All He Needs (All or Nothing) (30 page)

D
ominic arrived at his house in Eaton Place at eight.

Leo and Danny were waiting.

“Tell me again,” Dominic said as he walked in. “Reassure me.”

“Like I told you on the phone, the apartment across the street’s been cleared out,” Leo said. “The owner’s on vacation in Spain. He doesn’t even know Gora’s men were there.”

“What about the surveillance crews?”

“Gone. As of three hours ago.”

“All of them?”

“We followed them to their gates at the airport. Twenty men all told. They left in groups over the course of the last few hours. Some to Bucharest, some to Rome, three to Geneva.”

“Gora’s brown bagging his twenty mil so his wife doesn’t know.” Dominic smiled faintly. “Christ, you might almost feel sorry for the little shit if he wasn’t so totally fucking up my life.”

Danny gave him a commiserating look. “Three months you said?”

“That’s what the lawyers wrote down.”

“You can’t divorce in Italy.”

“Christ no. It will take years. I’ll divorce in France. The papers are already drawn up and signed. At least I can be
grateful that my mother had the good sense to be in Paris when I was born; it gives me dual citizenship. A divorce
par consentement mutuel
is a simple procedure; quick, easy, a rubber stamp by a judge.”

“When do you go back to Rome?”

Dominic scowled. “A couple of days.”

“Are you going to tell Katherine?”

“I’d rather not. I don’t want her living with fear or even the slightest bit of apprehension. And it’s not as though this fucking mess can be easily—and truthfully—explained away with the mafia involved.” Dominic sighed. “So it’s lies, lies, and more lies.”

“And the three-month countdown begins,” Leo said kindly.

“Yeah. At least there’s an end in sight.”

Then Dominic texted Sese.
As soon as I get there, you have the night off
.

But a half hour later, when Dominic knocked on Katherine’s door, his spirits were low and it showed.

“You’re tired,” Kate said, taking his hands and pulling him over the threshold as Sese slipped out the back door. “Come sleep. I’ll talk to you in the morning.”

“I don’t want to talk.” Kicking the door shut, he pulled free of her hands, swept her up in his arms, and strode to the bedroom. “I just want to fuck.” Sex was the constant in his life that overrode all dilemmas and blurred reality—like drugs to a junkie.

“I was trying to be polite.” Her smile was close, her breath warm on his cheek with her arms around his neck. “You look really tired. I should tell Sese—”

“He’s gone. And I’m never that tired, baby. Not with you.”

“How did—”

“Text. I wanted to be alone with you.” He was walking fast down the hallway, indifferent to his surroundings; he swiftly strode through the large, high-ceilinged reception room without a glance, swept past the small dining room that Amanda had furnished with an intimate table for two made by Chippendale 250 years ago for a lady who took her morning chocolate in her boudoir with her lover, the carpet beneath it a seventeenth-century Mogul rug faded to a lush rose that may have come from that same lady’s boudoir. “Did you have a good day at work?” he asked in a cursory way, as if someone had rapped him on the knuckles and demanded he be polite.

“I didn’t wear any clothes,” Kate murmured as the sporting prints decorating the hallway to the bedrooms flashed by. “Otherwise things went well.”

Dominic’s gaze snapped down. “You better be fucking kidding.”

“Just checking if you were actually listening to me, Mr. Knight. You seem to be in a rush.”

“You got that right,” he said brusquely, moving into her bedroom and setting her on her feet. “Take off your robe.” He was ripping off his clothes. “Hurry. I missed you.”

She knew how he felt. She’d missed him every minute of the day, every second while she was multitasking and actually doing her work. And she’d been waiting for his knock on the door, had almost begun to despair when he arrived.

Dominic was undressed before she’d tossed her robe on a chair and made it to the bed. He picked her off her feet, dropped her on the bed, and fell on top of her with an explosive urgency and a murmured, “Forgive me.”

He was frantic at first. She’d never seen him like that. He was always incredibly restrained, as though he could last forever; he
could
last forever. But this time he came almost the instant he entered her, panted “Sorry,” and a few moments later proceeded to come again when she climaxed.

“God, you feel… good,” he groaned, resting inside her as she gasped for air, his dick still rock hard. “You’re going to have to kick me when you can’t stand it anymore. I can go all night.” His adrenaline was pumped up to the max, from frustration and anger, from lust and horniness, from feelings he couldn’t define that burned through his body and brain.

“That works out then cuz I really need you.” She ran her hands down his back as though vetting his presence, compelled by her own urgencies, her sense of loss in his absence profound. Dominic had been gone only a night and a day and she’d missed him desperately: the feel of him in her and over her, the pleasure he offered that lit up her world, his warm smile and goodness. And she was filled now with such overwhelming gratitude that he’d returned she was near tears. Shaky. She had her own addictions, and her next hit was in sight. “Oh, hell,” she gulped, trying anything to keep from crying, even running through accounting formulas to divert her thoughts. And for a second it worked… until unassailable emotion overwhelmed the flood gates.

“Jesus, baby, don’t cry,” Dominic whispered, dipping his head and kissing away her tears. “If I did something, I’m sorry.”

“I’m… not… crying because… I’m sad,” she sobbed, clutching his back with white-knuckled fervor, weeping uncontrollably. “I’m just… happy… you’re back.”

He clenched his jaw so hard he thought his teeth would crack. Dragging in a breath, he slowly exhaled; then wiping the wetness from Katherine’s cheeks with the sheet, he rolled over, sat up, and pulled her onto his lap. “Okay, we both need a quick breather.” Reaching over, he picked up the box of tissues from the bedside table, took out a handful, and handed them to her because she was wailing like a baby now.

“Sorry,” she hiccupped between sobs, super embarrassed, her nose dripping; she was gasping for breath.

“Everything’s good. Cry all you want. I’ll get more tissue if you need it.” And he held her and handed her tissue and kissed her gently until her tears finally stopped.

“I suppose it’s really great to come home to this,” Kate said, wiping her eyes for the last time and tossing the tissue. “Every man’s dream.”

Coming home. He remembered Katherine saying that in San Francisco and it hit him in the gut now just as it had then.
“Hey, you’re my dream no matter what,” he said, overcome by a sudden wave of exhaustion as though his adrenaline had finally given out. He had been kidding himself—his decision in Rome had not been unemotional. He didn’t want anything to change. No three-month break, no playing his numbers game.

“Thanks.” Her voice was unsteady again; she wanted to believe he meant what he said when she wasn’t so sure about anything with Dominic. “Let’s talk about nothing until I get myself together.”

“You’re preaching to the choir, baby.”
Nothing
was a helluva lot better than the total mess screwing with his head. “So tell me about your first day at work. Who did you meet? What did you do? Do I have to crack any heads cuz some guys came onto you?”

She giggled.

Which was the point. He had to get through the night. Keep
his
shit together. He asked questions, she answered, and neither did anything irretrievably foolish. She described her first day at work. She told him of the projects assigned to her, the exciting scope of the problems, how she was looking forward to solving them.

“So you like a challenge,” he noted lightly. “That must be why we get along. You figure you’re going to fix me up someday.”

She smiled. “As if I could.”

“I like when you try.” He shrugged. “Who knows, you might get lucky.”

“I’m lucky already,” she said, forcing down the tears swelling in her throat. “I have you in my life.”

“There you go. Step one. Ten thousand more and you might be halfway to making me human. Remember?” he teased because he could see her struggling to hold back more tears and he’d talk about anything to keep his mind off his looming wedding. “You scolded me once about joining the human race. Now, tell me,” he said, changing the
subject to something even safer, “did you run into Justin today? Or is he on a different floor?”

“I met his wife. She came into the office.”

“How is she?”

“Nice. Friendly. A tall, willowy blonde, beautiful of course.”

“Why of course?”

“Because Justin makes a very good living so he gets to choose from the classy women. She was pregnant.”

“Ah… I was wondering what you meant.”

“She invited me to dinner sometime.”

“You should go.”

“Would you like to come?”

“Sure.”
Provided the anticipated explosion over his upcoming marriage was small.

They settled into easy and meaningless conversation and a few minutes later, Dominic went in search of something to drink. A refuge or remedy; he wasn’t sure which. But thanks to Sese, he found a nice supply of Krug Clos d’Ambonnay ’96 in the refrigerator and he brought back two bottles.

“With work tomorrow, you’ll have to ration your drinking.” He grinned. “I, however, do not.” Leaning back against the headboard, he pulled Kate under one arm, held a bottle in his other hand, and made a point of asking questions because he wanted to hear her voice. The welcome sound soothed him, kept his bad decisions at bay, and reminded him there was goodness in the world after all, at least when Katherine was near.

He made love to her tenderly after that, like a well-behaved
lover, like a man who was memorizing every sensation, every feeling, every touch, every kiss. She purred as he slowly moved in her, he softly growled, her wanting him ratified and endorsed in kind, and no two people were so generous to each other that night. He made love to her with exceptional patience, reading every nuance and subtlety of her arousal, meeting her passionate needs, whether frantic or leisurely, putting all his considerable skills at her disposal. And she gave herself up to him body and soul, responding to his disarming affection, the bounty of his indefatigable dick and as always to his arresting strength and beauty.

He was her temptation and deliverance. He was her life.

He probably should have stopped before he did, but he faced the possibility of three miserable, perhaps lonely, months and he wasn’t that unselfish. But he smiled faintly when she said, “I’m going to sleep. You feel good though. You don’t have to stop.”

“Once more for old times’ sake, then,” he whispered, pushing into her sleek warmth. And when her eyes opened wide in apprehension, he smiled. “Just an expression, baby. Here’s one for now. How about that?”

Afterward, he tucked her in and kissed her good night. “Sleep well, baby. I’m here. I’ll wake you at eight thirty.” Then he carried in another bottle and watched over her while she slept, feeling comfortless and depressed, pissed that he had no way out of this purgatory.

He silently cursed Gora and Gora’s wife’s family, which held them both prisoner, reviled the stupidity of a fifty-year-old man who messed with young girls, and wondered
when the evil that conspired to fuck with his life would give him a break.

Then he picked up his iPhone, left the bed, strolled into the kitchen, took out another bottle from the fridge, and went in search of a speaker.

The alarm woke Kate. She was alone in bed, but she could hear “Bring It On Home” playing so she didn’t panic. Dominic was still here.

She found him lounging in a chair in the living room, nude and beautiful, his eyes shadowed with fatigue, a bottle of Krug in one hand.

He looked up, turned off the music. “Sorry, I forgot to wake you. Did you sleep well?”

She smiled. “I did. You didn’t apparently.”

He shrugged.

He’d been rehearsing his speech—the one about giving her choices, about him being magnanimous. The one where he told her to go out with others, see more of the world, make sure she knew what she wanted. Enjoy herself. I’ll see you in three months when this business deal I’m involved in is over, he’d say, if you still want me.

But she fucked it all up by standing there without a stitch of clothes on, more beautiful than ever, tempting as hell, his eternal Eve. Logic took a hike. Reason flatlined. And if he had had any doubts as to what he wanted before, he was absolutely certain now. When she spoke, her voice was filled with compassion.

“What’s wrong?” she asked. She’d not heard Sam Cooke since Hong Kong. “Something’s wrong, Dominic. Please tell me.”

So he did, or at least he partially did. He had planned to give her his careful speech about the sudden change in his schedule that would take him away from London, how she should think about going out while he was gone, meet other people, make new friends. So much for the best laid plans. “I went to Rome to make a deal,” he said instead. “I ran into complications. It’s not a white-shoe lawyer or white-hat hacker kind of deal”—he paused, debating how much to say and how to phrase it—“so I’m caught in a bind. I have to temporarily marry someone. In three months I divorce her. That’s it.”

Kate’s legs buckled and she slowly slid to the floor.
Fainting just like in the movies
, she thought. It took her a moment to find her voice and even then it was almost noiseless. “You’re kidding.”

He didn’t immediately answer, struggling to find the right words. Or the words least likely to offend. “This isn’t something I’d kid about.”

Her normal voice was back, her green gaze turning steamy. “That’s a real lame-ass excuse. Can’t you think of something believable?”

“Believe me,” he said. “It’s fucking true.” He slid upright, set the bottle on a nearby table, leaned forward, and looked at her, his blue eyes somber. “I’d like to ask you to ignore the whole thing or if you can’t, at least wait for me. But it’s selfish of me to even consider asking you when this situation is so totally fucked. So I won’t.”