Chapter 20
Jude
My blood is boiling. I’m a whisker away from jumping this bannister and battering the complete dickhead of a man insulting Emma Lincoln.
But I hold back as I see her gather all her strength.
Watch how she stands her ground, not reacting to his vile insults.
Always the same—men who are threatened by a woman come out swinging with the age-old insults.
It’s a total joke, and an embarrassment to boot.
I want to pummel him black and blue, but I know Emma can handle him. She is handling him. The back of his neck is bright red. Yeah, she’s got him. Her calm and fuck you attitude with a slice of politeness has floored him.
As I see him take a step towards her, I call down.
Fair enough I won’t jump in, but he needs to know there is someone else here to witness his actions.
The coward he is, the bully he wants to be is stopped in his tracks.
His eyes move to fearful when he sees who’s called her name.
He’s wondering how much I heard. The fact I don’t acknowledge him probably clues him in.
She disappears into the toilets and he hesitates as I move down towards him.
“Jude Greystone, it’s nice to meet you again.”
I’ll hand it to him, he's brazen. Thinks I’m in his boys club. He walks towards me with an outstretched palm. I just look at it. And then into his face, which has now paled as he realises I heard his venom.
“I can’t say it’s mutual. Speak to her, or any woman like that again, and I’ll make sure you never work with any of my companies or my associated companies again.” He gulps and tries to maintain his stance, but I see his shoulders slump. He knows he was in the wrong.
“Emma and I have history. It’s compl—”
“You are not going to try to justify what you called her, or the insinuations you threw at her, are you? Surely you really wouldn’t be that stupid.” I glare into his face, raising my eyebrow at him.
“Errr—” He turns abruptly and scurries away.
What a vile specimen of a man. He’s the worst sort. A bully. Misogynistic. Everything I deplore in our particular species.
I stay and wait for Emma to reappear from the toilet. A couple of other ladies go in, and they all come out giggling and talking about Emma’s hen party.
When she exits, I grin at her and nod my head in a manner of I told you so. She just shakes her head, grinning.
“Taxi’s here.” I point upwards and offer my arm, whisking her away to dinner.
She shimmers and glows. That is the only way I can describe her. All through dinner, she’s entertaining and effervescent.
There are a couple of wives at dinner who hadn’t attended her now infamous presentation, so all of the other diners are treated to a rerun.
The weird thing is, Emma doesn’t tell the tale—everyone else at the table does.
Adding in their perspective. What they thought when the Zumba and Boxercise classes came up.
How well she did spinning it to her theme.
But when the ‘Do-Ring’ rang… They all start to laugh. Tears are rolling down everyone’s faces at her mother unboxing the blow up man. How surprised they were by the size and speed frequencies of the vibrators. The air blowers, and all the lube flavours.
It then goes from laughing to cheering as one of the men gets up and impersonates Emma doing her speech and mic drop.
“See,” I whisper in her ear. “You little beauty. You brought the house down. This is why I wanted you to stay.” I squeeze her hand under the table. “So you could see how amazing they think you are."
It’s the total topic of conversation throughout dinner. Everyone asking her how she felt. How she made the decisions about what to say. What she thought when her own front door appeared on the screen.
She answers them all like a pro. Being totally honest about how panicked she was. How in the end she just thought ‘Oh well, might as well go for it.’ She’s genuine, authentic. But she emits a power like I have never felt before. And I still can’t quite believe I thought she was a boring person.
I slow my drinking down as I notice she’s nervously drinking more than she thinks she is.
Her glass is constantly re-filled with Champagne, she’s the toast of Berlin.
And as we’re a table of high profile people, and although it’s a private dining space, the whole restaurant can see us.
More people come to get involved. She’s introduced, and in some instances she’s the reason they’re here.
“Oh Christ,” she whispers in my ear, her breath tickling my sensitive lobe, and I feel my whole body shiver as her scent hits me harder. Strawberries and cream, summer flowers and spice.
I try not to close my eyes and drink her completely in. I need to keep my head, as I don’t think she’ll be able to with all the drink and emotions coming at her.
“This is madness. Thank you, Jude, for talking me into staying. I would never have believed that people could be so interested, or on my side.”
I turn my head so that we are literally nose to nose.
I know that my smile is wide and genuine.
Her turquoise eyes have me in a trance. “I told you, you were magnificent. Now everyone is seeing what I see. But, see this tonight, it’s all you.
You still had to come here and deal with it all.
And you have. Oh God, here comes another one. ”
I spin away from her and she falls slightly forwards into me. She slowly moves her eyes to another well-wisher, beaming down at her from the side of the table.
“Okay, who’s up for a nightclub?” Seb, my long time friend and business associate, is up on his feet. He’s always up to party, and normally I am right there with him.
But not tonight. It’s well into the small hours, and I know Emma has a big day tomorrow. I can already see her eyes drooping.
“You don’t have to see me home. I can catch a ride with one of the others if you’re going out.” She’s watching my expressions. But I shake my head.
“I’ve been out with Seb before, and in Berlin.
If I need to be at the conference and actually alive and kicking, I can’t go with him.
Once I’m out with him, we don’t tend to come home til breakfast.” I smirk at her.
“I’m keynote. I can’t be just getting in ten minutes before I go on.
I’ve done that before. It was not pretty.
” I start to laugh at the horrified expression on her face.
“You got in from a night out and went on stage?” She’s incredulous.
I nod. “Was one of my better speeches. Well, I thought so. Until my brother rang me in the interval and said, ‘Tell them you’re ill. And you can’t go back on.’ I knew then it was a shit show.”
“You were drunk?”
She’s wide-eyed. And I love that look. She looks like an innocent fawn, seeing a different world for the first time. And I feel like the big bad predator. But the more I look at her and her me, I’m not remotely concerned. I intend to eat her up, and she needs to wise up quickly to that fact.
“Paralytic. I gave the promoter my fee back. But they loved it.” I shrug. “It was Jonno being over protective.”
“Yes,” she says faintly. “I certainly got that vibe from him.”
The night air nips at our exposed skin as we leave the restaurant to go get a taxi. I see her shiver under her shawl, so I take off my peacoat and place it on her shoulders. Her eyes go even wider as she looks at the coat as if it’s an alien species.
“Thank you,” she whispers out, shyly looking through her lashes at me.
My heart is going into overdrive. What the fuck is wrong with me.
Instead of waiting for taxis to take her home and not to bed, I should be in a nightclub with Seb doing god knows what.
But instead, I’m stood on the banks of the river with twinkly lights shining out from the restaurant we just ate at, this woman looking at me like I’m some sort of god.
And fuck, do I like it. I really, really like it.
We arrive back at the hotel, the last taxi to pull up.
“Emma, do you want to go into the bar? It’ll be more of the same, but they’ll be even drunker so the questions will be even more bawdy.
Do you want that, or have you had enough?
” I need to know which way to steer her. Right to the bar, or left to the lifts.
Even though she’s making the decisions now, I’ve made a few of my own.
Do I want her? Absolutely yes. Am I going to do anything about it tonight?
Absolutely No. I’m at war with myself. On the one hand, the way she’s looked at me all night is a huge green light.
I’ve touched her a little, but not in a creepy way.
Gestures here and there. She has touched me way more.
Tapping my hands, brushing my arms. And I could see it was intentional, not just a mistake.
But she’s had a lot to drink. She’s had a humdinger of a day. I’d feel like I was taking advantage of her. And I don’t want her to regret a thing, wherever we end up.
“I’ve had it,” she says as she stifles a yawn. “I need to sleep. I’ve got to be up early to get the stand sorted. And I’m going to need all my pomp and fizz to pull off this day.” Her warm smile hits me in the guts.
“I’ll see you to your room, then.”
I take her hand as we get out of the taxi and don’t let go, even when we enter the hotel. We can hear the raucous laughter coming from the bar, but I steer her left to the lifts. We’re lucky and a car is waiting.
“What time are you on tomorrow?” I can see she’s thinking about the day coming up, starting to bite at her lip nervously.
“One in the afternoon. I’ve got meetings in the morning before, then I fly straight to Venice after.”
“Wow, really? Venice? I’ve never been. Is it work or holiday?” She’s all genuine interest and not angling for an invite. It’s…refreshing.
“Bit of both. When do you fly home?” I’m casual, nonchalant. The total opposite of how I’m feeling. Why don’t I want her to leave?
“The conference… today, now.” As she looks at her watch. “Stay overnight afterwards. I didn’t think we’d need the break as much as we do. We’ve got a meal booked and then we take an early flight out.” Her voice is low and melodic, and I hang on every word.
I’m about to ask her to come to Venice with me when the lift pings at her floor, and I take her hand and tug her out. My brain is going ten to the dozen. Will she want to come? It’s a big thing, and a blatant thing. She’ll know why I’m asking her. Oh, fuck it.
We get to her door and she starts to root around in her bag. “Do you want to come in for a coffee?”
I smirk at her, pretty sure she means a real coffee and nothing else. Her eyes are boring into mine, but I move her hair away from her face. I hear the soft gasp, but I’m shaking my head.
“No. You’ve had a huge day, and a massive night. Get some sleep.” My voice is so low, I think it startles her.
She looks like she wants to say more, but I can’t hold myself back any longer.
I slip my hand around the back of her neck.
The pale skin standing out stark against my tanned hands.
Pulling her towards me, our breaths mingle.
My nostrils flare as I drink in all her scent, brushing my lips on hers.
I pull back ever so slightly, and see the pulse pounding at her neck.
I lean in again, increasing the pressure, and she kisses me back.
Her eyelids droop sensually down, shutting out the turquoise light.
We make out at her door like two teenagers on a prom night. My body is crying out to take more of her. I make sure I’m flush up against her so she can feel my hard-on. “Fuck, woman, you are testing all my resolve tonight.”
“Come in, then.”
Her entreaty is a surprise. But I know she’s had loads to drink and it might be that talking, making her bolder than usual.
“If I do that, I will want to fuck you into the next century. I won’t want to leave your bed.
So we’ll both miss our conference spectaculars.
” Her eyes go wide and her breathing picks up.
“Come to Venice. Let me take my time. Not just a quickie at a conference. Come to Venice. We can stay a couple of days. I’ll show you the sights and make love to you all night long. ”
I’m trying desperately to temper what I actually want to say. But she looks shocked at my ‘century’ comment. I need to dial it down.
“I wanted to take you to dinner. Let me do it in Venice. I know an amazing Italian restaurant. The best Italian food.” I’m nuzzling her neck now. Nipping and licking as I go up her neck to her jaw line. “Say yes, Emma. It’s only a couple of extra days. I’ll make all the arrangements.”
Jesus, I’m practically begging her. My brothers would have a field day if they saw this.
“I’ve got the kids to sort. They’re at Nigel's this weekend.” Her brain is going through logistics.
“Even more reason to come to Venice. We can have a great few days, and I’ll have you back Sunday morning, ready for the boys to come home.
” Gazing into her gorgeous eyes, I can see she wants to.
But the practicalities of family life are pulling on her.
“Do something for you, Emma. Come and run wild with me.”
I grin like a viking about to go on a rampage. I know I’m making it hard for her. But I want her to come to me. For us to be together with no distractions, no miscommunications. Everything I want laid bare. What I want, and hopefully what she does.
“I’ll ring my mother. It’s the least she can do after causing me so much trouble.” She smiles, and now my heart rate is going like the clappers.
I hold her head and kiss the fuck out of her. She seems dazed when I let her go. I love that look on her.
“Good girl. I’ll meet you in Venice,” I affirm, my low growl an erotic invitation.