Mistresses: Seduction In The Boardroom

‘I…’ Ari faltered. He’d been about to say, I do need you. But she was right. It wasn’t for work, and if it wasn’t for work then what was it? Had he got so used to her calm, insightful presence? Had he really missed her throughout dinner?

He made the only decision he could. ‘Fine, then I’ll escort you back.’

A huge neon danger sign flashed over Lucy’s head. ‘No!’ She tempered her response. ‘I mean—you stay. I don’t want to drag you away…’ From that blonde you were obviously enjoying so much.

But in his usual arrogant way he’d already taken her arm and was leading her outside, where as if by magic his car drew up in front of them.

She tried again in the car. ‘Really, you should stay.’

He quirked a small hard smile, leaning back easily, studying her. ‘Oh, really? Should I?’

Lucy’s hands twisted in her lap. She felt something intangible shift between them. The energy was palpable. ‘Yes…’ Why did her voice sound breathy all of a sudden? ‘Yes,’ she said again, stronger. ‘You should. You obviously have…people to talk to.’

Aristotle grimaced when he recalled trying to evade the clutches of Pia Kyriapoulos just now. A very beautiful and very wealthy divorcee, she’d made it quite clear what he could expect if he wanted to indulge in an affair while in Athens. Before, he might have been tempted—she was offering just what he liked, no-strings sex—but now…the only woman he wanted was sitting just a few inches away from him, and he couldn’t contemplate sex with anyone else.

‘You’re wrong, Lucy,’ he drawled in deep honeyed tones. ‘There’s no one I want to talk to, and I am only too happy to escort you back.’

Lucy stifled a retort and looked out of the window, a mixture of dread and excitement licking through her when she remembered the last time he’d insisted on taking her home.

Far too soon they were pulling up outside their hotel. Lucy scrambled inelegantly from the car before her door could be opened. But of course her attempts were futile. Aristotle caught up with her easily and took her arm again, leading them over to the gleaming lifts.

Once inside, standing apart from him, Lucy looked up resolutely. She nearly collapsed when she heard Aristotle say innocuously, ‘Do you remember the first time we met in a lift?’

Shocked and aghast, she looked at him—and realised too late that it was a mistake. ‘The first time we…?’

‘Met in a lift,’ he said easily, turning to look up at the display. ‘Funnily enough, the day you walked into my office to interview for the job I remembered it.’ He looked back down at her. ‘In vivid detail.’

Lucy was barely aware that she was still standing. She wanted to put out a hand to hold onto something, but the only solid thing was him. She prayed she wouldn’t collapse.

She shook her head. ‘No,’ she croaked…and then knew she couldn’t lie. ‘That is…yes. I remember you using the staff lift, but I don’t remember much else.’

Her heart was thumping as all she could remember right then was how hard his body had felt underneath hers. A lot like it had felt over hers the other day in the car.

The lift doors opened and Lucy almost fell out. Aristotle walked alongside her easily. Her legs were trembling. As she tried and failed to stick her keycard in her door she felt it taken out of her hand imperiously, and watched helplessly when he effortlessly opened the door.

When she stepped in he said quietly, ‘Who knew you were such a consummate liar, Lucy Proctor?’

She turned around, affronted. ‘What’s that supposed to mean?’ She saw that he’d neatly stepped into the room too, and when the door closed behind him her heart seemed to spasm in her chest. ‘And what do you think you’re doing in here?’

‘Proving what a liar you are, Lucy Proctor.’

And then he reached out, two big hands encompassing her waist, and pulled her inexorably towards him, towards that searing heat. Lucy, gripped by an awful feeling of inevitability, stumbled right into his chest.

‘This is much better,’ Aristotle growled as she fell against him, and he lifted his hands to cup her face and thread fingers through her hair. ‘Now I have you exactly where I want you.’

Lucy couldn’t help a groan of reluctant supplication when he bent his head and took her mouth. It felt as if he’d injected some kind of life force into her body. Every nerve came tinglingly alive, her heart-rate sped up, her skin seemed to glow…and down below, between her legs, she could already feel her traitorous body responding hotly, wetly.

His tongue swirled, sought hers, sucked it deep into his mouth. She felt fireworks explode in her head. Then he was nipping gently at her lower lip and sucking it, exploring the gap in her teeth and saying throatily, ‘Bite me…’

A feeling of exultation took her over. She felt him push her coat off her shoulders to the floor and hardly noticed. Experimentally, shyly, she bit down on his sensual lower lip, feeling its cushiony springiness, soothing with her tongue where she’d bitten.

He growled something indecipherable, and then she felt him searching for and undoing the zip at the side of her dress, pulling it aside so that one lace covered breast was bared. He lifted a hand and cupped its weight. Lucy bit her lip. She felt heavy, aching with a pooling of desire, and it was such an alien feeling it held her in its grip.

One of his big hands reached down and cupped her round buttocks, drawing her up and into him, where she could feel his arousal digging into soft flesh. She felt more liquid heat and instinctively closed her legs against it.

He was palming her breast, a thumb hovering teasingly over the puckered tip, Tension mounted until Lucy wanted to scream, and finally he lowered his head. Her own fell back when she felt that tight, aching lace-covered tip being drawn into the hot, sucking spiral of intense desire that was his mouth.

His hand gripped her buttock and she strained upwards, urging him to suck harder, her hips moving sinuously against his. She was seeking for a pinnacle that she’d never experienced before, but she knew it was there somewhere.

Something made Lucy open her eyes, and she drew in a shocked breath when she saw their reflections in the mirror across the room, highlighted by the one dim lamp in the corner. They must have moved from the door somehow, although Lucy knew that an earthquake might have happened and she wouldn’t have noticed. The image shocked her to the core. It was so explicit…and so like something she’d witnessed as a child, when she’d walked in on her mother unannounced one day.

Sanity and reality didn’t trickle back—they exploded in her face. In a second she’d pushed Aristotle away and was pulling up her dress to cover her heaving breasts. She shook violently.

‘Get out of here—now.’

She spied something from the corner of her eye and moved, grabbing the hotel robe from the end of her bed and pulling it on, wrapping it tightly around her, belting it firmly. She went and stood near the window, her brain hurting and her body throbbing with unfulfilled desire.

‘Please just get out.’

‘No, Lucy, I won’t.’ Aristotle’s voice was unbearably harsh.

She could only imagine how angry he must be with her. She knew what men called women who—

‘Look, I’m sorry. I should never have let that happen—it’s entirely my fault.’

‘You didn’t let it happen, Lucy. You weren’t helpless. You wanted it as much as I did.’

She shook her head dumbly and felt tears threaten.

Aristotle stepped forward then, and stopped a few feet away. His face looked as if it was carved from stone and Lucy quaked inwardly. She wanted to say sorry again, but didn’t. His bow-tie was askew, his hair ruffled. Had she done that?

He frowned, as if trying to understand. ‘Lucy, did someone do something to you? Did someone hurt you?’

She shook her head quickly. ‘No…nothing like that.’

He shook his head. ‘Well, if it’s not that…what is it?’

She felt like crying in earnest now. How could she get into her tangled emotional history? Into how threatened she felt by the way he made her feel?

‘I just…I don’t want this. I don’t want to feel this way.’ It was the closest she could come to an admission.

Aristotle was unsympathetic. ‘Well, tough—because you do and I do. It’s called chemistry and it’s unavoidable.’

‘What if I leave?’ Lucy asked hopefully.

He shook his head. ‘We’ve been through this. You’re not going anywhere.’

Her shoulders slumped, and she missed the flash of something that crossed Aristotle’s face.

‘Look,’ Lucy began awkwardly, ‘I’m not experienced—I’m not like the women you go for. I won’t know how to…’

‘You already do, sweetheart, without even trying.’

She looked up. It seemed important to say it. ‘I’m not a virgin…I’ve had sex before.’ Once. ‘But I didn’t feel anything. So I know that…it won’t do anything for me.’

He came close and tipped her chin up. Lucy tried to avoid his eye but it was impossible.

‘Are you seriously trying to tell me that you think you won’t enjoy having sex?’

She shrugged, feeling very silly.

‘Lucy, in case you haven’t noticed, you’re a sensualist. That’s the only word I can find to describe you. Even though you seem determined to deny it, and I’ve no idea why that is. Don’t you know why you have a taste for exotic underwear?’

‘It’s because…’ Lucy stopped, remembering all those shopping trips with her mother—how she’d had it drummed into her how important it was to buy decent underclothes. But of course other teenage girls hadn’t had the privilege of shopping with the scandalous Maxine Malbec.

‘It’s because I developed too early. I’m too…’ her face burnt and she was glad of the dim light ‘…big. To get the right sizes you have to pay more…’

His hand still gripped her chin. ‘Lucy, there’s a whole nation of women out there bigger than you who wear woefully fitting underwear. Can’t you just admit that you’re drawn to it? To the feel of it against your skin? How it fits and makes you look—’

She tore his hand away and stepped back further. ‘No.’ But she knew his words had made an impact. Did she instinctively like it? Was she a sensualist, despite everything—just like her mother? Well, she’d proven spectacularly that in all other respects their shared genes certainly seemed to be showing themselves.

‘No. Look…I have my reasons for not wanting this. I just…want you to respect that.’

Ari fought the most intense battle of his life as he looked at her downbent head and the tightly drawn belt on the robe. His body burned and ached. He felt hard from tip to toe and couldn’t believe she was denying them this.

But he found some strength from somewhere. He stepped close again and saw the way Lucy’s body tensed even more. In that instant something inside him melted. He wanted this woman with a passion he’d never known before, but he didn’t want to force her. He felt an uncomfortable level of concern grip him as he tipped her chin up to see her face. She avoided his eyes. He felt her grit her jaw against his hand and his stomach clenched. He rubbed his thumb back and forth over silky smooth skin. The bones felt unbelievably delicate. Her jaw finally relaxed, and something akin to triumph moved through him.

Suddenly the urge to take Lucy to bed was superseded by his wanting to reassure her. He had the insane impulse to pull her close and tell her everything was going to be OK. Something deeply ingrained within him kept him from making the move, but it made his voice husky.

‘I’m going to leave, but I want you to think about this, Lucy. What’s between us is more than a banal attraction that happens every day of the week. This is…’ His own words surprised him, and so did the emotion he could feel behind them, but he told himself it was just because he wanted her so badly. ‘ This is something much stronger. I don’t know what demons you’re fighting, and I can’t fight them for you. Only you can do that. I’m going to leave the interconnecting door to my room open. I’d like you to use it, Lucy…I want to explore what this is with you…’

His mouth twisted. ‘I’ve no doubt it’ll burn itself out, but it’s not going to go away until we do explore it. It’s just going to get stronger. It’s up to you. If you’re strong enough to resist this then by God I hope you have enough strength for the both of us.’

Lucy’s breath had stalled, and because it was hard not to she found herself staring directly into his eyes. What she saw there made her heart twist. It wasn’t the heated intensity she’d expected—well, it was—but it didn’t make her feel threatened. It made her feel quivery and achy, as if she wanted to throw caution to the wind and say yes.

For a long moment they stood like that, his words hanging heavy in the air, and all Lucy’s nerves seemed to centre on the hand which felt so warm and oddly reassuring on her jaw. But then Aristotle was taking that hand away and stepping back. He turned and walked to the door. In a second he was gone, and the room felt huge and cavernously empty. Bereft. In mere seconds she heard him opening the interconnecting door on his side and flinched slightly at the sound.

She went and sat heavily on the bed, feeling sick in her belly, his words swirling in her head. Was he right? Would this only get stronger? The ripples of sensation still pouring through her body mocked her. Who was she kidding? She’d fooled herself that it had receded this week, but he was right—especially if her reaction just now was anything to go by.

She’d also, she had to acknowledge, fooled herself into thinking she was frigid. Right now she felt like the least frigid person on the planet. She had to recognise that in losing her virginity she’d subconsciously gone out and deliberately chosen someone she didn’t feel attracted to—as if to try and convince herself that she wasn’t like her mother, that she wouldn’t spend her life craving sex.

She frowned at that. It sounded wrong as she thought it now. She’d always believed her mother to have craved sex…but in actual fact it had been the men, their power and attention. She’d sought validation from that. When Lucy really thought about it, her mother had always been quite cool and clinical about sex. She’d never become so passionate about a man that she’d lost sight of practicalities.

The way Lucy felt about Aristotle right now had nothing to do with being cool and clinical. He could be the hotel doorman and he’d still have this effect on her. While Lucy knew for a fact that her mother would never in a million years have spared a mere doorman a second glance.

Seeing herself and Ari reflected in the mirror, the look on her face—it hadn’t been the same as her mother’s that day. She’d never seen her mother look like that. So…desirous, so caught up in the moment.

The revelation stunned her now. Because of her mother’s profession, and how overtly sexual it had been, she’d always assumed that Maxine’s myriad liaisons had been all about sex. But they hadn’t. They’d been about money and power and her mother’s self-esteem. Not sex. That had merely been a tool she’d used. Lucy had known this, but it had taken the awakening of her own desire to really see it for the first time.

One of Lucy’s biggest fears had to do with losing her independence by depending on men as her mother had done. But wasn’t this a totally different situation? She was working; she already had a job. She wasn’t hoping to get anything out of Aristotle—certainly not money or gifts. And he seemed to be as surprised by this flaring of attraction as she was. She had no doubt that if he had a choice he’d prefer this to be happening with someone in his own social group.

So didn’t it stand to reason that once this thing had burnt out, as he’d said, things would get back to normal? Although Lucy had to concede she didn’t know what it would mean to get back to normal in the office after something like this…her mind skittered weakly away from that.

She was pacing now, the thought of sleep impossible to consider. She bit at her nail, a tight feeling growing in her belly. For the first time in her life the fears she’d carried for so long about turning into her mother and all that meant seemed flimsy—they didn’t hold water any more. She was different. The warm feeling of reassurance she’d imagined she’d felt just now surged back even stronger. And it scared her slightly, as she’d never in a million years have said that Ari was a reassuring type of man.

She stopped pacing. What if she could do this? Instead of running away, why not face this and vanquish the demons that had been plaguing her? Already she felt different; she had to admit she’d enjoyed the less restrictive wardrobe, and even though her reflex was still to cover up it was diminishing. She’d caught some of the men looking at her earlier in the ballroom, and instead of wanting to hide away she’d found herself straightening up, feeling a very fledgling sense of confidence trickling through her.

Had Aristotle helped her come to this? It didn’t feel like the diminishing needy power that she’d seen her mother crave. It felt like an innately feminine power, pure and strong.

She thought about it again, tested the words: what if she did this? Just went over there to that door, opened it and walked through.

Before she knew her legs had even carried her Lucy stood at the door, breathing short shallow breaths, her heart thumping. She’d once read a book: Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway. Was she brave enough? To step across the line?

As if in answer to her own question, an intense yearning spread through her. She wanted this—wanted this man and what he promised more than she wanted to look at all the reasons for not doing it. He was right. The thought of repressing this desire was…inconceivable.

With a shaking hand she touched the doorknob, took a breath and turned it. She shut her eyes as the door opened silently. A lurid mental image of Aristotle lounging back against black silk sheets, hands behind his head with a mocking smile, nearly made her slam it shut. But she resisted the impulse and opened her eyes.

It took a second for Lucy’s eyes to adjust, and the scene greeting her was as erotically charged as she could have imagined and yet surprisingly benign. Through the open bedroom door, across the wide expanse of opulent sitting room, Lucy could see the reflected figure of a sleeping Aristotle in his bed in a slightly open mirrored wardrobe door.

Far from black silk, the sheets he lay on were white, like hers. He’d thrown off the main covers and lay now, half propped up, with just a sheet hitched up to his waist. She’d seen his naked torso the other day, but now she looked her fill. It was long and lean and bronzed and hard, and exquisitely muscled. More superlatives filled her head but she couldn’t articulate them. He was simply the most devastating specimen of a man she’d ever seen—not that she’d seen many, she had to acknowledge wryly, but she felt fairly sure that Aristotle could take his place among some of the most beautiful men on the planet.

Unruly inky black hair flopped with incongruous youthfulness onto his forehead, making him look much less like the feared CEO of Levakis Enterprises and instead like someone altogether more vulnerable and human.

Lucy’s breath snagged when her eyes rested on those lean hips and then moved down lower, to where the strategically placed sheet was tented slightly over his lap. Hot colour poured into her cheeks at the intense and immediate reaction to even such subtle provocation.

A sound made her eyes dart up, and suddenly the sleeping god of perfection was no more—he was awake, light green eyes darkening even as she looked at him. Lucy belatedly realised that, as if in a dream, she’d walked right into his room and was now standing at the foot of his bed, the dim light of one lamp imbuing everything with innate intimacy.

Her hands gripped the sides of her robes together, knuckles showing white. Reality slammed into her, and she suddenly wondered if she’d suffered some kind of paralysis as she couldn’t seem to move.

‘I…’

Aristotle was completely still, awake and watchful now.

‘You…?’

The sound of his voice resonated deep within her.

‘I…I don’t think…That is…perhaps I should—’

‘Come here.’

The words were uttered with deep implacability, and Lucy’s legs felt shaky. She’d come too far to go back now, so she moved forward jerkily, around the bed, until she was standing just a few feet away, eyes glued to his, mesmerised.

He lifted a hand and gestured. ‘Come closer.’

Lucy looked desperately for any sign that he mightn’t be as ¨ber-cool as he looked. And at the last second, just when she was contemplating running while she still could, she saw it: the light sheen of sweat beading his brow and the pulse beating fast at the base of his neck.

But, even so, it was as if the old, safe Lucy was calling her back through the doors, willing her to slam them shut between her and this man and this craving, aching need within her. She even turned and looked, as if to judge the distance.

Immediately her hand was taken in a ring of heat. Lucy looked down to see her wrist dwarfed by his bronzed hand. She looked at him, and gulped.

‘Lucy, are you sure you want this? Because if you stay there’s no going back.’

And in that instant Lucy mentally shut the doors behind her. She didn’t want to go back. She wanted to go forward and free herself of this unwanted baggage she’d been carrying.

She shook her head and felt her hair slip around her shoulders. ‘I’m not going.’

He pulled her irrevocably towards him, and then she was there, legs leaning weakly against his bed, His eyes never left hers as he brought her wrist to his mouth and pressed a kiss against the pulse, his tongue flicking out. She gasped and felt as if he’d branded her, even with that small move.

And then he let her hand go and leant on one elbow. ‘Take off your clothes.’

When he said the words, Lucy felt only an intense explosion of heat in her pelvis. She was far beyond disgust or shock. Without breaking eye contact she undid her thick robe and let it drop to the floor. She still wore the dress, which gaped open, and her shoes. She stepped out of the shoes and bent to put them neatly under the chair. Then she stood and looked at Aristotle again.

He had made no move, but his eyes had turned so dark with lust that the green looked almost black. His gaze burnt into her.

With a tremor in her hands she pulled the zip down all the way, and then slowly peeled the dress off her shoulder and down, baring breasts only just confined by a strapless lace bra. Her awful self-consciousness seemed to have faded away to another place. Another person.

Hands on her hips, Lucy wriggled slightly to ease the dress down and over her womanly shape. The veritable waves of heat coming from Aristotle as his eyes followed the path of her dress nearly had Lucy melting on the spot. The heavy silk pooled at her feet, and she stepped out with an innate grace she was entirely unaware of.

Seeing a heavily brocaded chair beside the bed, Lucy lifted one leg to rest her foot there and started to peel one stocking down, only belatedly becoming aware of the eroticism of her pose. She sensed it in the way Ari had stilled even more, felt it in the intensity of his gaze on her, and for the first time in her life, found herself glorying in her innate femininity.

Aristotle knew that the only thing keeping him from jumping out of the bed and burying his aching hardness into her as she bent like that over the chair was the knowledge that, given one touch of her skin, he’d lose all control. When he’d seen her standing at the foot of the bed like a vision, his feeling of pure desire twinned with what had felt suspiciously like joy had made him act gruffer than he would have liked. He gripped the sheets tight in both hands now. It felt hard to breathe. The fact that he also felt more out of control than he’d ever felt with another woman was uncomfortable. Finesse in this kind of situation was a distant memory.