Illusions of Love (30 page)

He gave one long, last thrust and she screamed out loud as he came inside her with a force that pushed her right up against the sideboard, but he held onto her, keeping her close as her climax matched his before finally pulling her upright, holding her against him, wrapping his arms around her from behind.

‘Jesus, Dominic… that was, incredible!’
 
She leant back against him, trying hard to get her breath back, her chest heaving with the exertion, her skin damp with sweat.

He kissed her shoulder, wanting to keep her right where she was for a few more minutes because he wasn’t all that keen on rejoining the party just yet.
 
He felt much more like staying here, just the two of them.
 
Alone.
 
Something they very rarely were, but that was the life of a movie star.
 
Especially a movie star who was involved with another high-profile movie star.

‘
India
, can I ask you something?’

She turned round to face him, looking into those incredible blue eyes of his, pushing his hair back off his face.
 
‘Yeah, of course you can.’

He let his hands rest in the small of her back as he pulled her closer, so close it felt as though every inch of their bodies were touching, and just knowing she was there made him feel like a kid who’d just managed to get the best looking girl in school to go out with him.
 
He felt about sixteen again as nerves set in and his stomach flipped over and over in a million never-ending somersaults, his mouth suddenly dry as he tried to form the words he needed to tell her.
 
Words he’d never really told anyone else before.
 
Not ever.
 
Because he’d never felt like this before.

‘How… how do you really feel about me,
India
?
 
I mean, I know all of this has happened really quickly and things have moved along so fast, but…’
 
He looked at her, into a face so beautiful it tore him apart to think about what he was doing to her, and he had to avoid that now.
 
Somehow.
 
Should he tell her himself, before she found out from someone else?
 
Or should he try to pretend none of it had happened in the first place and put Michael Walsh back where he belonged?
 
In the past, forgotten.
 
After all, he didn’t need him, did he?
 
He didn’t need a father he’d never known.
 
He’d got by in life quite happily without him, and this game he’d thought he’d wanted to play – this ridiculous attempt at trying to prove something to a man who didn’t even matter – it was redundant now.
 
It meant nothing.

India
didn’t really know what to say.
 
She
 
hadn’t expected some big, deep and meaningful heart-to-heart with him.
 
They were together, they were having fun, and being with him felt good.
 
He made her feel young again, he made her feel alive, able to cope with anything, even Michael and whatever shit
he
might be creating.
 
But, as for anything else, she didn’t know.
 
She was going through an extremely high-profile divorce, Michael was messing with her head again, and what had all that been with Kenny downstairs in the club?
 

‘Dominic, I… Baby, I am having the time of my life with you…’

The air conditioning was suddenly making her feel quite chilly and she stepped away from him, grabbing his shirt and covering herself with it, walking over to the huge open French doors, staring out at the lights of Las Vegas spread out before her, like a blanket of multi-coloured stars against the clear black night sky.

She closed her eyes as she felt his arms circle her from behind and she leant back against him, a tiny shiver running right through her as his mouth brushed her neck, his breath warm on her skin.

‘I’m falling in love with you,
India
.’

Her heart almost stopped dead as he spoke words she’d never thought for one minute she’d ever hear from him.
 
Not from Dominic MacDonald, a man whom she knew had boasted he’d never been in love, a man who’d said he never really wanted to feel like that because it would tie him down, get in the way, cloud things – and wasn’t
that
the truth?
 
Which was why she’d gravitated towards him in the first place, because love was the last thing she needed right now.
 
She had enough complications going on without falling in love with a man she hardly knew.
 
She’d fallen foul of that all too often and look at the crap it had caused.

She kept her eyes closed, reaching up behind her to touch his face, burying her fingers in his hair as he continued to kiss her neck, moving the shirt she was wearing down off her shoulder, letting his fingers stroke it as his other hand gently ran over the curve of her waist.

But she couldn’t say anything back to him.
 
She couldn’t tell him she loved him too, because she didn’t.
 
Or she couldn’t, she didn’t know.
 
She couldn’t work out what was going on anymore.

‘
India
…’

She turned round and kissed him slowly, catching him slightly unawares, but it took just seconds for him to respond, his open mouth moving against hers, warm and soft, making her feel things she didn’t want to feel, making her weaker than she wanted to be.

‘I’ve been here before, Dominic.’
 
She gently stroked his rough chin, running her fingers over his lips.
 
‘With JJ…’

‘Baby, I’m not JJ…’

She put a finger to his lips, shaking her head.
 
‘Sssh… I know that, okay?
 
But… I can’t rush into anything; I don’t want to do that.
 
For both our sakes, Dominic.
 
It’s just… it’s just too early to be throwing words like love around.’

‘Especially when it’s coming from someone like me, huh?’

She couldn’t help smiling.
 
‘Hey, come on.
 
That’s not what I meant.
 
I just… I just can’t tell you something so… Look; it’s hard for me, okay?
 
Hard for me to get so involved again, because every time I do something goes wrong.
 
And I’m just not ready to feel that way again.’

‘I won’t hurt you,
India
.’

She stroked his cheek, staring into those piercing blue eyes, wanting to believe him.
 
She really wanted to believe him.
 
But it wasn’t just that, was it?
 
‘But
I
might hurt
you,
Dominic.
 
And I don’t want that to happen.’

‘I’ll take my chances,
India
.
 
I’m a big boy now.’

She smiled again, playing with the hair at the back of his neck.
 
‘Oh, I know that, mister.’
 
She kissed him slowly, closing her eyes as his mouth moved against hers, her stomach flipping over and over.
 
‘Let’s just see how things go.
 
Okay?’

She was right.
 
It was probably best not to push too hard right now.
 
It would happen.
 
He had no doubt about that.
 
She’d fall for him just as hard as he’d fallen for her, he was sure of that.
 
He was just going to have to be patient and let her get there at her own pace.
 
‘Yeah.
 
Okay.’

He flashed her that movie star smile and she wanted so much to just stay here with him, to lie in his arms and forget everything else around them.
 
But they had a party to get back to.
 
They had to show their faces, they had to keep up that front, that image, even at her own birthday party.
 
And if they stayed missing for too long all they were going to achieve was the creation of yet more rumours.
 
‘Come on, handsome.
 
Let’s get back down there.’

‘Do we have to?’ he groaned, pulling her back against him, sliding his hands underneath her shirt to touch her naked breasts, coaxing a tiny gasp out of her.

‘Yes, we do.’
 
She removed his hands and stepped away from him, going over to retrieve her clothes that were lying in a pile next to his on the floor where they’d thrown them off at a ridiculous speed the second they’d set foot inside the apartment.

‘It’ll happen,
India
.
 
You know that, don’t you?’

She looked up at him as she slipped back into her skinny jeans.
 
‘What will?’

‘Me and you.
 
It’ll happen.’

‘I thought it already had,’ she smiled, pulling her top down over her head and running her fingers through her hair.

He walked over to her, smiling too, reaching out to gently brush a strand of hair back behind her ear.
 
‘You’ll fall in love with me.
 
I know you will.
 
One day.’

And, as
India
looked up into those incredible eyes of his, she thought there was a chance he might just be right.

***

Michael had been patient, he really had.
 
But as he saw
India
and Dominic walk back into the club, arms wrapped around each other, leaning into one another, looking for the whole world to see like two people who’d just had great sex, he couldn’t take it anymore.
 
He’d had it; he was tired of it all, of knowing the truth and keeping it to himself.
 
Now
she
needed to know the truth, too.
 
She needed to know just who she was sleeping with.
 
And
he
needed Dominic MacDonald out of her life because with every second he was there, getting closer and closer, it took her farther away from
him
.
 
Farther away from his second chance.

Downing the last of the bourbon in the bottom of his glass he threw it down on the bar and walked over to them, any remaining feelings of guilt he may have been feeling at doing this to
India
wiped away with one look at Dominic’s hand in hers.

‘Michael… is everything alright?’
India
asked, trying not to giggle out loud as Dominic whispered something in her ear that promised a late birthday present she’d never forget.

Michael watched them for a second, studying their body language, the way they interacted with each other – the looks, the little touches, the way Dominic would smile at her for no reason, he recognised it all because he’d felt that way too, once.
 
No, he’d never stopped feeling it.
 
Not where
India
was concerned.
 

‘No.
 
Everything’s not alright.
 
Not really.’

India
looked at him, narrowing her eyes, a bad feeling suddenly washing over her.
 
She’d been here before, she could sense when something was about to happen and she held onto Dominic’s hand tight as she watched her ex-husband with a familiar feeling of trepidation.

Michael continued to stare at Dominic, trying to find something in this young man that he could relate to.
 
He was his son, after all, wasn’t he?
 
There should be something in there that he recognised.

‘Have you got a problem, Michael?’ Dominic asked, pulling
India
closer to him, sensing the tension.
 
He could feel it in the way she was gripping his hand.

‘Yeah.
 
I’ve got a problem, Dominic.
 
You.
 
You’re
my problem.’

India
felt her stomach sink, so fast she had to grip Dominic’s hand even tighter.
 
‘Michael…’

Michael turned his attention to India, fixing her with a look that told her this wasn’t going to be pretty, and suddenly she just wanted to run away, to leave behind whatever crap he was going to cause because that’s what was about to happen here.
 
She could feel it, hanging heavy in the air like a storm cloud that was about to burst open.

‘No,
India
.
 
It’s time to get this out in the open.’

Now it was Dominic’s turn to feel an icy shiver run up his spine.
 
Did Michael know something?
 
Jesus, no!
 
Was this how it was all going to come out?
 
Was this how
India
found out the truth? Because this wasn’t how Dominic wanted it to happen.
 
Anything but this, because this was not going to be good.

‘Get
what
out in the open?’
India
asked, looking at both Dominic and Michael, that bad feeling in the pit of her stomach growing ten-fold as she noticed the way they faced each other, something in both their eyes letting her know this wasn’t going to be good news.
 
It just wasn’t.
 
‘Dominic… do you know what he’s talking about?’