That prompted a laugh.“’Course you are.”
She bit her lip.How much did Xane know?Was he privy to all the filthy delicious things they’d got up to?
“Alle.”Spook chased a stray strand of hair away from her face.“He’s teasing you.Xane’s a wind-up merchant.Ignore him.Also, he has sex on the brain, and therefore can’t conceive of the possibility that everyone else doesn’t.”
“You’re all just in denial,” Xane drawled.“Leastways, you are.”
“I do think about it a lot while you’re around,” Alle confessed.It earned her a smile in return.
“Does that mean I can kiss you again?”
“You know you never have to ask permission to do that?”
“But I do,” he said quietly.His smile faded from the edge, sensual lips falling back into a worrisome frown.
There was a story here.Perhaps one related to Marshall’s ridiculous exposé piece, but prying the facts out of him would have to wait.
Kisses first, and with them, the reassurance that everything was going to be okay.
Besides, it was easy to let go of everything with the rasp of his tongue playing against her lips.Alle gasped as Spook delved into her mouth, tasting her with a deft, eager touch.It made her mind wander to where that kiss might have led if they weren’t in the foyer of a global corporation.
If they were alone together, then she might lean more tightly into his body.Perhaps, clasp a hand tight around his arse.Grind herself against him instead of contenting herself with an iron grip upon his shirt.
How long until they could leave here?Until they could ditch Xane and be alone together?
Xane coughed, bringing the moment to a close.“They’re waiting.”
Theyturned out to be two junior execs and an intern, every one of them utterly non-descript enough they could have been wearing a uniform.Nevertheless, introductions were made and handshakes exchanged, before they were all guided into the lifts and herded into a clinically dull meeting room on the fifth floor.Magnolia walls, too much glass, Formica tables, and a ghastly, not quite aubergine-coloured carpet that smelled of plastic.
Alle wrinkled her nose.It was whenever she stepped into the offices of any of the big international recording conglomerates that she remembered why she liked working for the pint-sized studios.They, at least, had personality.
“The photographer’s coming in an hour,” the intern, who appeared to be chief spokesperson, informed them.“Meanwhile, we thought you could make a start on these.”About a zillion CD cases were stacked in boxes along the back wall of the room.One had been opened, the contents piled on the table beside a selection of marker pens.
Neither man made a sound, but that didn’t mean she didn’t hear their groans.
“Company policy is that there are no hot drinks in the office space.Water only.”The female junior gave a nod in the direction of the water dispenser with its cylinder of white plastic cups.“Do please shout if there’s anything you require, otherwise, one of us will be back once the photographer is ready for you.”
“They really know how to spoil you, don’t they?”Alle said once the door was shut, leaving just the three of them again.“No coffee, not even a smile, and a room that smells of carpet glue.”
“Being left to get on with it is usually a good thing.”Xane reached for the first stack of CDs, and grabbed a silver pen.He chucked a second copper hued marker at Spook.“Box each and then swap?”
Spook nodded.He took a seat, and pulled Alle into the chair next to his.He worked one handed so he could hold onto her.That lasted until they both had sweaty palms, and then they reluctantly let go with dual sighs.
Alle watched the two men work for several minutes.The silence was uneasy.It made her anxiety prickle back to life.Spook looked desperately drawn around the eyes.At a guess, he’d barely slept since she’d seen him.He’d been plagued by nightmares even before the Marshall/Bang!debacle.She prayed the events of the last week hadn’t tipped him over into actual insomnia.
“How come it’s just the two of you scrawling signatures on things?”
“We’re the most important,” Xane deadpanned.
Alle squinted, not sure if he was serious.She found Xane difficult to read, especially when he was hiding behind his alien-esque contact lenses.In her experience, he could be dangerously irreverent one minute and deadly serious the next, and while the media liked to portray him as a super arrogant type with a messiah complex, she wasn’t convinced that was the real Xane at all.As to what was—she couldn’t pinpoint that either.
Spook looked up and caught her eye.“We were the ones available.The rest of the guys had better things to do.”
“Really?But what better thing could they possibly have to do than signing ten thousand CDs while being deprived of coffee?”
She received two glares in response to her sarcasm.
“Watch it, Hutton,” Xane snipped.“Your boyfriend’s mean when he’s deprived of his caffeine drip.”
