Beneath This Man

My bra is removed and my ankles tapped in the usual fashion so he can remove my knickers. Once we’re both naked, he takes me down to the thick, cream carpet and swaths me in his body, burying his face deep in my neck and breathing me into him. I mirror him and take my own hit of minty fresh water loveliness, wrapping my arms firmly around his back to pull him closer, eradicating any space that may have been between us.

We lie on the floor in the middle of the bedroom and hold each other for the longest time. I stare up at the ceiling and stroke his hair, taking all of my comfort from his strong heartbeat thudding against my chest.

‘I’ve missed you.’ he mumbles into my neck.

I shudder when I feel his hot tongue running circles around the delicate flesh under my ear. We’ve been apart for less than five hours. I would say he was unreasonable, but I have missed him too. Even though I was mad at him, I still found myself back here instead of Kate’s.

‘I missed you too. Thank you for the flowers.’

‘You’re welcome.’ He kisses up to my lips and scatters light pecks all over me before brushing my hair from my face. He gazes down at me. ‘I want to drag you to a desert island and have you all to myself forever.’

‘Okay. With the absence of other people, there will be no need for any trampling like behaviour.’

His lips twitch at the corners and his eyes regain a bit of twinkle. He drops a kiss on my lips and rolls us over so I’m straddling his hips. I can feel the evidence of his mood wedged between our bodies and it triggers all of the usual desperate needs for him. My ni**les pucker under his watchful eye and his grin widens into his signature, melt worthy smile, reserved only for women. I want it to be reserved only for me. An unreasonable pang of possessiveness assaults me.

‘I f**king love you.’ he sighs.

‘I know you do.’ I circle my palms over his chest and pinch his nipple. ‘I love you, too.’

‘Even after today?’

Oh good. Is he acknowledging that he was a challenge today? This is progress. ‘You mean after you stalked me all day?’

He pouts playfully and shifts his arms under his head to elevate it slightly. I dribble as his muscles bunch and flex. ‘I was worried about you.’ he protests, and I raise a mocking eyebrow at him. ‘I was.’ he argues.

He wasn’t worried about me at all. He had an unreasonable and unwarranted attack of possessiveness. ‘You were over-the-top and stupidly possessive. My challenging man needs to relax.’

He scoffs. ‘I’m not challenging.’

‘You’re challenging and in denial.’

His brow furrows. ‘What am I in denial about?’

‘Being challenging and unreasonable. Your performance today was way off the scales of unreasonableness.’ I need to know he won’t hijack every business meeting I have with a male client. He said it would be only Mikael, but then followed it up with and all other male threats. His idea of a threat is a million miles away from my idea of a threat. He’s going to trample all of my male clients, I know it. My work diary is going to be padlocked and so is my mouth. I’m not telling him anything.

He looks at me with a little scowl. ‘He would have made a move on you and then I’d really have to trample him.’

I laugh lightly. Like he didn’t make a good enough job of that already? He doesn’t need to know that Mikael has already made his move. I will be keeping that snippet of information to myself. ‘Well, I think you made your point pretty clear. It was embarrassing.’ I grumble.

‘It was necessary.’ he mutters, and I roll my eyes, making a dramatic display of my exasperation.

‘You should run more.’ I say. ‘Oh, the bath!’ I jump up and run into the bathroom.

‘No, I need you more.’ he calls to my back.

‘Don’t you have me enough?’ I flip the tap off. He’s had me here all week. He calls me, texts me, sends me flowers and gets John to drive me to work. It’s all some form of contact or control. I bet he couldn’t go a whole day without some form of trample or intrusion on my working day. Would I want him to not interfere? I like the flowers and the messages; it’s the tramples I have an issue with. Would he be tempted to have a drink to try and get through the day? Could I risk it? My relaxed brain begins to ache…again.

I make my way back into the bedroom, finding him still sprawled on the floor. He is just too delicious. I walk over and settle myself back on his hips.

‘Have you enough?’ he asks. ‘No, I don’t. I need you every second of the day, just like you need me.’ He reaches up and pinches my nipple, and I jerk on top of him, catching a full on rub from his erection. He gives me his roguish grin.

‘What if you couldn’t have me all day?’ I ask. There will be times in the future when he might actually be on a real business trip. Or, perhaps, I will.

His grin disappears instantly and is replaced with a glare pointed straight at me. ‘Are you going to try and stop me?’

‘No, but there may be situations when you can’t have instant access to me. I might be unobtainable.’

A fleeting look of panic flies across his face and his bottom lip disappears between his teeth. He’s considering what I’ve suggested, and it’s now I realise that he absolutely meant it when he said he’ll have me wherever and whenever he wants. Now that really is unreasonable. I’ve seen the result of a few missed calls on my part – he was frantic.

‘Would you make a grab for the vodka?’ There, I’ve said it.