Her Dirty Little Secret / The Marriage Clause

To outsiders, she had it all. And yet the planning alone for tonight’s show—the lists, the running order, the spreadsheets of which model would wear what for which designer—was enough to make her head explode.

Jack was right. She alone had responsibility for sabotaging the Morris deal. She’d failed. Again. Shot herself in the foot.

She leaned back against the wall, maintaining a low profile. She rarely lauded her own shows. Her fashion label, the only aspect of her life that offered her contentment, meant everything, but she’d decided from the beginning she wouldn’t use the Jacob name to garner publicity, make connections or grease the ladder rungs. If she made it in what was a competitive, often fickle and rapidly shifting industry, she’d make it on merit alone.

And it was the creative process—from sketching a new design, to sewing a sample garment and then styling an entire outfit—that allowed her a brief glimpse of chest-tingling pride. At least she was good at one thing.

But she wasn’t here to see her own designs paraded.

Harley snagged a glass of champagne from a table laden with exquisite crystal and located a quiet, dark corner to watch the show. She’d missed most of the first half, staying backstage to help the other designers dress their models.

The collective of young, emerging fashionistas she mentored had worked tirelessly for months putting this show together and she was here to support them, knowing first hand the importance of a leg up onto the bottom rung. The fashion industry, as cut-throat as any deal Hal Jacob peddled.

She released a small snort—she’d learned from the master. Not that Hal had ever dedicated any time to her education, preferring to hurl money at the situation, his ‘problem daughter’.

She’d known from an early age she was different. But her difficulties had gone undiagnosed through elementary school, until the age of twelve, when she’d been no longer able to hide her challenges and one particularly insightful teacher had suggested to her parents she might benefit from formal testing. Hal had struggled with her diagnosis, denying the label and preferring instead to employ a series of tutors to put his unmotivated daughter through the wringer.

Dyslexia affected sufferers differently. Harley struggled with the full gamut of challenges. The fact she’d learned strategies to mask her shortcomings had delayed confirmation of her diagnosis until well into sixth grade. By which time she’d become a bullied, socially isolated black sheep of her over-achieving family and a constant disappointment to Hal.

Harley gulped a mouthful of champagne, forcing down the shame and humiliation. She scuffed the toe of her shoe on the parquet flooring, cursing her stupidity with the Morris paperwork.

She’d checked and double checked until her eyes watered and her temples screamed. Then she’d run everything past her assistant. Not that she blamed Alice. The mistake was all Harley’s. And she was used to making the most simple of errors. But why did it have to be on that deal? With him?

Perhaps that explained her uncharacteristic rudeness. Heat crept up her neck as she recalled the shutters covering Jack’s heated stare earlier when she’d questioned his integrity. She’d obviously inherited her vicious tongue from Hal, too.

She smoothed her damp palm down the length of her form-fitting dress—a simple bias-cut sheath in black silk. Elegant, timeless, modest. Or as her twin sister, Hannah, would say, boring. But Harley preferred fading into the background over standing out.

She scanned the two-hundred-strong audience, sipping her champagne to chase away the demons that lurked beneath her polished exterior. Although her eyes focussed on the show, her mind wandered.

Back to Jack.

Her initial shock at seeing him again had faded quickly. Her annoyance at him holding the sale of Morris Building to ransom simmered. But the few stolen moments in his apartment this afternoon...? They played in a continuous looped film reel behind her eyes, every intensely erotic, libidinous moment relived over and over.

Surely she’d exhausted her supply of female hormones? She shifted, pressing her thighs together and leaning back against the wall in case she slid to the hardwood floor in a puddle of lust.

Just like the first time he’d touched her so intimately, he’d commanded her body, turned her inside out, thrust her so hard into an intense orgasm she’d literally seen stars.

She’d never known anything like it, not even with her ex-fiancé, not since the first one, also at Jack’s hands. And what talented hands they were.

She swallowed, face flushed with heat. Of course, there’d been one or two others since Jack. Not many, her troubled teens merging with her underwhelming early twenties—a time when most girls spread their sexual wings. But Harley had been too preoccupied with overcoming her dyslexia enough to prove her father wrong and get her college degree, albeit in a subject Hal considered more of a hobby—fashion design.

She’d even come close to marrying, again in an attempt to improve her standing in her father’s eyes. If she couldn’t be a Jacob Holdings’ executive, she could marry one... But she’d quickly realised her error—she and Phil, although he was Hal-approved, were ultimately too different. And she had no intention of becoming a Hal Jacob puppet by proxy. Hal and Phil, cut from similar cloth, shared too many opinions about Harley’s career, or, as they saw it and frequently commented, her lack of one.

The hairs on the back of her neck lifted seconds before the warm breath whispered across her skin. She froze, either instinct or her body’s imprinting onto the only man with whom she’d discovered such overwhelming pleasure warning her it was Jack.

‘Still stalking me, I see.’ His low voice vibrated against the sensitive skin of her neck, tingles spreading to her toes via her in-sync-with-Jack clit. It seemed she possessed an inexhaustible supply of hormones where this man was concerned.

She spun so quickly, she sloshed champagne from her glass over the back of her hand, a few spots landing on the front of her dress. Jack gripped her elbows, steadying her, his eyes amused in the red and green lighting bouncing off the loft’s every, whitewashed surface.

Jack’s stare pinned her and his lips twitched; he was clearly enjoying her rattled composure. He reached inside his breast pocket and withdrew a crisp white handkerchief. He pressed the square into her free hand, and she wiped the spill from her dress.

‘What are you doing here?’ She scanned the crowds behind him. Had he come here with a date? There were plenty of stunning women in the audience and Jack was by far the most handsome, put-together man present—not a bad accolade considering the number of male models present.

Harley’s pulse thrummed in her throat and between her legs as she flustered around with the handkerchief, avoiding his stare.

She’d come propped against the wall in his well-appointed living room this afternoon, writhed and bucked against his hand, getting herself off like a sex-starved nympho. Trouble was, she was sex-starved, at least starved of the high-calibre variety of sex she was sure came as this man’s standard. Not that her and Jack had ever hit a home run. Not nine years ago, and certainly not now.

‘I have a ticket.’ He tapped his breast pocket and her fashion-tuned eye took a few indulgent seconds to admire the cut of his suit—this one steel blue. His tailor really was excellent, but then Jack was every designer’s dream model. Tall, athletic, muscular but not buff—every inch of him expertly and expensively attired. His black shirt, open at the neck, brought out his fair good looks and highlighted the gleam in his eyes. A gleam levelled directly on her.

‘I see your label is up after the interval?’ He accepted the return of the handkerchief, slipping it back inside his breast pocket.

She nodded, marvelling at the way he could speak on such a mundane topic, all the while his eyes seemed to be stripping her bare. Was he recalling her libidinous display earlier?

Or perhaps it was just wishful thinking on her part, the wisp of silk she wore transforming into a bulky, itchy straightjacket, begging to be tossed so she could get down and dirty with him again.

‘Yes.’ So he’d done his homework. The Give Foundation she’d established after college comprised an ethical fashion house, a cruelty-free cosmetic line and a charity arm. The dyslexia school, if the purchase of the Morris Building proceeded, would be her latest acquisition and, she hoped, her most rewarding endeavour to date. If only she could pull it off.

If only the paperwork had been properly filed.

She kept her mind on business, perhaps then she’d stop eye-fucking him or drooling over her vivid imaginings of the real deal.

‘So have you reconsidered? Will the sale go ahead?’ She might as well work on rectifying her mistake while she had him here. It took her mind off dragging him backstage and stripping him out of that suit and demanding a replay of this afternoon.

His sinful mouth quirked up.

‘So you don’t trust me, but you still want my business?’

She swallowed. A hundred answers forming on her tongue. Trust him? She barely knew him. She just wanted their deal back on track so she could forget she’d ever...reacquainted with him.

Kissed him as if the world were ending. Used his incredible skills to get off and then slapped him back.

‘I’ve spent six months searching for the perfect building. I have an architect on standby for the renovations and I didn’t say I didn’t trust you.’

Trust...? She knew little of the man he’d become. But she craved the searing chemistry between them with a fierceness she didn’t recognise as her own.

He grinned. ‘You didn’t have to say it aloud.’ His eyes lingered on her mouth, his own lip curling. ‘Don’t worry, I don’t trust you, either.’ His lazy stare dragged slowly down the length of her body, and he stepped close, his voice dropping to a sultry murmur that skated over her ear and slid down her neck.

‘And yet you trust me with your body? With your pleasure?’ His lips grazed her earlobe as he straightened, the only point of contact between them. And just like that she returned to a state of full-body meltdown.

She leaned forward as he pulled away, as if her entire being were magnetised and drawn to his, opposing poles. Memory of that pleasure snaked south, a flood of heat dampening her panties. Damn him. How could he do that to her, with a few husky words? He seemed to have a direct line, a retinal scanner and magic wand to her libido.

A round of applause heralded the end to the current show. Harley ignored the heat fizzing through her veins and the more potent heat rising from the man next to her. She placed her champagne on a nearby table to clap as the designer took the stage with his models for one last walk.

‘Your turn next,’ he said as the lights went up, heralding the start of a fifteen-minute interval. Why did his every word scrape at her nipples? His sexy accent, the deep timbre, the accompanying smoulder that seemed to be tailored specifically for her.

‘Oh, I don’t walk at my shows.’ She picked up her champagne flute, giving her restless hands something to do other than touch Jack as she busied her stare with the audience, who rose from their seats, many heading to the bar.

‘Why not?’ He sipped his own drink, his tongue taking a slow swipe across his bottom lip. A lip she’d tasted, scraped with her teeth, sucked at while kissing him as if her life depended on it. Would it feel as amazing gliding over the rest of her body?

She lifted one shoulder, heat of a different kind infecting her buzz. Should she justify her rather unorthodox choices to him?

In the past, explaining her beliefs and opinions to the men in her life had only led to criticism. And she’d heard enough of that to last a lifetime. Could she tolerate it from Jack, of all people?

‘I find my label does better without the often adverse publicity of the Jacob name.’

His brow dipped, as if puzzled by her revelation. She was about to elaborate when they were joined by another couple, the man tall and immaculately tailored like Jack, and the woman elegantly understated in that trendy, New York way.

Jack stepped aside, welcoming the couple into their space. ‘Harley, I’d like you to meet my cousin, Alex Lancaster, and his fiancée, Libby Noble. Libby is a New Yorker, too.’

They shook hands, exchanging warm, polite greetings, and then the gorgeous couple took flutes of champagne from a passing waiter.

‘So, how do you two know each other?’ asked Alex, eyeing his cousin.

Harley jumped in. ‘We...’ What could she say? Their liaisons, both then and now, too complicated for polite conversation.

‘Harley and I are in business negotiations.’ Jack flicked her a look that replicated the effect of his fingers teasing her nipple earlier. She clamped her mouth shut in case she actually whimpered out loud. How did he do that? He hadn’t even touched her.

With his eyes still on her, he spoke to his cousin.

‘Her company is purchasing the Morris Building.’ He could have used different words, other explanations.

We holidayed together as kids. Our families were once friends. We shared hot and heavy make-out sessions during stolen teenaged moments.

Highly attuned to the erotic tension coiling between her and Jack, she avoided his eyes. But she couldn’t avoid the memories—those innocent moments of sexual awakening hijacked by an awakening of another kind, one that had killed that innocence, changed her view on relationships for ever and tore their two families apart. Hal’s explanation had been a business deal turned sour. But sadly, Harley knew better.

She swallowed the bitter aftertaste those memories always evoked, along with the harder to overcome shame.

Alex looked at Jack, who still stared at Harley.

‘Oh...’ Alex glanced between Harley and his cousin ‘...are you the person responsible for the cock up?’ He grinned, his expression teasing mischief. But the barb went deep, with the accuracy of a medical laser.

Harley winced, looking away.

‘Libby, are you enjoying the show?’ Jack deftly saved her from answering and changed the subject in one move.

But the damage had been done. What did Alex know? Had Jack talked about her? Blamed her stupidity for the stalled deal? Credited the error to some girl he’d known nine years ago, playing at business but woefully underqualified?

Did he congratulate himself on his disentanglement from her, from her dysfunctional family and now from their business deal? A close escape from dumb Harley and her ruthless old man. Oh, she could almost hear the conversation. No doubt Joe Lane had badmouthed her family as much as Hal had maligned his.

Her shoulders fell. Jack owed her no loyalty. And it was all true, mirroring how she saw herself.

As Libby and Jack discussed the first half of the show, Harley offered Alex a tight, polite smile, her face flaming. ‘Excuse me.’

Alex frowned. ‘I’m sorry. I—’

She almost comforted him; he seemed so contrite.

‘No problem.’ She forced her facial muscles to relax. Her blood pounded hot. Spreading fire. Whatever Jack had said about her to his cousin, she didn’t need to hear. ‘I need to check things backstage.’ She made to sidestep away from the group, away from the awkward exchange that had brought all her insecurities to the surface.

Despite the front she presented to the world, deep inside her self-esteem was shaky at best. Her undiagnosed dyslexia, a lifetime of never quite fitting in, even at home, and years of listening to her tactless and selfish father had shredded every scrap she possessed.

That was why her ‘projects’, as Hall called her business enterprises, carried such importance. They represented a chance to feel pride in her hard work. A chance to make a difference.

She’d barely moved when Jack’s hand found the small of her back, his fingers pressing with possession. She shot him a look, his own expression unreadable as he stared at her over the rim of his glass.

Harley smiled for Libby and made her excuses. He might have set her body alight, showed her the good time he’d promised, but he didn’t own her, didn’t even know her. And she owed him nothing.

She wasn’t that naïve schoolgirl any longer. She understood how the world worked, how people used each other, wrecked lives for a few minutes of selfish pleasure. She could compartmentalise sex. And she and Jack hadn’t even shared that.

As she wove her way backstage she made a vow. Tomorrow, she’d set her dreams back a few months and start looking for another piece of real estate for her beloved school.

* * *

Fuck, he’d blown it.

Harley had disappeared. He’d waited for her to emerge after her show but there’d been no sign of her. Why hadn’t he kept his mouth shut? Why hadn’t he had a better explanation ready for his inquisitive cousin? He should have known Alex would put it all together—sharp, astute bastard. He bit back another curse.

Alex and he had attended the same university. Their bond more akin to brothers than cousins. Alex had witnessed first hand the fallout from the abrupt, unexplained end of his relationship with teenaged Harley, his first relationship. And he knew all about the bad business, the rift that tore his and Harley’s families apart.

Without Alex’s friendship, he’d never have weathered his parents’ divorce, nor the financially turbulent years that had followed as everything his father had worked for had crumbled. If it hadn’t been for his mother’s family money, they’d have even lost their home.

A lead weight settled in his gut. It had seemed as if he’d thrown Harley under the bus. But any composure he might have displayed as his past and his present collided had been shot to pieces by the sight of her at the fashion show.

From the moment he’d arrived at the glamorous event she’d been on his mind. Instead of scoping out the guests for a beautiful and sophisticated distraction as he’d planned, he’d replayed the vision of her pleasure, rapt and clinging to him, her glorious mouth swollen from his kisses and her cries of ecstasy echoing around inside his skull, until the catwalk show had blurred before his eyes.

Then an inexplicable burn at the back of his neck had forced him to turn around. And there she was. As immaculate as ever but cloaked with an air of vulnerability. He’d watched her, shadowed in a dark corner, his whole body shocked into nerve-tingling life. A quick scan of the previously untouched programme in his lap and he’d slotted all the pieces together.

And then Alex had correctly guessed that the woman on the end of the Morris deal was the one that got away. No, ran away. He knew his cousin just as well as Alex knew him and Alex’s searching stare spoke a thousand words.

Her face at his cousin’s playful jibe haunted Jack—he’d supplied the ammunition to embarrass her over the botched contract. He’d never seen her anything but composed.

He clenched his fists. She’d looked as if she’d taken a blow to the chest. She’d shuttered the flash of hurt behind her huge luminous eyes, shot him a fuck you look and swanned away with a sway of her sexy ass.

He understood that the Morris Building, her plans for it, formed a personal crusade, but surely someone in her team should have spotted the clerical error his lawyers and hers were currently untangling. Didn’t she have a scapegoat to blame?

He slammed out onto the landing. Why did he even care that she’d been humiliated? Why was he so knotted up over this? He never allowed personal to interfere with business. Perhaps it originated in his persistent sexual frustration—he’d failed to get laid, despite a steady stream of interested looks from the abundant women here tonight.

But once he’d seen Harley again, he hadn’t been able to muster one tenth of the enthusiasm she inspired. Perhaps the revenge fuck idea carried more merit than he’d acknowledged.

He snorted out his frustration. He’d go home, have a second cold shower and try to wipe Harley from his mind.

But at the top of the stairs, he halted.

She stood on the next landing down, her focus on the phone clutched in her hand as she paced, worrying at her lip. He slowed his stride, taking the stairs at an easy pace while he willed his heart rate and breathing into submission.

He paused three stairs above her. At least he’d have a chance to apologise for Alex’s clumsy comments. He should never have mentioned the Morris deal to his cousin—business indiscretions were beneath them both.

‘Libby loved your collection.’

Harley looked up, her hand flying to her chest.

He should have coughed, warned her he was there. He offered an apologetic tilt of his head. ‘She said you understood real women’s bodies.’

She recovered quickly, cold eyes darting away to street level.

‘Thank you.’ She glanced back down at the screen of her phone as if he weren’t there. He deserved that—he should have been more circumspect. But he’d voiced his frustration to Alex before he’d discovered it was Harley behind the Morris deal.

And he owned his mistakes, big and small.

‘I’m sorry about earlier... Alex.’ A shrug. ‘I’d mentioned my latest deal was held up because of an oversight. I didn’t know of your identity at the time.’

‘Don’t worry about it.’ She shook her head, a humourless grin on her face as if she expected nothing less. ‘I’m used to making mistakes and paying the price. And who you choose to gossip with is none of my business.’ She glanced down the stairwell, her bottom lip taking another punishing.

What the fuck did that mean?

‘I don’t gossip. I discussed a stalled deal with a business colleague.’

And he’s an insightful pain in the ass with a really good memory.

‘You’re upset.’ His hand inside his pants pocket curled into a fist. ‘He was just teasing. He’s English.’

He thought she might smile at his outrageous explanation, but she shot him a frosty look and then returned her attention to her phone, which buzzed with an incoming text.

He took another step closer.

‘Why are you upset?’ Why did he care? He should walk away now. He’d proved his point both in relation to their aborted contract and their newfound sexual chemistry.

Her glare wavered, as if she grew fatigued by the weight of it. ‘I’m not upset. I’m...disappointed with myself.’ She deflated.

‘Mistakes happen.’ He willed himself to stay on the stair. ‘The lawyers should have picked this one up sooner.’

She shook her head. ‘I’m responsible.’ She looked up at him then, her eyes deep pools of vulnerability. ‘I have dyslexia.’ Just as quickly she looked away, her shoulders rolling back so she was once again composed and untouchable. ‘I usually triple check everything then ask my assistant to triple check too. I guess I was just so keen to start the renovations...’

This time she used her finger to push her bottom lip between her teeth, her gaze distant as if she was lost to her self-flagellation.

Pieces of the puzzle slotted into place. This wasn’t his problem. So she’d messed up. So she’d confided something intensely personal. So she carried a lifelong learning challenge.

It changed nothing.

His feet moved as if of their own accord. He took the last two stairs until they shared the small landing.

‘Why didn’t you tell me?’

She lifted her chin, her stare hard.

‘Why would I have told you? I’d just met you. And I already felt foolish enough.’ Her shoulders lifted a notch and he quashed the crazy urge to touch her. To wipe away the small frown crinkling her forehead.

‘But you haven’t just met me.’ He shoved the other hand into his pants pocket, away from temptation.

‘I didn’t know that about you.’

She shook her head, eyes darting away.

All those holidays, the time they’d spent together—she’d never once mentioned dyslexia and neither had her family. Perhaps she was only mildly affected? No, that wouldn’t explain her obvious disappointment in herself.