Knight and Stay (16 page)

He let his hand fall away, trusting her to finish what they'd started.

Over the last few months Lucien had given Sophie so many erotic memories, but this one, holding him completely surrendered in her arms, topped them all. He yelled out her name as he came in strong, frantic bursts, his body juddering with pleasure, his face a study of almost pained effort. Watching him come undone was so deeply intimate, and every jerk of his body slammed him back between her spread legs. She was open and unbelievably aroused when he turned his face to hers.

"I guess I won the game," he said, a little hoarsely, moving in to kiss her lips, making a slow and thorough exploration of her mouth. Sophie's fingers moved in the slickness on his abdomen.

"I don't know. It was a pretty good result for me too," she said.

"Hmm." Lucien moved a little to slide his arm behind him into the warm space between their bodies. His sure fingers sought her clitoris as his tongue licked over hers, concentrated little flicks on her already fevered flesh. Sophie's body burned for him, still wrapped around his torso as he slipped two fingers inside her.

"So fucking sexy..." he whispered. "Here, Sophie?" He massaged in fast little circles.

Sophie opened her legs even wider and dropped her forehead against his shoulder blade.
Yes, there. Yes, more. Yes, always.
The familiar, unstoppable tingle of her orgasm started beneath his fingers, making her gasp and rub herself against him.

"I've got you, princess. I've got you."

Chapter Twenty-One

Lucien tipped his face up into the powerful spray of the hot shower, eyes closed, his mind on the girl asleep a few feet away in the bedroom. He was thinking hard. Solutions to problems in life and in business usually came effortlessly to him, but this one was proving intractable. They were going back to London the following evening, back to normality.
How the hell was he going to play it?
 

He didn't want to go back to being Mr. Knight, Sophie's boss. He wanted her to keep calling him by his first name, and to keep kissing him, and to keep letting him bury himself inside her.

He rolled his shoulders, the memory of Sophie's hands on his cock as he washed his body. Christ, just thinking about her had him hard. How could someone so delicate and soft hold him as completely as she had on that armchair? Cradled in her warm smooth limbs, Lucien had found something he had no name for. Plenty of women had got him off in the past with their pretty mouths and experienced fingers. But with Sophie... it wasn't just physical.

They were colleagues, but this wasn't professional compatibility.

They were friends, of sorts, but this wasn't just friendship.

She'd had him on the ropes out there earlier. Her hand under his, her pleasure drawn from his pleasure, giving without taking back. She was good, and generous, and wholesome. And she confused the hell out of him.
Since when had he been attracted to wholesome?

Theirs was a closeness that went way beyond physical proximity.

She was under his skin.

Moving closer to his heart.

He just didn't know it yet, because no one else had ever found the pathway in before.

Lucien eased the Aston Martin to a stop outside Sophie's small house and turned off the engine so as not to wake the neighbours.

Their final day in Paris had been mercifully busy with meetings, calls and negotiations, facilitated by Sophie, who proved her worth anew as a resourceful PA as they raced to meet deadlines and finalise paperwork. Even their flight home had been dominated by the presence of the Carmichaels who were bound for meetings in London.

Finally still and alone in the car, they'd lapsed into pensive silence. Sophie broke it first, staring fixedly out of the window at her own front door.

"So what happens now?"

Her expression was as heavy as the clouds outside. Lucien didn't need her to elaborate on her question, because he'd been expecting it.

"We carry on as usual."

She paused for a beat. "You mean 'what happens in Paris stays in Paris', and all that?"

No.
He'd dropped her here on this doorstep after their trip to Norway and let her walk away. He wasn't doing that again.

"It's not where we are in the world that matters, Sophie. We've had sex in London too, remember? In my club. In my house." He glanced towards Sophie's home. "In yours too, if you want."

She shook her head, her face turned away from him.
Look at me.

"I'm not done with you yet," he said. "There’s a whole lot more still out there for us, if we want it. Are you done with me?"

Still she didn't speak, and still she didn't look at him. He wasn't sure he wasn't screwing this up, or if the words coming out of his mouth reflected the thoughts going on inside his head, but the truth was that he didn't
have
any better words. He had nothing to offer Sophie in terms of promises or commitment, and there weren't cutesy tags to apply to this thing happening between them.

Friends with benefits? The euphemism made his lip curl.

They were lovers, except without the love.

It was about sex. Amazing, fantastic, not-ready-to-walk-away-from-it-yet sex. A coming together. Quite literally.

"Just come to work on Monday, Sophie. No running, okay?'

Finally, she looked at him, her big blue eyes shadowed by the lateness of the hour.

"I'll be there."

Relief flooded his body when she reached out her hand and placed it on his chest.

He covered it briefly with his own, and then drew her into him.

Sophie's lips opened for his, an invitation to linger, and to savour. Lucien sighed with pleasure as he moulded her curves to his body, as far as possible in the confined space of the car.

"Are you sure you don't want me to come in?" he muttered against her mouth. She tasted delicious, and he wanted to keep her in his mouth and his hands. Every time he touched her she did this, made him crave more of the feeling that her nearness gave him.

She eased her head back from his. "Not tonight, okay?"

He sighed and pushed a hand through his hair as frustration spiked him. Then he laughed softly and shook his head.
Sophie fucking Black.
She had him acting like an over-eager teen dropping his date home from the prom.

"You've got the count of three to get out of my car. Any more, and I'll have you on your front lawn."

"That would give the neighbours something to talk about." The lightness of Sophie's tone was reassuring. She'd be there on Monday, and that was enough for now.

"One," he growled.

A flicker of amusement kinked her lips, and a second later she leaned in and kissed him briefly, lingering just enough for her tongue to touch his.

"Goodnight, Lucien."

He swallowed hard. "Two."

Sophie reached out and stroked a hand down his face. "Thank you for Paris. I loved it."

He ought to say 'three' and wake up her neighbours for her impudence, but the tenderness of her words and her hands wiped the word from his lips. He pressed a kiss against her palm.

"Goodnight princess."

He watched her in, and shook his head as she turned on the doorstep and blew him a kiss.

"Three," he murmured to himself, regretfully, then turned the engine over.

Inside the house, Sophie leaned against the door and listened to the sound of Lucien leaving, belatedly realising that she'd left her case in the back of the Aston.

She placed her fingers against her lips, closing her eyes and smiling as she remembered his kiss there.

Beyond tired now that she was alone, Sophie checked the answerphone more out of habit than necessity. No flashing red light. No messages. Dan was moving on, just as she was.

She locked the door and contemplated a late night cup of tea, but the lure of bed won over. She couldn't have asked Lucien in here tonight, and not just because this was her marital home. He'd exhausted her. She needed to sleep.

Unbuttoning her blouse as she moved upstairs, she paused by the bathroom door and tried to work up the energy to shower as she stepped out of her clothes. It was no good. She was dead on her feet, and her comfortable duvet was too close to resist. She didn't need lights to guide her in the familiar bedroom, and sank between the sheets with a bone weary sigh.

Then she froze.

There was a man in her bed.

Chapter Twenty-Two

He reached for her naked body, and for the briefest of disorientated seconds, Sophie wondered how Lucien could suddenly be here in her bed.

But the chest under her hands was a little less broad, and the hands skimming down her back a little smoother. Achingly familiar, and yet all very, very wrong.

"Hey Soph."

She sat up, hauling the quilt over her body as she slammed the lamp on.

"What the hell are you doing here?"

Dan sat up too, facing her in what had been their bed. He'd obviously been asleep; his hair had that messed up way about it that she used to find endearing. Looking at him now with fresh eyes, Sophie saw less perfection than she used to see. But then she was measuring him up against an unfair opponent in Lucien. There weren't many men who would come off better in that particular comparison.

"I've come home."

"What?"
She screwed her eyes up and scrubbed at them. Was she hallucinating with tiredness? Was she asleep and dreaming?

"I didn't think this
was
home to you anymore," she managed.

He looked reproachful. "I never wanted to leave in the first place. I left because you told me to."

"It was your doing. You wanted me at home and Maria away. How inconvenient for you that I found out." She couldn’t suppress the shake in her voice, whether from hurt or anger or surprise.

"Yeah, well you're hardly snow white in all this, are you?" Dan’s tone was defensive.

Sophie sighed heavily and reached for her robe off the end of the bed. She didn't have the stomach or the heart for this fight. Dan was right, in part. Her affair with Lucien – yes, there was no gilding it, it was an affair - could not be explained away or justified by his infidelity.

"I'm going to the bathroom. I want you gone when I get back."

"Sophie. You're not listening. I've left Maria. It's you I want."

Dan got out of bed to follow her as she crossed to the door. Unabashed by his own nakedness, he stood in front of her to make his case.

"Living with her was awful. Everything was wrong." He stepped closer, and Sophie found her eyes moving over his body. The football injury scar on his left hip she'd kissed more times than she could count. The pinkness of his nipples.
Lucien's were brown.

"She smells wrong. She feels wrong. She's just not you, Soph." He reached out for her hand to pull her close, his voice choked with emotion. "I miss you so much."

He was saying all the right words, and he sounded as if he genuinely meant them.

"I don't care about that bloke. I know you did it to get at me. I don't even blame you."

Did she do it to get back at him?
Not consciously, if at all. Truth was, Lucien would have been hard to resist under any circumstances.

"You don't blame me?" She narrowed her eyes at him. "I'm sorry Dan, but I can't say the same. You've been with Maria for years."

"It's over, I promise you. I've told her I still love you."

"I see." Sophie surveyed him. "And I'm supposed to take you back with open arms?"

He looked down at her hand in his and tried to tug her closer, but she stepped back.

"Don't." She pulled her hand free of his. "You can't do this Dan. You can't just waltz back in here, get into
my
bed, and expect me to forgive you."

"I know that. I know that." He scrubbed a hand over the black stubble on his chin. "I know that, Sophie." He looked utterly dejected, and his nakedness rendered him vulnerable. "Please let me stay. For tonight, at least?"

Sophie' shoulders sagged in resignation. It was late, and it was cold out there. "One night, Dan." She stepped aside. "Not in here though. In the spare room."

Dan lay between the cold sheets of the guest bed and stared at the ceiling.

It wasn't exactly the homecoming he'd hoped for, but it was early days.

Sophie would take him back.
She still loved him, he could tell. He still loved her. It would take time, but she'd come around.

He thumped the pillow as he turned over, acutely aware of Sophie so close by in the next room, wishing he could go and take his place in bed beside her where he belonged.

Maybe not tonight, and probably not tomorrow night either. But some day soon, and for the rest of their lives.

On the other side of the wall, Sophie lay equally wakeful and restless.

Dan was back. Here, in her house, in
their
house. Their home. There was a question mark unspoken. She ran a hand out across the other side of the bed, but the cool sheet no longer held the imprint of his body heat.

She drew her arm back into the warmth of her own side and sighed heavily.

He was home.
Was this still his home?
His name was still on the mortgage, and his belongings still lingered in the rooms.
Did he feel justified in his presence here?

He'd seemed pretty at home just now, given the fact that he'd stripped naked, climbed into bed and then fallen asleep as if nothing had happened.

She closed her eyes, but sleep was a long time coming. Something had happened. It couldn’t just be put aside.

Some miles away, Lucien threw a log on the glowing fire and sat back down, a glass of deep amber malt whisky in his hand.

He was worried. The sensation was unfamiliar and he didn’t like it.

It worried him that Sophie might get the wrong idea, and that he would ultimately end up hurting her.