Chapter 17
Ivy
Awall of hot air hits me as soon as I walk through the door to the orangery.
It’s balmy outside, but this place is warm.
At the same time, a flash of annoyance flares inside me at Xavier’s words.
The fact that he’s been charming and informative and perfect for the past half an hour adds heat to the irritation, as does the innocent tone of voice.
You wanted to talk about my sister? About the beautiful young woman I’m cockblocking by pouring truckloads of purity culture bullshit into her ear and putting the fear of God into her?
I spin around to face him. ‘Damn right I want to talk to you about Flora.’
He shuts the door carefully behind him. On his face is an expression of alarm, but he keeps his voice polite when he speaks. ‘Of course. What’s wrong? Is she okay?’
I suck in a sharp breath through my nose, nostrils flaring, as I try to organise my outrage at what she told me last week into something involving actual words.
I’ve been fuming since our first day together, I really have, and I’ve given him a piece of my mind a hundred times in my head, only now I don’t know what to say.
I glance around, vaguely registering how gorgeous it is in here, with its stone floor and wide stone shelves, urns on plinths between each window, and beautiful plants.
Holy crap, those are actual lemons.
No wonder they have to keep it so bloody tropical in here.
‘Hang on.’ I hold up a finger before stripping off Flora’s sweater. I’m going to overheat in a minute if I don’t. I tug it over my head just in time to see his eyes going straight to my tits in my little tank top before he remembers himself and looks away. It should irritate me, but it… doesn’t.
I place the sweater on one of the stone ledges, away from the potted plants. I’ll just come out with it. ‘I want to talk to you about your sister’s sex life.’
His eyes actually bulge. ‘I beg your pardon? What sex life?’
‘Exactly!’ I throw my hands up in the air and back away from him. ‘She has no fucking sex life because you and your brother have been feeding her bullshit about “predators” and scaring the living daylights out of her!’
‘Now, hang on a second.’ He takes a step closer. ‘That’s preposterous. Of course she has to be careful of predators. She’s a beautiful and extremely wealthy young woman. You have no idea how vulnerable she—’
I put my hand out. ‘Don’t even go there.
She is not vulnerable. She is inexperienced.
That’s a big difference. She’s relatively unsafe in the dating world because you and Benedict the Walking Penis have refused to cut her any slack to get to know the ways of the world.
Dating’s just like taking public transport—there are no shortcuts.
People have to learn for themselves how to do it.
Although the fact that she’d never taken the fucking Tube before last week makes my point for me very bloody nicely. ’
‘We’re her brothers! Of course we’re not going to help her launch herself on the dating market!’
‘Yes, because this is not Grosvenor, and it’s not like you have to escort her when she makes her debut into society.’
He opens his mouth to say something, and I realise that of course these old-fashioned weirdos still do the debutant thing.
I roll my eyes but press on. I have no intention of letting him speak—I’m too furious.
‘Oh, for fuck’s sake,’ I continue. ‘But anyway, you don’t have to actively hinder her!
Unless you inbred patriarchs still operate on the basis that you all go to whores like me to pop your cherries while you expect your women to keep themselves pure and completely fucking clueless, is that it? ’
His mouth is opening and closing like a goldfish, colour rising along his cheekbones. ‘Of course not. Don’t be ridiculous.’
‘You may think I’m being ridiculous, but I know for a fact that your sister’s a virgin and your brother fucks everything in Alchemy with a pulse, so tell me my theory isn’t sound.’
‘No, you listen to me.’ He steps right up to me.
Clearly, the combination of heat and moral outrage is getting to him too, because he yanks his gilet off and chucks it onto the ledge with far less care than I took with Flora’s sweater.
It lands on top of some potted geraniums. Tut-tut.
Bad Xavier. I cross my arms under my tits and his gaze snags on them again.
Too bad he’s an uptight prick and will never know the transcendental pleasure of an Ivy Cooper tit wank.
‘Flora is very innocent,’ he snaps. ‘She’s been at an all-girls’ school her entire life.
’ I roll my eyes because of course she has.
‘She is an adult, and she’s perfectly entitled to make her own choices in life, as long as those choices are responsible.
All Ben and I have done is advise her to take her time and use her judgement. ’
‘Listen to yourself! You pompous fucking prick. She’s entitled to make all her own choices, even if they’re irresponsible. Even if you don’t like them. She’s nineteen. She’s supposed to be letting rip and having fun!’
I look him up and down, disgust and something else making my stomach flip as I take in the anger on his face and the heat in those moss-green eyes. Riling him is so fucking gratifying on so many levels.
‘You know what makes me sick?’ I continue.
I’m on a roll now. I want to rile him. Want to taunt him, to shock him out of his revolting self-satisfaction.
‘The gaslighting. If you’d said to her, Flora, we’re here to support you and your life choices even though we’re really fucking terrified because you’re our little sister, that would be one thing.
But you haven’t, have you? No, you’ve invented all these bogeymen so that she becomes her own biggest cockblocker, and that’s seriously clever, and seriously disgusting.
’ I purse my lips to underline said disgust, and tighten my arms for good measure, pushing my tits up.
‘They’re not bogeymen!’ He’s full-on shouting now, and he’s stepped right up into my face.
‘They’re fucking real! Any single night of the week, she could walk into a club and get roofied.
Or she could get wined and dined by a seeming perfect gentleman who’s only pursuing her for her title. Literally everyone is a threat!’
‘That’s offensive to your sister. You’re assuming guys won’t go for her just because she’s stunning and smart and entertaining.
And you’re assuming that she’s na?ve enough to allow herself to get ensnared by some dickhead with the wrong motives.
Well, let me tell you something. Every single woman is at risk of something like that, and if you weren’t engaged, you’d be at risk of gold-diggers too, I’m sure.
‘How does your brother handle the hangers-on? He sees them coming a mile off, because he’s been around the block enough to have sound judgement.
Benedict is no pushover. And Flora won’t be either, if you let her have her fucking power, because she’ll learn on the job.
’ I blow out a huge breath. ‘You’ve hired me to show her how to take the Tube, for fuck’s sake, but it seems I’ll need to teach her how to get laid safely, too. ’
‘You’ll do no such thing.’ He jabs a finger in my face. His voice has gone low and scary. I may be furious, but he looks on the verge of a heart attack.
‘Somebody has to. She told me you said she should wait until she was in a relationship before she shagged someone because it would be more “meaningful”. What a crock of shit.’
‘It’s not a crock of shit. It’s true. Of course it will be more meaningful if she’s with someone who genuinely cares for her.’
‘It is precisely none of your fucking business how meaningful her first lay is, and it’s so fucking hypocritical, you patriarchal arsehole.’ God, I’m unleashed now. I can’t even imagine how quickly Gen or Maddy or any of the Alchemy women would rip this guy a new one if they were here.
I channel my Alchemy queens as I advocate for my new friend.
‘I’ve had more orgasms in a single night of being bent over at Alchemy than you and your posh pals could ever have dreamt of while wanking each other off under the covers at school when Matron wasn’t looking.
Do you think any of them were “meaningful”?
Do you think women only want “meaning” when they take a hot guy home to fuck him? Wrong, pal.’
His jaw has now dropped open, and he’s staring at me wordlessly like I’m the she-devil incarnate. I take advantage of his silence to vomit out the rest of my fury while I have the chance.
Now I jab him, and I don’t stop until my finger is pressing on the very firm flesh between his pecs. I can feel the heat of him through his shirt, and I swear it makes my heart bang even harder.
‘You want to know what I think?’ I whisper in my most sinister voice.
‘I think your brother is the worst kind of sexist hypocrite, presuming to tell a woman what she should and shouldn’t want, and I think you, my friend, are so fucking horrified by the idea of casual sex that you’re projecting onto your poor sister.
You’re trying to keep her safe out in big, bad London, and you don’t even realise what you’re robbing her of because you don’t understand what she’s missing. How about that?’
That jolts him out of his stupor. His eyes are nearly all pupil now, and they look absolutely wild. ‘What did you say?’
‘You heard me. I had my tits out for you and your dick in my hand, and you bailed. You’re signing the rest of your life away for a woman you don’t love. I can only assume that it’s just not a big deal for you. But that still doesn’t give you the right to—’
I don’t get to finish what I started to say, because he moves, quick as a flash, and grabs both my wrists, holding them in a vice and pulling me in as close to him as he can.
‘You think the idea of sex horrifies me?’
His voice is almost a snarl, and his face is so close to mine, and my pussy actually drips onto my knickers. It’s fucking shameful, but there it is. I don’t exactly have much choice here except to double down. ‘Yeah.’ I look him in the eye and tilt my chin up in defiance.
‘You think I bailed that night because I was scared.’
‘I think you were worried you wouldn’t be able to handle me, yeah, and—’ I let out a little squeak, because he pushes our bodies even more flush together, so that the sides of my fists are crushed against his pecs and his knuckles are now literally brushing my nipples, and it’s arousing to an extent that’s frankly embarrassing.
‘You thought I wouldn’t be able to handle you.
’ He repeats my words back to me slowly like I’m a backward toddler.
‘Jesus fucking Christ, no good deed goes unpunished, does it? I was trying to be good. I was trying not to exploit you.’ He groans and lowers his forehead to mine.
We’re both already slick with sweat, and I can smell him, and his scent is fucking gorgeous.
Something like pine and firewood. Shower gel, maybe, or soap.
I can’t get enough of it. ‘Do you know what I did as soon as I kicked you out that night?’
‘What?’ I’m breathing raggedly, and I hate myself, and I can’t bloody well help it. I roll my damp forehead against his.
‘I shot my load straight into a priceless antique chamber pot and imagined it was your tight little cunt.’
I moan, squeezing my thighs together as I press my hard, needy nipples harder against his knuckles. Holy fuck, that’s good.
With a stern look, he pulls back and releases my wrists. I’m about to weep with the frustration of it until he rakes my hair back from my face, pulling it into a ponytail and wrapping it around one fist.
I think I’m going to come or faint.
Not sure which.
‘Do you know why I act like a protective arsehole towards my sister, Ivy?’
‘No.’ I whisper it. I try to shake my head, but his grip on my hair is too strong.
He uses my hair as a rein to tilt my head to one side and lowers his lips to my neck, whispering against my skin. ‘Because I know exactly what men like me are capable of when they’re pushed too far.’
His words are ominous, filthy, somehow, and I squeeze my thighs together more tightly. ‘Oh my God,’ I mutter to myself, but it seems he hears me.
‘These fucking nipples of yours. I’ve been dreaming about your tits. Dreaming about your mouth, you know that? Do you want me to show you how categorically not horrified I am by casual sex?’
I grab at the sides of his shirt with both hands, noting the hard slabs of his obliques as I do, and pull him in closer so I can feel his hardness against me. ‘Yes. Yes. Please.’
‘I’m not sure you deserve it. You just accused me of a lot of very, very nasty things, you know.’
‘I’m sorry.’ I twist my head further away, trying to press my neck towards his mouth. His stubble grazes my jaw as I do. ‘I’ll do anything. Anything.’
‘You told me I couldn’t handle you.’ He grinds against me, and holy mother of God, I’m so close. ‘That was very, very rude. As was telling me how much you adore getting bent over by fuck knows who.’
‘I know. I’m sorry.’ I can barely form words. ‘I was trying to… goad you.’
He stills and chuckles softly against my neck. ‘Were you, now? And why was that?’
‘I wanted you to break,’ I mumble against the crisp cotton of his shirt. ‘You’re so fucking insufferable when you’re being all noble and self-controlled.’ I release his shirt with one hand and slide it between us, over his lovely, flat stomach.
His lips brush down my neck, and there’s a blissful, fleeting glimpse of tongue. My knickers are soaked and my nipples may rip two holes in my bra at this rate.
‘Now we’re getting somewhere, Ivy. Seeing as you have such a low opinion of my ability to know what women want, do you want me to tell you what I think you want?’
‘Yeah—yes.’
I stay frozen for a moment, my palm on his stomach, his mouth on my neck. He pauses, presumably deciding whether to put me out of my misery, and then he clamps his free hand to my arse, gluing me more fully against his monstrous boner.
‘I think you want me to show you just how well I can handle you.’