I rapidly untie the bow, unravelling it from the shoe-sized box which might contain anything. But,quelle surpris, it actually contains a pair of shoes. There’s also a card, so no need to guess who these are from. Though if I find the previous occupant of this suite left a pair of Olivia-sized shoes behind by mistake, then too bad. Finders keepers!
I pull out the card and read it.
Olivia,
I hope you’ll enjoy this four-hundred-pound pair of shoes, bought for no good reason other than I wanted to. And just because I can.
Your turn soon.
Beckett.
Despite our earlier exchanges, I find myself smiling as I recall the conversation including those same words.
It doesn’t make me a bad person to want nice things.
Maybe he’s trying to remind me. Or maybe it’s a gift for the pure sake of gifting. Whatever it is, I’m not going to read into it too deeply. But I am strangely touched all the same.
And something else I know? These shoes cost way more than £400. I saw them in Selfridges two weeks ago. Okay, coveted them. But two weeks ago, I would no more have been able to buy a pair of shoes as frivolous as these as I would have booked a night in a hotel like this. But in a few short hours, I’ll be able to buy all the ridiculous footwear I want.
No more nagging sense of dread at what will become. No more avoiding calls from the accountant. No more scrimping and scraping to get by or worrying about where my next month’s rent will come from. No facing the team to tell them I can’t pay them anymore. I can breathe easy. Buy fucking shoes.
I’ll just have to learn to live with myself.
As I glance down at the shoe in my hand, running my fingers over the kid-soft leather and frivolous ribbon, I think I can.
Chapter 19
OLIVIA
Forty-five minutes later, and fifteen minutes before I decide to go down to the lobby to meet Beckett—because there’s no sense in him coming to me—I hear one of the outer doors open and his deep voice calling my name. ‘Are you ready?’
‘Nearly,’ I call back, smiling ridiculously to myself.It seems I was wrong. Maybe the mountain sometimes does move for Mohammed. ‘I’m in the bedroom.’ Turning back to the floor-length mirror, I continue fixing my hair.
‘You’re in the wrong one.’ His deep voice pulls my attention to where he stands in the doorway.
‘Sorry?’
‘The bed in this room is smaller.’
My stomach turns over I glance at it, then swallow.
He’s saying we’re going to need a big bed.
Is that for what I think he means or for something else?
Maybe he wriggles in his sleep, or snores, or—’
‘Relax.’ In a moment, he’s behind me, his hands resting against the curves of my hips. Always so handsome and proper in a suit, there’s just something about the shadow of scruff on his jaw that lifts the whole effect. Something that deepens the suggestion of rakishness. And when he presses his lips against my cheek, something bursts inside me, something suddenly yearning and slick.
‘I am calm,’ I whisper to our reflections.Even though I appear to be pulling a face.‘I’m mostly calm.’ I might be calmer if he wasn’t touching me. I might be calmer once we’ve done the dirty deed. As it is, just having him near feels all kinds of illicit.And just not enough.‘My bag was already in this room when I got here,’ I continue, almost babbling. ‘And I didn’t want to presume.’
One delusory eyebrow lifts. ‘You didn’t want to presume I’d want you in my bed? On the night of our wedding?’
‘Fake wedding—’
‘Real wedding,’ he corrects with a squeeze of my hips. ‘Real wedding night. That was the deal.’
That sounds so wrong. Why can’t he just say fucking?
