Everything You Are (23 page)

She shifted herself onto her knees and pushed herself up then down on him. She started to ride him, gently and slowly, with her arms around his neck, her hands in his hair and her breath brushing against the side of his neck.

He rolled his hips, meeting her halfway, while his hands held her and helped her to lift her hips up. He wanted to make love to her, gently and slowly, to make her writhe in wicked pleasure, but the want for her suffocated him, urging him to rut with her like an animal, fast and hard. He held himself back, thrusting into her gently, letting her set the pace of her descents. “I love you.”

She gasped against his skin, her face hidden in the niche between his shoulder and neck, while her heat moved against him, the friction between them so agonizing.

He lifted his hips just a little bit faster, just a little bit harder.

“Ian.” Her arms tightened around his neck and she lifted her head. Her lips were slightly ajar and her pupils dilated and glazed. She was close, so close, he could feel it in the tension of her body and hear it in her panting. Lovely, she was so lovely.

He bent over her and pressed his mouth against her; his tongue licked the seam of her mouth before he thrust it into her wet cave, plundering it like the beast that he was. With his hand holding her hips he shoved up into her, hard, over and over again.

Her nails dug into the fabric of his shirt and her muscles started to clench around him.

He continued to pound into her, his mouth devouring her. He wanted her always, just the sight of her made him hard and ready to push her over the first flat surface and shove himself into her, the hunger for her a never ending ache. Touching her, holding her, loving her, it was never enough, the craving for her could never be filled, the hunger never sated. Never. Even after he came and emptied himself deep inside her, after he pulled out of her and pushed her panties and pantyhose up and pulled her skirt down and buttoned her shirt, when he just held her in his arms in silence, he could feel it again. The savage greed that burned in the pit of his stomach, that demanded that he take her again. He would never have enough of her. Never.

“Are you sure that you don't want us to bring you anything?”

“I'll just grab a sandwich from the vending machine. Thank you for asking though.” Jane smiled at her co-worker, Sharon, who stood at the door of the office.

“Okay.” Sharon nodded and closed the door, joining two others who waited for her in the hallway.

When she didn't have any other plans, Jane often joined her co-workers when they went to eat at the small bistro a block away from Thornton Tower. But today, because of the time she had spent in Ian's office, going to lunch would mean working overtime. Her gaze went to the brown folders piled on the right edge of her desk. She sighed. It seemed that she would have to work late anyway. She took her phone out of the first drawer and dialled Mark's number. After he answered and she greeted him, she said, “Can we push back our rendezvous half an hour, or better yet, an hour? I have some work that needs to be done.”

“Sure, no problem,” Mark said. “I'll just come pick you up and, if you're not done by then, I'll just hang out at the water cooler -- or better yet, maybe hang out with Ian.”

“He has meetings, so I doubt he would be free to hang out with you.” With one hand, she clumsily gathered the papers in front of her.

“Oh, what a shame. Hey, guess who called me today?”

“Your father.” She stapled the papers and moved them aside.

“No. It was a female.”

“Your mother.” She wedged the phone between her shoulder and ear and from the pile of folders picked up the top one.

“Our age.”

“I don't know.” She opened the folder. There were five columns with twenty three rows that she needed to put into Excel.

“Guess.”

“Come on, tell me.” Her eyes went to the rest of the folders. It looked as if there were eight of them. She silently sighed.

“Elle.”

“Elle? I don't know an Elle.”

“Of course you do, our schoolmate Elle.”

“The rich Elle, the one whose parents owned a hotel and a spa?”

“Yes, that Elle.”

“But...” Jane moved the phone to her other ear. “She never even said hello to you, or to me.”

“I know.”

“What did she want?”

“She heard you're engaged.”

“Deborah?” She had already told Mark about her encounter with Deborah.

“Deborah.”

“The girls, she said, are organizing a high school reunion at her parents' spa next weekend and she would love for us to come, with our partners, of course, to spend our time there, gratis.”

“Yes, I bet they would.”

“I told her that, unfortunately, you're far too busy to attend, but that I would love to come.”

“You didn't.”

“Yes, I did.”

“But you're not going, right?”

“Have you seen how deluxe their spa is? Two days of that for free, hell yeah, I'm going.”

“No.”

“Yes.”

“On your own? Mark, remember how bad their taunting made you feel.”

“They won't taunt me.”

“Mark.”

“Jane, you're engaged to Sebastian Thornton Junior.”

“I'm not. I never gave him an answer.”

“Insignificant detail,” Mark said. “Anyway, since I'm the best friend of Sebastian Thornton Junior's fiancée, I expect a lot of fawning, especially after I tell them that Ian has a brother, who looks even better than Ian and who works in the fashion industry.”

“Chris doesn't look better than Ian.”

“Besides, I might not go there alone.”

“Yeah?”

“You know about the party I went to this past Saturday, right?”

“The one Ian got you an invitation to?”

“And Chris's company. Well, I met somebody there.”

The landline phone on her desk rang.

“You did?”

“He's gorgeous, all dark and with such a firm abdomen, and a really nice personality. He asked for my number, don't know why. I gave it. I didn't think he would call, but he did, just an hour ago.”

“He did? That's great.” She glanced at the display of the landline phone. Richardson's phone number flashed there. “Hey, I have to take this. I want to hear everything about this dark, gorgeous man with great abs, but you'll have to tell me about him when you get here.”

“See you later.”

“See you later,” Jane said then turned off the phone. She set it on the desk, took a big breath and smoothed her hair before she picked up the receiver of the landline phone. “Planning and Analysis.”

“One moment, please,” Richardson said.

A second later Ian's voice came over the line. “Hey.”

Jane didn't have to ask why Richardson was connecting him. Since Ian always called her mobile phone, he probably didn't even know her office phone number. “You're not going to waste my time, right?”

“You say that as if I always call you for no reason at all.”

“But you do.” And she liked it, it made her feel wanted. Not that she would acknowledge that out loud; Ian's ego was already too big. “Shouldn't you be working?”

“I just wanted to hear your voice.”

“I was just in your office an hour ago.” They had made love, wonderful lovely love. A small tremor passed through her body. She put her hand on the curve of her belly.
Your daddy and mummy have been so naughty today. Which probably means that whatever has been bothering daddy since Saturday is sorted out
. She frowned. What had it been? And why hadn’t he mentioned anything to her?

“I miss you already.” His voice lowered to a sensual whisper. “I want to make love to you again.”A tingling sensation bloomed between her legs.

“Stop saying things like that.”

“Like what?”

“You know.”

“That you were so warm in my arms, so sweet,” he said in a low, raspy voice whose vibration she could feel in her chest, warming her. “Just remembering...” He made a small sound like he was licking his lip. “I just want to bury myself in your heat again and feel your sweetness clenching around me as I make you come.”

The tingling spread through her body like heat waves. She crossed her legs and pressed them tightly together, as if that could lessen the lust that had started to course through her veins. “You're trying to make me horny,” she accused him.

“Is it working?”

She shook her head, smiling. “I might let you know when you get home.”

“But we are not going to be alone then,” he said, sulkiness in his voice. “Mother's coming today, and she'll probably try to keep you all to herself. Don't let her occupy all of your time, okay? You have to give me priority over her.”

“She's your mother; I'm sure she came to see you, not me.” Even though in their last phone conversation Ian's mother had told her that she was looking forward to spending time with Jane.

“She came because of you, she said so. She intends to take you shopping. Don't let her take you shopping and buy you things, Jane, you have to promise me. If anybody is going to buy you things, it’s me.”

A lump wedged in her throat and she cleared it with a cough. “I really need to start working on some calculations and you need to prepare for a meeting,” she said, even though she suspected that he was already well acquainted with the topic of the meeting. She opened the document in the cloud with which she kept track of Ian's schedule. “Which you have in twenty minutes.”

He chuckled. “You're such a slave driver.”

“Bye.” She put the receiver into the cradle, then leaned back in the chair, smiling. Her hand went over her stomach. In tight clothes the bulge was quite noticeable now, but she could still sell it as gaining weight. She should start to feel the child move soon. She was looking forward to that and to sharing those kicks with Ian. “Your daddy can be such a pest. Such a lovable, amazing pest.”

#

Jane scowled at the shopping bags stacked up in the corner of her room. There were at least twenty of them, and all had designer labels on the side. When she had gone out with Amelia, as Mrs. Thornton had asked Jane to call her, she hadn’t expected Ian's mother to be worse than Ian. When she went clothes shopping with Ian, since he insisted on buying her various colours of the leggings she chose, she had ended up with five items instead of one. While with Amelia, the lady hadn’t insisted on more colours of the same article, but on the matching vest and shirt, and shoes. And to try that dress, because she was certain that it would look good on Jane, and since a white cardigan would go so well with the dress, let's take it too. Having Mark with them didn't help; with him always siding with Amelia, it actually made things worse.

Jane hadn't planned on acquiring any new clothes. She had intended to spend her evening with her best friend and to learn all about the man he had met, but then Ian's mother had called, saying she was already in the city. She said that she had some errands she needed to take care of, asking if Jane would join her. Jane had told her that she was with her friend Mark, to which Amelia had replied to bring him too. They were only supposed to keep Amelia company, and here she was with a whole new wardrobe.

The door opened and Ian appeared in her room. With crossed arms, he glowered at the bags, then at her. “I told you not to go shopping with her.” His jaw tensed. “You let her buy you so many things, while I, your fiancé, am only allowed to buy a few pairs of leggings?”

“You bought me a bunch of maternity clothes.”

“Which you haven't even looked at.”

“Are you sulking?”

“No.” His chin jutted out.

Oh, he was, and it was so cute, in a very manly way. In two steps she was before him and she wrapped her arm around his neck and tugged him down. She pressed a kiss on his cheek. Then she wound her arms around his waist and snuggled against him. So cute. “Better?”

“Much better.” He hugged her and buried his face in her hair.

“Ian.”

“Hmmm?”

“You're not really mad that I allowed your mother to buy me so many things, are you? I mean, it's impossible to say no to her.”

“But you are managing to say no to me quite well.”

“Not that you ever listen to me,” she said. “You're not angry, right?”

His hand stroked her back. “No, I'm not mad, only mildly annoyed. I'll get over it.”

“Good.” They stayed like that for a while, with the warmth of his body seeping into hers. There was something that she had wanted to ask him for a while now. “Ian,” she said. “Is the company all right now?”

“What do you mean?”

She leaned back slightly to face him. “I know there were some problems, you know, like those rumours, because of which we had to travel around, and that time when you needed to go to Norway. Is everything okay now?”

“As well as it can be.”

Did that mean that he wasn't as fine as she thought he was? Her eyes scrutinised his face. He looked normal and she couldn't read him at all. “That's good to hear.”

A knock on the door and a woman's voice asked, “Miss, Sir, Mrs. Thornton requested your presence in the living room.”

“Yes, thank you,” Ian said.

Jane pressed her lips together, stifling a smile. “Is this for real?”

“You should get used to it,” Ian said. “The girl's not going to spend nights here, but as long as Mother is keeping us company, she'll be here from morning to evening.”

They went to the living room, where Ian's mother sat on the armchair, her spine straight, her knees together and a vintage china cup and saucer in her hand.

Mark sat on the couch opposite Amelia, nibbling on a cookie. When they came closer he lifted it. “This is really good. You have to try it.”

Jane joined Mark on the couch. Ian sat beside her and wrapped his arm around her waist. They made small talk about music and movies, then Amelia steered the conversation to theatre and opera, all the while they were eating cookies and drinking tea. After a while, Mark excused himself and left, and Ian said that there was something he needed to do and went to his office, while Amelia went to her room, to freshen up.

Jane set down the cup that she held in her hand and glanced at Holly, who had already started to clear the dirty dishes off the table and onto the tray. “What is it like working for Mrs. Thornton?”

“Okay. She's a very nice woman.” Holly gave her a small smile then averted her eyes, focusing on the dishes with an attitude that made clear to Jane that the girl wasn't open to chit chat.

Jane stood up and stretched, yawning. It was only eight o'clock and she felt ready to go to bed. In the evenings, she usually watched telly or read on the couch in the living room, with Ian joining her after his evening exercise, if he did it. Or sometimes she went to keep him company in the gym, watching him sweat. She opened the drawer of the coffee table. She should have had an e-reader there, but she remembered that she had left it in her bedroom. She glanced at Holly.

The girl had her back turned to her, half-visible behind the kitchen counter as she stacked the dishes from the tray on the counter into the dish washer.