At the Billionaire's Bidding Read online

  Connor didn’t need much more of an invitation, but he needed to be sure she was ready for him, so he slipped an investigative finger beneath the lace—and found liquid, molten heat. With his eyes still focused on hers, he watched her eyelids grow heavy, saw her arching her head back from him as she moaned again.

  He’d known it would be like this with them, hadn’t he? Had known it from the moment he had seen her on the dance floor of that small bar his first night in Galway. The first time had been unforgettable, but this was unforgettable on a whole new level. Who wouldn’t want a woman like this?

  ‘I remember this.’

  He stepped in closer again, his finger sliding back and forth inside her as she arched into his touch. ‘I remember what it felt like to have you naked against me.’

  Shannon’s head dropped back further, her body bowing up from the counter as she made small sighs and gasps of pleasure.

  ‘I remember those noises you’re making right now.’

  Using his knuckles to stretch the lace a little more, he ran his fingertip up and circled her—the touch eliciting an upward buck of her hips towards him.

  She rocked forwards, her forehead against his chest as she gasped out, ‘Please tell me you have a condom with you.’

  ‘In my wallet—back pocket. Lift your hips for me.’

  It seemed to take for ever for her to find the condom in his wallet, while he took an equal amount of for ever slowly removing the last scrap of lace from her body. And all the while Shannon had her head tilted back enough for her glorious curls of long blonde hair to cascade over her shoulders while she smiled up at him.

  And Connor suddenly realized that that wasn’t an echo of an image from his memory.

  This one was new. Last time she had had that sultry outfit on so that he hadn’t been looking at Shannon, not really, just glimpses of her. This time he could see the corkscrew curl he was so fond of plastered against her damp cheek, he could see the smile on her swollen lips, the slow blinking of her stunning green eyes. He wasn’t looking at a fantasy version of Shannon. This time she was trusting herself to him completely.

  And he felt ridiculously humbled by that.

  Smiling down at her, he reached forward to take the foil packet from her fingers. But Shannon shook her head, her hair moving in waves as she damped her lips again.

  ‘I’ll do it.’

  ‘That’s not a good idea. I’m hanging by a thread here as it is.’

  She shook her head again.

  Shedding his jeans and boxers he grasped hold of the counter on either side of her, his arms flexing as he gritted his teeth to fight for control while she rolled the condom onto him, her eyes focused completely on the task. ‘It’s always going to be a battle of wills with us, even over the little things, isn’t it?’

  She tilted her head forwards, her lips against the taut column of his neck as her small hand encircled his raging erection. ‘Nothing little about it.’

  Sidling forwards on the counter, her heels brushing up the back of his calves, she shook her hair back and looked up at him, her eyes studying his for the longest time. And she held the simple unspoken contact with him as he lifted his arms, placing one hand in the small of her back and one in her hair, as he slowly slid into her slick warmth.

  Shannon drew in a long, slow gasp of air as she took in every inch of him, until he was buried as deep as he could go.

  And Connor closed his eyes for a moment, lost in the sensation of her body sheathing his.

  There was no barrier this time; her gasp wasn’t an indication of the brief pain she had experienced losing her virginity before. When he opened his eyes she was staring up at him, her hands whispering against his skin.

  For that brief moment Connor’s heart stopped. She was truly, truly amazing. It was true that no other woman had ever made him angrier. But it was also true that no other woman had ever had him so hot so fast.

  She was amazing.

  ‘I remember this too.’ He flexed his hips, drawing back until he had almost left her, then sliding back until his pelvis hit hers, tilting his head to look down as he repeated the movement, watching the way her stomach was sucked inwards every time he slid home.

  Lifting a hand from his side, she cupped the side of his face, biting down on her bottom lip as he slid back and forwards again, damping her lips before she angled his face up and drew him down for another searing kiss. ‘I remember too—all of it—this most of all.’

  Already he could feel her beginning to clamp around him, her inner muscles tightening as she got closer to release. It was the sweetest kind of torture, the answering build of tension in his abdomen, the most basic of male responses. But with Shannon tearing her mouth from his to rest her forehead against his chin, breathing in sharp gasps, Connor felt something else build inside him. Something he didn’t recognize; something almost painful.

  But they were too far gone for him to take time out to think about it or to try and pin a name to it while he increased the pace, heard her moans growing louder as her damp body arched back from him. So close. He was so close.

  ‘Shannon—’

  ‘I know.’ She silenced him with another kiss. ‘I know. Don’t stop.’

  She kissed him again. And again. And when he reached a hand between their slick bodies to touch a fingertip to her sensitive nub, she cried out against his mouth, her body convulsing inside and out as her release pulled him over the edge.

  And she kissed him again. And on and on until they both had to stop for breath, foreheads touching, eyes fixed on each other’s. Then, as the rippling sensations ebbed, Connor smiled again, slower this time, wrapping his arms around her slender frame to draw her closer against him.

  ‘Oh, yeah, definitely a fan of make-up sex.’

  Shannon laughed, her sweet breath washing cool air over his heated skin. ‘That’s just as well considering the way we argue.’

  ‘We could have been doing this for the last seven years, you know.’

  ‘No, we couldn’t.’ Her hands smoothed up his back while she tilted her head back to look up at him, wearing a more serious expression on her face. ‘But you were right; we weren’t done with this.’

  Connor frowned at her reasoning, more irritated by her swift dismissal of a potential relationship than he could ever remember being with any woman before. In fact, he’d dated women before who, if they’d even mentioned the ‘R’word, would have had him on the run pretty damn fast. But this was Shannon, and even if he hadn’t found his way in other portions of his life or even decided what in hell he was going to do with it in the long term—he knew he wanted her in it in the here and now.

  In the meantime he picked on the one thing she had said that he agreed with. ‘No, and we’re still not done.’

  When he kissed her this time it was slow and deliberate, placing a seal on his words, because he had meant them. Figuring out how to make everything work could come somewhere along the line, he reckoned.

  ‘Do you have to go or are you staying?’

  He smiled softly at the question. ‘I have to go meet some of the guys from the gym at six to go hang-gliding.’

  Shannon rolled her eyes. ‘Course you do.’

  ‘No, really, I do. We have a gym here in the city and when I visited the other day we arranged to do a team-building trip. It’s not an excuse to not stay the night.’

  She frowned in confusion. ‘You have a gym in Galway?’

  ‘Yep. And technically I still own half the business so I dropped in to see how they were doing.’

  ‘How long has it been open?’

  ‘Nearly a year.’

  ‘Did you set it up or do you hire people to do that?’

  His fingers absentmindedly played with his favourite curl while he answered. ‘I do all the set-ups for the new places. When Rory was overseas I did General Manager between the three we had but since he came home we’ve split it between us and expanded.’

  She was still frowning.

  �
��What?’

  ‘You were here when I arrived in Galway.’

  ‘Was I?’

  She nodded, then leaned forwards and kissed him again. ‘Small world. And now I’m starting to get cold.’

  ‘Maybe we should try and find all our clothes before anyone else does?’

  The idea made her laugh. And Connor laughed with her—he could just imagine how that would go down with the Briedas of her world!

  ‘It would certainly be less embarrassing than coming down here in the morning to explain, yes.’

  After another loud smacking kiss, Connor pulled away from her, bending to lift his jeans and pull on his boxers. Then together they searched around to find all the items they had discarded along the way, rewarding each rediscovered item with another kiss.

  Another thought occurred to him. ‘What are you doing on Monday night?’

  ‘We’re quiet on Monday. Why?’ Her eyes sparkled with mischief from across the room as she hauled her T-shirt over her head, her voice muffled for a second. ‘Do you have something for us to argue about so we can make up?’

  He didn’t answer for a second while he watched her breasts lift upwards as she raised her arms. Though she’d obviously lost weight at some point, judging by the almost invisible fine lines he could see on her stomach, all the varying sports and activities she had studied in America had left her more toned than she’d been before she’d left. But she still had more than enough curves to fill his eye and he looked upwards for a second to thank whoever was responsible for that.

  He assumed a straight face before she reappeared from behind her mussed hair. ‘If we get to make up after then I’ll think of something we can debate. But I have a do to go to—so come with me.’

  ‘What sort of a do?’

  He shrugged. ‘Just a do. I’d tell you more but it would take away the mystery of it. When two people have known each other as long as we have it’s important to keep working on that, I feel.’ He discovered his last shoe and pushed it on before stepping across and kissing her one last time, smiling down at her when he lifted his head. ‘So I’ll see you Monday. It’ll be a date. We never tried one of those before.’

  Shannon stared at him for a long while, the ‘something’ that had been so elusive earlier in the day briefly making a reappearance before she answered him, ‘All right. What should I wear?’

  ‘My preference will always be nothing. So I’m not the right person to ask that question.’

  CHAPTER NINE

  THE PARCEL ARRIVED Monday morning, causing quite a stir. Mainly because Shannon hadn’t been there to sign for it and it had become the focus of much debate in her absence—so that by the time she returned it had a small guard of honour.

  ‘Delivery for you, sugar lump!’ Mario beckoned her over with a rapidly gesturing hand.

  ‘And you have to open it here so we can all see what it is. The curiosity has been killing us!’

  Shannon scowled at the flat box when there was enough of a gap for her to see it. ‘I didn’t order anything.’

  ‘Honey, if this came from the shop named on the delivery docket you couldn’t afford to order anything.’

  His flare for the dramatic was almost legendary, so Shannon ignored the glee on her friend’s face and studied the box. She was almost afraid to touch it. Especially if it had come from where she thought it had come from.

  Not that he had bothered his backside picking up a phone in two days.

  Which had left her feeling more than a tad annoyed—well, furious would be more accurate. She’d been in a foul mood for most of the weekend because of it, and it hadn’t gone unnoticed either. So much for dealing with the consequences of her actions!

  ‘C’mon and open it. It might cheer you up!’

  Yep. And it was Mario who had been pointing out her mood all weekend. He’d tried to pry the gory details out of her. But she wasn’t ready to talk about Connor to anyone.

  Where would she begin?

  ‘Well, actually we had a row after the film and then great make-up sex.’

  Not that ‘great’ was the right description. Yes, the sex itself had been great there was no arguing that—it had been better than great. What had caused her almost obsessive angst ever since had been what hadn’t been so great about it. For starters she had the old sex-versus-making-love debate going on in her head…

  Two people who cared about each other didn’t just have sex. That was what it said in all the women’s magazines, right? And there was no doubt in Shannon’s mind that what they had had was great, hot, mutually satisfying sex. The tension that had been building between them from argument to argument had been based in the sexual relationship they had that obviously wasn’t over and done with yet. Just as Connor had said. It had been there ever since he’d come back—bubbling under the surface—simmering away until it had to have a natural release of some kind or another, right?

  But it wasn’t the same as the first time. When they had made love. And it hadn’t taken away the magical quality of that night, or any of the agony that had followed it.

  If anything, it had made things worse.

  Her eyes still on the box, she began to tug off her coat, walking around the counter to put it away while Mario practically danced from foot to foot with excitement.

  ‘If you don’t open that thing in the next two seconds I swear I will!’

  ‘He’s been like a child at Christmas since it arrived.’

  Shannon glanced up at the sound of a familiar voice, smiling a genuine smile when she saw the young woman’s face. ‘Hello, Mary. It’s good to see you again. How’s the baby?

  Did you bring her with you?’

  ‘Yes, she’s asleep in her pushchair—’

  ‘And you can see her after you open the box…’ Mario tapped it with his index finger.

  ‘Box—remember?’

  All eyes refocused on it while Shannon sent a silent prayer upwards that there was nothing too personal in it. Especially if it was from Connor, double especially after the make-up sex. Who knew what he might have put in there?

  With a flex of her fingers, she leaned forwards and undid the straps, lifting the lid to discover layers of tissue underneath—with an envelope on top.

  Shannon stared at it as if touching it might burn her.

  ‘Oh, for goodness’ sake!’ It was unceremoniously pushed into her hand. ‘Just read it!’

  She stepped back while she opened it. To find a familiar scrawl on a piece of white card.

  ‘For tonight Sunshine. Will be there 7.30.’

  ‘It’s from him, isn’t it?’

  ‘From who?’ Mary grinned at Mario’s beaming face. ‘Has Shannon met a man? I knew I’d miss something good while I was in hospital—it’s always the way.’

  With a deep breath, and her heart beating erratically in her chest, she stepped forwards again to push back the layer of tissue paper.

  ‘Oh, what a gorgeous dress!’ Mary and her friend oohed and ahhed before Shannon even had it out of the box, ‘It looks really expensive.’

  ‘When you have a millionaire for a boyfriend, then money’s not a problem.’ Mario peered down at the label. ‘Oh, dear, another Dior. You have a wardrobe stuffed with those already. Not.’

  As he lifted it with a flourish from the box Shannon continued to stare in silence. It was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen, even held up in front of a six-foot lunatic wearing a Gay Pride T-shirt.

  A deep emerald green, the material shimmered in the light, so soft that even the minuscule airflow in the foyer made it shift back and forth like a whisper. And it would feel like that against her skin too, wouldn’t it? Wearing that dress for the evening would be foreplay again when she was in Connor’s company.

  ‘He must be taking you somewhere nice.’

  She finally managed to mumble back an answer. ‘I have no idea. All he said was it was a

  “do”.’

  ‘If this dress is anything to go by, then I bet I know what “do�
�� he was referring to.’

  Her gaze shifted to the smug expression above the dress. ‘What is it?’

  ‘Hottest ticket in town if you move in the right circles.’ The glare she gave him was apparently enough for him to continue. ‘It’s the launch of the new wing at the museum—

  part of the celebration for Galway’s bid for European City of Culture. Your gorgeous man won’t be the only millionaire there, I bet. And with you in this dress he’ll have a job keeping them away from you.’

  Shannon shook her head, reaching out to touch the material of the dress. It was beautiful.

  The most beautiful thing anyone had ever given her. And it was from Connor. He had looked at this dress and thought of her in it. And that thought made her smile.

  Dolly Mixtures and Dior. It was a potent combination.

  ‘I don’t know that I can do this dress justice.’ She reluctantly folded it back into the box, stroking her palm over it lovingly. Connor had bought her a Dior dress. It was surreal.

  ‘I’ve never worn something this beautiful.’

  Somewhere in her furtive imagination, it briefly felt like payment for Friday night. But that was ridiculous, and she knew it was a callous thing for her to think, even for a second.

  She just felt so empty inside.

  She could pinpoint the beginning of her awareness of that emptiness to when he had told her he had been in Galway when she’d arrived there. He had probably been there for months while she’d looked for a place to live, while she’d tentatively begun to open her heart to a brand-new group of friends, while she’d tried for once to allow herself to fill the void she’d had inside ever since America.

  He’d been here in Galway, living his life without her—had maybe even passed her in the street or on a sunny day in Eyre Square and not even noticed she was there.

  When she’d purposefully picked Galway to make sure she would never have to bump into him again.

  Knowing he had been there had made her ache and that was when she had first felt the emptiness. Even when he had been inside her, filling her body and sending her spiralling off the edge, there had still been something missing—something that might have helped fill that emptiness.