Table for Two-epub Read online

  “Maybe, but it’s now my problem.”

  The muscles in his stomach clenched tight. His friend’s world was falling apart and there wasn’t a single thing he could do to help her.

  “Here.” He pushed her plate back toward her. “I can’t make your problems disappear, but I can promise you everything seems a whole lot harder when you don’t look after yourself.”

  She shook her head.

  “It’s common sense, pretty one. Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. Nourish your body, take care of the basics so you’re physically strong enough to handle the rest of the crap.”

  Liv opened her mouth to argue, but must have seen the determination in his face. She took her fork and ate another bite.

  “I guess you were right,” she said a few minutes later, her plate empty. “I was starving.”

  “Feel better?”

  She gave him a weak smile. “Not really. But it’s the first time this week I’ve discussed work without crying. That’s a good sign.”

  “There’s no hope of saving the company?”

  “None. Unless someone miraculously finds a quarter of a million dollars stashed away in the offices somewhere.”

  “That’s how much Marion lost?”

  “That’s a fraction of it. That figure is the amount we’d need to pay off business debts and salaries. She lost a whole lot more, including her car, her house and her marriage.”

  Liv yawned twice, and James signaled for the bill, satisfied she’d eaten enough for now.

  By the time they reached their building, she looked as though she might fall asleep at her front door.

  “Eight forty-three.” James said. “Just in time to get you tucked into bed by nine.”

  “I am so ready for bed.” She patted her stomach. “You were right about the food, by the way. I do feel better. Thank you.”

  “Anytime.” He just wished he could help her with her other problems as easily.

  Liv took her keys out and fumbled as she tried to find the right one. James took the bunch from her and opened the door.

  The flat was quiet and dark. Ava must still be at yoga. Liv flipped a switch and soft light filled the lounge room. “Well—” she turned to him, “—good night.”

  James smiled. “I’m not leaving yet. I promised to tuck you in, and I’m a man of my word.”

  “You got me home. That’s good enough.”

  “Not for me. Feeding you was only part of the deal. Maslow’s needs, remember? I still have to ensure you get some sleep. So, head on over to your room, change into your pj’s, and I’ll be there in a few minutes.”

  “I’m perfectly capable of falling asleep on my own.”

  “Really?” He raised a brow. “When last did you get a good night’s rest?”

  “Last night. Or the night before that.”

  “Or the night before?”

  She shrugged.

  “You have circles under your eyes, and you yawned the whole way through dinner. I’m staying until you’re in dreamland.”

  She rolled her eyes. “Forgive me for doubting your motives, Jimmy, but somehow I imagine sleep is the last thing on your mind.”

  The corners of his mouth twitched. “You believe I have ulterior motives?”

  “The last time I saw you, you tossed me over your shoulder, hauled me into your flat, stripped me and fucked me. I have no reason to think tonight will be any different.”

  “The way I remember it, you did the stripping. And the fucking.” He grinned. “For the record? I loved every second of it.”

  She folded her arms over her chest. “For the record? I am not having sex with you tonight.”

  “You were too tired to unlock your door. I hardly assumed sex was on the agenda. I will, however, be there until you fall asleep so I can ensure you get the rest your body needs.”

  She dropped her arms to her sides. “You motives are that innocent?”

  “They are.”

  “You won’t try to strip my clothes off?”

  He placed one hand over his heart and the other beside his head. “Tonight I do solemnly swear to not remove a single item of clothing from your body.”

  She rolled her eyes again—she’d pretty much mastered the art—and opened her mouth to speak. He cut her off. “Liv, stop arguing and go get into your pj’s. You have my word I won’t try get you naked. Okay?”

  “I suppose,” she said on another yawn and disappeared into her room. A minute later the door to her ensuite clicked shut.

  James gave her a few minutes, then followed her into her bedroom, shut the door and kicked off his shoes. He set his keys and wallet on her bedside table and lay back on the bed, staring at the ceiling.

  The linen smelled like Liv, floral and fresh, and James inhaled deeply as he waited for her. Her room was chic and comfortable, like the rest of the flat, leading him to marvel at her taste all over again.

  It was shamefully unfair that someone as talented as she should be going through all this shit.

  Liv walked out of the bathroom dressed in pajamas that almost sent James into cardiac arrest. The pants were candy-striped boxers that only just covered the curve of her ass, and the top was a tiny pink singlet that clearly showed off the outline of her small, braless breasts.

  Electricity jolted through him. He couldn’t have hidden his reaction if he’d tried. Liv was staring right at him as his cock roared to life.

  “James! You promised.”

  “And I keep my promises.” Blood vessels almost exploded in his brain as he struggled to get a hold of his desire. “But you can’t blame a man for reacting to a beautiful woman.”

  “I don’t feel beautiful.” She rubbed a hand over her eyes. “I feel like a complete failure.”

  “You are beautiful. Jesus, Liv, you’re fucking gorgeous.” He jumped to his feet. “And Marion’s the one who failed, not you.”

  She just stared at him, looking dejected.

  He flipped the doona down then held his arms open. “Come here. Let me take care of you tonight.”

  Her lips twisted in indecision. “We’re not having sex.”

  “I know. Now come here.”

  With a big sigh, Liv padded over to him, stepped up close and placed her forehead on his chest.

  James closed his arms around her, holding her to him.

  She shifted in closer. “Feels good,” she murmured, her breath sending soft ripples over his T-shirt and the flesh below.

  “I’ll always try to make you feel good, pretty one.”

  James held her for a long moment before picking her up, placing her on the bed, climbing in beside her and covering them both with her doona. Then he wrapped her in his arms once again, and held her until her breathing evened out, her body relaxed and she drifted off to sleep.

  It almost killed him not to taste even the littlest piece of her, but he did it. Somehow he managed. His balls were bluer than the Pacific Ocean on a cloudless summer day, but he managed. Somehow.

  Chapter Five

  For the second time in a week, Liv awoke to find a hand clasped possessively over her breast. This time, her breast was not bare. It was covered by her pajama top.

  It took a few seconds to find her bearings. The room was familiar, as was the bed. The hard wall of warm flesh behind her was not. And it wasn’t just behind her. It was wrapped around her, pressed against her legs, her ass and her back, with an arm—the one attached to the hand on her breast—holding her close.

  James.

  The man was like a living furnace, radiating heat.

  The last time she’d woken up plastered to his side, Liv couldn’t get away fast enough. This time, feeling secure, cozy and too lethargic to move, she simply burrowed into him and fell back asleep.

  The next time she awoke, their positions had changed. James lay on his back, and Liv was curled into his side, using his chest as a pillow. Not a very comfortable pillow, mind you. Solid muscle did not conform to the shape of her neck and head like down feathers did.


  Now, instead of James’s hand on her breast, her hand had crept beneath his T-shirt and lay against his firm pecs, just beside his nipple. With a flick of her wrist, she could trail her fingertips over that nipple.

  She didn’t. But she thought about it. A lot.

  Obsessed about it.

  As she glanced at the clock and realized it was almost five a.m. and she’d slept through the night for the first time in weeks, she thought about his nipple. As she soaked in the press of the long, hard length of his body against hers, she thought about it. And as she yawned and stretched and sat up, she thought about it.

  She instantly regretted sitting, missing the feel of his body against hers.

  Wow. Who’d have thought she’d feel comfortable enough with James to spend an entire night wrapped in his arms?

  He shifted in his sleep, flinging one arm behind his head. The other landed on his stomach then moved. He murmured wordlessly, patting the bed beside him as though searching for something. When his hand landed on her leg, he wrapped it around her thigh, muttered something else and settled back into sleep.

  Olivia watched him, convinced she’d never seen anything as sexy as the mountain of a man lying in her bed. The thought messed with her head. She’d spent eight years viewing him as nothing more than a good friend, and then a few hours considering him the best thing that had ever happened to the female orgasm.

  But thinking of him as a man in her bed, a man she’d slept with, in both the literal and physical sense of the words, made no sense to her.

  Sure, she’d slept with a friend before. She and Levi had spent a sensual night together. But neither of them had assumed it was anything more than a quickie between friends, and neither of them had been affected by it after that. They’d said goodbye in the morning and continued being the same old friends they’d always been.

  She’d assumed it would be the same with James—only James wasn’t pretending Sunday night meant nothing.

  Yes, he’d always been caring and concerned, and even if they hadn’t done the dirty, last night he’d still have bullied her into eating and getting some rest. But he wouldn’t have spent the night beside her, and he sure as hell wouldn’t have looked at her as though the sun rose whenever she smiled.

  Nor would her belly have quivered in response to that look.

  He seemed to see something in her he’d never seen before. Which was pretty lovely, considering her view of the world at the moment was the opposite of James’s. For her, it felt as though the sun had set. Every bit of joy she’d found in her work and her future had been squeezed out of her.

  Perhaps the only reason she had to smile of late was the attention James showered on her. But Liv had no idea what to do with the attention.

  Logic told her not to do anything.

  Taking whatever had sparked between them any further would complicate their friendship. If things turned sour, the resulting tension could screw up the dynamics in their whole circle of friends.

  James, Ava and the rest of the Sunday Night Dinner Club were the only stable forces in her life right now. If she messed that up, she’d have nowhere to turn when her world fell to pieces.

  Quite apart from the friendship angle, Liv wasn’t up to sexual complications. She had enough crap in her life. What she needed to do was nip whatever was going on between them neatly in the bud.

  But logic and reasoning had little to do with the way her breath quickened as she stared at James. The heat from his hand seeped through her thigh, warming her leg.

  Okay, damn it. It didn’t just warm her leg. It sent hot tingles straight through it.

  At some point in the night, the covers had been pushed down. Probably by her. She wouldn’t have needed both the doona and the breathing heater to keep warm.

  James took up a lot of space. On Sunday night she’d been so intent on getting out of his flat, she’d cast him only the odd glance, just to check he didn’t wake up.

  But now, with the sun peeking weakly through the blinds, Liv looked her fill. Relaxed in slumber, he looked good enough to eat. She just wished his clothes didn’t hide his body from her.

  His hand, the one on her thigh, seared her skin clean away. Sparks shot up her leg, igniting in her pussy. And suddenly sleep and food weren’t the primary requirements on Olivia’s hierarchy of needs. Sex was. Hot, dirty, satisfying sex.

  With James.

  If she shifted slightly, settling her ass a few inches down the bed, his hand would no longer rest on her thigh. It would rest on her pussy.

  But there were two inherent problems with that plan. One: if she shifted, she risked bumping his hand off her leg altogether, and two: it didn’t matter where his hand lay, it mattered that his hand lay still. James was asleep. He wasn’t going to be moving it anytime soon, and movement was what Liv required.

  Fine. If he wasn’t up to moving, she’d have to.

  Gently, she tugged his shirt up over his stomach and laid her hands on the bare flesh above his jeans. Warm, smooth and firm, it felt good beneath her palms. So good, she ached to feel more. She pushed his shirt up higher to explore the flat planes of his stomach, following the slope of hard, ropy muscle up to his chest.

  James shuddered beneath her touch but didn’t wake. She kept an eye on his face, entranced by the sharp ridges of his cheekbones and the beginnings of a beard on his square jaw.

  The man epitomized all that was masculine in the world.

  Earlier reluctance forgotten, she found his nipples and grazed her fingertips over them. They beaded instantly. And suddenly, touch wasn’t enough. She needed to taste—even if it meant displacing the hand on her thigh.

  Carefully, she twisted around and stretched one leg over his waist until she perched above him on her knees. Then she set her hands on the bed next to either side of his neck, leaned forward and drew her tongue across his left nipple.

  The salty flavor of his skin sent a shiver through her, and she licked again. Needing to confirm his other nipple tasted as good, she turned her attention to the right side of his body.

  It did. It tasted so good, she sucked his nipple into her mouth.

  Every muscle in James’s chest rippled and flexed. The rhythmic rise and fall of his chest changed, and a breath hissed from his mouth. But he didn’t move, nor did he speak, and Liv refused to look up to see if his eyes had opened. She feasted on him, moving from one nipple to the other before curiosity and an eagerness to taste more sent her mouth southward.

  She trailed wet kisses down to his navel and laved her way from there to the button of his jeans.

  Another breath hissed from James.

  Still on her knees, she crawled down the bed, bracketing his shins with hers. Then she ran her nose along the length of his fly—and the turgid flesh beneath it. Her mouth watered.

  “Liv,” he whispered hoarsely. Fingers wound through her hair, sending shivers skittering down her spine.

  She found his zip with her mouth, took the tag between her teeth and tugged it down slowly. His soft growl sent a fresh rush of shivers over her back.

  But the open zip did not give her the access she sought, and she tackled the button with shaky fingers, shoving the open flaps of his jeans aside. Encased in a snug pair of cotton boxers, James’s cock lay taut and erect.

  Liv tugged on the elasticized waist, pulling it over his shaft, exposing his spongy cockhead to her greedy gaze. As his fingers flexed and relaxed in her hair, she wrapped her mouth around his tip and sucked.

  James jerked.

  His flavor flowed over her tongue, tantalizing her taste buds with its salt and musk. Moist heat filled her pussy, and she moaned, loving his taste but ruing the restriction his boxers and jeans placed on her access.

  She tugged at the waistband of both, and James lifted his hips so she could push the offensive clothing down his hips and legs. She lifted her body slightly so he could take care of the rest, kicking his clothes over his feet.

  The second she had him pant-less, she
gave in to her need to sample every inch of his groin. And sample she did, licking along the underside of his dick, circling the head with her tongue and licking back down again. Over and over, until his shaft was wet and his tip dripped with precome. And then she took him into her mouth, sucking him in as far as he could go then releasing him, only to repeat the process again and again.

  His shallow panting spurred her on. She cupped his balls, massaging gently as she slipped a single finger downward to stroke the sensitive stretch of skin behind his scrotum.

  His appreciative moans made her pussy clench. She ached to feel his fingers and tongue on her. Yearned for it. She’d have placed her hand between her legs if she wasn’t using it to prop herself up.

  Even to her own ears her groan sounded needy. Hungry.

  “I’d sacrifice my left nut to taste your pussy now,” James muttered.

  A wave of lust engulfed her. She sucked him in deeper.

  A scratching sound drew her gaze to his free hand. His fingers clawed at the sheet.

  “Want to lick you so bad.” The rawness of his voice reverberated through her, and the throb in her pussy intensified.

  Do it, she implored silently. Now. Please.

  “Fucking…promises…” He balled the sheet into his fist, his knuckles turning white.

  What promises?

  His hips were moving now, rocking, so he was fucking her mouth as much as she fucked him with it. God, she needed him to touch her. Desperation for the feel of his wet tongue on her pussy clawed at her like he clawed at the sheets.

  “Clothes, Liv.” He panted. “Too many clothes.”

  And then she remembered James standing before her with one hand over his heart and the other hand in the air.

  “I do solemnly swear to not remove a single item of clothing from your body.”

  She repressed a frustrated scream. Did he have to stand so firmly by his word?

  With a last, drawn-out suck, Liv eased her mouth off his shaft and sat up.

  His hand dropped from her head.

  James watched with dark, hooded eyes and a heaving chest as she slowly pulled the singlet over her head and tossed it on the floor. Her nipples had pebbled, and like her pussy, they throbbed with the need to be touched.