Boxed Set: Books & Billionaires Page 9

  Everything was softer, more slippery when I gripped him. I began to stroke.

  My fingers glided up and down his skin, cool and caressing in the hot water, working him leisurely, with no hurry, the swirl of the water a warm compliment to my strokes.

  Before me, Booker had gone quiet. His hand reached up to caress my face as I worked. “Clara-”

  “Shh,” I said, cutting him off. “Just lie back and relax.” I pushed him back with one hand as I stroked him with my other. He fought me, leaning in for a deep kiss before finally reclining against the Jacuzzi wall.

  It felt naughty doing this. On a boat, out in the open air. Even though I knew no-one could see, the sunshine and the wind against my hair suggested differently. And it felt naughty servicing him; gaining my pleasure exclusively from his pleasure.

  He began to breathe harder. I adjusted my grip and quickened my pace, my wrist emerging then disappearing under the water as splashes began to make the area bubble.

  How must it feel? My hand slippery on his shaft, pulling then pushing at his most sensitive of nerves. My body pressed against his, the weight of my wet breasts in my shirt rough against his skin. The feel of my lips as I kissed him in a slow counterpoint to the ever quickening motion below.

  He gave an involuntary buck of anticipation. Not long now, I could tell. Both hands grasped him and I pumped faster. The area between us became waves and bubbles that moved in time to the rhythm of my hands.

  Booker groaned, then again, the sounds building in intensity as the pleasure inside him grew. One of his hands leapt to my shoulder, gripping it tight. “Clara!”

  I could feel him within my hand. I needed to see what I had done to him. My motions ceased as he began to release, and the water cleared to reveal creamy spurts of fluid issuing from him wildly, to slow under the pressure of the water and begin to drift gently away. It was hypnotic: magical. I watched, spellbound, as his member jerked on display before me until his head collapsed against the spa’s edge: the only thing now moving his chest; rising and falling heavily.

  Suddenly I noticed, truly, where we were for the first time: in a spa on a superyacht sailing over the ocean, salt air and sunshine on our faces. It was a fantasy I had only ever dreamed about, but was now reality with Booker by my side.

  And I noticed my clothing, wet upon my body, almost carnal in the way that it hugged my skin, appreciating my curves as I rose to stand in the water. It sucked at me, demanding that I satisfy the urge that had built as I satisfied Booker’s.

  It seemed he had the same idea. He pulled me to him, my summer dress floating around my waist as I sunk back into the water.

  I shivered, delighting in the eddying current as he pushed my underwear aside. My arms went around his neck and we kissed, then one of his hands went to my hips and the other to his base and he guided me, slowly, upon him.

  I groaned as I slid down his shaft, the feel of him inside me sending delicious shivers through my body. How could he generate such wonder and delight inside me?

  Booker leaned back reaching for a button beside the spa. A low whir sounded. And then the spa began to bubble.

  “Ohh.” I could feel tickles all along my calves where spa jets hit and then trailed air upward. But between my legs, a different sensation was building. I could feel him inside me; our bases grinding together as we moved slowly upon each other, each tiny motion generating corresponding movements inside.

  Being in the spa with Booker was like nothing I had ever experienced before. I was weightless, but anchored to him. We were exposed, and yet so intimately connected I could focus only on him. Liquid pools of pleasure were forming in my hips and thighs.

  I needed this man. I needed him as much as his hard, firm member revealed he still needed me. I began to grind him in the water, kissing him as I did so, enjoying the feel of his hands as they roamed my breasts and back. Faster and faster we began to move, until the water was sloshing in the tub around us, exposing my thighs and then splashing up my back. The feeling inside me grew in time with the water, getting higher and more turbulent with each passing motion.

  I closed my eyes, enjoying the sensation between my legs—a sensation that was now spreading to every inch of my body. Then I felt Booker shift, and suddenly the weight of my body was back. I opened my eyes to find him standing in the middle of the spa, lifting me while we were still connected, supporting me as he slid me up and down upon him. The abrupt change sent a whole new set of thrills through me. Thrills at his strength. Thrills at what the sudden heaviness did to the pressure of him inside. Thrills at being caught in his arms. I gasped, gripping his back, my vision spinning before I managed to focus with desperate eyes.

  “I can feel it,” I groaned. “I can feel it coming.”

  His response was a growl—a primal sound that sent shivers through me. Then he lay me over the edge of the spa and began to work me harder.

  He drove into me as I lay on the decking, feet still in the water but body out. Now our motions were not heavy, but instead fast and sharp. Each collision as our bodies met sent shivers from my thighs to my brain. Each loud slap drove my pleasure higher. The liquid pools inside were starting to superheat. Soon they must wash through my entire body.

  I began to moan, my hips flexing with him, then he lifted my legs high, to give him better access. The angle thrust him deeper; my eyes widened and my moans changed pitch. He raised my legs to his shoulders. I couldn’t take it. I couldn’t-

  My loud moans changed to a single cry. “Booker!” And then the liquid pools burst inside, and pleasure raged through my body in a tidal wave of ecstasy that almost blacked me out. My cries set Booker off, too. He began to move sharply inside me. The feeling set me off once more, and suddenly we were sailing together on a sea of sensuous susurrations.

  The feeling went on and on and on, until what felt like hours later he collapsed, panting, on top of me.

  “Remind me to take a bath with you more often,” he growled. “It’s rather fun.”

  We both slid back into the water. I cuddled into his side, and we stayed there, in each other’s company, minds drifting, until our breathing had slowed.

  “Booker,” I said hesitantly. My head lifted off his shoulder and I turned to him. “Can I ask you something?”

  His head turned. “Anything.”

  There was something I’d been thinking about for a while. I didn’t know how to say it… so what the heck, I was just going to come out with it.

  “Booker, why are you leaving your wife?”

  CHAPTER THREE

  Booker sighed in the spa beside me, hand going to the back of his neck. “I was wondering when you’d ask.”

  “I’m sorry. It’s just…”

  Just… what? That I’d just had sex with a married man? That I needed to know the competition? That I couldn’t understand why anyone would want to give him up?

  I sighed. “If you don’t want to tell me, that’s okay.”

  “No. You deserve to know,” he said. “It’s just hard to know where to start.”

  I ran my hand through the water, playing with it. “How about you treat it like a book? Start at the beginning.”

  He chuckled. “Ok. Since you put it like that… Once upon a time, I guess we were in love. We married young, before I made my fortune. She was pretty, and she had a mean business sense.”

  He hesitated. “I became wealthy not long after, and that’s when I first noticed the change. Suddenly it was all about the money. I’m sure jealousy was a part of it; I was the successful one, not her.”

  He shrugged, apologetic. “I know it’s probably not what you want to hear, but I tried my hardest to fix things.”

  It was exactly what I needed to hear. I motioned for him to continue.

  “The real trouble began the first time I used my new money.”

  “Did she think you were spending too much?” I murmured.

  His laugh was short and sharp. “No. Especially since it was a gift for her.”
>
  A diamond ring perhaps. Or a car. “What was it?”

  “An island.”

  I almost choked. “A what?”

  “An island,” he repeated. “I bought an island off the coast of Borneo. Pristine wilderness—the most amazing beaches, beautiful clear water, and a government corrupt enough to let us do whatever we wanted with it.”

  “Corrupt enough?”

  His hand went to the back of his neck. “I was a different person back then, Clara. You have to understand, we bonded over business. My marriage was failing because my wife hadn’t been as lucky as I was.”

  He looked out over the ocean. “The island was an anniversary present to my wife. We were going to build a resort on it; a way for her to make her own fortune, beside mine.”

  “What happened?” I asked, lost in his story. “Did the resort go up?”

  He shook his head. “That’s the problem. On our first trip there, I changed my mind. The land needed to be preserved, not destroyed. My wife disagreed.”

  I looked at him, confused.

  “I guess this is where I admit that I have an ulterior motive for this trip.” He indicated the horizon. “But it will be easier to show you. We should be there shortly.”

  CHAPTER FOUR

  It was like we had sailed into a post card. Deep blue waters changed to turquoise in the late afternoon sunlight, and then suddenly they were aquamarine and we were dropping anchor on one of the most beautiful beaches I had ever seen. The white sand gave way to palm trees and then heavy jungle that rose to a peak on the island before us.

  “This. This is your island?”

  “Technically, it’s my wife’s. But she’s only ever been here twice.”

  “It’s beautiful!”

  Booker nodded his agreement. “1600 acres of some of the most ecologically diverse wilderness on the planet, in an area twice as big as central park. Four species of monkey, two of which are endangered. 61 catalogued species of bird. The clouded leopard. There is a small population of natives on the-”

  “Wait. Back up,” I demanded, alarmed. “Leopard? As in the huge cat with lots of teeth?”

  Booker’s face darkened momentarily. “Not so huge. And also, not so many anymore. They’re highly endangered.”

  “And natives?” I asked hesitantly.

  He nodded. “An offshoot of the Dayak people in Borneo, I believe. But you won’t see them. They don’t like outsiders and have almost no contact with the outside world.”

  A text beeped from his pocket, and Booker pulled out his phone. His face brightened when he read the message. “You’ll have to forgive me, but I have some work to do. Shall we meet for dinner at nine?”

  * * *

  I’d been in the library for two hours cataloguing Booker’s collection when I heard a motor start up. It wasn’t the Leaf. Had Booker taken the speedboat? I walked outside and in the darkening light followed a trail of barely visible wake until I saw the unlit shadow of the speedboat heading toward the shore. What on earth was he doing?

  I ambled inside, content to go back to my books, until another thought occurred to me. Why were the lights out on his boat? And why hadn’t Booker told me he was leaving?

  I hesitated for only a moment before picking up the antique spyglass.

  Booker had reached the shore by the time I found the boat again, a dark stain on the white beach. He leapt out, pulling a small shoe sized box with him. He looked to be heading toward the tree line.

  I almost dropped the spyglass when my vision skimmed past Booker to a figure waiting in the shadows! Tall, with long, dark hair and a curvaceous figure.

  A woman.

  Booker approached her, there was what looked to be a brief conversation, and then she leapt into his arms and kissed him.

  CHAPTER FIVE

  I didn’t mention the meeting when Booker got back. Neither, more worryingly, did he. And so I told him I was unwell; a half-baked excuse about bad chicken sticks that he didn’t question, but didn’t believe, and then I avoided him for the rest of the night on a boat so large that it wasn’t hard to do.

  Was Booker cheating on me? I couldn’t believe it. And yet the evidence had been right there in the darkening light. It hadn’t been his wife—she was blonde, and anyway they hated each other.

  Perhaps this was the reason? All that story about the island being the cause of their breakup. Maybe, perversely, Booker had been telling the truth. I slipped into bed when he began looking for me in earnest, then pretended I was asleep when he finally found me. I couldn’t deal with this right now. In the morning, I’d confront him about my fears.

  * * *

  I awoke eager to talk to Booker about what I had seen, convinced it must have all been a trick of the dying light. But he was gone again when I awoke.

  I wandered aimlessly, the boat’s toys bringing no joy. My mother had told me something once, words of wisdom I’d never forgotten. Once a cheater, always a cheater. But that couldn’t be Booker. I knew him, didn’t I?

  To take my mind off things, I decided to make breakfast. I wasn’t the world’s greatest chef, but I could do a mean bacon and eggs when I tried. Food was a comfort thing for me—the act of eating, something that could anchor me briefly in the here and now. It was why I’d always carried a little weight after my own divorce those three or so years ago. It was why I’d started losing weight almost immediately after things worked out with Booker.

  It was why I wanted to eat so bad again right now.

  I was pulling bacon out of the fridge when I noticed Booker’s phone. It was sitting on a bench in the galley kitchen, where he’d obviously left it when fixing his own breakfast. Booker had received a text last night, shortly before saying he had ‘work to do’.

  I reached out toward the phone, then pulled away. I couldn’t, could I? Snooping was one of those things that you just didn’t do in a trusting relationship.

  I pulled eggs from the fridge next, and set them beside the bacon. Next to the phone.

  But what if snooping could save a relationship? What if one little text could explain away all the doubts and fears… wouldn’t it be worth it? My hand hovered, but I pulled away again. No.

  My will broke halfway through doing the dishes. The phone had just been sitting there, watching me, and not even food had been able to stop me from thinking about what might be inside.

  A phone number. A text message. An email explaining that the girl on the beach was secretly his long lost sister, or a cast member from Survivor….

  I snatched up the phone before I could think about it—the trusting relationship had ended when Booker and that woman had met on the beach. I needed to know where I stood.

  Most of the messages were as I’d expected—short, sharp ones to and from his wife, long sappy ones to and from me. I smiled when I read them, remembering the feelings behind what I’d written. Remembering what I’d felt when I’d read his replies. ‘Two lovesick schoolkids’ was the phrase Sandra at work had used. She was just jealous.

  My smile faltered when I opened a short chain of texts to someone known only as ‘L’.

  It’s Booker. I’m here.

  So I see.

  Have a package for you.

  The usual?

  How did you guess?

  Can’t wait to wrap my lips around it ;)

  I’ll come to you?

  No. Have company…

  Would rather she doesn’t know.

  Obviously.

  Meet @ beach @ sunset.

  We can go to your place. B

  Well, there it was, as plain as day; so obvious that the tears had started before I even reached the end.

  How could he do this to me? We were about to start a new life together! Was I a front? Was I the excuse? I had so many questions, but there was only one answer. I needed to get away.

  Suddenly the boat felt dirty. Suddenly I felt dirty for being on it.

  I’d cheated with a married man. The first time, perhaps I could be forgiven for.
I hadn’t known. But the second, and third, and fourth? I’d believed all the promises. I’d believed the look in his eyes. I’d allowed myself to finally be happy, for just one moment…. and this was what I got for it.

  The phone dropped to the floor. I didn’t bother to pick it up. Instead, I pulled a tube of cherry red lipstick from my back pocket, scrawled It’s Over in huge letters on the fridge, and then strode angrily out the door.

  CHAPTER SIX

  I wasn’t quite sure what I was doing. I only knew I didn’t want to stay on this boat. I’d pushed a change of clothes and as many blurry books as I could fit into a backpack, and now I was standing at the Jet Ski launch, winching it angrily into the water as tears rolled down my cheeks.

  Think he could cheat on me, did he? Think I was just going to roll over and take it?

  The keys were in the ignition. I’d never ridden a Jet Ski before, but it couldn’t be that hard. I gunned it and almost lost my balance before leaning into the wind and zipping toward the shore.

  The breeze dried my eyes for the first time since I’d read that message. By the time I reached the shore I was thinking a little more rationally.

  What was I actually going to do? I had no food, no water and no plan; just a hollow feeling in my stomach, and a heart that would never be the same again.

  The Jet Ski was surprisingly heavy out of the water, but I managed to drag it high enough that it wouldn’t float away. Then I walked up the most perfect sand I had ever failed to notice, toward the tree line just beyond.

  Yep, there were the two sets of footprints, just like I’d seen. The last tiny, itsy bitsy spark of hope inside me died.

  Maybe I could call for someone to pick me up? Who, Sandra half a world away? Was she going to just fly over on her private helicopter?