Page 10 of Fake Engagement Arrangement (Wilde Billionaire Brothers #1)
Mollie didn’t care that she had let him win by making her reveal her desire for him. Right then, all she cared about was the feel of his lips moving on hers with such explosive sensual heat. His mouth was firm and yet gentle, cajoling her into joining a dance as old as time itself.
But this was their dance, the sexy tango that she had only ever experienced with this degree of pleasure with Jago.
His lips moulded to hers as if they had been crafted for exactly this purpose, to tease hers into sensual play and transport her to another place, a place where nothing mattered but the molten heat that fizzed and flashed and fired between them.
Their chemistry hadn’t changed: if anything, there was a new quality to it.
A desperate clawing sort of hunger because they both knew this was not going to last forever.
By the end of the weekend, they would return to their separate lives.
Somehow that made their kiss all the more passionate, even poignant.
Jago’s hands went to her hips, holding her against his hardened body, his mouth moving with mind-blowing expertise on hers.
He made a guttural sound and deepened the kiss with a bold stroke of his tongue.
Mollie couldn’t hold back her own sounds of pleasure and encouragement, her tongue dancing with his in an erotic choreography that sent tingles racing up and down her spine.
How had she gone without Jago’s kisses for two years?
How had she denied herself the sensual pleasure of being hotly wanted, urgently desired by a full-blooded man?
But what other man could ever make her feel this way?
Jago was the only man who had ever made her feel this level of arousal, this level of enjoyment, this level of delight.
Jago finally lifted his mouth off hers and looked down at her with desire shining like a bright light in his eyes.
His hands were still on her hips, his arousal pressing against her stomach.
Her own arousal was pulsing away in silky secrecy, a throbbing ache, a sense of being left hanging.
But she tried not to show it in her face.
She didn’t want him to know how close she was to begging him to make love to her here and now.
To satisfy the ache, to ease the burning fire of her longing.
She was conscious of his gaze scanning her face, his expression inscrutable all except for the glitter of unrelieved desire in his eyes.
Mollie moved out of his hold and smoothed her dress over her hips, giving him a worldly glance that was a million miles from what she was really feeling. ‘If you kiss me like that in public, people will think you’re madly in love with me.’
‘Don’t go confusing lust with love,’ he said with one of his trademark cynical smiles.
‘I’m not going to make that mistake twice,’ Mollie said with an edge of bitterness she couldn’t eradicate in time. ‘You weren’t in love with me, so why you asked me to marry you in the first place is a total mystery to me.’
His features hardened like fast-setting concrete. ‘There’s no mystery about why you said yes , though, is there? You would never have accepted my proposal if I’d been some regular guy with a basic income. You saw money and fell in love with that, not me.’
Mollie held his stony look with enormous self-possession, a skill she had perfected since childhood. ‘I think it’s time you left.’
‘Not without you.’ Thunder rumbled in his voice, and lightning flashed in his gaze.
She arched her brows and folded her arms in an intractable pose.
‘You’re not the boss of me.’ She knew she sounded like a recalcitrant child, but his overbearing manner was getting her riled up.
That was another power he had over her: he could make her lose control of her carefully crafted self-possession in a heartbeat.
Jago drew in a slow breath and released it in a steady stream.
His shoulders loosened, and his features softened as if he was trying to calm himself down.
He moved over to the other side of the room and sat on the worn sofa, his left arm draped languidly across the back.
‘I’ll wait here until you pack what you need for the next two nights and the weekend. ’
Mollie wanted to argue the point with him, but she thought of the huge sum of money he had already paid her and the remaining balance she would receive at the end of the weekend.
She would be every type of fool not to do as he said.
She hated her bedsit anyway. Why make such a big deal out of something she would gladly escape for a few days?
She, too, blew out a long breath and dropped her tense shoulders.
‘I’m not sleeping with you. I want to make that clear right here and now.
’ Mollie was saying it more for her own benefit than his.
She had to resist him. She had to find a way to break his powerful, sensual spell over her.
‘You’re under no obligation to sleep with me. We do, however, have to appear in public as if we are an engaged couple, so that will require some display of affection from time to time.’
Mollie steeled her spine, holding his unreadable gaze with an effort.
‘There’s one thing that concerns me…’ She unfolded her arms and let out another breath, wondering if she should risk mentioning his grandfather.
She dared not reveal the reason why she took the money and ran, but she was concerned about seeing Maxwell when he had expressly told her never to contact Jago again.
To turn up at Wildewood Manor newly reunited with Jago was going to cause a mountain of a trouble she could do without.
What if Maxwell decided to punish her by leaking the images of her for reneging on their deal?
But then Mollie thought of Elsie, Jago’s grandmother who, because of her memory loss, still believed her grandson was engaged.
And then there was the money Jago had paid her to pretend to be his fiancée.
She could not do without that money because it was her last chance to help her brother.
She might never get another opportunity to get Eliot the help he so desperately needed.
She had failed him before; she would not do so again.
If she had to risk a scandal if those deepfakes were released, then so be it.
Jago knew she had been paid to go away, but as far as she could tell, he didn’t know why she had accepted the payment.
He assumed she was a gold-digger and had planned the whole thing, to pretend to fall in love with him and run away as soon as she got a payout.
‘If you’re worried about my grandfather, don’t be,’ Jago said. ‘He doesn’t have the power he used to have. He’ll grumble and insult you like he does everyone, but he can’t force you to stay away. Anyway, we’re only going to be there two nights.’
Mollie scratched at the inside of her wrist, a nervous habit she had when stressed. ‘But what if your grandmother doesn’t get her memory back? Won’t you have to tell her we’re not engaged then?’
Jago rose from the sofa in one fluid movement, his hand raking through the thick pelt of his hair, a frown pulling at his brow.
‘She’s very frail since the fall. The doctors aren’t giving any guarantees about her prognosis.
She may live weeks or months, no one knows.
My grandfather’s stroke last year put extra stress on her, even though we employed help with his care.
She tried to take care of him herself, and he, of course, has not been an easy patient. ’
‘It must be hard facing the prospect of losing your grandmother. I mean, she raised you and your brothers since your parents’ death.’
There was a cavernous silence.
Jago’s jaw worked for a moment, his eyes moving away from hers to look past her left shoulder as if he was looking into the past, remembering the day of the plane crash and how the news was broken to him.
Mollie could see the flickering emotions going through his gaze like a reel of memories.
But then he blinked a couple of times and met her eyes again.
‘I’ll give you ten minutes to pack your bag.
We’ll spend tonight at my hotel and then travel to Wildewood tomorrow instead of Friday.
I think it’s best if we get down there sooner rather than later. ’
‘But I have to tell my boss I’m not coming in and—’
‘Is it your dream job?’
‘No.’
‘Do you like your boss?’
Mollie grimaced. ‘Not particularly.’
‘Then, you can hand in your notice by email or phone call. The money I gave you will tide you over for a year without having to work.’
But it won’t tide me over when most of it is going towards getting help for Eliot .
Of course, she didn’t tell Jago that. ‘I have clients booked in for tomorrow,’ Mollie said, even though she only had one the last time she’d looked, and they might well have cancelled by now anyway.
But she had to find a chance to talk to Eliot in private to tell him she was going away for the weekend.
She only hoped he would stay at the rehab clinic long enough for his cycle of addiction to be broken.
‘Fine,’ Jago said. ‘But as soon as you’re finished, I’ll pick you up, and we’ll head straight to the airport.’