Stay the Night (20 page)

Her mother smiled at her sadly. “There’s always time, remember?”

“Not today there isn’t,” Rosalind said, holding out the dress. “Go put it on.”

She carried it into the adjoining bathroom and closed the door. She took a moment to compose herself, washing her face with cold water.

Her mother had bought one of her photos. Not only had she bought one, she’d hung it in the most sacred of places: her closet. Titania may not know her mother very well personally, but she knew what her clothing meant to her. That room was her sanctuary. Anything placed in there was done deliberately. With care.

And love.

Pressing her palm to her forehead, she tried to wrap her mind around it. All these years she’d thought Jacqueline had been apathetic and uninterested. She didn’t know what to do with this new information. It changed everything.

Gigi was going to be so smug when she found out she was right.

But Rosalind was right, too; she had to get ready. Splashing more water on her face, she wiped away the regret and adjusted her focus on the future.

Stripping out of her clothes, she left them in a pile on the floor and then stepped into the dress. The fabric was so silky that even she couldn’t resist running her hands over it. It had thin straps that could slide down her shoulders without the least provocation. The slits in the skirt fluttered and bared her legs.

When she walked out of the bathroom, everyone stopped talking and just stared at her.

She froze, looking back and forth between them. “Is it that bad?”

“It’s that good,” Rosalind assured her, walking around her to survey it from every angle. “I don’t need to do anything to it. It’s a touch loose, but you’re so thin you carry it off. It looks perfect on you.”

“You look like a fairy princess,” Summer said, her hands clasped together.

Jacqueline approached her, tucking something at the strap. Her fingers were cold but the gesture was warm. “I wore this dress to my engagement party. Karl Lagerfeld gave it to me to try to entice me to model for him.”

Rosalind stopped her fussing and stared at their mother, her eyes huge. “Karl Lagerfeld wanted you to model for him?”

“He said I was the ideal he designed for. Of course, Reginald would have nothing of it.”

Rosalind put her arm around their mother’s waist and hugged her. “It’s a hopeful dress. It’ll bring Titania luck.”

“It’s beautiful,” Summer agreed. “Except it’s missing something, but I know what to do about that. Hold on.”

“What something?” Titania called after her as Summer rushed from the room. She turned to Rosalind. “She doesn’t own any daggers or anything, does she?”

“Don’t be silly, Titania,” her mother said. “She’s trying. She can’t help the circumstances of her birth. We’re all she has.”

Titania shook her head, gaping. “Who
are
you?”

Jacqueline smiled, that impish look in her eyes that Gigi always got. “Stick around, darling, and find out.”

Fortunately she didn’t have to reply because Summer reentered, carrying a pair of silver shoes. “Try these on with the dress. They’re perfect.”

She mumbled her thanks and slipped the shoes on her feet.

“The heels are low,” Summer said, “so you won’t break your neck. Do they fit?”

They fit perfectly, of course. Titania cleared her throat. “Thanks.”

“Hair first, then makeup.” Rosalind tipped her head toward the vanity. “Sit.”

She grumbled as she sat, but on the inside she smiled. This was why Gigi was always telling her she needed to be around the family more. She had no idea it’d feel so nice to be fawned over and cared for. She felt special.

Loved.

She swallowed the lump in her throat and then winced as Rosalind pulled her hair. “The dress’s effect will be lost if I have a bald spot.”

Rosalind gave her a flat look in the mirror and then came at her with a dangerous looking iron.

“I almost forgot.” Summer went to the bed and rummaged through her purse. “Here it is,” she said triumphantly, holding something shiny out to Titania.

She accepted it. “A flask?”

“Whiskey.” Summer grinned. “I thought you might like a little.”

“See?” Rosalind said, yanking another section of hair. “She’s not so bad.”

“Not so much.” Titania grinned at Summer and held the flask up in salute.

From the other side of the room, there was a snap and the whir of a camera.

Psyche
. Titania looked up with a frown.

Her mother turned the camera off and returned it to its spot. “I couldn’t help myself. I wanted you to look back on this moment and see what I’m seeing.”

What did she see?
Titania wanted to jump up and study the preview.

Rosalind put a hand on her shoulder and shook her head. “Stay. We have a lot to do in a very short time.”

She frowned. “My date is in two hours.”

“Exactly.” Her sister pulled another hunk of hair.

“Ow.” Titania glared at her in the mirror.

“Stop being a baby.”

She stuck her tongue out, feeling so happy she was tempted to call Cole and thank him.

Chapter Twenty

Ian waited impatiently outside the restaurant where Titania was supposed to meet him. He was early—he couldn’t help it. He tugged the sleeves of his shirt down inside his coat and resisted the urge to pace.

Then he saw her pull up.

He did a double take as she stepped out of the car. He knew she was beautiful—he’d seen her naked after all, he knew firsthand—but he had no idea she was so stunning. Her dress fluttered between and around her long legs as she strode toward him, her hair loose and bouncing.

She’d done something subtle to her eyes, so they looked even brighter than they normally did. Her shoulders were covered with one of those large scarves women wore, and her camera was in her hand instead of a purse. Not surprising. She flashed her quirky grin as she approached, as though she knew what was going through his head, and she found it amusing.

There was nothing amusing about how she looked. She was delectable. His imagination hadn’t done her justice.

He met her halfway.

“Thank you for sending a car for me,” she said in an oddly demure greeting.

“You’re welcome.” Normally he didn’t like public displays—too many cameras everywhere—but he couldn’t help himself tonight. Taking her hand, he kissed her on her glistening lips. “You look amazing.”

She clutched his coat and kissed him harder, wiping his lips with her thumb after. “So you approve of the dress?”

“Yes.” He took her arm and led her to the restaurant. “I will approve of it more when it’s lying on the floor of my bedroom.”

She smirked at him as he opened the door. “Think you’ll get lucky tonight?”

“I’m going to do my best, yes.” He gave their name to the hostess and then leaned in to whisper in Titania’s ear. “I can’t wait to get you out of it.”

She flushed delightfully, but she tipped her head and said, “You’re being contrary. You wanted me in it.”

“Only because I know what you look like naked. I wonder what you’re wearing under it.”

She arched her brow. “You think I’m wearing something underneath?”

Wasn’t she? Ian stared at the lines of the dress, trying to develop X-ray vision, mentally cursing at himself because now he was going to be distracted all night.

Laughing softly, Titania followed the hostess to the table. She sat at the table they were guided to and set her camera next to her. Then she shimmied out of the scarf and handed it to the hostess.

Ian froze, his hand on the back of his chair as he pulled it out. She wasn’t wearing underwear, and her dress clung to the pointy tips of her breasts. His mouth went dry, and he sat quickly, dropping his napkin on his lap to cover the evidence of his arousal.

She looked at him with a slight frown creasing her forehead. “What’s the matter?”

“Nothing at all.” Later he’d push the strap of her dress down and take her nipple in his mouth. Dessert, he promised himself, lifting the menu.

“The championship is in a week,” she said after they ordered. She leaned her elbows on the table and studied him. “How do you feel?”

“Great.” This time he meant it. “I’ve been playing strong.”

She nodded. “I’ll be cheering for you.”

“Will you?”

“Of course.” She leaned forward. “I plan to help you celebrate your win.”

He glanced down into her dress. “How will you be dressed?”

“In nothing at all, if you’re lucky.”

Then lifted his water glass to toast. “Here’s hoping I get lucky.”

“Can I show you something?” Titania asked in the taxi ride back to his flat.

Ian leered at her. “Please do.”

She flashed that confident smirk he loved so much. “You’re going to be disappointed when you see what it is.”

“I doubt that.” He angled himself toward her. “Show me.”

She lifted her camera. “This picture of me was taken as I was getting ready. What do you see?”

He looked at the screen she held out to him. There was a picture of her in the dress she was wearing. Her hair was in its usual messy ponytail and she held a flask up, toasting someone he couldn’t see. But she loved whoever she was looking at—that was evident from the soft look on her face, which wasn’t often present.

Did she look at him like that? Frowning, he sat back. “This was earlier.”

“When I was getting ready.” She pursed her lips as she studied the image more. “But what do you see?”

He looked into her eyes. “I see love. And happiness.”

“That’s what I thought.”

“You sound puzzled by that.”

She shrugged, still looking at the screen, as if the image was the answer to all the secrets of the universe. “The camera never lies. It shows what’s genuine, what’s happening in that exact moment.”

He leaned over to look at it again. “Whoever took it loves you, to see this moment and want it captured.”

Her brow furrowed. “My mother took this picture.”

He knew she and her mother didn’t have the best relationship. Not knowing how to reply, he waited to see what she was thinking.

She faced him, her gaze frank and confused. “She had a piece from my first gallery show in her closet, too. I thought she hadn’t gone, but it was hanging in her closet, which is her sanctuary. What does it all mean?”

“Maybe it just means that she loves you.”

“That’s so strange.” She wrinkled her nose.

“I know.” Grinning, he took her hand. “A person must be mad to find you lovable.”

Titania knocked her shoulder into his, but there was a pleased smile on her lips.

He had to kiss it. He meant for it to be brief and simple, but he should have known better—nothing was brief or simple with her.

The taxi pulled over, and Ian reluctantly let her go to pay the man. Titania slid out of the car in a flash of long legs, slinging her case on her shoulder, her camera in her hand. He followed, feeling like she was the Pied Piper and he’d succumbed to her siren call.

In the elevator, he pressed the button for his floor, waited until the car started ascending, and then flipped the emergency stop switch.

Titania’s eyes widened, backing up against the wall as he approached her. “You promised me a nightcap.”

“I promised you more than that.” He hooked his finger under the thin strap of her dress and lowered it to reveal her nipple. It hardened as though eager for his tongue. Bending down, he lapped at it.

Titania moaned, her head hitting the wall behind her. “Is this what you were thinking every time you had that look in your eyes?”

“This, and more.” He moved the pieces of her dress aside and slid his hand up the inside of her thigh to moist center. His fingers spread the wetness he found there around. “I see you were thinking it too.”

She gripped his hair with her free hand. “Don’t tease me,” she commanded, her voice husky. “Please, Ian.”

How could he resist? He focused on the little nub that made her writhe in instant ecstasy, rolling it between his thumb and forefinger. Her hand tightened, pulling his scalp. He watched her face, seeing the flush rising up her chest, hearing her panting gasps. She was close. All he needed to do was nudge her over the edge.

He took the tip of her breast in his mouth and sucked.

She cried out, and he felt a rush of wetness on his fingers. Smiling, loving how he could make her senseless with pleasure, he scraped his teeth over her other breast through the dress and then returned to the one he’d exposed. It capped her breast like a ripe raspberry, plump and sweet, begging to be consumed. Who was he to deny it?

“Yes,” she cried, her voice hoarse with need. She arched her hips into his hand, rubbing herself on him. “
Ian.
”

Her fingers pulled on his hair, a delicious pain he willingly accepted as she came apart in his arms. Watching her, his chest filled with the sharp feeling of joy.

Love.

He lifted his head, his fingers below soothing her. He kissed her temple and then her lips before he straightened her dress and restarted the elevator.

She propped against him, boneless and quietly blissful. He loved this part, when she was sated and languid. He held her around the waist and nuzzled her neck.

Turning to him, she put her arms around him. “That wasn’t enough.”

He had a feeling it’d never be enough. “I wasn’t planning on stopping there.”

“Good,” she said as the elevator door opened. She sauntered ahead of him, punching in the keycode to his apartment and leaving the door open for him to follow her in.

He walked in as she set her camera on the dining room table. “Pour me that nightcap you promised?” she asked.

“Yes.”

She stopped in front of him and kissed him, her lips swollen and delicious. “Be right back.”

He watched her walk down the hall to the loo. He loved her no-nonsense walk.

Going to the liquor he got out the whiskey bottle and a couple glasses and took them to the living room. He smiled at her camera, sitting there on the table next to its case.

He picked it up, knowing he probably shouldn’t, but he was happy and wanted to share her perspective on life. He turned it on and began to scroll through all the photos, from the most recent back.