CHAPTER ONE
You are cordially invited to the wedding of
Lady Coco Lauren
and
Mr Ash Livingston
August 1st
Livingston Castle, Scottish Highlands
YOU KNOW WHEN you feel like you’re dreaming...not because you remember falling asleep, but because what’s happening before your eyes, within your grasp, is too good to be true?
That’s me right now.
I feel like a million dollars—I’m English, but pounds just doesn’t have the same ring—and it’s not the hefty price tag associated with my emerald silk floor-length dress making me feel that way, or the diamonds that sparkle in my ears. It’s the way my dance partner is looking at me as he sweeps me across the ballroom floor.
My dance partner, Jackson Black. Even my brain says his name all breathy and hitched.
Today he’s the Best Man to my Maid of Honour status, and the same man I’ve lusted after since the day we met six years ago. Six years of unrequited, mind-losing, toe-curling desire, without so much as a kiss to the lips... Oh, I’ve given him a fair few to the cheek, I’ve leaned in slightly longer than could be considered platonic, hugged him tighter than perhaps I should, all in an attempt to have him lower his guard, to see me as more than just a client. More than just a friend of his best friend’s girl.
But he doesn’t bite.
He has rules.
Rules he won’t break.
You see, as a client of his club, of Blacks—a sex club protected by non-disclosure agreements, and catering to the British elite—my membership status brands me as off-limits.
Only I don’t feel off-limits now. Not when we are hundreds of miles from the London club itself, celebrating the marriage of our best friends in the Highlands of Scotland with champagne swimming in my blood and his cologne swirling through my senses.
I could say it’s the drink going to my head, the seductive music that floats around us, but I swear his need is pressing between us, beneath the shield of his sporran. I want to make a joke of it, a tease—is that your sporran talking or are you just pleased to see me?
If I was myself, I would...hell, I’d even make it into a serious come-on.
But Jackson isn’t just any guy I have a crush on; he’s Jackson and he’s made it clear we can never be. It doesn’t stop me wanting it though.
It doesn’t stop me curving into him ever closer, tighter, head to toe. Forgetting how to breathe, or speak, or do anything other than follow his expert lead. He can dance, really dance, and I’m wrapped up in his hypnotic rhythm, following him step for step, sway for sway, arse grope for arse grope...almost.
A little giggle rises up within me. It’s nervous, ridiculous, but he only holds me closer, his hard, muscular warmth seeping into my sensitised skin, the delicate silk of my dress doing nothing to hinder its penetration. Nothing to ease his effect on me.
Tradition dictates that we have this dance—or rather it dictates that we have one dance, but that was three songs ago, after the Bride and Groom had shared their first. The fact that he hasn’t stepped away, that neither of us have ended this sudden intimacy, isn’t lost on me and hope swells.
I tilt my head back, intending to say something, anything, but my lips merely part, words lost in the darkness of his eyes way above mine. His impressive height and brawn make my petite frame feel all the more so.