But Ewan was counting on her. He wasn’t just her boss; he was her friend.
She nodded slowly. “You know I do. But I at least need to text my manager…”
“No, cara. The only thing you need to do is feel.” His lips were heaven and hell on her skin. A blessing and a curse. Pleasure and pain. She moaned as he moved his mouth over her, tasting every inch of her skin as he dispensed with the underwear she’d hastily pulled on.
“I want to…” she dug her nails into his shoulders. “I want to…” She made a noise of frustration as her usual eloquence deserted her.
His laugh was a deep rumble. “What do you want, my sweet innocent Emily?”
She lifted her mouth and ran her tongue over his muscular chest. He was salty and her insides clenched with desire. “I want more.”
“Yes, I am sure.” He pressed his elbows into the bed on either side of her head, so that their faces were aligned. “I want that too.” He was serious, suddenly. Business like. “I want you in a way that is new and foreign to me.” The admission sent a thrill trickling down her spine. Even in her sensual fog, she knew his confession was one to cherish. It promised that she was different. That this was new for him, too. “But you are inexperienced. A novice.” He kissed the tip of her nose. “I do not make a habit of taking innocence for the sake of it, cara. I wanted you before I knew. I want you still. But I need to know this is definitely what you want. That you are not going to regret this, when the weekend is over.”
When the weekend is over. When the weekend was over… she would go back to her normal life, and he would go back to his. Which was, presumably, far away. In a different place, perhaps as far removed from her as it was possible to be. Not just geographically. Financially, socially; in every way.
“I won’t regret it.”
And she wouldn’t. She might bitterly regret the temporary nature of their time together, but she wouldn’t regret the time itself. Nor what they were about to do.
A frown crossed his features. A small flicker of doubt. “Why?” He ran a finger from her chin to the valley between her breasts.
“Why?” She repeated, lifting her hips a
nd smiling when his eyes widened with obvious desire.
“Why have you not done this? Why are you still a virgin?”
Her cheeks flushed pink. “I’m twenty two, Sabato, not ninety two.”
His laugh was self-derisive. “Am I so different to you, cara? At twenty two, I had enjoyed many lovers. I did not consider myself young, by any stretch.”
“No,” she bit down on her lip. “Nor do I.” Her eyes searched his. “It’s not that I’m too young. I’ve been too busy.”
“For sex?” He was teasing, and for some reason, it truly needled her.
“Yes. I’ve had responsibilities.”
The way she said it, with such reverence, made him pause. “Such as?”
She thought of Andrew, her sweet brother, and smiled slowly. “Family stuff.” She lifted her finger to the dimples that were right at the top of his head – his mystery scars. “My mum had me when she was a teenager. Fifteen, actually. I was brought up partly by mum, and also my grandparents.”
“Milly,” he supplied, showcasing his excellent recall for details and facts.
“Yes. Milly and Jacob. I think they always blamed themselves for having been too lax with mum. For giving her too many freedoms; too much trust.” She shrugged and dropped her hand to his chest. “It was a … mistake … they were not going to repeat with me.”
“They put bars over your windows and made you wear a Maid Marion style chastity belt?” He joked, wondering how the usual thrust and parry of teenage hormones had been pulled into order.
“They didn’t need to.” Her eyes flecked with an emotion he didn’t immediately comprehend. “I grew up knowing what my arrival had meant for my mother. She put her life on hold for a long time, because of me.”
His expression was dark. “That is not your fault. You should never have been made to feel …”
“No, no,” she cut him off. “My mother was wonderful. She adored me. We were always more like friends than anything else. But she didn’t want me to cut short my dreams because of something as fleeting as hormones and teenage lust.”
He wondered, briefly, about her dreams. Surely not to work as a housekeeper at a hotel in central London.
“What’s changed now?” He asked. “Why are you now willing to explore your sensuality?”
Her expression was bemused. “Do you really not know?”