Sweet Talk Boxed Set (Ten NEW Contemporary Romances by Bestselling Authors to Benefit Diabetes Research plus BONUS Novel) (94 page)

Will glanced at her and seemed to read something in her face, because his hand came out to cover hers. “I wasn’t lying,” he told her gently. “I’m leaving.”

She nodded once, feeling dangerously close to tears, just like that.

Lelei was looking at her, but Solomon was frowning at Will. “You didn’t get an offer? I could’ve sworn—”

“Nah. I did. Least my agent did. And I said no. Part of the reason I’ve been here,” he told Faith. “To have a break, and to work out. But also to try out for the Outlaws, the new NFL franchise. For a kicking spot.”

“Oh.” She swallowed. “And they offered you one, but you said no?”

“I did. Call me a prima donna, but I have to matter more than that. My position, in rugby—I’m a first-five. A Number 10.”

“I know,” she said. “I looked it up.” And then could have kicked herself.

“I’ve spent my whole life directing the game,” he said. “And I found out, when it came down to it…” He ran a hand over his close-cut hair, looking a little sheepish. “That I can’t stand the idea of being a part-time actor, waiting on the sidelines for my chance to come on and do my bit. Sounds bad, I know, but there it is.”

“Why does it sound bad?” Faith asked.

“Tall poppy?” he suggested. “A bit stuck on myself?”

“That’s
stuck on yourself? I don’t think so.”

“Multi-million-dollar choice,” Solomon pointed out.

“Yeh,” Will said. “And that matters, and even so…the only choice for me. Besides…” He shrugged. “I just got back to En Zed, didn’t I. Spent a few years in Aussie,” he explained again to Faith. “And I wanted to go home. Must’ve been mad to think about leaving again, but then, at the time, I
was
a bit mad. I’ve come to my senses again, maybe. And I’m going home.”

Which was what he’d said all along. So why did she feel…bereft?

“Well,” Lelei said briskly, standing up with some difficulty and beginning to collect paper plates and cups. “Now that everybody’s ready to get good and sick, who wants to go on some bumper boats?”

“I do,” Will said. “Got to celebrate winning that five dollars from Faith, don’t I. Because who got a hole in one on the windmill? Me, that’s who. Me.”

Easy-Peasy

It wasn’t so bad after all, doing the spanking shots. It was much, much worse.

You can do this,
Will told himself, standing in the toilet in Calvin’s studio a few days later.
Easy-peasy.

He was meant to be changing into the charcoal-gray suit again, but instead, he was gripping the edges of the sink, staring himself in the eye, and having a serious attack of stage fright. Or an attack of rational thought, maybe.

He’d balked at the idea of spanking Gretchen from the beginning, but somehow, he’d let things get to this point, because he’d let Faith talk him into it.

She always sounded so reasonable, that was the problem. And he liked her too much. That might be the
real
problem.

“There’s no limit to the mad things a man will do for a woman’s sake,” his grandfather had always said, and Will had always thought,
Not me
. Well, he’d used to think that, before he’d met Faith. Now, he knew that as always, his grandfather had been right.

He’d taken her home after their miniature golf date. One of the silliest days he’d spent in a fair while, and one of the best. But one of the worst, too. He’d walked inside the building with her, said hello to Mrs. Johnson and waited while Faith chatted. And then he’d walked with her to her door, where the words, “Want to come over to my place for a bit?” had hovered on his lips.

“Thanks,” she’d said. “Fun day. See you Monday, at the shoot. Last week, huh?”

That had been the “worst” part.
Last week.
Because on Friday, he was leaving.

“Yeh.” He’d leaned down and kissed her cheek, his hand coming up to push her hair, loosened as always by the wind, back from her face. Had felt her lean into him, and had wanted so badly to keep kissing her.

“Still no? Or yes?” he’d murmured, his lips brushing over her forehead, his hand moving over her soft skin with a will of its own, tracing the curve of her cheek.

The sigh had been a warm breath against him. “Still no. Because…last week.”

“Yeh. Right.” He’d forced himself to step back, to say “See you then,” and to walk away. Knowing it was the right thing, even though, as always, it felt so completely wrong.

Now, he looked at the face in the mirror.
In or out?
This was the last episode. Time to choose.

He’d done a shower scene already this week, after all, wearing the tiniest Speedo, with Gretchen in a microscopic flesh-toned thong and nothing more.

“Of course, we won’t show bare breasts in any of the shots,” Calvin had assured the pair of them, although Gretchen hadn’t seemed fussed. “But we need to see all of her back. Arm bra works, too.”

Which wasn’t something Will had heard of, but he found out what it was. Hands—Gretchen’s own hands, fortunately. And then an arm, which was Will’s. The tattooed one, of course, his heavy forearm doing a perfectly adequate job of covering both of Gretchen’s pretty little breasts, his bicep flexed to the max as he’d hauled her up against him. He’d been desperately careful all the same not to crush her, after the first time, when she’d winced.

He’d done all that, so having her over his lap in a pair of pink cotton undies wouldn’t be so bad, would it?

Yes.
It would be just that bad. But he’d agreed to it, mad or not, so he slung the black tie around his neck and began to knot it, although he still thought it was stupid.

“Who would wear a tie to spank a woman?” he’d objected when Charlotte had handed him his wardrobe.

“Hemi would.” Faith had answered for her. “He’s very, very rich.”

“That doesn’t even make sense,” Will had said. “And I thought nothing was written yet.”

“Trust me,” Faith had said. “You can bet he’ll be rich. Which is why you’re wearing the tie.”

It was as if their cozy family time with Solomon and Lelei had never happened, because she’d been all business again ever since. He sighed.
In for a penny, in for a pound.
He got busy tying, and that was when he heard the unmistakable sound of somebody spewing.

His hands stilled as the retching went on, and then, when silence fell, he finished up, pulled the suit jacket off the hanger and shrugged into it. Maybe he’d be saved by the bug.

He went on out into the studio and submitted to some readjustment by Charlotte. She clucked over the dog’s breakfast he’d apparently made of the tie, unfastened it and re-did it, and was going over his jacket with a lint roller when the other toilet door opened and Gretchen came out in her robe. Her face was paler than ever, her eyes huge in her little heart-shaped face, and she looked fragile to the point of transparency.

Will stepped out of Charlotte’s grasp with a “Sorry. One minute,” and went across to Gretchen, putting a hand onto her arm to steady her, because she looked like she was about to pass out. “You OK?” he asked.

“Shh,” she hissed, casting a wary glance at Calvin, but he was mucking about with his camera setup with Faith at the other end of the extensive room.

“We don’t have to do this,” Will told her, keeping his voice low. “If you’re ill. We can reschedule for tomorrow, maybe.”

“It won’t be better tomorrow. I’m fine. Forget it, OK?”

The idea was dawning in Will’s brain in all its horror, because he had sisters, and he had cousins. “You’re pregnant,” he realized.

“Shh,”
she hissed frantically. “Not even a couple months,” she whispered.

“What, they don’t know?” Will jerked his head at Calvin and Faith. “They should know. Make sure we’re careful enough not to hurt you.”

She sighed in obvious exasperation. “You’re not going to hurt me. Calvin doesn’t know, because he wouldn’t have picked me, and who knows what he’d do now? I need this job, and men are so weird about women being…” She looked around again. “That. And I need to save up for me and Quentin, and the…you know. Anyway, Faith knows. And don’t worry,” she added. “I brushed my teeth.”

Will seized on the one thing he could grab hold of. “Faith knows? She
knows?”

“She heard me being…sick.” Gretchen was whispering again. “Like I guess you did. But she won’t tell. Faith isn’t like that.”

“I need you over here, Gretchen,” Charlotte called. “Right away, please.”

Will had heard enough anyway. He left her there and stalked across the studio, grateful after all that he was wearing the suit. He was meant to be intimidating? It could start right now.

“I need to talk to you,” he told Faith. “Outside.” He jerked his head towards the carpark.

She started to say something, but he didn’t wait around to hear what it was. She had better be following him, or…Well, he didn’t know what “or” was, but she had better be following him.

He hit the glass door hard, then turned and held it for her, because, yes, she’d followed him. Wearing jeans and a blue Henley today, most of the tiny buttons undone, and wrapping her arms around herself against the brisk January wind. Even as he fumed, he noticed the way it pushed up her breasts. She was showing a fair bit of cleavage now.
Focus,
he told himself sternly.

“What?” she asked. “It’s freezing out here.”

He slipped impatiently out of the jacket and draped it over her shoulders, and she hugged it around herself, though it didn’t hide the cleavage, and he needed to stop looking.

“Why the hell,” he said, his voice rising, not that he was trying too hard to keep it under control, “didn’t you tell me Gretchen was bloody
pregnant?”

“Shh,” she said, exactly as Gretchen had. “Because Calvin would have pitched a fit, just like you are, because men are ridiculous.”

“Ridiculous?” he demanded. “
Ridiculous?
I’ve had my hands all over a pregnant woman. I’ve had her tied to the
bed.”

“Well, you didn’t actually do anything to her,” Faith pointed out. “She’s just fine. And she signed up for this. It isn’t
real,
Will. You’ve got nothing to be upset about. Nobody will know she was pregnant, and you haven’t done anything wrong.”

“Do. Not,” Will said, gritting out the words, “give me that bloody soothing thing.
I
know she’s pregnant.
I
know what I did. And I cannot—I can
not—
spank a pregnant woman.”

“You don’t have to spank her.” Faith was still so maddeningly calm he could—he could hit something. “You just have to pretend that you’re
going
to spank her. You don’t like soothing? I won’t be soothing. I’ll point out that you’re being patriarchal and patronizing. Gretchen’s perfectly willing to do it. She doesn’t need your protection. She’s waiting in there for you to fulfill your contract. We all are. And don’t tell me you can’t even pretend to think about spanking a woman, because I won’t believe it.”

“How d’you know what I do or don’t think about?”

She snorted. “I was born in the dark, but it wasn’t last night. I saw how you looked when we were in that store, and that was just
me.
Besides, that’s one of the most common male fantasies. I did the research.”

“Of course you did,” he muttered. What did she mean, “that was just me?” She didn’t know nearly as much as she thought she did. “Google must have a pretty interesting profile on you. I’ve thought about heaps of things I haven’t done. When you’re big and…”

“Strong,” she guessed. “Powerful.” Which would have been nice to hear, under other circumstances.

“Well, when you are, you take care that you don’t scare a woman, and you bloody well take care that you don’t hurt her. I don’t have to hurt women. I hurt men. That’s my job. If I’ve got any excess testosterone, I’ve got an outlet for it, haven’t I.”

“All very reasonable,” she said. “All very noble, but it doesn’t matter, because you won’t be hurting Gretchen. You’ll be doing a little fantasy fulfillment of your own. Here’s your big chance to do something exciting without actually having to worry about scaring a woman, or hurting her. Everybody’s happy, and we’re done.”

“Let’s make this dead clear,” he told her. “There’s not one bit of fantasy fulfillment in my spanking Gretchen, because there’s nothing I want to do less. I can think of one woman I wouldn’t mind spanking, but that’s not on offer, is it?”

Her eyes widened, then she seemed to catch herself and laughed, hugging his jacket a little closer. “Well, then, take yourself to your Happy Place. Whatever floats your boat. We done talking?”

“I’ve got an even better idea,” he said. “If it’s such an insignificant wee thing, how about if
you
do it? Hemi’s got a threesome going, maybe. That seems like the kind of bloke he is. And I’d be rapt about having
you
over my knee. I could look dark and dangerous as you like.”

She wasn’t looking one bit comfortable now. He should care about that, but he didn’t.

“Trust me,” she said, “nobody’s going to pay to look at naked pictures of me, especially not of my butt. And that isn’t the kind of threesome that sells stories to women.”

“No?” He took a step towards her, and she backed up, then seemed to catch herself. “I’d pay for that. And I’d do that shoot for free.”

“You hold that thought.” She was the one struggling for composure now, and he was enjoying watching it. “You’re looking just exactly right.”

“Dark and dangerous?” he asked softly, closing the distance, putting his hands on her shoulders. She leaned into him, and he took the jacket from around her shoulders and put it on again. “Then let’s go.” He saw her looking off-balance, and smiled. “You just keep looking at me while I’m doing it. You can know what I’m really thinking about. That way, we both get at least a taste of what we want.”

His Every Desire

For all his protesting, Will looked as cool and remote as an iceberg during the shoot that followed. He certainly didn’t seem to mind having Gretchen stretched across his lap.