Undertaking Love Page 0,36
a booth.
‘Happy?’ he whispered, when he finally allowed her up for air. She nodded with an affectionate smile. He looked like a schoolboy, eager to please. ‘I am. Thank you.’
His fingers slipped under the hemline of her skirt. Okay, maybe not so schoolboy, after all. ‘You’re welcome, Marla.’ He leaned back in and kissed her again, taking the chance to inch his fingers further up her thigh.
‘Rupert,’ she warned, and slid away from him a little more until she was wedged against the wooden wall of the booth. He scooted closer in response, his fingers scandalously near to her knickers. ‘Rupert, stop it,’ she hissed out of the side of her mouth with a surreptitious glance at the neighbouring booths.
‘Chill out. No one can see.’ Lust had thickened his voice to a growl as he tried to work a finger under the cotton of her underwear. Marla clamped her thighs together hard in an effort to cut off his blood supply and prove that she really meant it.
‘Tease,’ he laughed and tickled her ribs, which had the unfortunate effect of forcing her to release her death grip on his hand.
Marla cringed. God, he thought she was enjoying this, and the worst thing was that she couldn’t even blame him for the assumption. She’d found herself over-compensating ever since that night in the chapel kitchen with Gabe, and had been all but hanging from the chandeliers during sex in order to tip the scales back in Rupert’s favour. It didn’t help that it took all of her concentration not to imagine that it was Gabe rather than Rupert who reached for her in bed; so much so that she’d started to insist on sex with the lights on and her eyes open. As a consequence, Rupert now had her pegged as something of a sex maniac, and no doubt imagined that a spot of public groping would get her all steamed up. He couldn’t have been more wrong.
‘Rupert …’ she twisted her fingers into the back of his floppy hair and yanked it. Hard. ‘If you don’t get your hand out of my skirt right now, I’ll stab you with my steak knife.’
She felt him still momentarily as he glanced at her fingers curled around the silver handle of the knife on the table.
‘You are a naughty, naughty little minx,’ he croaked. ‘I’m going to have to punish you severely for this when we get home.’ He sank his teeth into her earlobe, but removed his hand from her skirt. Marla breathed out and eased her grip on the knife, not even sure herself how much she’d been joking.
Chapter Sixteen
Dan straightened his black tie and winked at his reflection in the rear window of the hearse.
Not too shabby, Danny boy. Not too shabby at all.
It was just a shame that Emily-from-the-chapel didn’t seem to agree with him. He’d only caught one fleeting glimpse of her since her birthday and she’d looked scared witless. What did she think he was going to do? Fall on his knees in front of her in the street and declare his undying love?
He knew the score. She was a married woman. He wasn’t going to broadcast her infidelity to anyone else, but something about her melancholy beauty had got under his skin in a way that didn’t sit easily with his usual love ’em and leave ’em attitude. He’d actually liked her, as well as wanting to get in her knickers. He knew he couldn’t expect anything to come of it, but all the same, he couldn’t quite shake her.
‘Dan, you almost ready?’
Gabe appeared at the back door dressed in equally sombre attire. His dark hair marginally more tamed than usual out of respect for Charlie Gibbons, a local veteran of both world wars. Come midday, Beckleberry High Street would be filled with mourners ready to walk the five minute journey behind the hearse to the local church, a fitting tribute to a man who deserved only the very best of send-offs.
‘What’s up, bud?’ Dan asked, tipping his head to one side.
Gabe sighed. He looked to Dan like a man who could do with a cigarette, but as a non-smoker Gabe would have to shoulder his stress without that convenient crutch to lean on.
‘I just need today to go without a hitch, you know? It’s our biggest funeral so far. I didn’t know Charlie for long, but long enough to know that he was one of the good guys.’
Dan nodded. Charlie had been a part of