Saint Kate of the Cupcake: The Dangers of Lust and Baking (18 page)

We were staying at Rupert and Bats’, and Jack and I had gone to bed relatively early. We were sound asleep when I was woken by someone softly moving into the room, closing the door with a soft click. Whoever it was, they were trying to be very stealthy. I nudged Jack, who quickly reached over to turn on the bedroom light. The man quickly averted his eyes, but not before we both recognized him.

“Crispin, what the fuck are you doing?” Jack boomed, not finding it in the least funny. I, on the other hand, was trying not to howl with laughter at the embarrassment on his face.

“Ugh…argh…” he stammered, gathering the cords of his dressing gown around his nudity, trying to work out an exit strategy. “Sorry…wrong room. Good night.” He turned and fled. I couldn’t help myself and burst out laughing. Jack looked at me a bit puzzled, but then he saw the funny side and started laughing too. He turned out the light and spooned against my back as my laugh subsided into giggles.

“I hope I didn’t spoil your night with Crispin.” He chuckled, his breath brushing my ear.

“Frankly, I’d rather set my eyeballs on fire,” I said, disgusted at the thought of anything even vaguely intimate with Crispin. I wondered at the identity of the poor unfortunate who was the focus of Crispin’s attentions. The only bedrooms near ours were married couples and the children’s rooms, which were empty tonight. While in the back of my mind, I hoped that whoever it was had invited him for the tryst, with Crispin, nothing could be assumed. I was tempted to get out of bed and make sure he went back to his own room, but there was no way of ensuring he would stay there.

“Really? I don’t think that is actually possible,” he said with a laugh.

“Hmm…I’d give it a go.” There is something seriously wrong with Crispin, not that I’d say that to Jack. He was his brother, after all. The irony of joking about having a fling also made me feel slightly queasy.

Chapter Fifteen

I D
ID
W
ONDER
H
OW
L
ONG
I would last, living this double life, but after six months, everything was still together and functioning. I started to hope that maybe I could have it all: a stable life with Jack and a thrilling affair with Anders. Jack couldn’t give me everything I needed, and Anders more than filled the void. We were both happy with what we had, and I felt fulfilled.

I still experienced a thrill every time I saw Anders. He was amazing—clever, intuitive, funny, as well as so damn masculinely beautiful that he took my breath away in those first moments when I saw him after a break of a few weeks. I couldn’t believe sometimes that he was there, waiting for me, wanting me still. Like he was a really,
really
good dream, the kind that you are disappointed when you wake up and try futilely to get back to sleep so you can go back there. Only Anders was real. So, I had to tempt fate by relaxing, thinking I might just be able to have it all.

“Would you ever leave Jack?” he asked, stroking my stomach lazily as I lay in a daze in the aftermath of almost frenzied sex, endorphins pumping around my body.

“I’m not sure,” I said slowly. “It’s far from perfect, but we have the kids and a lot of history. Are you asking me to leave him?” I watched his face carefully. Why had I jinxed it by thinking that everything was perfect, and everyone was happy with what they had?

“Maybe.”

“Maybe? That’s a pretty loaded word.” My heart sank. I knew that this was the conversation where everything changed. He was going to break up with me.

“Maybe this won’t be enough forever. I’m thirty-four and I’m starting to think about the future. I don’t feel so comfortable being your bit on the side. I’d rather be the main meal.”

“You knew I was married from the beginning,” I pointed out.

“I know, and maybe it should have mattered, but it didn’t bother me then. It bothers me now,” he admitted.

“Why does it bother you?” I asked, curious.

“I want more.”

“What happened to the ‘player’ thing you were doing?”

“What do you mean?” he retorted, eyebrows coming together in an almost straight line.

“You were so smooth and very practiced at seduction, I never stood a chance against that kind of charm assault.” I smiled at him to take away the sting of the accusation.

“Well, I’m no virgin, and I know what I want. Does that make me a player?” he said gruffly.

“It does if all you are looking for is sex, which you were.”

“I love sex with you, but that’s not all I want. You don’t really think that I need to be here every few weeks for work or just to have sex?”

“No, I guess not.” I had deliberately tried to not read too much into it.

“Are you still sleeping with Jack?”

“No. We haven’t had sex in a long time, since before I met you.”

“Really?” he said, looking happy. “Great.”

“So, if what you want is me sleeping just with you, you already have that.”

“It’s not the same thing. We have to hide the fact that we’re seeing each other. I’m tired of sneaking around.” He sighed, no longer looking so happy. “Don’t you wish we could just be together?”

“Of course!” I exclaimed. “You were my fantasy guy before I even met you, and you turned out to be even better than I could have imagined.” I kissed him lightly on the lips.

“Why not then?”

“If people found out about us being together, it’s not just my marriage I’d be risking. It would be devastating for my children. Also my career depends on my lifestyle to a great extent. Unless we were really serious about each other, it makes no sense to risk it all, even though I would love to not have to hide where I’m going all the time.”

“I’m not after a friends-with-benefits arrangement.”

“What exactly are you looking for?” I asked.

“A wife…maybe children.”

“Really? Oh…I…” I lay back and thought for a moment before responding. “I’ve done that already. I’m not sure I could have another child, physically or emotionally,” I said quietly.

“Right.” He looked down so I couldn’t see his eyes.

“So, this is it? Do you want to stop seeing me?” I felt a pang at the thought of not seeing him again. I ducked my head so I could catch his eyes. I was surprised to see the same pain echoed there.

“We don’t want the same things. Would you ever change your mind?” he asked directly.

I hesitated before answering. “That’s a big decision and probably something I should think about before I answer definitively. I don’t want to lose you, but if I decide that it’s absolutely not something I would do, then I won’t leave you hanging. It wouldn’t be fair.”

“I guess that’s as much as I should ask for, but much less than I want.”

“What do you want?”

“You, every day. In my bed, in my house instead of these impersonal hotels.” He huffed in frustration. “You’ve never seen where I live nor have I seen your place. I don’t get to see you enough, and its driving me crazy, thinking of you with him, when I want it to be me there sharing your day, telling you what happened in mine. I can’t even call you to tell you in case he gets suspicious.”

“So, how would it work exactly? We live on different continents, and you’re away working so much.” It seemed like a fantasy, having Anders on a daily basis. I don’t think we’d ever leave the bedroom.

“I figured that if we decided to do it, then we’d work it out. You haven’t actually said that you’d leave Jack yet.”

“Until today I didn’t know you even wanted that. I thought you were after a fairly casual thing.”

“I don’t feel very casual about you.”

“How do you feel?” I asked teasingly, not really thinking he would answer with anything other than a joke.

“I love you, of course,” he said, exasperated, like I should have known that already. “Sorry,” he apologized. “That didn’t come out how I meant it to.
Jeg elsker deg
. I love you.” He stared into my eyes and then kissed me gently but thoroughly, and I was breathless when we broke apart.

I wasn’t expecting that. At most, I thought he was going to say “I really like you.” I had to put some thought into how I would respond. I liked him,
more
than liked him, but I hadn’t let my guard down, not expecting this to ever become serious. It made me see him in a new light, and I had never felt the differences in our stages of life before, but now it had become a gulf.

Despite his beauty and glamour, life had been largely kind and easy for him, a few skirmishes here and there, but nothing too serious that would shake his optimism about love. But he was the green recruit to my scarred and cynical veteran, who had seen pain and grief and been wounded to the point where I didn’t think I would survive. I couldn’t tell him that I loved him back. I was about to become a painful memory for him, and it would hurt me to do it, but I couldn’t lie to him. He was the one place where I was being honest in my life at the moment, and lying to him would pollute what we had. If this was the beginning of the end, I would at least be honorable about it. I owed him that for offering me his love.

“I’ve been careful not to think about you like that because I was sure you weren’t serious about me,” I answered carefully. “I really like you. I adore you, but…”

“I can wait. I’ll wait for you because we belong together and I know you know it too, even if you can’t admit it right now.” His gaze was clear and focused, showing his sincerity. This shocked me.

“Umm…” It was so unsettling, his confidence. I had no such faith, and I knew from experience that no matter if you wanted something so much you would give anything, literally anything, to have or keep someone, there were no guarantees that you could influence the outcome at all. Or that what you wanted wasn’t actually more painful than letting go.

“Shhh. Don’t look like that.” He hugged me closer, and I clung to him, my head on his chest, trying not to cry at the dark turn my thoughts had taken. His hand stroking my back brought me back to the present.

“I’m so sorry,” I mumbled into the valley of his chest.

“Do you think there is a chance you ever might love me?” he asked. I couldn’t believe he was so calm and understanding. It’s a hard thing to put yourself out there and not get a reciprocal declaration. Most people would be having a meltdown and walking out around now.

“There are so many amazing things about you; it would be strange if I didn’t. I just never let myself think about where we were going in case I ruined it.”

“Hmm…” he said, considering it. “Maybe there’s something I can do to hurry you up.”

His hands became more determined in their movements, and I sighed in pleasure. I turned my head to watch us in the mirror on the wall as he entered me, still wet and open from our previous lovemaking, my skin white to his golden hue, my thighs wrapped around his hips as he moved rhythmically back and forth, his beautiful rounded buttocks squeezing tightly as he reached the apex of his thrust. I looked up at him above me and twined my hand in his blond hair. His eyes were shut in concentration but opened at my touch.

“My beautiful Viking,” I whispered. His bright blue eyes were intense as he stared down at me. He suddenly stopped moving and, rolling us over, pulled himself back up the bed until he was leaning against the headboard and I was in his lap, with him still hard up inside me. He put his hands on my hips and started rotating me on him, rubbing me back and forth to work my clit too. My head lolled back, only his large hands keeping me upright, moving me back and forth as the tension built. Just when I was about to come, he would stop, slowing down before starting again. By the fourth time, I was aching for it so badly I was about to scream or weep with his delicious torture.

“Do you love me?” he asked.

“Oh, God, yes! Don’t stop!” I gasped, my body wrapped in incandescent pleasure.

“Say it!”

“What?” I breathed, barely cognizant. I was so close.

“Tell me you love me,” he urged, moving faster.

“I love you!” I panted as I exploded and the waves of pleasure wiped out all coherent thought and I collapsed on top of him, shuddering with the aftershocks from the huge orgasm. I was so wrapped in my own pleasure, I barely felt his climax, only the after-pulses and pooling warmth as he came inside me with a loud groan.

“Oh, God, we forgot to put on a condom.” I had been so distracted by our conversation that I had completely forgotten to think of it.

“I got tested a couple of weeks ago for insurance stuff. I don’t have anything. I can show you the results if you like.”

“Are you sleeping with anyone else?”

“No. You’ve got me so tied up, I haven’t been able to look at anyone else. Are you?”

“No, not even Jack.”

“What about pregnancy? Are you on the pill?”

“No, but it’s not possible for me to fall pregnant naturally.”

“Why?”

“I think things got a little screwed up when I had the boys. Twins sometimes do that.”

“I’m sorry.”

“Don’t be. It’s just one of those things. Let’s talk about something else.” I moved to roll off him, but he held me there.