles broadly. “Try it, see what happens to you.” He takes a drink of his shake. “And you won’t be here tonight, you will be at your mother’s.”
I can’t help it and my face mirrors his stupid smile. “Stop it.” I shake my head.
“You stop it. I don’t want you here alone because I don’t want anything to happen to you while I am at work.”
I frown. “Josh, I have been here on my own for eight months since you left. Nothing is going to happen to me. Max takes care of me and if I get too scared, he sleeps in the spare room.”
He folds his arms in front of him as he stares at me. “Really?”
I raise my eyebrows. “Really, and if you are going to make me have a bodyguard it is Max or nothing, the choice is yours.”
“No, I think I am going to swap Max with Ben,” he says in his best matter of fact voice.
I narrow my eyes. “Don’t you dare. I am not hanging around with Ben. No way in hell.”
“Well, do as you’re told,” he snaps. He then walks into the bathroom and runs the shower.
I sit still at my kitchen counter and look at my eggs on toast as my blood starts to boil. All I want to do is yell you are not my boyfriend so shut up. But I need to keep calm and play the game, I want to win him back at all costs…this is going to be a damn tough assignment.
Adrian
The night before
I walk up the street towards the restaurant I am meeting Nicholas in.
How did I let him ambush me like this? My security is trailing behind me and I am painfully aware of their presence.
I’m proud to be gay but when I have people watching me on a date, or a brush off in this case, I feel uncomfortable.
I guess everyone who has security trailing them everywhere feels like this.
Joshua hates it probably more than me. Apparently at his dinner date with Tash the other night she cried at the table and he was mortified that they had security witnessing the whole nightmare.
I hope they catch this maniac soon. We could all do with some much-needed privacy.
I blow out a breath in a nervous gesture.
Nicholas keeps telling me there was something there between us on the last date and he wasn’t wrong…
there was too much there. Too much sexual energy, too much intelligence and humor, too much yearning for intimacy and I know it can only end badly.
He lives in France for heaven’s sake. I’m nipping it in the bud before it turns sour, as relationships always do for me.
What I don’t like though is the way he has called me out on it.
He obviously doesn’t get the brush off very often.
Today when he rang me, he was furious and told me if I don’t go out to dinner with him alone tonight, he will come into the office and ambush me in front of whoever is there and he doesn’t give a fuck who hears what he has to say, those exact words.
I get out my phone to check the number of the street the
restaurant is on. We are going to O’Shea’s, an oyster bar and restaurant.
It’s just up here. I stop out the front and peer in through the window and turn to my two security guards who are four or five meters behind me.
After the graffiti in our office back home a month ago, with the words Joshua Stanton and Adrian Murphy Next written in blood on our office wall, Ben has been security crazy.
Joshua and I are being guarded to a ridiculous degree.
The police don’t know whose blood the writing was in, but it’s messed with all of our heads.
If you are crazy enough to use your own blood to graffiti some- one’s office it’s a nightmare. If it wasn’t his blood…that’s worse.
“Just wait out here, please. I will be fine,” I ask the bodyguards.
Their eyes flick to each other and they nod.
“Ok, no worries.” I open the large heavy doors and enter the restaurant tentatively as I look around.
Nicholas stands up next to a table at the rear of the restaurant and waves. I smile and make my way over to him.