33. KATE
33
KATE
N ico’s head falls to my shoulder, his heart thumping against my back.
“Good thing this is safety glass,” I say, exhausted from the intensity of my orgasm. “We’re a long way up.”
He chuckles. “Quite the fall.”
His dick softens inside of me and he eases out, the warmth of our combined juices instantly leaking down my thigh. I grab the nearest piece of clothing from the floor and use it to wipe his cum from my leg.
“Woah,” he says, his eyes on his shirt. I freeze, noticing how soft and fine the fabric is.
“I would have used mine if you hadn’t made me take it off at the door,” I retort, but I wonder if I should be on my knees, begging forgiveness.
I like you begging .
“That’s a thousand dollar shirt,” he growls.
“I thought I was worth every penny you have,” I joke, feeling bad about his shirt.
He smirks and only then does the tension seep from my body. He kisses me with a dominance that fades to gentleness in seconds. When he breaks away, my lips throb, cool and exposed without his to cover them.
“You are. I’m never going to wash it.”
I laugh. “Please do.”
He takes his shirt, using it to wipe gently up my thighs and between my legs. Then, to my amazement, he shakes it out and puts it on, leaving it unbuttoned over the defined ridges of his tanned abs. His mouth curves into a tight-lipped smile, and he closes his eyes and inhales, long and slow. “Mmm. We smell perfect together.”
I laugh louder this time and slap his chest, letting my hand linger on the hard warmth of his torso. “Please have a shower when you get home.”
His gaze flashes with something— regret ?—before he says, “I’d take you with me, but Charlie’s at mine again. And it’s not a good idea to…” He shrugs, tugging on his trousers and fastening them.
“To what?” I ask, watching as he pulls on his socks and laces his shoes.
“To do this publicly.”
“Well, no. We’d get arrested.” I gesture to my naked body and a deep chuckle parts his gorgeous mouth.
“I meant letting anyone know. I don’t think it would be good for your career.”
My chest splinters. Does he mean that whatever this is between us has to be a secret forever?
If that’s what he wants, then this can’t ever be serious. The realisation hits and it makes me feel sick. To distract myself, I pace across the room and pick up my clothes. I start to get dressed, yanking up my skirt and buttoning my shirt, not caring that I haven’t put on my underwear first.
“Kate?” Nico must have noticed the change in my demeanor because he joins me on this side of the room and pins me with both hands on my shoulders, staring intently into my eyes. “Are you all right?”
“Yeah.” I roll my shoulders and his hands fall away. “Just dizzy. Maybe it's the window. The height.”
He pulls back a fraction, eyes narrowing. “Are you frightened?”
“A bit.”
The air pulses with a heavy beat, our eyes locked, each of us searching out something more than words. His lips tug down a fraction. He knows what I mean .
He hugs me, engulfing me in his essence and kissing the top of my head. “I’m sorry. I’ve only just got back to the UK. I’m not ready to—”
“Commit to anything?” I squirm out of his embrace and peer up at him.
He frowns, and something plummets through my centre, leaving me empty.
“No. It’s not about commitment. I’m yours if you want me. It’s about taking things public. I need to settle back in to being in here. Keep a low profile for a bit longer. I’ve got to go back to New York soon. After that, we can reassess. If you still want to, we can take it public then.”
He said a lot of words, but all of it translates to one thing in my mind: rejection. It hits like a blow, and I have to physically stop myself from reeling backwards.
“A low profile?” I blurt, hating how petty and jealous I sound. “Is that what you were doing by taking Erica Lefroy out? Or Amy Moritz?”
He looks at me curiously. “Did you hear what I just said?”
His gentle tone takes me by surprise. “Huh?”
He cups my cheeks, tilting my face to his. “I’m yours, Kate. Do you want me?”
His words feel unreal. I must be dreaming. I wait for a moment, in case he’s joking. Or someone’s about to shake me awake.
“Kate?” His mouth breaks into a smile so devastatingly warm and gorgeous that all my doubts, all my questions, dissolve like sherbet on my tongue.
“Yes. Yes. Yes, I very much do.”
“Good, because I want you every night and every morning and every fucking second in between.”
I throw my arms around his neck to kiss him. My tongue steals through his parted lips, claiming him as mine; not just physically, but emotionally, too. Nico Hawkston is all mine.
We’re breathless when I eventually drag my mouth from his. “Hey,” I whisper.
His eyes flicker open. “Hey, beautiful.”
“Can I ask you a question?”
He tucks my hair behind my ear. “What?”
“You’re not going back to the States permanently, are you?”
“Not yet. It depends what my father’s plans are for retirement, and we won’t know that for a while. But I have to go back in a couple of weeks for an event. Some charity thing I said I’d make a speech at. It’s been in the calendar for months.”
“I’ll miss you.”
“I’ll miss you too. I think about you all the fucking time. It’s becoming a hazard in the workplace. I’m constantly distracted.”
My heart gives a giddy little canter.
I feel so safe, so contained in his hold. And yet, when I walked into this room, that look in his eye… there was a fierceness lurking there, hiding beneath his desire.
“Was something wrong when I got here?” I ask.
His muscles stiffen slightly beneath my hands. “What do you mean?”
“You were… different. The crawling. The fucking at the window.”
“Did you not like it?”
Under his watchful gaze, heat rises through my body until I feel slightly choked by it. “I did. But I wondered if it was about something else. If you needed me to be that way and do those things to make up for something else. You and Jack—”
“Please tell me there’s a good reason you’re mentioning your brother right now.”
He’s making light of it, but what happened this morning has been bothering me all day. The way Jack barked at me for not telling him about Martin. How Nico’s shoulders had tensed, his fingers flexing against the desk.
“The spa meeting,” I reply. “What was wrong? Is it Martin?”
An expression I can’t place flits over Nico’s features, unsettling me. “It’s nothing. You don’t have to worry.”
“You and Jack walked out of that meeting like the world was ending.”
Nico shakes his head. “I’m sorry it looked that way. We weren’t expecting it. You get used to one person being in charge and it takes a moment to adjust. I haven't seen Martin Brooks for years. Not since before your father died.” His tone is light, but there’s a darkness in his eyes that doesn’t match.
“So, nothing is wrong?” I clarify.
“Nothing is wrong.”
“Don’t lie to me. I can’t take it. I need to be able to trust you.” I suspect he’s keeping something from me and uncertainty coils around my heart. “Swear to me, Nico. Please. Swear you aren’t lying. You won’t lie. It’s the only thing I need.”
He lowers his forehead to mine, resting them together. A contemplative grunt sounds from deep in his throat. I don’t know if it’s agreement or disagreement, or pure lust.
“I need your word,” I repeat, pulling back. “Otherwise, this isn’t going anywhere.”
He holds my gaze. “I swear it. Nothing is wrong.” His voice is so steadfast that my doubts begin to seep away.
“And just so you know,” he adds, closing in and speaking against my mouth. “I’d want to see you crawl whether something was wrong or not. You’re unbelievably hot on your knees.”