Her New Worst Enemy (14 page)

“The sort that when you nibble them, their juice runs down your fingers and over your
tongue.” He dipped his tongue to taste the little hidden nub between her folds.

Ellie experienced a shock of pure arousal. She didn’t think it was possible to feel
more turned on than she had the day before, but it just went to show, she still had
a lot to learn about her response to sex. And to Gideon, too, it seemed.

Gazing down at his dark head as he moved between her legs she felt a surge of powerful
delight that it was Gideon down there, intent on pleasing her. The man who let her
get away with very little when it came to her misgivings or her attempts at ridiculing
him for his less than considerate behavior toward his girlfriends.

Paul had never been very interested in oral sex — at least not giving it; he hadn’t
had any trouble receiving — and she wasn’t used to such intimacy. Gideon didn’t seem
to have any qualms. In fact, she’d swear he was enjoying himself if his eager response
to her was anything to go by. She’d worried for a second that she’d pushed things
too far by suggesting he might be happy there with her, but he’d seemed more than
willing to have sex with her again, so who was she to complain? Perhaps he was using
the sex to divert her away from talking about such icky things as feelings, but hey,
that was fine by her if he continued doing what he was doing right then.

Her body was tight with arousal and she began to peak under his intensive attentions,
her head spinning with joy as her body convulsed with sensations, leaving her limp
and spent and totally blissed-out.

• • •

After finally dragging himself out of bed, Gideon made his leisurely way down the
stairs, leaving Ellie to follow innocently behind five minutes later, so as not to
give the game away to Penny and Will.

The kitchen was empty when he got there, so he set about making coffee and grabbing
eggs and bacon out of the fridge. He was physically drained from their morning of
sex and he was in desperate need of a slap-up breakfast.

Ellie poked her head around the door just as the coffeemaker made its final death
rattle.

“All alone?” she asked, her gaze dancing around the room.

“Yup, our secret’s safe,” he said, smiling at her relieved expression. Play-acting
that nothing was going on between them was frustrating, and he wished again that Penny
and Will weren’t here so he and Ellie could enjoy relaxing together, having lazy sex,
and talking crap. He’d never really got into hanging out with girlfriends like that
on a Sunday, but the idea of doing it with Ellie appealed to him. She was such easy
company.

He poured her a coffee and handed it to her, meeting her eyes as their fingers brushed.
She looked so adorable when she blushed.

He set about grilling the bacon and beating the eggs, all the while aware of Ellie
watching him.

He felt a pang of guilt at his less than enthusiastic response to her comment about
him seeming happy. He wasn’t sure why it had made him feel so uncomfortable. Maybe
because he was acutely aware that this thing between them would be over soon and he
couldn’t afford to start attaching any emotions to it. It was going to be hard enough
as it was to walk away.

When he finally turned to slide plates of bacon and eggs onto the table, she was sitting
in one of the chairs with a far-away expression in her eyes.

“Earth to Ellie. Grub’s up,” he said, nodding at the food as he pushed the plate closer
to her.

“Thanks,” she said, shaking herself out of her trance. She picked up her fork and
held it above the food, sinking back into her thoughts.

“What’s going on in your head?” he asked, amused by her flakiness.

“I was just wondering what Penny sees in Will. I know he’s reasonably good looking,
but he’s so bloody surly. She’s such an upbeat person. If she sticks with him, he’ll
probably drain all the joy out of her. I don’t think I could stand to see it.”

Her voice had taken on a desperate edge and the fork twitched in her hand.

“You don’t need to worry anymore,” said a deep voice from the doorway, and they both
twisted round to see Will standing there, a defiant expression on his face.

“I’m leaving,” he continued before either of them could respond. “Look after Penny
for me,” he said, and Gideon could have sworn he saw a look of pain flash across his
face, before he turned and walked away.

They sat there in stunned silence for a beat before Ellie stood up, knocking her chair
away from her and throwing him a quick look of worry before hurrying out.

Gideon sat and listened to her footsteps ring out in the hall before she mounted the
stairs and pounded up them at speed, off to find Penny he supposed.

He finished his breakfast while he waited for the women to appear, knowing they were
all in for a tough morning. He was going to need all his strength to deal with the
amount of emotion he imagined would be flying around once they came downstairs. He
shuddered at the thought. Placating crying women was not his forte, although, he reminded
himself, he’d done okay with Ellie only yesterday. Mind you, that had been a totally
different proposition, especially as he’d had some benefit out of it, too.

His thoughts flew back to their sex-filled day, and he felt himself get hard again.

With a sinking feeling, he realized there wouldn’t be another opportunity to get Ellie
back into bed now. They couldn’t leave Penny to deal with Will leaving on her own.

Sighing, he got up and cleared the plates away, stacking them in the dishwasher and
washing the dirty pans in the sink, before going to find the women and offer his tea-making
assistance.

• • •

Ellie stood outside Penny’s door for a minute to listen for the sound of crying. Her
heart beat in double-quick time at the thought of finding her friend in who-knew-what
sort of state.

She was about to knock quietly on the door when it flew open to reveal Penny, her
face pale and drawn and her eyes wide with shock.

“I was coming down to find you,” she said, her voice shaking slightly, “You got what
you wanted. Will has … ,” she seemed to have trouble swallowing before continuing
on and Ellie was aware of a pain, deep in her chest at the sight of her friend trying
to be brave.

“He’s gone,” she finally said in a rush. “The wedding’s off; he can’t go through with
it.”

Tears now welled in her eyes and she blinked rapidly, trying to force them away.

“Oh Penny, I’m so sorry,” was all Ellie could think to say while her emotions raged
internally: relief at her friend being free of a controlling leech warring with guilt
at inciting Will to leave and make her so unhappy.

“Are you really, Ellie? Because I got the impression you were doing your damnedest
to make him so uncomfortable he felt he had to leave.”

Not knowing how to answer that, she pulled Penny toward her, needing to hold her close,
hoping to show her how loved, how cared for she was, but Penny resisted, holding herself
stiffly away.

“Don’t,” she whispered, her voice strangled by sadness. “I don’t want you to touch
me right now. If I start crying I don’t think I’ll ever stop.” She drew back and Ellie
saw that her face was rigid with the effort of stopping the tears.

“Okay,” Ellie said, totally at a loss now for how to help her friend. It was for the
best, she reminded herself, but after seeing Penny so distraught, she didn’t feel
so confident any more.

“I need a cup of tea,” Penny said with what sounded like false confidence.

“Good idea. Let’s go down to the kitchen,” Ellie said, backing up so Penny could leave
the room. They walked down the staircase in silence, Ellie in the lead, her legs slightly
shaky. If she was feeling so messed up, God knew how Penny was feeling.

Gideon was standing at the bottom of the stairs, looking up at them as they descended.
Ellie gave him an infinitesimal nod as they drew closer and he seemed to get what
she meant because he turned and headed back to the kitchen. He was taking some mugs
down from the cupboard when they walked in and he gave Penny a supportive smile.

“Hey Penny,” he said, his bright green eyes heavy with sympathy.

“Will’s gone,” Penny said to him, her voice cracking with the effort.

Gideon stopped what he was doing at the counter and came over to give her a hug.

Ellie felt a twang of jealousy to see that Penny allowed him to hold her without pulling
away. Perhaps a bit of male attention was what she needed right now, she told herself
to squash the discomfort.

“You want to talk about it over a cup of tea?” he asked her, pulling back to look
her in the eyes.

“You read my mind,” she answered, giving him a small smile.

Gideon gestured toward a chair at the table, “Take a seat, and I’ll bring it over
when it’s ready.”

Penny did as she was told, slumping down onto one of the seats with a defeated sigh.
Ellie took the seat next to her and put her hand gently over her friend’s, totally
stunned when Penny moved hers away from her touch. What was going on? It wasn’t supposed
to go like this.

“I’m so sorry for ruining your weekend, Gideon,” Penny said, staring down at the table
as she spoke. “Will didn’t want to come, and it took me a while to persuade him. That’s
why we were so late. We didn’t have other friends to meet on Friday.”

A prickle of unease began at the base of Ellie’s spine as Penny continued to give
her the cold shoulder. Surely she could see getting rid of Will was for her own good?
The guy had been downright rude to them all and had clearly buckled under the pressure
of being questioned about his motives for being with Penny.

“I was hoping that once he met you guys, he’d see how excited you were for me to be
with someone who made me happy,” Penny went on, still not looking at her. “That he’d
realize you wanted me to be happy, and you trusted me to make my own decisions.”

She turned to face Ellie now and the anger in her expression sent a burning heat up
Ellie’s neck to her face, while a low, dark drag of shame traveled quickly downward,
making her suddenly nauseous.

“My parents were their usually sniffy selves,” Penny continued, totally unaware of
the chaos of feeling that rooted Ellie to the spot, “and it really knocked his confidence
when he saw how unimpressed they were with him as my choice of husband. He doesn’t
know them well enough to know that no one I chose would have passed their test. I
tried to tell him, but it didn’t make any difference.”

“What was it they didn’t like about him?” Gideon asked gently, bringing three cups
of tea over to the table and sitting down opposite them.

“The fact he doesn’t have any money. They clearly can’t understand why someone as
gorgeous as Will would want to be with someone as plain and boring as me.”

“Don’t say that … ,” Ellie began, but Penny ignored her.

“They were angry we were planning to go to America to get married quickly. I think
they’d expected to put on some great show to impress their friends once someone was
finally fool enough to take me on. Or maybe just to prove they hadn’t totally failed
with me after all.”

“I can see why they’d be suspicious, Penny,” Ellie said trying to keep the nervous
shake out of her voice. “Why did you agree to go to the States to get married so soon
anyway? I thought you’d always wanted a big, grand wedding.”

“I’m pregnant,” Penny said, and Ellie felt as if all the air had been sucked out of
the room and the ceiling was pressing in on her.

“What?” She could barely speak for the sudden constricting pain in her throat.

“It was an accident,” Penny said, her face pale with tension. “When we found out,
we hadn’t been seeing each other long and I think Will only asked me to marry him
out of a sense of duty. It was important to me that my child would have security and
two parents to care about him. I guess I jumped at the proposal, imagining it was
real for the sake of my sanity, when I should have given the whole thing more thought
and time. I was scared. I couldn’t stand the thought of bringing up a child on my
own and there was no way in hell I was getting rid of him.” Her expression now reflected
the depth of her misery and Ellie thought she’d never felt so wretched in her entire
life.

“I would probably have done exactly the same thing, Pen,” she said, desperately trying
to hide how affected she was by it all.

“I do love him though,” Penny said and she dropped her gaze and stared at the floor
while Ellie sat there like a lump of stone, feeling like the worst friend in the entire
world.

“Why didn’t you tell me?” she asked, but she knew why.

Penny looked at her sadly. “I didn’t want to burden you with it. You were going through
so much crap after Paul left, I didn’t feel like I could ask you to take on any more
problems.”

“Pen, you should have come to me. To hell with my pathetic wallowing, I’m so sorry
I wasn’t there for you.”

Penny sighed. “It’s okay, Ellie, I don’t even know what I would have said to you to
be honest. I never thought for a second anything would actually develop with Will.
I hoped … but he never seemed that interested in a relationship. When we finally got
together I was thrilled, then I found out about the extent of his money problems and
I felt — I dunno … worried that I was being used. He promised me that wasn’t the case
and I believed him. He proved it to me. Every second we were together. I know he loves
me.”

She took a deep shuddering breath and a quick sip of her tea. “I’m sorry I was so
evasive about coming out to meet you alone. It was at a really tricky time with Will,
and I didn’t feel I could leave him on his own. He became so depressed about his debt
situation, I was terrified he’d do something stupid while I was out. I couldn’t break
his confidence by telling you that. He would have been so humiliated. He’s never felt
as though he deserves to be happy, you see.”