Chapter 27 Gemma
GEMMA
Gemma held the dress up to herself in the mirror and sighed. She should have taken Rory up on her offer to buy her something new, but she was already worried about how much her girlfriend was spending on her.
She looked back at the black dress she had worn last time and grimaced.
Even though it had been three months since they had been at the opera together, the thought of wearing the same thing prickled at her.
She went back to the pile of clothes on the bed and moaned again.
Obviously, she must have been louder than she thought as Teagan pushed her head around the door.
“Wassup?”
Gemma sat back on the bed with a sigh. “I can’t find anything to wear this weekend, and Rory is picking me up in,” she looked at her watch, “twenty minutes.”
“And we both know your girlfriend is going to be on time,” Teagan giggled. Over the weeks, she had also become used to Rory’s precision over timings, and Gemma loved that her friend had so easily accepted Rory into her life.
“Talking of partners.” Gemma poked Teagan with her toe. “Is Brad coming over this weekend?”
Teagan blushed to the roots of her auburn hair and flopped onto the bed with Gemma.
“He is but,” she took a breath, “we are seriously thinking of moving in together, and as you're away for a long weekend, we thought we’d spend all the time here to see how we get on living with each other. It’s one thing when he pops over for a takeaway and a quick bit of sex, but 72 hours full on will be something different. ”
Gemma nodded and pondered the information Teagan had revealed.
“I know what you mean. I'm spending all that time with Rory, admittedly in a gorgeous hotel suite and also with our family, who don't know we’re dating.” She rolled her eyes and waved a hand so Teagan wouldn't pull at that string, “but we've not really had more than two nights together. What if I get fed up with her, or she with me?”
“Oh please!” Teagan rolled her eyes dramatically. “First, you’ll be in a swanky hotel room and having so much sex it won’t matter.” Teagan waggled her eyebrows suggestively. “Second, Gemma! She adores you, it’s obvious to anyone within a fifty-mile radius. She won’t get fed up with you.”
“But what about my six-week thing?” Gemma worried a fingernail. “I have been thinking of all my exes, and there really is no one in the last few years that has lasted longer. What if that happens with Rory?”
Teagan took hold of her hands and looked deeply into her eyes. “Gemma, you have been crazy about this woman for the last ten years.”
Gemma nodded, and her friend continued, “What if those other relationships didn't last because they weren't her, hey?”
Gemma felt the words slam into her like a lorry.
She sat, winded, as the truth of Teagan’s words ran through her.
Could it really be that simple? Had she somehow been searching for another Rory for ten years to the point that any woman that wasn't her was found wanting?
Was it that easy? Was Rory her person, so no one else got a look in?
“Also,” Teagan ploughed on seemingly oblivious to Gemma's internal realisations, “although you only started doing the horizontal tango a few weeks ago, you have been dating for far longer than six weeks.”
Gemma stared open-mouthed at her friend. Had they? Was what she thought was friendship really more than that?
The conversation continued to bounce around her head as Rory drove them out of London towards Larchester. As Rory's car ate up the miles, Gemma guiltily worked out how easy it should be for them to visit home and that she really should make more of an effort with her parents.
“Are you okay?” Rory’s voice cut across the radio playing from the car stereo.
“Yeah, just thinking how close we actually live to home and how we need to visit more.”
“Hmm, yeah, I guess we should.” Rory took a breath. “Perhaps after Christmas we could tell them about us and plan more weekends at home?”
Gemma sighed. She’d love to walk into her parents’ house this weekend and declare that she and Rory were dating.
She’d love her parents to be happy for them and for her father to clasp his hand to Rory’s shoulder and tell her to “look after his little girl”.
But Gemma knew that wouldn't happen. Her mother would start talking about weddings and babies, and her dad would offer Rory a job in his law firm and pressure them into moving home.
They would then live every moment of their lives under the microscope of their respective parents.
Just thinking about it made Gemma feel claustrophobic.
She opened a window to get some air, and Rory frowned.
“Do you want the air con turned up?”
“Huh?” Gemma looked across to Rory then shook her head as her brain caught up. “Oh, no. I just needed a bit of fresh air.” She sighed and then realised she didn't need to hide anything from Rory.
“I’m just anxious about seeing our parents again. I mean, last time they were all ‘you two should get together.’’’ She groaned. “I don't know how they will be when we tell them we are dating.”
Rory winced, and Gemma’s heart plummeted.
“Tell me.” Gemma’s heart thumped in her chest. She knew the look on Rory’s face, and it wasn’t good.
“Tell you what?” Rory's voice was neutral, but Gemma knew there was more to it.
“What are you not telling me?”
Rory reached a hand over the central console to take Gemma's. She kept her eyes on the road, but her gaze also flickered to Gemma as she spoke.
“Your dad offered me a job.”
“What?” Gemma felt the tightness return to her chest. Her head started to throb, and it felt like the control she had fought hard to get over her life was ebbing away.
“Last time, he saw me walk away from your hotel room. The morning after we had slept by the swimming pool. He thought we had, you know, and over breakfast he offered me a job.”
“Oh God!” Gemma threw her head back against the headrest and squeezed her eyes shut. “I knew this would happen. Why didn't you tell me?” She snapped at Rory and instantly regretted it. She wasn’t annoyed with her, but with her own parents for interfering, as usual.
“Well, first, you walked in wearing those really short shorts.” Rory grinned. “Then you were in your bikini all day, and then we argued. My mind was otherwise occupied. To be honest, until that incident in the bathroom at Montague Holdings, I hadn't thought about it.”
“Why then?” Gemma asked, not sure if she wanted to know the answer.
Rory sighed. “I guess I wondered if making a life in London was worth it.”
“With what happened at Montague’s, or something else?”
Rory swallowed hard, and Gemma knew instantly there was something else. She waited for Rory to tell her and was upset when Rory brushed it off.
“I just wondered if being in a smaller firm would be better.” Rory shot her a tight smile.
A knot formed in Gemma's stomach, and she wondered what Rory was holding back.
She debated between pushing it with Rory and letting it go.
She worried a lip and wished she were better at relationships than she was.
The silence in the car stretched between them, with only the radio providing any respite.
“People are going to be arseholes everywhere,” Gemma eventually said.
Rory hummed noncommittally, and Gemma sensed her girlfriend wanted to move the conversation on.
She could understand why - she hadn't said much about her altercation in the loo since their initial talk. Gemma had been fuming on Rory’s behalf but had just about kept a lid on her emotions for Rory’s sake.
She had worried about Rory for the rest of the week but, fortunately, there were no other incidents.
More worrying now was this revelation that not only had her father interfered with their relationship before it had even started, but also that Rory had considered taking him up on his job offer.
If Rory moved home, what would that mean for them?
Could their relationship survive if Gemma was in London and Rory was back in Sussex?
Her stomach fell away from her as she realised she didn't want that.
She didn't want to be away from Rory but wanted to be closer to her.
She bit her lip and looked out of the window.
How had this happened so quickly? She had said she was falling for Rory but hadn't realised quite how far or how fast.
Gemma trailed behind Rory as they walked into the hotel.
The tension stretched between them, and Gemma wasn’t comfortable with how they had left things from their talk in the car.
She sensed Rory was holding something back from her.
Determined to talk to Rory as soon as they were in their room, she stood next to her as they checked in.
The rest of the family were due to arrive tomorrow lunchtime, and they would travel together to the opera early evening.
Rory had suggested that she and Gemma get there a night early to have some time to themselves as a couple before the family descended upon them and they would have to pretend not to be a couple.
Gemma massaged her forehead. This was all getting a bit too complicated, and part of her wanted to shout to the world that this wonderful person was her girlfriend.
“You are in the Alhambra suite.” The receptionist handed Rory a key card. “Would you like a second key for your room?”
“Yes please,” Rory replied deftly and handed over her credit card for the room.
“Can I confirm we have a dinner reservation for 8pm?”
The receptionist tapped on her computer and confirmed with Rory that dinner was indeed booked. Rory turned to Gemma.
“Fancy a walk around the garden before we change for dinner?” Rory asked.
That adorable eyebrow quirk returned, and Gemma felt her stomach flip at the sight.
She mentally scolded herself. Was she falling for Rory so much that everything the other woman did made her gooey?
Gemma had never been ‘gooey’ with a girlfriend before.
Sexy, yes. Horny? Definitely. But never this gooey, soppy person who melted every time her girlfriend smiled or cocked an eyebrow.
“Sure, that sounds good.” Gemma noticed how effortlessly Rory spoke to the staff and with a few quick words had arranged for someone to take their suitcases to their room whilst they walked around the gardens.
The late summer sun was doing its best to warm them, but Gemma felt a slight chill as the evening breeze gusted around the gardens.
“I hope it’s going to stay nice tomorrow.” Rory cast an eye to the sky as if warning it not to rain.
“How did you persuade the families to stay at a hotel rather than at home?” Gemma looked at Rory. Her girlfriend blushed and looked sheepish. She rubbed the back of her neck.
“Well…” She moved closer to Gemma. “I certainly didn’t say that we wanted to stay in a hotel so I could trail my tongue over your body and make sweet, sexy love to you all night, until you’re hoarse from screaming my name.
” She trailed her fingertips up Gemma's forearm and stopped at her elbow.
Shivers of another kind flashed over Gemma's skin.
It was almost criminal how Rory could turn her on with just a look or a touch.
“All night, you say?” She hooked a finger in the belt loops of her trousers and pulled her in for a gentle kiss. Rory was wearing her new chinos and a shirt that Charles had altered for her, and she looked deliciously elegant and very fucking hot.
“All night,” Rory confirmed as their lips grazed each other.
Her arm wrapped around Gemma’s shoulder to pull her in and kissed her harder.
Gemma's stomach flipped, and the familiar buzzing and fizzing she felt over her body whenever Rory kissed her was in full effect. Rory’s mouth on hers was so familiar but at the same time exhilarating.
The familiar velvet swipe of Rory's tongue had Gemma opening herself to Rory.
All concepts of time and space were lost to her as she kissed Rory.
Their breasts pressed together, and Gemma suddenly wanted there to be far fewer clothes between them.
“If we go back now.” Gemma gasped between kisses.
“We might have time for a shower before dinner.” Rory's brows knitted together for a second in confusion before realisation dawned.
Almost at a run, she grabbed Gemma's hand and propelled them back to the hotel.
Laughing, they burst into the foyer only to come face to face with their parents.
“Oh, hello you two.” Rory’s father turned to them. “Seems we all had the same idea to arrive early.”
Cursing under her breath, Rory snatched her hand away from Gemma, and Gemma felt its lost almost immediately.
Fuck, whatever this was, it would not get her and Rory naked together in the shower any time soon. Cursing whichever deity was pissing on them right now, Gemma plastered a smile on her face and turned to greet her parents.
“Oh my God, Rory!” Rory’s mother’s voice was shrill across the foyer of the hotel. “What on earth have you done to your hair?”