The Billionaire's Disgraced Virgin (Billionaire Knights Book 2) (11 page)

T
he moment
the suite door closed behind them, Mike’s lips were on hers, with a passion and an eager desire she hadn’t thought possible. He wanted her, a jubilant voice inside her sang. He really wanted her! But only her body, another voice countered. But then she was swept up in the heat of the moment and her mind was rendered silent, as the tongue that had stroked against hers plunged deeper, and she opened her lips wider on a soft moan of pure, unadulterated pleasure and lustful desire. As she curled her arms around his neck his hands pulled down the dress to reveal her bare breasts, the upper slopes pale and silky in the moonlight and then his kisses were snaking along her throat, his hands full on her breasts, his thumbs stroking her nipples and raising them to an aching contraction as if in yearning for his touch.

She arched her back to press herself closer to him as his lips lit a fiery trail along her clavicle and lower, until she was delirious with eager need. His fingers caressed her naked breasts, the smooth skin responding to his touch and then he took her nipple into the heat of his mouth, his hands traveling along her sides down to her hips and curling beneath her buttocks to press her into him.

Frantically she clawed at his shirt, and when he lifted her up and carried her into the master bedroom and gently lowered her onto the softness of the covers she was already reaching for him, pulling his dark head toward her even as he stripped his shirt and kicked off his trousers. When he descended upon her they were both naked, and the sensation of his heated skin on hers had her crying out, his answering wild grunt sweeping up the passion he was engendering.

The sight of her pale flesh in the moonlight, her nipples hardened into dark peaks of urgent desire and the soft hair covering her sex tantalizingly enticing, had him grappling for control. He wanted to take her in a wild frenzy of heat but paced himself, allowing his fingers and lips to discover the warm softness of her flesh. When he reached the bedewed triangle, his fingers lightly caressing her inner thighs, she gasped, as if he was her first. As he gently parted the swollen lips of her sex, revealing the glistening heat within, his tongue quickly followed his fingers and he was stroking along her wetness. The moment his tongue tip touched her clitoris sent her quaking and trembling beneath his touch. His hands traveled to her breasts and as his tongue slid deeper inside her quivering sex, his fingers teased and rolled her burning nipples until she was thrashing wildly and bucking against the delicious onslaught he was provoking.

It had never been like this for her. Never had a man brought her to this quivering peak of pleasure. Lewis had been her first, but they’d made love only once, and even then it had been a fumbling and joyless affair compared to the way Mike was making her feel. She’d never even known it could be like this.

Her lashes swept up, her lips parted as she supported herself on quaking arms on the bed to watch Mike’s face as he rose up between her thighs, the muscles of his shoulders working as he moved over her, and as she glanced past his features to his torso and the hardness of his arousal, she gasped again at the sight of his girth, hard and towering in a mass of rigid, veined flesh. She reached for him, wanting to feel all that power under her slender fingers, and he groaned when she folded her fingers around his throbbing heat, a small droplet of moisture extending from the tip. The pressure inside was building to a peak, and she couldn’t wait one moment longer to feel him inside, to have his flesh and hers united as he slid deeply into the channel of her sex.

“Mike,” she whispered, her face flushed and heat coming off her in waves in equal measure with the heat she could see in the smoldering look he was giving her, his eyes dark and molten with desire.

The one word was his command, and as he was thrusting into her he could feel the muscles of her sex embracing him, pulling him deeper. She’d thrown her head back against the pillow, and he devoured the tender flesh of her throat with lips and tongue and teeth, even as he moved deeper inside her, thrusting within her quivering flesh, penetrating her very core. His buttocks bunched when she placed her legs around him and then they were moving together in the ageless dance, his thrusts coming faster, deeper and harder with each long slide of his hardness into the softness of her womanhood.

“Chloe,” he grunted, when finally he was on the verge of exploding.

She held onto him, pressing herself against him as if she wanted to disappear inside him, become one with him, her legs curled around his flexing buttocks and her fingers scraping his back, her nails digging into the undulating muscles, now damp with the same film of perspiration that was covering her body. And as each long thrust of his flesh into hers swept her closer to the ultimate pleasure, she was suddenly lost in an orgasm that snatched the last sense of reason from her mind and left her quaking uncontrollably, only aware of Mike’s grated roar as he, too, crested the precipice and hurled into nothingness, his life-giving juice mixing with her own juices in the seat of her womanhood.

And at that moment she decided she couldn’t conceal from him what she’d done. As she lay curled up against him, her head on his chest as she listened to the steady drum of his heartbeat, his arms protectively around her, she swore that tomorrow morning, before he signed that contract, she would tell him what she’d done. She’d reveal all. She would lose him, she knew, even if she’d never had him, for this had only been sex. To him, at least. To her it had been the celebration and culmination of the love she felt for him. She loved Mike Knight, and as tears welled up in her eyes, she vowed to imprint this very memory onto her mind, for it would be the last time they’d ever be together.

T
he next morning
she was awakened by a stray ray of sunlight that had made it past the curtain that was still drawn. The moment the cobwebs of sleep were eradicated from her mind, she shot up in bed, the horrific truth of the task she’d set out to accomplish coming back to her. She was going to tell Mike about her betrayal. She glanced over to where he’d lain but found the bed empty, still depressed where they’d made love last night, his scent clinging to the air and making her throat clog up. Then, in a sudden realization, her eyes shot to the clock on the nightstand. Nine thirty! She’d overslept! And the contracts were supposed to be signed at nine!

Instantly, she leapt from the bed, and as adrenaline rushed through her veins she pulled on her jeans and shirt, stepped into her sneakers, finger-combed her hair and was out the door, a deep sense of panic and despair filling her. She raced along the corridor and down the main staircase to the reception hall. And as she swept through the door she saw that Mike and Roderick were seated at the conference table, surrounded by a group of smiling representatives from both companies, the tip of his pen touching the paper, on the verge of adding his signature to the contracts.

“Mike! No!” she cried out, racing to the fore.

All eyes turned to her, and apprehension colored her cheeks.

“What’s this?!” Roderick demanded, visibly incensed.

“Don’t sign,” she panted. “I—there’s been a mistake—there’s…” She looked at him wildly, even as his frown deepened.

“What mistake?” he demanded.

There was nothing for it. She had to confess. “I’ve been feeding you falsified numbers,” she told him hoarsely. “Numbers supplied by Lewis Dixon.”

There. The truth was out.

Mike’s gaze had whipped to Dixon, whose eyes were narrowed into slits.

“Is this true?” Mike demanded.

“Of course it’s not!” Roderick exclaimed. “Tell him, Dixon. Tell him this is nonsense!”

“You leave me no other choice,” Dixon declared, and to her horror Chloe saw him reach for his tablet computer. God, no! He pointed a finger in her direction. “This woman is not who you think she is, Mike,” he announced. “Her name isn’t even Chloe Ross. It’s Gwen Parker. And she sure as hell isn’t the trusty accountant you mistook her for. She’s deceived you and I can prove it.”

“No—don’t listen to him, Mike,” Chloe stammered, now trembling all over as her eyes fastened on the tablet Dixon had placed on top of the contracts, directly in front of Mike and Roderick.

“The moment I saw her I recognized her,” he told Mike. “I didn’t want to tell anyone because I had too much affection for her. Misplaced, I now see.”

He switched on the tablet and when she saw the old pictures of herself appearing on the screen tears sprang to Chloe’s eyes. No, not again, she thought desperately. Not all over again!

Mike and Roderick and the others all glanced at the pictures of a vivacious girl, happy to pose for the man she thought she loved and loved her back, and she could see Mike’s eyes lift to hers and flickering dangerously with something she thought was revulsion and disgust, just the way she’d feared.

“But that’s—that’s the Men’s Monthly girl,” Roderick cried out. He looked from Chloe to the pictures. “You dyed your hair but that’s you, isn’t it? Dixon?”

Dixon grinned. “Yep, that’s her, all right. I recognized her immediately. I didn’t want to say anything, of course, until now, when she tried to derail this very important deal. It’s obvious she has her own agenda, but don’t you believe a word she tells you. She can’t be trusted. I should know. I’m the one she tried to take to court in a bid to squeeze more money from me even though she signed a waiver for those pictures.” He directed himself to Mike. “That’s all this is, Mike. A desperate ploy to extort more money from you. Trust me, I’ve been on the receiving end of this woman’s deception. I know her treacherous ways.”

Chloe caught Mike’s eye, and saw the shocked dismay reflected there. And that’s when she broke down and ran from the room. Her feet slapped against the stone floor as she desperately fled, tears blinding her, and it was only when she felt the iron band of Mike’s fingers biting into her arm that she halted in her tracks.

“You have some explaining to do, Chloe,” he told her gruffly, then shook her when instead of responding she produced a desperate agonized wail. “Stop it! What’s going on? Are you really this woman in the pictures? This—this Men’s Monthly girl?” he spat.

“Yes!” she cried. “Yes, I am!”

“And Lewis Dixon took those pictures?”

Wildly, she cast about, tears streaming down her face. “He—he threatened to show them to you—to show them to everyone. I—I’ve changed my name, changed my appearance and started my life afresh. I—I never knew—never imagined I would ever meet Dixon again but when I did he forced me to feed you wrong information. Doctored numbers to boost the Press Corp purchase price.” She looked at him imploringly, his face swimming before her eyes. “I wanted to tell you, but I was afraid he was going to expose me—to show those horrible pictures to the whole world, to tell everybody who I really was.”

He seemed to ponder something, and his next question took her by complete surprise. “And your parents? Did they know about this?”

Pain lanced through her. “Yes. Yes, they did. It—it destroyed them.”

He was simply staring at her, and she knew she’d lost. She’d lost him and she’d lost the new lease on life she thought she’d bought. And she couldn’t bear it. Most of all, she couldn’t bear the disappointment and the judgment in his eyes—the eyes of the man she loved.

With an agonized sob, she tore herself away from him, and this time he let her go. His hands fell to his side and he watched as she hurtled headlong toward the door, yanked it open and fled through into the void beyond.

S
he’d been roaming
the streets of London for hours now, not knowing where to turn. She hadn’t dared to return to her flat, knowing the press would be there to hound her again, just like they had the last time. They’d be waiting for her with their cameras flashing in her face and their cries of “Gwen—here, Gwen!”

She couldn’t face the world anymore, she couldn’t face anyone, but most definitely she couldn’t face Mike. She’d seen the look in his eyes, the look of utter and complete shock at her deception, and knew that he would spit her out like the others had. He’d never loved her, of course, but at least last night, when she’d been in his arms, she’d briefly had the illusion that perhaps one day he might. For a brief moment she’d felt perfectly content knowing that perhaps she did have a stab at happiness after all.

It was all over. She’d taken a taxi from the village just beyond the Knight domain and it had dropped her off in the heart of London, where she was but a speck in a crowd of millions. As the hour grew late, the rain had come, mimicking her mood, and as it pelted down on the rooftops and the hurriedly produced umbrellas, the streets had emptied, and now only a scant few souls braved the weather, not paying attention to the lonely girl wandering aimlessly.

How she’d finally ended up on the Millennium Bridge she didn’t know, but as she stared down at the raging waters below, whipped up into a frenzy by the howling wind and driving rain, her mind a hopeless whirl of jumbled thoughts and jangling emotions, she recognized the river as a reflection of her life. She was truly lost now. She couldn’t go back to work, since the truth of her identity would spread like wildfire, and the whole world would be clamoring to meet the Men’s Monthly girl, to see what had become of her.

And Mike—she’d betrayed him so horribly, let him down in every way. She knew he would believe Dixon, who’d spin a story that she was the one who’d set up this whole deception, and Mike would believe him, and his opinion of her would sink even lower than it already had. Lower than the floor of the River Thames, where the flotsam and jetsam of life gathered, rejected by society and slowly settling on the bottom. Perhaps it was where she should be. Just another reject.

And she was just closing her eyes and allowing the wind to pummel her and the rain to lash her when she thought she could hear Mike’s voice. Which couldn’t be, of course. Because he had no idea where she was. No one did. Perhaps save for her parents, who were perhaps watching over her from the heavens above, sorely disappointed in the life their daughter had led. She glanced up when she heard the voice again.

“Chloe! Don’t do it!” the voice was crying out, carried on the howling wind, and she frowned when she thought she detected another crazy person braving the storm to traverse the swaying bridge.

Then the figure drew nearer and materialized from the whirlpool of water, his long overcoat flapping about his powerful frame—the frame of Mike!

She blinked away the spray from her lashes, disbelief rendering her dumb.

“For Christ’s sakes, Chloe!” he thundered when he’d finally reached her. “Are you crazy?! Let’s get you out of here.”

She blinked again, still not believing he was really there. Then the implications dawned on her and she fought him fiercely as he tried to lead her away from the bridge. “Mike, no! I can’t go back there. I can’t—”

“Don’t talk nonsense, Chloe. You’re coming with me before you catch a cold or worse. What were you thinking? Don’t you ever walk away from me again, you hear me?! I thought I’d die when I couldn’t reach you.”

That gave her pause. “How did you find me?”

He eyed her wryly, wiping the water from his face. “I run a telecommunications company, remember? We have ways of tracking cell phones. And speaking of cell phones, perhaps next time when I call you you might want to pick up.”

“I can’t do this, Mike. I can’t be this girl—this Men’s Monthly girl.”

“Don’t you think I know that?”

He wasn’t making any sense, but he’d removed his overcoat and had draped it over her shivering form, lifting up the cap to protect her face from the relentless wind. He was hurrying her along, and she saw he’d parked his car at the edge of the bridge. The accountant in her wanted to tell him he might get a fine, but then she was ushered into the backseat. He reached over her and flipped the latch on a small compartment. “You’ll find a towel in there and some of my clothes.” She looked up into his grinning face as he swept his wet hair from his brow. “They probably won’t fit you but at least they’re warm and dry.”

As she stared down at the clothes, he took the wheel and started up the car.

“Where are you taking me?”

“Home,” he announced curtly, and put the car in gear. The vehicle lurched into motion, and she suddenly felt a chill set in she hadn’t even been aware of.

So she did as she was told and automatically changed into his clothes. She had no idea where home was, but if Mike was there, it was a pretty good start.

“The deal is off,” he suddenly announced when the silence had stretched on while he navigated the car through London traffic and the freak summer storm. He wasn’t taking her to her flat, she saw, but driving out of the city. Then the purport of his words came home to her.

“What do you mean, the deal is off?”

“Just sit tight. I’ll tell you all about it when we arrive.”

And arrive they did, a little while later, at the castle she’d left in such a hurry only hours before. She squirmed in her seat. “Mike, I can’t be back here. I can’t face these people anymore.”

“You won’t have to. They’re all gone.”

This was another surprise. She let him help her out of the car, as she was still too dazed to trust her legs to support her weight, and when they were inside, he led her straight into the kitchen, where Maria was already waiting with a hot grog. Mike must have called her ahead, she figured, for the woman was fussing over her and wouldn’t let her out of her sight until she’d drunk the hot beverage.

Mike watched the scene dispassionately, or so she thought, for the moment Maria had left he told her in a voice thick with emotion, “You practically gave me heart failure when you suddenly went off the grid like that. Now are you finally going to tell me the truth about what happened between you and Dixon?”

“But what about your deal?” she began.

He made a slashing movement with his hand. “Hang the deal. That’s not important right now. What’s important is you.”

She gazed at him in surprise. She still didn’t quite comprehend what was going on, but she did know that he had a right to know the truth. So she sighed, and looked away from him as she recalled the terrible events of five years ago.

“I met Lewis Dixon in a local bar in downtown Poole. He was a fledgling photographer, and impressed me with his stories of campaigns he would run and galleries that would display his art. How he would conquer the world with his unique vision. I posed for him, but just regular pictures, no nudes. We went on a date, and I ended up sleeping with him. He—he was my first, and to celebrate he opened a bottle of champagne he kept in his studio. I wasn’t used to drinking and so I was slightly drunk when he suggested he take a couple of pictures, just for his own personal collection. I was feeling so great I obliged. He—he got me naked and had me dance for him, snapping away with a professionalism and intensity that gave me pause, even in my post-sex, champagne-fueled haze. I ignored the warning bells, however, even when the next day he texted me to let me know he couldn’t see me anymore. I’d been dumped by text.

“The disaster struck later, when friends of my parents came round the house with copies of some sleazy tabloid, my pictures featured on the front page. When I came home that night, and saw my parents sitting at the kitchen table, my mother’s face wet with tears, my father terrified for my future, I realized what I’d done and my world fell apart. Over the course of the next few weeks I didn’t leave the house, as the pictures garnered national acclaim and the press descended on the house. I was expelled from college, and the story really blew up when my image was selected as masthead for Men’s Monthly. It was the final nail in the coffin of my future. I had no prospects anymore, no life. My parents tried to get the rights to the pictures back, but Dixon had been devious enough to have me sign a waiver. Not for these pictures, but for some innocuous session at the park when we first met. He’d claimed it was a simple formality.

“And then came the second shock when my parents died in that terrible house fire. I couldn’t even go to the funeral, as the press came out en masse, eager to snap a picture of ‘the Men’s Monthly girl’. It was then that I decided to disappear and start life over again. Hard as it was, I traveled to London, changed my name and took evening classes while moonlighting to survive.”

“And then I gave you the Press Corp merger job,” Mike said wryly.

She inclined her head. “I was afraid to come face to face with Roderick Holmes. Afraid he’d recognize me. I never thought I’d meet Lewis. Or see those horrid pictures again.” She looked up when his hand covered hers, and the warmth seeping into her fingers sent shivers racing up and down her spine. Shivers of hope—hope against hope.

“You will never have to see those pictures again, Chloe. I scratched the old deal with Roderick and drew up a new one. He was as taken aback by the whole sordid affair as I was. This was all Dixon’s doing, apparently, hoping to cash in on the deal and earn a higher bonus. Dixon is out. Your picture at Men’s Monthly’s masthead is out. We’re seizing every last copy of those pictures to have them destroyed. Roderick will see to that. He might be a tough businessman but he’s no monster. He never knew you were abused and coerced. We’re also taking down every last copy of those pictures from the Internet.”

“I—but that’s impossible,” she gasped.

“It is possible,” he told her in a soft voice, gripping her hand tighter. “Roderick and I will make sure. Between us we have considerable clout and can make that happen. And your identity is quite safe. All the people present have signed non-disclosure agreements and I will personally sue them to hell and back if they so much as even think about revealing your identity.”

“But—but why?” she stuttered. Why was he doing all this? She wasn’t that great an accountant to go to all this trouble.

“Can’t you guess?” he asked gently.

She shook her head, her damp tresses dancing about her face.

“There shouldn’t have to be a reason, Chloe, other than common decency. No one should have to go through what you did, and I’m bringing charges against Dixon, by the way. I’ll make sure that he’ll never do to anyone what he did to you. But more importantly I’m doing this for the woman I love.”

Her heart sank. “The woman you love? Who—who is she?” It must be Eileen Holmes, she thought. She must have convinced Mike all this was bad for business.

But then he cupped her face in his hands, and murmured softly, “You, Chloe Ross. You are the woman I love.”

Tears suddenly sprang to her eyes. This wasn’t happening, and yet it was.

“You mean…”

He smiled, and his eyes lit up. “I think I fell in love with you when you showed me around that shoebox of an apartment of yours, which against all odds you’d managed to turn into a home. I just didn’t want to admit it to myself until you were running away from me like a bat out of hell and I was too dumbfounded to run after you until you were already gone.” He frowned. “I know it must come as a surprise to you, and I understand you don’t feel the same way about me as I do about you. I just—just wanted to tell you…”

For the first time since she’d met the handsome billionaire he was lost for words, looking positively flustered, and the love she’d been feeling suddenly threatened to flood her completely, choking the words in her throat.

He looked at her earnestly. “I would like to take you out on a date, Chloe. Put this whole thing behind us and start from scratch. Perhaps in due time you will learn to—I mean I can only hope that you may come to feel about me the way I feel about you and—and well, that is to say…”

“I don’t need time, Mike,” she finally managed, her voice breaking as tears flowed freely. “My heart is yours already. It’s been yours for a long time.”