AllFreeNovel
Share Us
‘Next time—if there ever is a next time... or a next man—try baiting your trap a little more cleverly. A seductive little whisper in a very public place that underneath the very respectable skirt you’ve got on you’re wearing... nothing...works wonders, or so I’ve been told..’
‘You’re disgusting,’ Poppy told him furiously, her cheeks burning as she realised what he meant. ‘And, for your information, I would never—’
“Oh, no, Poppy,’ James corrected her mock-gently, ‘I’m not disgusting, but you most certainly are naïve... very naive.
‘Now, didn’t you say something about coming here to work? I want you to send a fax for me, please. I hope that your Japanese is as good as your mother claims. I’ve just been talking to one of the German groups; their linguist spent two years in Tokyo...’
‘Probably as a geisha,’ Poppy muttered disrespectfully under her breath as James finally walked out of the bathroom and left her in peace to get dressed.
It didn’t matter that she was his cousin and that there had been countless occasions in their shared childhood when he had seen her naked. She could even remember once suffering the indignity of having her seven-year-old self stripped of her torn and filthy clothes, summarily dumped into the bath and virtually scrubbed clean by him at the same time as he delivered a lecture to her on what was likely to happen to her if her mother found out that she had deliberately ignored her instructions that she was not to play in the stream at the foot of their shared holiday-cottage garden.
Then she had foolishly actually been grateful to James... and, even more ridiculously, seen him as her saviour... Now she knew better, she decided.
James had been right about the chaos, was Poppy’s first thought as she waited for him to join her in the crowded foyer as they had arranged. She had already talked to several other people whom she had recognised from other conferences and they had confirmed what James had aheady told her.
It seemed that the hotel manager had overestimated their ability to cope with something as complex as organising such a large-scale event.
‘They say that two of the chefs have already left and that they’ve had to bribe the others to stay,’ a German sales manager whom Poppy had met at Frankfurt the previous year had confided to her.
At the time, Chris had teased her gently that Gunther Weiner was obviously attracted to her, and as she’d listened to him she had wished achingly that it were Chris’s attraction for her that they were discussing and not another man’s...
She heard Gunther asking her if she had again attended the conference with her cousin.
‘Yes,’ she told him absently, her attention on James, whom she could see making his way towards them.
Excusing herself to Gunther, she went to meet him.
‘Who was that?’ James demanded curtly, looking over her shoulder at Gunther.
When she told him he demanded, ‘What did he want?’
The aggression in his voice surprised her. ‘Well, not our company secrets, James,’ she told him, enjoying mocking him as he constantly did her, adding with relish, ‘Hard though you may find it to believe, he is more interested in me.’
She looked at him, waiting for him to come back at her with some typically derogatory response, and then looked curiously across the room to see what was occupying his attention and causing anger to tighten his mouth to a hairline, but he still seemed to be watching Gunther walking away from them.
Dinner, predictably, was a chaotic and hurried affair, although the food was surprisingly good-not that she had very much of an appetite.
Once they had finished eating James announced that he had some business he wanted to attend to and left her to her own devices. Poppy decided that she might as well explore the rest of the hotel.
The brochure had stressed the benefits of the spa, highlighting the various treatments available, but upon enquiry Poppy discovered that the delay in completion of the building work had meant that most of these facilities were not yet up and running.
There was the Jacuzzi, the sauna and steam room, the gym and the swimming pool, the receptionist informed her, although no one was allowed to use them after ten o’clock in the evening.
It was already gone ten but, nevertheless, Poppy decided that she might as well take a look. The brochure had shown photographs of the swimming pool and Jacuzzi area which had included views through the floor-to-ceiling glass wall on one whole side, looking straight out across the sheer rock-face to the spectacular view beyond it. And, even though it was now dark, the moon was almost full, and should shed enough light to illuminate at least some of the view.
Poppy found her way to the sports centre quite easily. The swimming pool was clearly marked, set in a circular, enclosed area with a raised platform overlooking the now covered pool on one side and allowing a view through the huge expanse of glass she recognised from the brochure on the other.
The remaining two walls, from what she could see in the dim lighting, had been painted with frescos, and a columned walkway led from the pool towards the Jacuzzi and, beyond it, to what she presumed to be another entrance.
As she paused to study the frescos with interest, she heard a sudden sound from the Jacuzzi. Lifting her head, Poppy stared curiously towards it. There appeared to be two people in the water. As she watched, she heard a feminine giggle followed by a soft shushing sound and then male laughter, accompanied by the rhythmic sound of the water moving, as if... as if...
Poppy could feel her face starting to flush as she suddenly realised what was happening...what she had interrupted. They were not, as she had originally thought, two people simply illicitly using the Jacuzzi after hours but a pair of lovers who had obviously decided to try out for themselves the pool’s aphrodisiac effect, and then, having discovered that it was not in operation, had patently decided that they might as well make use of... make love in it, after all.
Even though she knew that there was no way they could see her, Poppy felt her face burning an even deeper red as she heard one of them—the woman, she suspected—giving a small, soft moan.
Quickly turning on her heel, she started to walk away. Her face was still burning by the time she reached her room... their room, she acknowledged as she took off her jacket and saw thankfully that there was no sign of James. And she decided that she might as well prepare for bed whilst she had the place to herself.
Seeing that couple making love, hearing them, knowing what they were doing hadn’t just embarrassed her, it had also brought back all the pain of knowing that Chris was lost to her... Her throat and eyes ached with the weight of the tears that she refused to allow herself to cry. The last thing she needed now was for James to come back and find her in tears, and yet, as she p
repared for bed, her heart ached with the pain of her loss, her mind filled with feverish, tormented thoughts and mental images.
What was it like to have your love... your need ... your desire for a man reciprocated? To know that he wanted you? To feel his desire for you? To know that you had the freedom to reach out and touch him, to share every sensual and emotional intimacy with him? To love him and be loved by him?
Her hands trembling, Poppy pulled on the robe she had unpacked earlier. Used to sleeping naked, as she climbed into the large bed she grimaced at the unfamiliar drag of the fabric against her skin, already disliking the cumbersome restriction of the cloth. As she reached out to switch off the bedside light she was already yawning.
Poppy was having the most wonderful dream. In it all her heartache and loneliness had gone, melted away by the loving warmth of the man whose arms held her so tightly, the man whose body shielded and protected her own, the man who whispered to her that he loved her and that he had always loved her, that he would always love her...
A delicious thrill of pleasure ran through her as she moved even closer to him, pressing her body against his, enjoying the satin warmth of his skin against her own, her senses glorying in the nearness of him, in her freedom to share such intimacy with him, to show him her love.
She had known him for a long, long time... loved him for a long time, but this familiarity, instead of lessening the intensity of the pleasure that lapped at her body in soft, warm waves, only increased it. It gave her a sense of security, an ability to shed her inhibitions and to show her feelings, her desire for him freely and openly, to reach out and touch him, to smooth her fingertips over his skin.
In her sleep Poppy made a soft, contented sound of pleasure as she snuggled closer to James, burrowing against his body, unaware of what she was doing and of the fact that the robe that she had so carefully and resentfully put on earlier was now lying on the floor where she had thrown it, having finally, in her sleep, given in to the irritation of its unaccustomed feel against her skin and pulled it off.
