Her Best Worst Mistake (14 page)

He caught sight of the clock again as he pulled
back.

“
I have to go,” he said
regretfully.

She smiled faintly, her eyes filled with the same
regret.

He kissed her again, then rolled away and swung his
legs over the edge of the bed. He was very aware of her watching as
he dressed, and he threw her a self-conscious glance.

“
Everything okay over
there?”

“
Just admiring the view. You have a
very nice ass.”

He felt a ridiculous rush of pleasure at her blatant
appreciation of his body. Funny, but he’d never considered himself
a particularly vain man before, but the idea that Violet admired
his body made want to climb back into bed again.

“
I really have to go,” he
said.

“
I know.”

There was a devilish glint in her eye as she leaned
back against the pillows. The sheet slipped, revealing a glimpse of
pale pink nipple.

“
Be fair. You’re killing me here,”
he said, indicating the growing bulge in the jeans he’d just
zipped.

She laughed and tugged the sheet a little higher.
“Better?”

“
No. But smarter.”

He finished dressing, then grabbed his phone and car
keys and returned to the bed to drop a final kiss onto her
lips.

“
Have a good day,” she
said.

“
You, too.”

It wasn’t until he was pulling out into busy early
morning traffic that he realized that neither of them had mentioned
when they would see each other again, or where.

There wasn’t a doubt in his mind that he would see
her, though. She was in his blood. Under his skin. No way was he
walking away from the way she made him feel. No way.

There was no guaranteeing that she felt the same way,
though. The thought made him frown as he wove his way through
traffic. As she’d said the other night, Elizabeth was her friend.
Although he and Elizabeth had parted ways amicably enough, he could
understand that there were other issues at play for Violet beyond
the fact that they enjoyed combustible chemistry.

He wondered if she’d told Elizabeth about them. Then
he thought back to the tortured expression on her face when she’d
told him she was catching a taxi home and knew she hadn’t.

If he was a gentleman, he’d back off and leave her to
sort things out with her friend. Violet and Elizabeth had known
each other for years, after all. A fling was hardly worth
compromising such a long-lasting, deep-seated friendship.

Even as he thought it he knew he wouldn’t be
following his own suggestion. He’d already established that he had
precious little will-power where Violet was concerned. He wasn’t
ready to give her up yet. When the passion died, when he could
share the same air as her and not feel as though his skin was two
sizes too small, fine. But until that moment happened—as it
eventually would—or until she drew a line under their liaison, he
was going to let himself have her.

The rest of the week passed in a blur. Violet was run
off her feet at the shop by day, and every night she was on her
back, giving in to the apparently endless desire she had to be
skin-to-skin with Martin St Clair. Tuesday night they were both so
desperate they did it on the stairs to the flat, unable to wait the
few seconds until they made it to her apartment. Wednesday he
appeared at lunch-time and she locked the front door before he took
her from behind in the back room. Thursday was Christmas Eve and
she knew from long experience that Martin’s law firm traditionally
had drinks after work, an event she’d helped Elizabeth plan several
times over the years. Even though they hadn’t discussed it, she
knew she wouldn’t be seeing him tonight. In fact, in all likelihood
it would be a few days before she heard from him again, given the
time of year. A fact that made her feel ridiculously hollow.

It was just sex, after all. She’d survived for months
without it before. She could manage a few days now.

Her thoughts drifted to Elizabeth as she tidied the
shop after closing time. They hadn’t spoken for a few weeks now and
Violet experienced an increasingly familiar pang of guilt as she
thought about her friend. She felt the distance between them
profoundly, but the thought of lying to E down the phone line
stilled her hand every time she reached for the handset.

She needed to find some way through this, for the
sake of their friendship, but every time she thought about
confessing what had happened with Martin—what was still
happening—she felt sick and shaky.

She wasn’t stupid, she understood that some of that
sick, shaky feeling was a throwback to what had happened when she
was sixteen, but it didn’t make any difference. She was still
terrified of confessing her actions to her best friend.

And yet she also couldn’t find it in herself to deny
Martin.

When she was with him, the world shrank to a few
square feet. There was only his eyes and his mouth and his hands
and his cock and the way he looked at her and the way touched her
and the things he said to her and the way he moved…

She sighed heavily. She was a hopeless case, guilt-
and lust-ridden in equal degrees. A mess, in other words.

She treated herself to take-out
Indian for dinner, then hunkered down in front of the TV to watch
sappy Christmas specials. As she did every year, she planned out
the following day in her mind. Something decadent for
breakfast—because it
was
Christmas, after all—then she would take a drive
into the country to get some fresh air. With a bit of luck there
would be some kids with new bikes and skates to enjoy along the
way, then she would come back home and get snuggly on the couch.
She had a couple of movies she’d been saving, and she’d make her
favorite comfort meal of macaroni and cheese and eat a whole block
of fruit and nut chocolate while sniveling and laughing at the TV.
Then she would go to bed early, and she would have survived yet
another Christmas day.

It had become a tradition of sorts, her
non-Christmas. For a while Elizabeth had tried to lure her to her
grandparents’ house for a big cooked lunch, complete with plum
pudding and brightly wrapped gifts, but Violet had always resisted.
She wasn’t so pathetic she had to borrow someone else’s family for
what was, really, just a commercially-driven holiday. Once Martin
had come along, she’d been extremely glad she’d remained firm.
Sharing Christmas with him every year would have been one bridge
too far, and extracting herself from the arrangement without
offending Elizabeth’s grandparents next to impossible.

Besides, there was something solid and reassuring
about her solo Christmas. No one could let her down. No one could
change plans on her. No one could decide she was no longer worthy
of their love and respect and reject her from their home. So while
it might be hard to be alone while the bulk of the Western world
was eating turkey and plum pudding and exchanging gifts, it was
also a reminder of the fact that she had her own back, and that she
was strong and resilient and her own person.

She was watching a chat show when the intercom
buzzed. Despite knowing that Martin was busy on the other side of
town, her belly did a little backflip in anticipation. She crossed
to the intercom and pressed the button.

“
Hello?”

“
It’s me.”

“
Don’t you have a party?”

“
I bailed.”

She grinned, unable to repress the delight she felt
at his confession. Martin was ferociously ambitious. He’d spent
many, many years doing whatever was needed to be accepted by the
senior partners in the law firm. A few months ago, the notion of
ducking out on a company function would have been unthinkable to
him, she was sure of it.

Yet tonight he’d done just that, and he’d come to
her.

She buzzed him upstairs, then glanced down at her
baggy flannel pajama pants. She was tempted to make a dash to her
bedroom and change into something more glamorous, but she could
already hear his tread on the stairs.

He would have to take her as he found her.

She reached up and pulled her hair out of the pony
tail she’d shoved it into when she finished work and fluffed it
quickly before opening the front door. Martin was still in his work
suit and navy overcoat and he brought the cold in with him as he
stepped over the threshold.

“
You look frozen,” she said as he
shrugged out of his coat.

“
I had to park two blocks over and
walk.”

“
Do you want something hot to drink?
Coffee, tea? Some brandy?”

“
No.”

He reached for her, his mouth finding hers
unerringly. He tasted of Scotch and his hands slid down her back,
quickly finding their way beneath the waistband of her pajamas. He
stilled when he cupped her bare backside, lifting his head to look
her into her eyes.

“
Expecting me?”

“
I always go commando in my
jim-jams.”

“
Remind me to throw a pajama party
sometime soon.”

He walked her backward up the hallway to her bedroom,
pushing her down onto the bed and them lowering himself on top of
her. She loved the intensity of his caresses, the way he shaped and
soothed and taunted her with his hands and mouth, as though his
only purpose in all the world was to give her the most pleasure
possible. She was only too happy to oblige, sighing and shivering
beneath his assault.

He coaxed her to climax twice before sliding inside
her and beginning a slow, measured ride. When his hand slipped
between their bodies to find her again she shook her head, sure
that she couldn’t possibly go again.

He murmured sweet, dark, dirty things in her ear and
showed her how wrong she was, wringing a back-arching orgasm from
her before burying himself to the hilt and finding his own release.
Even though she was limp with satisfaction, she made him roll onto
his belly afterward and kneaded the tension of the day from his
shoulders.

“
Bad day?” she asked as she felt his
muscles give a notch.

“
Yes. We’ve got a big bankruptcy
case on at the moment. Evidence by the boat load, millions of
statements… Keeping a track of it all is next to
impossible.”

“
You’ll do it.”

He lifted his head so he could look at her over his
shoulder. “You’re confident on my behalf, given you have no idea if
I’m even competent or not.”

“
Of course you’re competent. You’ve
earned everything you have. You’re dedicated and meticulous and
honorable.”

He went still. She suddenly felt very silly, as
though she’d commented on something she shouldn’t have or
overstepped the mark in some way.

“
Thank you,” he said quietly.
“Believe it or not, I needed to hear that.”

She stretched out on top of him, blanketing his body
with hers, and pressed a kiss to the nape of his neck.

“
You make a good mattress,” she
said.

“
You make a good
blanket.”

His hand wandered onto her thigh, gripping it
lightly.

“
So, do you have a big day planned
for tomorrow?” he asked idly. “Doing the rounds of the rellies,
eating plum pudd until you feel sick?”

She thought about her relatives and the big house in
Sussex that she hadn’t visited in years. “Something like that. How
about you?”

“
Lunch with Mum. Usually a bit hit
and miss but she likes to think she can cook and I don’t see the
point in disillusioning her at this late stage.”

“
Very gallant of you.”

“
I do try.”

He knew she was taking the piss, however, and he
levered their joint bodyweight up off the bed and toppled her to
the side. She laughed, then sighed as he lowered his head to her
breasts and drew a nipple into his mouth.

“
What did you get her?” she
asked.

“
Sorry?” His words were muffled by
her breast.

“
Your mother. What did you get
her?”

She wasn’t sure why she was asking. She didn’t know
Mrs. St Clair. She would have no idea if his gift was appropriate
or if it might be appreciated. But for some reason she wanted to
know more. About him, about his life, his world.

“
She claimed she doesn’t need or
want anything. She always does. So I bought her a new TV and
tickets for ‘Phantom of the Opera’. She’s seen it three times
already but she loves it to death, so…”

“
Have you been with her all three
times?”

“
Yes.”

There was a certain wryness to the single word that
told her that he didn’t share his mother’s love for Andrew Lloyd
Webber. Yet he’d taken her three times, and was gearing up for a
fourth.

She felt a sudden, almost overwhelming wave of
affection and liking for him as she imagined him escorting his
mother into the city on her big night out and tolerantly enduring
two plus hours of musical theatre. She rested her hand on his head,
fingers tangling in his hair, a little blindsided by the strength
of her reaction.

“
Believe it or not, it’s possible to
sleep through the second act if you have the right seats,” he said
in between peppering kisses across the slope of her
breast.

“
Well, then, that’s
okay.”

They made love again before he rolled from the bed
and started collecting his clothes. Even though intellectually
she’d guessed he would go home—it was Christmas Eve, after all—a
part of her had secretly hoped he might stay the night, the way he
had on Sunday.