Chapter 27

Chapter Twenty-Seven

" W hat a night." Ariel flopped onto a sofa, toed off her three-inch cork wedges, and rubbed her aching feet, wishing a cup of tea would miraculously appear in her hand.

"Would you like something to drink? A nice hot cup of tea perhaps?" Cooper squatted in front of her, still looking perky and gorgeous while she felt like a washed out rag.

"I knew I let you stay for a reason," she said, hating how her heart lurched at the tender expression on his face, at the way his lips curved in a smile, at the way he read her mind and knew exactly what she needed at that precise moment. "A cup of blackcurrant and apple tea would be great."

He grimaced. "That combo belongs in a kid's fruit drink."

"It's delicious. Then again, a caffeine addict like you wouldn't have a clue." She softened her dig with a smile and his answering grin warmed her from the inside out, better than a cup of tea.

"You sit tight and this clueless coffee connoisseur will bring your fruity concoction in a jiffy."

As Cooper straightened and strode away, she admired how the black denim moulded his butt and his long, lean legs. Predictably, her pulse raced and heat stole through her.

She shouldn't have let him stay.

She should've booted him out with the rest of the stragglers—an exuberant Chelsea and matchmaking Sofia—but she didn't have the energy. Besides, there was nothing he could say that would change her mind about selling the gallery and she wanted to make that clear.

Once she outlined her plans for raising the necessary funds, she had no doubt she'd see the back of Cooper Vance.

She should be rapt. Instead, an empty feeling blossomed in the vicinity of her heart and spread outward, icy tentacles of loneliness creeping through her and making her wish for all sorts of futile things.

She wished Cooper wasn't a callous businessman.

She wished they'd met under different circumstances.

Scariest of all, she wished she didn't have a huge crush on a guy who had no interest in her other than as a means to an end.

"Here we are, one cup of hot fruit punch as requested." He pretended to gag. "Gross."

Cooper handed her a steaming cup of tea and she inhaled the irresistible fruity aroma, sighing with pleasure after her first sip.

"Thanks. This is heaven," she said, tucking her feet under her and taking blissful sips while studying Cooper over the rim of her cup.

"You're easily pleased if that's your idea of heaven," he said, taking a seat next to her on the sofa, his proximity setting off warning bells in her head.

She could've scuttled away like a frightened mouse but lethargy infused her body. She simply didn't have the energy to move, or the inclination, if she were completely honest. What did she expect to happen anyway? For the guy to kiss her senseless?

You wish.

The stupid thing was, she did, and she took several gulps of hot tea to ease the sudden tightness in her throat.

"You're not having anything?"

He shook his head. "I'm fine. Are you?"

Before she could decipher what he meant, he reached across the short space separating them and skimmed his fingertips across her cheek. "You look worn out. And as gorgeous as you are without makeup, I've never seen you with dark smudges under your eyes."

"I haven't been sleeping well," she muttered, glaring at the main cause of her insomnia and wishing he'd revert to uncaring business mode.

She could handle that guy. This softer, astute version of Cooper had the power to undo her in a second.

"I'm guessing that's partly my fault, huh?"

"There's no partly about it. It's all your fault."

His eyes widened and for a confusing second, guilt flickered in his gaze, like he didn't want to kick her out from the only home she'd ever known. But that couldn't be right. He'd outlined in clear terms why she needed to sell to him, but the longer he stared at her with concern, the harder it was to stay resentful.

"Having you breathing down my neck, trying to oust me from this place hasn't been pleasant," she said, focussing on the business side of things in the hope he wouldn't delve deeper and realise there was more to her sleepless nights than worrying about the gallery's future. "It's stressful, and you're talking to a person who doesn't do stress. Yoga, yeah. Meditation, yeah. Stress, no."

He pulled away from her, a tiny frown indenting his brow. "It doesn't have to be stressful if you'd listen to reason."

Anger shot through her and she placed her near empty cup on the floor. "Reason being?"

"I'm not going to rehash old ground," he said, leaning back in his corner of the sofa and spreading his arms across the top, looking way too confident. "You know my offer is fair, considering the council can kick you out of here once the lease is up and you'll be left with nothing."

"How about I kick you out of here right now?" She leaned closer, refraining from jabbing him in the chest at the last second. "Or better yet, you finally get the message that I'm not interested in anything you have to offer, ever, and walk on out of here of your own accord?"

"You're lying." His eyes darkened to midnight as he sat forward and lowered his arms. "I think you're very interested in what I have to offer."

Her heart thudded at his loaded response, at his nearness. He smelt so good, an intoxicating blend of sandalwood and something lighter that evoked a powerful response in her. She loved scents: fresh flowers, aromatherapy oils, rain on freshly cut grass, but none of her favourite smells came close to Cooper's heady scent.

Damn him, he knew how he affected her and he was rubbing her nose in it.

She'd show him.

"You're delusional." She waved her hand as if shooing a fly. "And if you're trying to imply there's something behind our occasional flirting, forget it. We both know you're slumming it for a while, getting to know how the other half live."

His jaw clenched, his eyes narrowed, and tension radiated off him in palpable waves. She moved in for the kill. If what she said next didn't get him out of her life once and for all, nothing would.

"Don't worry, I'm a big girl, I can take it. You spend time with the eccentric artist, flirt a little, soften her up, get her to buy into your crazy scheme. I get it. It's the way you do business. Take no prisoners, tell no lies, and all that crap." She shrugged, pretending like she didn't care, while her chest tightened with regret. "Hey, no hard feelings."

Though he'd been right to accuse her of lying. At least about the feelings part. She had feelings and plenty of them. Sadly, she couldn't do anything about them. Her life was complicated enough without letting her erratic emotions join the party.

"Are you finished?" He said, his tone low, menacing.

"Actually, I haven't. I also think you're snobby, condescending, cocky, and—"

His lips crushed hers into silence and she gasped in shock, realising a second too late that opening her mouth might be construed as an invitation.

Cooper didn't hesitate, deepening the kiss, challenging her to meet him half way, coercing her with a skilful precision that took her breath away.

He wasn't the only one who liked a challenge and in the split second where reason warred with passion, she threw caution to the wind and showed him exactly who he was messing with.

Her lips clung to his, frantic, desperate, meshing in a whirlpool of hot sensation that lit a fire deep within.

Her hands took on a life of their own, skimming the wall of his rock-hard chest before sliding higher, tangling in his hair to pull his head closer, to anchor herself in a world tilting crazily out of control.

Heat streaked through her body and she leaned into him, wanting more, needing more, and as his arms slid around her, hauling her across his body to lie on top of him, logic fled; to be replaced by a deep-seated yearning that this should go on forever.

"Wow," Cooper murmured, breaking the kiss to stare into her eyes, his hands pushing the curls off her face in a gentle caress.

She couldn't fathom his bewildered expression and reality hit as he shifted slightly beneath her. Here she was, lying on top of an extremely hot guy, a guy she could easily fall for in the blink of an eye if she completely lost her mind, a guy she'd been in the process of vanquishing from her life a few moments ago, a guy who had just sent her spiralling out of control with a simple kiss.

What the hell was she doing?

Maybe the kiss hadn't been simple. It had been downright amazing, but that wasn't the point. She still needed to get rid of him, and fast. No telling what her kick-started hormones might do in the next ten seconds.

She disengaged his hands from her face and slid onto the floor in an undignified heap before leaping to her feet like some bumbling clown act in a circus. "That was an interesting diversion but I hate to tell you, it didn't work. I still want you to get out of here."

Cooper stood with a lot more grace than she had, his inscrutable expression annoying her. Couldn't the guy at least look the teensiest bit shaken by the cataclysmic kiss they'd shared?

Then again, maybe it wasn't so extraordinary for him. He probably went around kissing half the female population in Melbourne like that. And no, that sharp stab of pain in the vicinity of her heart wasn't jealousy; it had to be all the cheese she'd consumed earlier mixing with the tea to give her heartburn.

"If you don't shut up, I'm going to kiss you again until you do."

She opened her mouth with an instant rebuke but shut it quickly as he took a step towards her. Then again, the thought of more of that sensational kissing wasn't so bad…

"Good, now that I've got your attention, I want you to listen. Yes, I want this deal to go through, and yes, it's very important to me. In fact, it's more than important, it's imperative."

He paused for a moment as if searching for the right words and she waited, prepared to give him a little leeway. After all, it's the least she could do before she planted her foot on his butt and booted him out the door permanently.

"As for what's happening between you and me, it's got nothing to do with business. Do I wish you were some shrivelled up old prune that wouldn't tempt me? Yes. Do I wish I could separate business from everything about you that entices me? Yes. Do I wish I could seal this deal and not look back without remembering the curve of your smile, the fire in your eyes, the passion of your kiss? You bet."

He shook his head as if trying to clear it, but confusion clouded his eyes. "But there's no use wishing for the impossible, and right now, pretending something doesn't exist between us would be doing just that and I won't. I can't."

Ariel gaped as she absorbed what Cooper had said while he stared her down, the bad-boy businessman daring her to disagree.

She couldn't help admire that he was man enough to acknowledge the spark between them. It didn't mean she had to agree with him or encourage him, despite how her heart raced at the wonderful things he'd said about her and that he found her just as attractive as she found him.

He was still the enemy and would tear her world apart given half a chance.

A chance she had no intention of giving him.

"Got nothing to say? Come on, give it your best shot," he said, the grim glint in his eyes at odds with his sardonic smirk.

"What do you want me to say?"

Apart from the obvious: I like you, I desire you, I can easily lose my head and go crazy for you.

But she wasn't the type of girl to lose her head. She had too much at stake, too many responsibilities, starting with making the gallery a viable proposition for the next umpteenth years as Barb would've wanted.

"How about you start with the truth?"

Ariel compressed her lips, a simple defensive gesture to prevent her from blurting a host of truths Cooper wouldn't want to hear: how the couldn't quell the relentless fear that the gallery would slip through her fingers despite how hard she worked to keep it afloat, the guilt that she'd let everyone down, and the biggie of them all, how out of depth he made her feel.

So, despite her penchant for brutal honesty, she opted for the easy way out.

She lied.

"There isn't anything between us beyond the usual guy-girl chemistry. We're opposites in every way and you want something from me I can't give you, imperative or not."

Avoiding his penetrating stare, she continued. "I won't sell, you don't get what you want, and we have no reason to keep meeting like this. So let's call it quits while we're both still being civil to each other, okay?"

She expected him to bamboozle her with more convoluted arguments, similar to the ones in his long-winded business proposal, to change her mind. She expected him to pressure her, to ram home the reasons why obtaining her gallery was imperative to him.

Instead, he surprised her again. He took a step forward, invading her personal space with his overpowering presence, and she resisted the urge to lean into him, to experience the thrill of having his arms slide around her one last time and make her forget every single reason why they couldn't be together.

He placed a finger under her chin, gently tipping it up, and stared into her eyes. "You know the interesting thing about chemistry? It can lead to explosive reactions and unexpected outcomes."

She should look away.

She wanted to look away.

Instead, she stared at him like a hypnotised dummy while his thumb brushed her bottom lip with infinite tenderness and he smiled, a hot loaded smile rather than the smug smile of a guy who knew how he made her resistance melt.

"And one more thing," he said. "Chemistry was my best subject at school and I love combining elements to create combustion."

Before she could gather her wits and tell him exactly what he could do with his elements, he hauled her into his arms and kissed her with the force of a man hell-bent on proving how great he was at chemistry.

This was her last chance. Push him away, ignore all the great things he'd said about her, and forget that she hadn't had sex in three years.

Three long years.

He deepened the kiss, his hands winding through her curls, angling her head for better access, and the second his tongue touched hers, she lost it.

The point of no return.

She practically leaped on him, pushing him back against the sofa, her hands everywhere, sliding under black cotton, stroking the hot skin of his tight abs beneath.

Someone moaned, a low, sexy sound, and in the passionate haze that had invaded her brain, she had no idea if it was him or her. She didn't care. The scent of him, the feel of him, the taste of him, the sounds of ragged breathing and low moans set a spark to her latent libido and sent it up in flames in a raging inferno that promised to consume them.

"You sure about this?" Cooper broke the kiss for a second, capturing her face in his hands, staring deep into her eyes.

"Shut up and kiss me," she said, the blatant lust radiating from his too-blue gaze setting fire to any tiny residual doubt she may have harboured and sending it up in smoke.

"Your call, sweetheart."

And he did exactly as she'd instructed, with one heck of a difference.

He didn't hold back.

Their mouths clashed in a heated frenzy of lips and tongue, challenging, duelling, an erotic game where there were no losers, only winners.

Ariel sighed as his lips slid down her throat and she arched against him, bringing her into direct contact with his hard-on, his very impressive hard-on if the size of him against her belly was any indication.

"You're beautiful," he said, his lips ceasing their leisurely exploration as he swiftly unbuttoned her top and peeled it open, the anticipatory gleam in his eyes that of a guy opening the best present over.

The few times she'd had sex in the past, she'd hated the undressing part. Plagued by inadequacies growing up, they manifested at the oddest of times, like now, when she hoped her boobs weren't a disappointment and he wouldn't find her too skinny.

"Stunning," he murmured, unclipping her bra with a deft flick of his fingers and staring at her breasts as if he'd found treasure, before capturing a nipple in his mouth.

"That feels so good." She writhed beneath him, burning up from the inside, wishing their clothes would disappear.

"You feel so good."

He set about proving it, drawing his tongue slowly across her chest, sucking one nipple then the other, feasting on her like he hadn't eaten in a decade.

Ariel throbbed in so many places she didn't know whether she should shock the living daylights out of Cooper and devour him now or prolong the sweet agony and let him continue to lavish her with more of the exquisite licking and sucking that was sending her into meltdown.

"I need you," she whispered, proving how much by sliding a hand between them and cupping his cock.

Cooper tensed, muttered a very sexy curse that she had every intention of doing to him, and pulled away, his stare so searing that desire shot through her veins, her nipples pebbled, and a heaviness settled in her core.

"I need you now ."

He hovered over her, a sexy smile playing around his mouth. "You know you're bossy and sassy and thoroughly irresistible, don't you?"

"I'll show you bossy."

She surged upwards, her hands against his chest, pushing him upright against the back of the sofa so she could straddle him.

He laughed, a low, wicked sound that provoked her to show him just how bossy she could be.

She whipped his T-shirt over his head in a second, before leaning forward to nuzzle his neck and drape her hair across his bare chest. He groaned and she smiled, a self-satisfied smile of a woman who knew she had the power to drive a guy crazy.

"Think you're in charge, huh?" His hands spanned her waist, holding her in place while he shifted beneath her, leaving her in little doubt that the second their clothes vanished, she'd be in heaven.

"You ain't seen nothing yet," she said, sliding off him to kneel at his feet, her fingers making short work of his zipper and button, easing the denim down his long legs with her gaze locked on his the entire time.

His low moan turned her on.

His glazed look empowered her.

His hard-on beneath tight black boxers encouraged her to toy with the elastic, brush her fingertips against his penis, and slowly, tantalisingly, peel the cotton down his legs.

"Oh wow," she said, sitting on her heels and admiring the view as liquid heat pooled between her legs. With reverence, she reached out to stroke him, to touch him.

At last.