Miranda Lee - Contract with Consequences

‘Fine. Though none of the other girls are a patch on you when it comes to colour. I suspect a few of your clients will wait till you come back before getting theirs done again. Still, you’ll only be gone ten days. It’s not an eternity. I’m sure they’ll survive.’

‘I’m sure they will. I’d better go now, Mum. I keep on yawning. I’ll give you a call again tomorrow night.’

‘I’d like that. You can tell me what you’ve been up to all day.’

Scarlet swallowed, then glanced over at John. Would he want to make love in the morning, in broad daylight? Or would he wait till tomorrow night?

‘I… er… I doubt I’ll be doing too much tomorrow,’ she said. ‘I might just walk around the city and get my bearings. Do a little shopping for food. I don’t fancy going out to restaurants on my own so I’ll probably cook.’

‘Sounds nice. Night night, darling. Love you.’

‘Love you too, Mum. Bye.’ After she hung up, Scarlet took a deep swallow of the wine before glancing over at John.

‘Mothers!’ she said with a mixture of exasperation and affection.

‘They mean well,’ he replied.

‘But?’ Scarlet prompted with a wry little smile. ‘I’m sure I heard a but in there somewhere,’ she added, echoing the words he’d used earlier.

His smile carried amusement. ‘I think you’re the witty one here, Scarlet, not me. But, no, no buts. Mothers will be mothers, no matter how old their children get. You just have to learn how to circumnavigate their tendency to cling and control without their knowing how much you hate it.’

‘But I don’t hate it,’ she said. ‘Not the way you do. I think of my mother’s concern for me as caring, not clinging and controlling.’

He shrugged his shoulders. ‘Not all mothers are equal. Yours, I have to admit, is especially nice.’

‘So is yours.’

‘True. But mine is married to my father.’

Scarlet tipped her head slightly to one side as she searched his face. ‘I’ve always wanted to ask you why you hate your father so much. I mean… I know he’s not the happiest of souls but he’s still your father.’

‘Please don’t go down that road, Scarlet.’

‘What road?’

‘The third degree road.’

‘I was just curious about the relationship between you and your father. I have no intention of asking you a whole heap of questions about your life.’

‘Good. Because I have no intention of answering them,’ he growled as he crossed his arms in a belligerent fashion.

Scarlet added ‘defensive’ and ‘secretive’ to John’s list of personality flaws, along with arrogant and rude.

‘Charming,’ she muttered.

‘No. I’m actually not at all charming,’ he admitted drily. ‘I’m exactly what you called me earlier-introverted and antisocial.’

Scarlet’s blood pressure began to rise. ‘For pity’s sake, let’s not go down that road, either!’

‘And what road is that , might I ask?’ he snapped.

‘The back-to-the-future childish road, where we fight all the time and end up spoiling what I came up here for. Trust me when I say I no longer wish to know the ins and out of your life story. I know I originally said I did but I’ve changed my mind on that score. I don’t give a damn where you’ve been all these years, what you’ve done or who you’ve slept with, safely or otherwise. I also don’t give a damn how bloody rich you are. All I care about is whether this works and we can actually make a baby!‘

She was still glaring at him several seconds later when the beginnings of a smile tugged at the corners of his tightly pressed lips. Before long he was smiling broadly at her.

‘You always were good at tongue lashings.’

Scarlet refused to smile back at him. She was still way too angry. Instead, she took another gulp of wine. When it went straight to her head, she realised she really needed to eat something. And soon.

As if on cue, the buzzer to the apartment’s security system went off, indicating that someone required entry to the building. Hopefully, it was someone delivering the Thai food.

‘Saved by the bell,’ John quipped and stood up. ‘That should be dinner,’ he said as he walked to the front door where he flipped a switch on the wall console and asked who it was.

‘Dinner delivery for John Mitchell.’

‘I’ll come down and get it.’

Scarlet sat and worried a little about the future while he was downstairs, then decided she had to stop thinking. She drained her glass, then went out to the kitchen where she refilled from the opened wine bottle she found in the fridge door and returned to sit, sipping in silence, as she waited for John’s return.

He arrived with some delicious-smelling containers.

‘Let’s go eat this in the kitchen. Unless of course you want me to set the dining table?’ he added.

‘I don’t think we have time for that,’ Scarlet said when she stood up and the room spun round. ‘If I don’t eat something in the next five minutes, I’m going to become seriously tipsy.’

‘On one glass of wine?’

‘I refilled whilst you were downstairs.’

‘You drunkard, you!’

‘Stop mocking me and go serve up that food!’

‘Can you make it to the kitchen on your own or do you want me to carry you?’

She rolled her eyes at him. ‘I think I can make it that far alone.’

‘What a shame. I’ve always wanted to sweep you up into my arms.’

‘You liar, you!’

He sighed melodramatically. ‘Oh, Scarlet, whatever am I going to do with you?’

‘Hopefully, you’re going to feed me.’

JOHN was still sitting up in his bed, watching television, at eleven-fifteen. It was a deep-sea fishing documentary which would normally have interested him. But his mind kept wandering. The only reason he had the TV on was that he couldn’t sleep. He couldn’t stop thinking about Scarlet.

He now regretted his decision to leave making love to Scarlet till tomorrow. His desire had deepened with each minute he spent with her. Even when she was being sassy or actively rude, he wanted her. Actually, the sassier she was, the more he wanted her. It was all rather perverse. He could not wait till the morning. Yet he would have to, he supposed. He could hardly barge into her bedroom at this late hour and demand she honour their deal, particularly when she was fast asleep. That would hardly endear him to her. Which would be a shame, considering they were getting along surprisingly well, despite the sarcastic repartee which they both seemed compelled to indulge in. But what the hell? He’d enjoyed it.

Unfortunately, the evening had ended shortly after the meal was over, with Scarlet claiming total exhaustion.

He’d listened to her in the shower as he’d cleaned up the kitchen, his mind bombarded with the image of her standing there naked whilst jets of hot water streamed over her shoulders and back. Before long the image had become a fully fledged sexual fantasy. In his head she’d turned around so that the water splashed over her face and threw her head back, arching her spine so that her breasts were thrust up towards the water, gasping when it beat against her erect nipples, her belly quivering with anticipation.

Because of course in this fantasy she hadn’t been alone. He’d been there in the shower, close behind her, watching and waiting. But not for long. Soon, she’d handed him a cake of soap and asked him to wash her. Which he had, oh so slowly, all over. It was deliciously decadent, the way she’d moaned. And the way she’d moved, parting her legs and inviting him in.

Unfortunately, she’d switched the shower off at that point, leaving him so damned frustrated that he could have screamed. He’d quickly headed for a shower himself, a cold one, where shards of icy water had lashed his overheated body till it was devoid of desire. But it was only a temporary solution. By the time he’d dried himself and climbed into bed shortly after eight-thirty, John had briefly contemplated doing something about the situation himself but abandoned that idea when he remembered that too much ejaculation lowered a man’s sperm count. After all, Scarlet was depending on him.