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“I honestly don’t know.”
“Hence the Evergarden,” he said, understanding clear in his voice.
“Hence the Evergarden,” I echoed. “I wanted him to know how I felt, whatever I chose.”
“I hope he knows how lucky he is. I’m almost jealous. I’d like myself a love like that.” He sipped his tea, a playful grin playing around his mouth as he guided us to lighter topics.
“No Mrs Fitzpatrick out there, then?”
“Not yet. I met a girl once but she slipped through my fingers. I still think about her from time to time, though. Anyway,” he said, shaking himself out of that memory, “I’m really happy with your designs and if you ever need—” He was cut off by his phone ringing and he pulled it out of his pocket to check the caller. “Shite, I need to take this,” he said as he stood. I followed suit, rising from my own chair. He answered the phone and told whoever was on the line to give him a minute before covering themouthpiece. “Lola, this is fantastic work. I hope you’ll come back and see it in a year’s time when it’s finished.” Pride bloomed in my chest and excitement too at the prospect of being able to see my own designs in real life.
“Of course, thank you Mr Fitzpatrick.” I stuck out my hand and he grinned before giving in to the overly formal handshake.
“Miss O’Connell.” He left to take his call and I turned to look out at the view.
I’d done it. If ever I failed at anything else I would still be Lola O’Connell, the woman who designed a garden for a billion dollar hotel chain. The back of my mind still gnawed on the impending decision I had to make, but right now, I was flying.
Fifty-Two
Hours later I was enjoying one of the most surreal experiences of my life. I felt like a queen, sitting in the highest tower in the tallest castle, having my skin teased by jacuzzi bubbles and filling myself up with the richest black forest gateaux I’d ever tasted. My hair was piled up high to keep it out of the water and a few loose tendrils stuck to my damp skin.
The jacuzzi sat in the centre of the room, high up on a bed of marble, with a floor-to-ceiling window ahead that beautifully framed the setting sun, casting an orange glow across the room.
I had no idea when Alfie would be back and I hadn’t heard from him since this morning, but I didn’t mind. I was celebrating my triumph!
I sat on the bench that ran the circumference of the jacuzzi, enjoying the bubbles that tickled my shoulder blades, picking at the cake with what I’d been informed by the waiter was a dessert fork–see Alfie, I was learning! I gazed out at the view of my town in the burnt sunlight. The world of Alfie Tell was truly a decadent one. Even the cake was smooth and rich on my tongue and the cherries were a bright Happy Christmas red. It was peculiar to have begun my day in my old, slipper bathtub with crappy water pressure and now ending it in a marble bed jacuzzi. Switchingbetween two worlds was jarring and left me wondering who I was and if I could ever get used to this. Maybe I could, if it meant I got Alfie.
I was startled out of my daydreaming by the small squeak of a leather shoe on tile and turned to find Alfie leaning on the door jam, watching me intently. Relief flooded me at being back in his presence, and a little apprehension too. He was unreadable, his expression distant, the way it so often was when he’d been working. I shivered despite the heat from the water. His eyes glistened as if tears rested on the surface, ready to fall at any moment. I wondered if he was surprised to find me here, surprised that I’d stuck to my promise of gateaux and sweet nothings in the jacuzzi.
We watched each other for the longest moment before I finally caved. The distance between us was too great and it had been too long since I’d felt his lips on mine. I moved to rise out of the water but he raised his hand, only slightly but it was enough to stop me in my tracks. I waited, and my breathing quickened as he began to undress, his eyes never leaving mine.
He shrugged out of his charcoal suit—jacket first, then his waist coat. Deft fingers made quick work of the tie, which he pulled off with a sharpswish. I followed the buttons down his shirt as they came undone one by one, revealing more and more of that torso that I’d kissed a hundred times. His shoes came next and then his socks, his muscles bunching and flexing as he bent to remove them. I bit my lip as he began on his trousers, the buckle of his belt flashing. His underwear went with them and, in a second, he was bare, every delicious inch of him. Yet it was the strange, almost desperate expression on his face that drew me in.
He came to me, seemingly calm but I knew better. I knew this side of Alfie. He’d always shut me out when he was like this, but now, without words, he seemed to be letting me in. He was aboutto show me what he needed and I kept still as he sank into the water and reached for me. He needed my body. I reached out to stroke his face, to try to impart some affection but he stiffened and I backed off.
Without a word, with an almost proprietary manner, he took my hips and turned me until I faced away from him. My knees rested on the bench, and he held me flush to him for a second, long enough to wrap a hand around my throat and bury his face in my neck. I melted and moulded into him, becoming malleable flesh in his hands as I allowed him to seek solace in my body, though solace from what I didn’t know.
A hand pressed between my shoulder blades, lowering me to my forearms on the marble bed until I faced out towards the setting sun. Hands appeared either side of me, shoving the cake aside until it landed with a clatter on the floor. I felt his body, so much larger than my own, loom over me. I parted my legs for him, allowing him all the access he needed. Bubbles teased my clitoris and I gasped at the sensation. He nudged my head and I tilted, giving him room to bite my neck, and as soon as his teeth found me, the rest of him did too. He sank into me on a moan that echoed around the room.
Alfie had taken me dozens of times, but I had never felt like this before, so…mounted.
He released my neck and licked and kissed the tender spot before placing a hand on my shoulder and forcing me lower until my flushed cheek pressed against the cool marble. His other hand found my hip and gripped it firm, holding me still. I closed my eyes and forced my body to relax and open, to prepare for what was coming.
The first thrust took my breath away and would have had me sprawled across the marble if it wasn’t for his tight hold. The second thrust was harder. He bumped against my cervix and groaned as he felt it, pulling me back onto him so tightly that hemassaged the ring of muscle with his cock. I whimpered. It was exquisitely painful. My entire body felt weak, completely at his mercy as he began the punishing rhythm. It was hard and silent, save for our gasped breaths. There were no moans, no cries of pleasure. Both of us were lost, both of us were falling in our own passion parachute.
I was building, riding my way up to that peak when his orgasm came quickly and took me by surprise. He poured into me, heart and soul, before falling onto me, his heated torso pressing me further into the unforgiving marble. His forehead, cool and damp, rested on my shoulder blade while he caught his breath.
He pulled out gently and turned me until I was sitting in his lap. The bubbles swarmed up around my shoulders and I nuzzled into his chest. His racing heart thudded in my ear, I found the sound oddly comforting. He didn’t speak, and for a few minutes we were silent, his arms pulling me in tight, as if he was afraid I would fly away if he loosened his grip. His nose buried in my hair, he breathed me in, and gradually, his heart rate began to slow until eventually he spoke.
“You didn’t come,” he murmured. I was surprised that he’d noticed. He’d seemed so far away.
“It doesn’t matter,” I told him but his hand moving between my legs told me it absolutely did matter. “What are you doing?”
“I can finish,” he said, turning me so that I sat on the bench with water lapping at my breasts and my legs up around his waist. His eyes were dark and desperate, as if heneededme to get off, as if his life depended on it. Usually I would welcome this, but for once I didn’t want it, because it wasn’t right. I tried to pry his hands off my thighs but it was useless.
“Alfie…Alfie, stop. Look at me.” I gave up on trying to force away his hands and instead pressed my palms to his cheeks, forcing him to meet my eyes. “I don’t need it. I’m telling you tostop.” I didn’t know what was going on here, but I got the feeling that I was uncovering yet another Alfie Tell layer.
Slowly, he drew his hands away, moving them to the safety of my calves, which he gripped as if I would float away if he let me go. He knelt between my legs, his eyes level with mine as we assessed each other, both of us wondering what the other’s game was.