The Morning After the Night Before: Love & Lust in the city that never sleeps! (19 page)

Too bad if the lift had CCTV.

Harry practically fell on her the moment the doors closed. Sadly, eight floors was hardly enough to get any serious action happening, but he managed to squeeze in some serious groping and a lot of kissing before the doors opened again on the penthouse level.

‘Keys…' he murmured against her lips and she fished his keys and phone from her bag.

That was a thing they did now, too. She carried some of his stuff. So, she was taking her intimacies where she could get them.

And then they were in, back amid the luxury and privacy of his apartment. Somehow he managed to keep the contact between their skin even as he shed layers of clothing onto the plush carpet.

Izzy thought about all the talking she'd wanted to do. All the emotional closeness she'd wanted to work on. A foundation on which she could feel confident about their relationship…
if that was what this truly was. Questions she could ask him that might not get caught up in his personal spam filter for secrets.

I'm not looking for a relationship
, he'd warned that first time they were together.

Rubbish. Everything about his behaviour towards her since then said he was crying out for a relationship. For someone to keep close, to confide in, to share with. And everything seemed to indicate that
that someone
was her.

Everything except the secrecy, that was.

What aren't you telling me, Harry?

His mouth ravaged her throat and it seemed designed to distract her from even her thoughts. Should she be more upset with him or with herself that she was so easily turned from purpose?

Her head tipped back to give him access to that special place they both loved best. The place that only he knew kindled her fires better than anything else. Who else was she ever going to find who could know her body so damned well? Who could play it like a fine instrument.

No one. Harry was it.

Her heart missed a beat. Possibly two.

Oh, crap.

Despite everything she'd done to keep herself at arm's length she'd started to fall for Harry.
She let those little moments of kindness or sweetness or gentleness wiggle under her skin and do their subtle work. All the days she spent with him, all the nights, weren't just about getting to know him. Or him getting to know her. She was there because it just felt
wrong
not to be. To know Harry and not be with him.

It would be like finding the part of herself she'd been looking for all this time and then just casually throwing it away.

But she was raised a survivor. If Harry couldn't bring himself to open up by himself then she'd raise it before they went any further.

Enough was enough.

‘Harry…' she breathed, pulling back just slightly from him.

But then his mouth found the breast that was practically afire from all the casual brushing on the tube and he sucked and nipped all that determination straight from her head.

‘Oh, sod it,' she whispered.

Tomorrow.

* * *

‘Holy Christ, this was not a good idea…'

Tori doubled over, pressing a hand into her side and heaving great sucks of air into her lungs.

‘Maybe if you ran more than once every six months it wouldn't be such a challenge,' Poppy pointed out.

‘Maybe if I had breast reduction it wouldn't be such a challenge,' she quipped. ‘I'm going to knock myself senseless if I'm not careful.'

Izzy slid down onto the bench next to her, only half listening.

‘Earth to Izzy?'

Her head snapped up.

‘Jogging is your cone of silence,' Poppy pointed out. ‘You only bring us when you have an upper case I issue to work through. So spill. What's up?'

‘I'm comfortable and exciting,' she said with no benefit of introduction.

‘Is that a general affirmation—' Tori frowned ‘—or are we talking about Harry?'

‘Harry.'

Her friends glanced at each other.

‘Well, exciting is good.' Tori nodded. ‘And comfort is…valuable. It gives you something solid to fall back on when the excitement wanes.'

There was an optimistic thought.

‘No, I mean why is he with me? There must be plenty of “exciting” women available to a man like him.'

And even more comfortable ones.

Tori plonked down next to her. ‘A mid-level manager at a conservative finance firm isn't exactly fishing out of your league, Izzy.'

‘No. I guess…'

‘What?' Poppy's eyes narrowed. ‘I know that lip-gnaw anywhere.'

Sure enough the inside of her cheek had found its way between her canines. ‘He's…I think there's more to him than you might suspect.'

‘I knew it! Hung like a camel, right?'

‘Tori!' Her energy drink ended up half dribbling down her chin. ‘I can't put my finger on it. He's just…secretive.'

Poppy instantly sobered. ‘He's not married, is he?'

‘No.'

Tori leaned in and lowered her voice. ‘Did he try your underwear on?'

‘What? No!'

Tori tossed her hair back, eyes darting around. ‘No. Right. Mark never did either.'

But the way she slumped down on the bench and became instantly fascinated with her laces told a very different story.

‘Look,' Poppy sighed. ‘He's gainfully
employed, he's good-looking, he's straight and he makes sure you climax first. I think you can credit him a secret or two until you get to know each other a bit better.'

‘Unless it's the underwear,' Tori murmured.

‘Or the wife,' Poppy added.

‘He's not married or a cross-dresser.' Izzy frowned. ‘When does a “secret” become a lie?' she asked.

Tori grew more serious than Izzy had ever seen her. ‘When it starts hurting you.'

Izzy's gaze dropped to the footpath and she started to speak and then stopped. Why? These were her closest friends. If she couldn't be honest with them, then who?

‘I don't always feel good about myself when I'm with him,' she finally admitted.

Neither woman had anything clever to say about that.

At all.

‘Why, Iz?'

She shook her head. ‘It's hard to explain.'

‘Do we look like we're ready to be running again?'

‘He's so giving, physically, and generous with his time and money…'

‘But?'

‘But he doesn't give of himself. I know all these things about him as a person but nothing concrete. I know that he went to boarding school but not where or when. I know he has sisters but not how many or who they are. I know he's from Australia but I know nothing about his life there. Like he doesn't want me to know.'

‘Oh-h-h…' Poppy murmured.

‘Or that I'm not going to be around long enough for it to matter.' She sighed. ‘I live with this vague feeling that I'm batting way above my average with him.'

‘Isadora Dean!' Poppy scolded. ‘You are plenty good enough for any man.'

‘I assume you've checked him out online?' Tori asked outright.

Izzy lifted her heard. ‘That's a bit creepy, isn't it?'

‘Are you kidding? Basic dating due diligence. I'm not saying stalk the guy, just check out his footprint. Get the basics. Maybe that will help you understand him.'

‘It just feels wrong.'

‘Then ask him outright.'

‘What if I'm too scared of the answer?'

Silence stretched out. And out. All the endorphins
from their run lay scattered in ruins around their feet.

‘Is this about your family, Iz?'

And by ‘family' Poppy meant ‘childhood'.

Isadora couldn't be poorer…

‘No, it's—' But what exactly was it, then? ‘I just know that everything he doesn't say has a lot more power over me than the things he does. I find them impossible to ignore. And the good things impossible to trust.'

Poppy gnawed her lip. ‘I thought he was treating you like a princess.'

‘He is. In some ways. He's just not open.'

‘Iz,' Tori started. ‘Normally I'd say that kind, handsome men who press you against art gallery walls and kiss you senseless don't come along every day. That you should give him a chance.'

A chance…hadn't her reasonable side said much the same thing?

‘But, if you don't feel good about yourself now, after just a few weeks with him, where will you be in five years?'

A desperate kind of sadness washed over her, that Tori had summarised her tragedy so succinctly.

‘I really want this to work out,' she whispered.

Poppy wrapped an arm around her shoulder. ‘I know, love.'

Tori pushed to her feet and pulled Izzy up behind her. ‘Come on. I think this is a job for SupperMan.'

The best cakes in Notting Hill. Izzy tugged her emergency twenty pounds out of her running bra.

‘No, this one's on me, Iz.' She turned to Poppy. ‘Chocolate cake, Dr Spencer. Stat!'

‘And you know what goes perfectly with chocolate cake?' Tori added, curling her arm through Izzy's. ‘Google.'

* * *

He should have followed through that day at the markets.

Told Izzy everything.

If he had he wouldn't be facing the gut-churning reality that he couldn't take their relationship further until he'd fessed up. Who he was. Why he'd been lying.

That
he'd been lying.

It seemed foolish now not to have told her right back in their first week, before the telling carried so much extra weight even if the words themselves were weightless. There must have been a point weeks ago when he'd decided
she was going to be in his life for longer than a week—two weeks, three—that his brain should have nudged him to confess. Back when the deception was only young.

Now it was fully grown. Hell, it practically had grown up kids of its own. Telling Izzy now that he'd been lying to her for every one of thirty dates—thirty hot nights and hotter mornings—was going to be brutal.

That was a long time to not tell someone something so fundamental.

And he'd deserve every bit of the recriminations she'd throw at him. He had to assume that she'd go ballistic. He would, if it was his trust being betrayed.

But it wasn't the worst news in the world, right? Especially for someone who was a card-carrying fan of cash. It wasn't as if he were dirt poor and pretending to be rich.

Hey, good news, Iz. I'm loaded!

She'd jump up and down as if she'd just won the lottery. And they'd all live happily ever after. The end.

Assuming she didn't slap his face and walk out.

Which was a distinct possibility.

But Izzy was nothing if not a realist. He'd
explain that he'd wanted to wait until their relationship was more certain before telling her and then he'd struggled to find the right time. And a month wasn't really that long to be vacillating, right?

Sure,
an annoying little voice said,
if you were going by the calendar.
If you were going by the number of dates or conversations or intense sexual experiences they'd had it was near criminal. Some people didn't experience that much in a year.

Some people didn't experience it in their whole lives.

A lifetime with Izzy, the idea felt nothing but…right.

Isadora Dean was not his mother. And what a freaking relief it was to discover that he was categorically not his father. He and Izzy were having a perfectly functional, perfectly healthy, perfectly
perfect
relationship.

Well, not quite
perfect
, but he'd fix that as soon as she walked in tonight.

Full disclosure. Full explanation.

With a surprise chaser.

He patted his pocket. Not what he'd gone out for today but the moment he held it in his hand
everything in his world just clicked into place. Even the London light got brighter.

The lift dropped him up on his floor and the guy from two doors down was standing in the hallway looking intense.

‘Hey,' Harry said awkwardly given how long they'd shared this floor. He didn't even know the guy's name.

The man stepped towards him but, just then, his phone rang and the stranger drew back, waiting respectfully. Almost deferentially. Harry threw him a half apology as he fumbled his phone out of his back pocket and pressed it to his ear, entering his apartment.

‘Yeh-lo?' he answered absently, closing the door behind him.

On the other end—far on the other end—a female voice burst into tears. He bent his head to try and make sense of the hysterical shrieking.

‘Mags…?'

Behind him, the doorbell rang.

* * *

‘He can't not exist at all, Izzy,' Poppy admonished, reversing out of the kitchen with a tray filled with steaming tea makings.

‘He's not on social-media sites, or the professional
networks. Plenty of other Harry Mitchells but not him.'

Not
her
Harry.

‘Try the video sites,' Tori suggested. ‘He must have at least stuck a pair of carrot sticks up his nose and filmed it at some point in his life. That's a rite of passage, isn't it?'

Izzy flopped back onto the sofa. Lord, how did people manage before the internet? Back in the Dark Ages. But it didn't take long to rule that out, either…

‘Nothing. I just can't find him.'

And her Izzometer spun even more wildly.

‘Broaden your search,' Alex muttered as he returned from the bathroom in his boxers, his face sleep creased. Tori's lips split into an enormous smile at the sight of a semi-naked hard body in the room.

Poppy just rolled her eyes. ‘Brilliant tech support, Alex, thank you.'

He waved two fingers. ‘I'm going back to bed, then. Night.'

‘Afternoon!' Poppy called.

Tori craned her neck for one last look as he marched away.

Izzy tabbed the cursor back to where she'd written
Harry Mitchell
and added
Broadmore Natále
for good measure. If this was a money trail she was trying to find and not a person she'd start with the confirmed knowns. Name and occupation.