His Irresistible Darling - Sarah Randall Page 0,63

unison and he rolled her nipple in his hand.

“God,” he murmured breathing heavily, “I would give anything to have two working arms right now. We’re going to have to get inventive,” he promised suggestively as her heart jumped in her chest. Her blood heated further as his hand urged her higher against his body until his lips made contact with her nipples. He worshipped them for a moment before encouraging her higher still. She gasped, unsure of herself as he made his intentions clear. She looked down and met Jumal’s vivid eyes, hungry with desire. “Please, Pippa,” he begged now. “Let me do this.” She closed her eyes and nodded slowly and, after carefully guiding her left leg up and around his arm and shoulder, she positioned her knees either side of his head. She leaned forward and grasped the wooden headboard tightly as Jumal gently pulled her body lower…

The sound of the shower finally woke Pippa from her sleep of the dead. She rolled over and glanced at the clock before stretching her arms over her head. Her mind drifted back to the events of last night and she blushed, grabbing Jumal’s pillow to muffle her loud complaints about her stupidity. God it smelt good.

“Something the matter?” Jumal’s deep voice asked her.

She lowered the pillow shyly. “Huh?”

He had a towel wrapped about his lean hips and was using his good hand to rub his hair dry with a smaller towel. She tracked the progress of the trail of water droplets as they raced down over his pecs and paused before continuing along his abdominal muscles and down towards the towel. She may have even licked her lips. It was the first time she’d seen the bruising on his chest. God it looked painful. The worst of the bruising had come out and it was turning a more yellow, brownish/purple colour around the outer edges. She thought she could actually make out the hoof prints…ouch.

“You know,” he said, nodding towards the pillow she held with a wickedly teasing smile on his face, “that’s exactly what started last night’s, er—”

He was clearly struggling with how to classify what had happened between them last night, and she couldn’t bear the wait to see what he was actually thinking, so as usual she jumped in to save potential heartache.

“Fun?” she suggested and watched his eyes widen as he paused from rubbing his hair with the towel.

“Erm, right yeah,” he said, shrugging his broad shoulders. “It was…” her eyes were drawn to his jaw, which seemed to be flexing a muscle “…fun.”

Pip tried to fight the unjustified sense of disappointment that threatened to swamp her with his agreement that it had just been a bit of harmless fun. Of course, she knew that this was just a one-off. Hell, that was her whole justification for her behaviour last night—but still…

It had meant so much more to her.

She wasn’t a needy person, not at all, quite the opposite in fact, but she still had the sour taste in her mouth from Jumal agreeing and uttering that word fun. So she was just his bit of fun until he found someone to replace Faridah. He would keep her keen in the meantime while she played sloppy seconds to the long-legged freak. She took a deep breath and organised her thoughts; she wouldn’t allow him to see her disappointment. Perhaps if she repeated the mantra enough even she would start to believe it.

She offered him a tight-lipped smiled and pulled up the covers to hide her chest.

“Pippa?” He stopped and lowered the towel.

“What?” Oh yeah he was waiting for her answer. “It was…fun,” she finally agreed, the word almost sticking in her throat. “I’ve got to get ready.”

Jumal stared intensely at the closed bathroom door. Pippa had darted in there about twenty minutes ago and appeared to be staying in there for the day. He wanted to talk things through with her. Sure he was disappointed that she thought last night was just casual. Fun. Yes it had been but he’d thought it had been so much more too. He’d never felt such a close connection with a woman like he had with Pippa—and they hadn’t even had full sex. Not technically, although it had blown his mind and made him anxious for an extra speedy recovery.

He was grateful that she had uttered her thoughts before him. He had just been about to say something that was clearly not what she would have wanted to hear. She’d