there’s one consolation,’ he added wryly, once they were under way with the heater going full blast.
‘What’s that?’ she asked somewhat dazedly. She was, quite frankly, still a little off the planet.
‘I had enough of a brain left to use a condom.’
‘Yes. Yes, I noticed that,’ she said. But only after he withdrew. She hadn’t during the act. She’d been off in another world. It was just as well she was on the pill. Being with Jack had made her uncharacteristically reckless. He wasn’t much better. They were mad, all right. Mad for each other. She almost told him then that she was on the pill because of course it would be better, not having to worry about protection all the time, especially if they were going to have spontaneous sex at any given moment. Which seemed on the cards. His desire for her was as strong as hers for him. But being on the pill only protected you against pregnancy, nothing else. She couldn’t see Jack as a man who took silly risks, but who knew?
‘What are you thinking about?’ he asked her when they stopped at a set of lights.
‘Nothing.’
‘Come now, Vivienne, I know you too well. Your mind is never empty.’
She stared down at the bag in her lap which was bulging from where she’d stuffed in her cotton panties. The tights, she’d left behind since they’d been ruined when Jack had ripped them off her. Finally, she looked up and over at him.
‘I was thinking I’m going to go out tomorrow and buy myself some seriously sexy underwear,’ she invented. ‘As long as you promise not to destroy it, that is.’
He smiled a wicked little smile. ‘Sorry. Can’t give you any guarantees on that. You bring out the beast in me.’
‘I do?’
‘You know you do.’
‘You bring out the same in me,’ she admitted. ‘I’m not usually like this, you know.’
‘What do you mean?’ he asked straight away.
Vivienne wished she hadn’t said that. For how could she tell him that she’d never before done a tenth of the things that she’d done with him? He probably wouldn’t believe her. Either that or he’d start asking her questions, questions she didn’t have answers for. She didn’t want to think about why she was so different with him. She just wanted to live in the moment. To say and do whatever she wanted with him. To be wild and wanton and, yes, even downright wicked.
She smiled a saucy smile. ‘I mean, I don’t usually have sex in car parks. But it was fun, wasn’t it?’
His smile was wry. ‘It wouldn’t have been fun if we’d been arrested.’
‘Can you get arrested for that?’
‘I would imagine so.’
‘Have you ever been arrested?’ she asked, happy to change the subject from herself onto him.
‘Not as yet.’ The lights went green and he drove on towards the bridge. ‘You’re coming back to my place for the night, aren’t you?’
‘What...the whole night?’ She hadn’t been expecting that. But instantly, it was what she wanted to do. To sleep with him naked, all night, where she could touch him at will, kiss him all over, whenever and wherever it took her fancy.
‘You have a problem with that?’ he said when she remained silent. Little did he know the thoughts going on in her head, or the instant need gripping her flesh. ‘I could drop you home first thing in the morning on my way to work. You could sneak in like a naughty teenager before Marion wakes up and spots you.’
‘Marion never wakes up till around ten,’ she told him, her matter-of-fact tone hiding the escalating desire firing her blood once more. ‘Not when she’s doing the two-to-ten shift. She doesn’t get home till nearly eleven, and she’s always dog tired. She never knocks on my door till late morning.’
‘That settles it, then. You’re staying the night.’
‘If that’s what you want,’ she agreed, hugging her excitement to herself.
Jack glanced over at her and wondered what she’d been really thinking back at the lights. He wasn’t a mind reader—especially where women were concerned—but he doubted she’d been thinking about underwear shopping.
Vivienne was an enigma all right. Always cool on the surface, but underneath, very hot to trot, a classic case of fire and ice. His stomach lurched when he thought of how she’d urged him on back in that car park.
‘Faster, Jack,’ she’d said in a voice unlike the one she used when working. Or even just now, here, in the car. There’d been nothing cool, calm and collected about that voice. It had been wild!
He felt the sex between them now would be even better, knowing he had all night. He could take his time with her. Make her wait more. Make her see the rapture in elongated foreplay. There was something infinitely satisfying about long, slow lovemaking where the emphasis was not so much on coming but on sensual experiences. He would stroke her back with gentle hands, massage her bottom with oil and caress her beautiful breasts. He would make her sigh with pleasure. He wanted to satisfy her more completely than she’d ever been satisfied before.
‘Now what are you thinking?’ she asked.
Jack turned to smile at her. ‘I was thinking that you don’t need to buy any new underwear. Because, from now on, you won’t be wearing any.’
Her blush startled Jack. Why on earth, he wondered, would the girl who’d just done what she’d just done blush at the idea of going without her underwear? It didn’t compute. She was an enigma all right. A woman of contradictions and contrary behaviour.
Take her apartment, for instance. Why was it furnished in such a stark way when her professional designs were never like that? Vivienne had a reputation for creating warm, comfy interiors which appealed to people. It was why he always hired her to do his show units and villas, because her décor made them sell. There had to be reasons for why she’d chosen to decorate her own place in such a soulless fashion; deep, personal reasons. Jack suspected it had something to do with her family background, which obviously hadn’t been very happy. She’d sounded stressed when she’d talked about her parents. She hadn’t been all that forthcoming, either. Most of the women he’d dated in the past were eager to talk about themselves, launching into detailed life stories without too much encouragement.
Of course, he wasn’t dating Vivienne, was he? He was just sleeping with her. For now, that was. Jack hadn’t abandoned his idea of her becoming his girlfriend for real. He’d just put it on the back-burner for a while.
One day, in the hopefully not-too-distant future, she would see that it would be good for her to date a guy like him: an honest, straightforward, straight-down-the-line type of guy who didn’t lie or cheat and who could show her a good time, in bed and out, without any false declarations of love and till-death-do-us-part commitment. Just the thing she needed after getting tangled up with El Creepo. And, when she finally realised that having an easygoing boyfriend would be good for her—and once she got her trust back in men—he would find out all that she’d been hiding from him.
Meanwhile, he would give her exactly
