She felt his hand still on her thigh, smiled at the flare of shock and panic in his eyes.
‘I’m not a virgin.’ Nina couldn’t help but laugh at his reaction.
‘Thank God for that.’ Jack blew out a breath. ‘Never?’
‘Never,’ Nina said. ‘I don’t really have time.’ And she certainly had no intention of telling him about her past or admit to Jack that he was the first man she’d been attracted to in the longest, longest time … ever, really. That the nights spent on friends’ sofas had rather too often had a down side in the shape of her friends’ brothers or fathers—no, Jack didn’t need to know all that.
It was far easier to let him think this was just casual, even if she’d never wanted anything like this in her life before. So that was what she told him, that just for tonight was completely fine. And Jack told himself that he could deal with this. After all, he’d never been in much of a relationship either, but there was a certain disquiet at her honesty that she was only there for sex. Jack noted his own double standards and got over them quickly, his hand resuming its path on her thigh.
If she had thought he would haul her over his shoulder and throw her onto the bed she couldn’t have been more wrong. If she had thought he might quickly undress her, she had it wrong there too, because instead he kissed her.
A kiss that was far more tender than expected, a nice kiss that turned into a deeper kiss, but really, though, his kiss was measured and thoughtful and the hand on the back of her head was not bold or forceful, it was the other hand that misbehaved.
It climbed up her stockings, without even pretending to idle, and he stroked her through her pantyhose. He pushed where he could not enter, he fiddled and he probed and he stroked her as, like a gentleman, he kissed her.
And she kissed him back and wriggled on his knee until she could not stand the tease, couldn’t take the frustration any more.
‘Tear them …’ she breathed into his mouth.
He ignored her.
‘Jack …’ She pulled her mouth away. ‘Tear them.’
‘No.’ His whole hand cupped her. ‘Because I like them and I lied, it will be awkward when I see you in these stocking at work …’
‘I’ve got loads.’ But he kept stroking her and kissing her till she wanted to climb off his lap and take the bloody things off herself, except he pulled her down harder to him. She wanted him to undress her, wanted him to take her to bed, wanted to catch her breath, but he did not let her. Jack just kept touching her through her stockings and kissing her, because with his hand working its magic a kiss was all it would take to undo her. And he did not give in even when she tried to move a little to undress him to reciprocate.
‘Why are you so stubborn?’ Jack said when she held onto her orgasm.
‘I’m not.’ She could hardly get her breath, yet she refused to just give in to him. She didn’t know why she was fighting it, she just didn’t want to let go.
She wanted him to let her down, wanted him to be selfish, wanted to fault him in some way so that she could get him out of her mind, but she was failing miserably as she bit her lip, desperately trying not to come. He felt her thighs clamp around his hand, felt her breath rapid in his mouth and he stopped stroking, just enjoyed the small jolts of her body and the triumph of beating her resistance, but more than that, her reluctant pleasure was his.
He angered her.
She didn’t know why.
Maybe it was the combination of good looks and wealth and knowing that things came so easily to him.
Even her.
That he simply knew he was that good made her angry and she turned on his lap to face him and refused to simply hand over control, to just lie there when he took her and whimper his name.
So, facing Jack, she kissed him, a different kiss this time. He was detained at her pleasure now, so it was the buttons to his shirt that she opened. He moved her hips up just a little higher so that his erection pressed into her and she kissed down his face to his neck, trying to gauge his collar line, nipping his neck just a little lower and sucking hard. There was a fight for control here and one Jack wasn’t used to, but he was up for it, and their mouths found each other as she tackled his belt.
And she didn’t just find out what sort of a lover Jack was, Nina found out what sort of a lover she could be.
That she could demand and be met, that she could offer no explanation but be understood. She unbuckled his belt and the top button of his trousers too, freeing him, and he let her feel a lot of him, then his hand moved in and shredded her stockings and her panties too, and she moaned with the pleasure of his fingers inside her and his mouth on her neck, and then somehow Jack made even the search for a condom sexy.
‘I’ve got a little job for you.’
She had to lean over to his discarded jacket, had to find the little silver packet while his other hand stroked her bum, and then she had to rest back on her booted heels with his huge erection between them.
‘Here.’ She held out the packet.
‘I’m busy,’ he said, trying to find the zipper to her dress. ‘You put it on.’
‘You’re old enough to dress yourself, Jack.’ And she stayed back on her heels and held him, stroked him upwards over and over with both hands, one after the other in an endless tunnel till Jack was the one holding on now, Jack was the one fighting not to come.
‘Why are you so stubborn, Jack?’ Nina teased.
‘Why are you?’ Jack said, and lifted her hips enough so that she was over him, till her hands were removed from him and she had to steady herself on his shoulders. Then his hands held her hips and he pulled her down just a little way, just enough to teach her a very hard lesson, and then he lifted her a little and he watched her face as he did it again, and it was then that Nina conceded these were dangerous, reckless games and she never played them, but it was very easy to lose your head around Jack.
He watched as she went to retrieve the packet, but Jack changed his mind.
He didn’t want sex on the sofa and neither did he want to be driving her home at two a.m. or calling a taxi, which he was somehow sure that she’d demand, because, unlike others, Nina didn’t seem to want an entry pass to his bedroom. Nina wasn’t even attempting that futile entry into his heart.
This, it would seem, was all she wanted.
It was Jack, as he kissed her into the bedroom, who wanted more.
He took off her dress in one motion.
And off came the purple jumper too and he looked at the tattiest bra he’d ever seen, and he even made her laugh as he took it off.
‘Dressing to impress, Nina?’
‘I don’t need to.’
She didn’t, because never had Jack cared less about the packaging. All Jack wanted was what was inside, but still she resisted.
Not with her body.
Her mouth met his as she undressed him. Nina indulged herself, because he was easily the most beautiful man she had ever seen, or had felt beneath her fingers. He was as luxurious naked as he was dressed. He smelt like Jack but a close-up version that she got to taste, and he acted like Jack, but a more intimate version that she now got to sample.
But, yes, she resisted, because even with Jack inside her, even with her body flaring with heat as he moved deep within her, even while being given the full Jack Carter experience, she held back just one vital piece, and he knew it.
‘Nina …’ He was chasing something and he didn’t know what it was. He could feel her wanton beneath him, every lift of her hips bringing him closer. Her mouth was as probing as his, on his neck on his shoulders, her