Happy New Year! Hope everyone has a wonderful start to 2015.
As The Season Changes
Chapter Seven
Keigo pushed away the paperwork he'd been trying to concentrate on for three hours. Damn her. He was his mistress, for Christ's sake. What in the hell did she want? He'd never had a mistress who made him feel as if he were jumping through flaming hoops. And she did it seemingly without guile.
He'd become used to her waiting for him at his house in the evening. Used to the novelty of helping her prepare a meal in his kitchen. Damn well complacent about having her in his bed at night. He felt annoyingly uncomfortable making Ai get up to go home. Usually he left the woman right after sex. But she refused to let him sleep at her place.
Somehow, spending the entire night with a woman had always implied an intimacy he'd never wanted, a level of trust he'd never experienced. This way the sex act was easy—fast, satisfying and impersonal. Intimacy was different. Intimacy required vulnerability, loss of control.
It was probably a good thing the affair with Saotome Aiko was over.
Keigo had walked into her apartment. She'd given him a key last month, the day after Billy, although this was the first time he'd used it. She was standing at her desk with headphones plugged into the computer. He slowly walked to stand behind her, when she took a step back and smack into his body.
"Keigo." She turned in his arms. And before she could say anything more, his mouth came down hungrily on hers as he angled her head for a perfect fit. Ai wound her arms around his neck, pulling him closer. She made a soft sound of pleasure as his hands slid under her shirt and found bare skin.
"What are you doing here?"
"If it's not obvious then my technique is lacking something," Keigo said dryly. "I came to invite you do dinner. How about Thai tonight?"
"Great." Ai unwound her arms. She hit the save button on her computer and strolled across the room, then plunked down in her seat. "I love Thai."
Her home was decorated in all the colors she loved. The sunshine-yellow canvas sofa was strewn with plush pillows in blues and reds and parrot green. Various clay pots held grasses and twigs. A large brass spittoon on her table held the mixed bouquet of iris and daffodils Keigo had sent her a few days ago. The apartment was a comfortable blend of antiques coupled with very modern amenities.
"Good, because we'll be eating that Thai meal in Fiji."
She paused. As if taking a moment to process what he had just said. "Not we, Keigo."
His lips tightened. "Part of our agreement, Ai, was that you would be available to accompany me on my business trips. I'm leaving in two hours. Don't bother packing much. You'll have ample time to shop."
"Please don't tell me what to do, Keigo. I said no, and I mean it."
Keigo used shopping trips like a carrot at the end of a stick. Shopping had been an inducement to his other mistresses. And he was observant enough to know that that trick didn't work on Ai. He supposed he should be grateful that she wasn't enticed by the same baubles as his former mistresses.
"I have plenty of clothes—that's not the point. You'll have to give me more than a couple of hours notice for these trips. I have a job that requires my attention and bosses who depend on me to carry my share of the work."
He hadn't liked it when she'd refused the BMW he'd had delivered a few weeks ago either. He didn't understand her insistence in driving an ancient Toyota, just like he couldn't understand the why of many things pertaining to her. She comes from a family of wealth and prestige, though she does not flaunt her money the way he does, there's no need for her to work a single day of her life. Yet she chooses to.
His face rigid, Keigo dug his hands into his pockets.
She gentled her voice. "I enjoy being with you, you know that. But I can't take a few days off unexpectedly." She rose and put her arms around his neck. Despite his obvious reluctance to be cajoled, he dipped his head and accepted her kiss.
Keigo felt the stiffness in his shoulders gradually ease. Her lips felt warm, alive. That she could make him melt in her arms, to respond to her without restraint. He didn't want to analyze why, but with every breath he took, he didn't like that she had this much power over him.
She moaned into his mouth and Keigo's arm tightened around her back, drawing her up and onto her toes, one hand buried in her hair. He heard the anchoring pencils fall onto the floor, Keigo bent her backward like a bow, his teeth nipping ravenously on her lower lip.
Suddenly he gripped her wrists and brought them from around his neck and took a step back. His fingers imprisoned the delicate bones. "Come with me, Ai."
"No. I'm sorry you're disappointed, Keigo. But I have a life, too. My show is important, and when I make a commitment, I damn well keep it."
"You have a commitment..." he said harshly, his fingers flexing on her wrists, gripping her then letting her go. "To me. Which is far more important."
"My radio network is a long-term commitment, Keigo. By next January you won't even remember my name. I'll be mistress number—" she waved her hand "—whatever."
"I'll be gone fourteen days." Keigo searched her face, having no idea what he was looking for. Capitulation?
"Have a safe trip."
There was a long paused. Keigo closed his eyes and sighed inwardly. He hardened his heart. He had a bad habit of believing he knew what she was thinking and invariably ended up being wrong.
"I beg no woman, Ai." Keigo stated in a voice sharp enough to chip ice. He strode to the door and reached for the doorknob. "You only had to tell me once. I won't ask you again."
"Keigo—" The door shut quietly behind him.
Keigo stared at the clouds drifting by the window of his 727. The pressurized cabin was cool, the way he liked it.
From hidden speakers came the faint sound of a dreamy Brahms waltz. Something Ai would love to dance to, her slender body pressed against his chest, her arms stealing up around his neck, her fragrant hair tickling his chin as she hummed along, out of tune, with the music.
That annoyed him. Keigo called over a flight attendant and ordered her to switch the music.
He'd been forced to be emotionally independent early in life. He'd learned the lesson well. It was damn hard for him to trust anyone. But, damn it, he wanted to trust Ai. He wanted it badly enough to relax his guard once in a while, like a dog belly-crawling for a pat instead of the stick.
Keigo laid his head back against the velvety nap of his seat and squeezed his eyes shut against the headache starting to throb in his temples.
How dare she presume that he would come running back when she clicked her fingers. Like a goddamn lap-dog. He didn't need her. He didn't need any woman, least of all her. She complained, never complied, she was too wild and unpredictable.
He wished he'd never met her. Never tasted her soft, pouty mouth, never held her in his arms or felt her velvety skin beneath his hand. Never had her slick and panting under him crying his name as her slender body convulsed time and again.
He shifted in his seat. Keigo cursed, he shouldn't have thought of that.
He'd left Ai five hours ago and already his body ached for her. Keigo gripped the armrests with fingers that turned white. He was getting too involved. It wasn't emotional, of course. But his body craved hers like a drug. He'd never before bedded a woman as sexually compatible. That was all it was.
If any one of a number of other mistresses in the past had done to him what Ai had done today, that would have been the last time he'd have seen her.
He hadn't become a millionaire by being dictated to by anyone. He called the shots and people obeyed or were eliminated from his equations. He made a thousand competent decisions a day. Had thousands of people working for him who considered his word law. Saotome Aiko was dangerous. She reminded him of things he'd never had.
Wrong.
She didn't remind of things he's never had. She reminded him of the things he has had but lost, of how his life had once been. For a small moment, Keigo allowed himself to traverse in the past. To the first time he met Aiko.
She'd been five and he could still clearly picture those large innocent eyes looking up at him in wonder. She had followed him everywhere with that big silly smile on her face and chattering nonstop. He'd been annoyed at his inability to understand some of the words she was saying. She spoke only Japanese, and he—having grown up speaking primarily English—was still learning his father's native tongue.
Keigo pushed himself upright and drew the papers on his desk closer. To hell with Aiko. She wasn't worth all this introspection. When he said jump to a mistress, she sure as hell better ask how high.
He paused, his eyes on the phone at his left hand. He could call her and give her one more chance. He'd make sure she understood she'd been given a reprieve. It was damn inconvenient when he was so busy to be looking for another bed partner.
Keigo picked up the phone.
ATSC
Juggling two bags of groceries Ai managed to open the door into her apartment, as the phone started ringing. Rushing, she set the bags down. Her heart gave an illogical leap. Keigo. Apples rolled from the bag and her eggs landed, box open, to splatter on the wooden floor. The second her hand touched the receiver the ringing stopped.
Ai picked up the phone anyway. For a moment she stood there, eggs slithering across her clean floor as she clasped the phone and its dial tone to her chest. Her heart was beating much too fast for a short spring across her living area.
Ai carefully hung up the phone.
She went to clean up the egg mess and put away the food. All the while thinking of the events that happened that morning.
It had been hours since Keigo left her place. He'd come in wearing a dark business suit, with a teal tie and his hair brushed back, he looked immaculate, efficient and cool. As usual. Whilst she had look like hell with her hair haphazardly piled on top of her head and anchored with a couple of pencils. She hadn't worn any makeup and was dressed in black leggings and her favorite red shirt which came to her knees. Ai hadn't expected him. Usually at that time of day he was entrenched in his office. She'd left him sleeping at 3:00 am and then seven hours later, he was insisting she pack for a trip to Thailand and leave within hours. He hadn't said a word about it last night.
His eyes had been cool, aloof. But she knew he was ticked off by her refusal to go. And now, too late, Ai recalled how tired he had looked. Not a hair was out of place and no wrinkle had marked his impeccable suit or crisp white shirt but lines of fatigue were clearly visible on his face. The man worked too long and too hard.
She sighed and walked upstairs to her bedroom. There wasn't a needy bone in this man's body. If Keigo wanted her in Thailand, it was for his convenience.
Ai knew all she wanted to know about Atobe Keigo. He was impatient, arrogant, dictatorial and rude. He was also generous, insightful and an incredible lover. She groaned. She had told her friend the relationship with Keigo wasn't personal, but it was becoming more personal by the day.
It was becoming too easy to be touched by him. Far to enjoyable to have his mouth explore hers.
She didn't like it. He had one purpose for being in her life, and one purpose only. She couldn't lose sight of the whole point of this exercise. There was no use weeping and wailing and pounding her breast. She'd keep doing it until she got it right.
ATSC
Keigo had not called once in the three weeks he'd been gone. There had been an unusual amount of hangups—people not leaving messages. But Ai knew that Keigo would always have something pithy to say to her machine when she wasn't there. The hang-ups were just coincidences.
Keigo's absence was intolerable. Damn him, the least he could have done was call. He'd been gone a week longer than he'd said.
The enormous black wrought-iron gates slid open, as she drove her five-year-old Toyota up the herringbone brick driveway to the house.
Keigo's home was a two-story English designed set on six acres of prime real estate just north of Tokyo. Behind the stone wall surrounding the property, emerald green lawns and deep flowers beds, filled with brilliant profusion of spring bulbs, lined the long entry to Keigo's very private estate.
The weeks he'd been gone had crept by, no matter how busy she kept herself. He hadn't even bothered to call her himself this morning. One of his secretaries had called and set up the 'appointment' for Thursday evening at seven. Typical Keigo. He was still mad that she hadn't gone with him. Ai wasn't going to tell him how close she'd been to hopping a commercial jet and surprising him.
She parked beside a brilliant bed of pink parrot tulips. The crisp breeze played with her hem as she hopped out of the car. Perhaps she should have worn something a little more conservative. Ai grinned to herself. She looked like a wild gypsy with the brilliantly colored, ankle-length, ruffled skirt and off-the-shoulder blouse, but she'd changed so many times before coming, she finally decided she needed the added confidence of the bright colors.
Her hair was its usual curly tangle around her shoulders and the air currents ruffled through it as Ai sprinted up the shallow brick steps curving up to the massive black front doors, which were slightly ajar. She stepped into the dim entry hall checkered in black-and-gray Italian marble.
She'd been here so many times, she knew her way around the mansion by heart. And just as before she felt like redecorating the house out of it's official corporate mold. She'd love to bring in bold colors, teal and sienna, gold and royal purple. She'd strip the tall windows of their fussy layers of draperies. Let the sunlight pour in to warm both house and man. If she hadn't loved producing radio broadcasts, she'd definitely had become an interior designer.
Ai's heels clicked across the marble, clacked on the polished wooden floor, and then became muffled on the thick burgundy carpet of the formal living room. Every one of Keigo's homes carried the same corporate colors of his office, planes and yachts included.
Keigo stood at the windows at the far end of the room overlooking the rose garden. Outside, the gardeners had turned on the sprinkler system. Water sparkled in lazy swoops across the freshly mowed lawn. Other than dropping the sheer back across the window, he didn't acknowledge her arrival.
"I'm here," she said unnecessarily, tossing her purse onto the white brocade sofa and stepping up behind him. Her heart suddenly pounded with anticipation, her mouth dry. Obviously her body had made up her mind for her.
He didn't turn around as she slid her arms around his waist. His stomach contracted, his only acknowledgment. Rock hard under her fingertips, his skin felt warm, alive. Ai rested her cheek against his broad back. "How was your trip?"
"Profitable."
"Did you get any rest?" Ai felt the exhaustion dragging at his shoulders beneath her cheek.
"I'm not a child. I know my own limitations."
"No, you don't," Ai scolded as she felt his stomach clench under hands. "You push yourself to the very edge. One day you should play hooky with me and smell the roses."
"I suggested that, you declined."
"Thailand?" Ai tried to turn his large body. He remained like a blasted rock. "It wouldn't have been playing hooky, Keigo. You probably worked eighteen-hour days, and I would have been sightseeing and waiting in a hotel room for you to come to me." Ai ran her hands up his flat stomach, pressing a series of kissing on his suited back. "Come upstairs, and I'll help you relax."
"Is sex all you think about, Ai?"
Ai gave a soft, incredulous snort of laughter. "Talk about the pot calling the kettle black." He had no idea how close to the truth he was.
"We've been apart for three weeks, and all you can think about is going upstairs and having sex."
The smiled died on Ai's face. "Good Lord. You're serious." She moved a step away from him. "Keigo, I can tell how exhausted you are. I just wanted to help you relax. That doesn't always mean we have to make love."
"Have sex."
"Make love, damn it. I missed you more than you'll ever know. And that had nothing to do with sex." Oh God. Where had that come from? Ai thought, panicked.
"I don't want you to love me."
"I know." Ai squeezed her eyes shut. I'm trying not to.
"And I'll never love you. From observation, love isn't all it's cracked up to be. It binds you, strips away your pride and strength with nothing in return."
"You've had more experience. I'll take your word for it," Ai hedged. "But I did miss you holding me. Turn around. Kiss me. Please, Keigo." Her voice sounded thick. Her heart took up a dull, heavy beat as he remained facing the window before turning around slowly. He looked down into her upturned face, using a finger to trace the curve of her cheek.
The feel of his fingers on her face was unbearably tender. A contradiction to the rock hard look in his blue eyes.
"Did you miss me, Ai?"
"Yes. Very much." She ached for him to wrap his arms around her, to hold her close to his broad chest. She uselessly yearned to have him welcome her into his arms. Every time they were apart, it seemed to Ai as if they had to start again from square one.
He dropped his hand from her face, reaching into his jacket pocket and withdrawing a glossy black paper bag with gold corded handles. "Here."
She looked at the bag. Jewelry wasn't what she wanted from him. "I told you I don't want you to keep buying me things, Keigo." She refused to take it from him. "Don't make me feel... cheap."
He ran his knuckle down her cheek as he stared down at her meditatively. "No, you're not cheap, are you, Ai?"
"I'll stay for as long as it suits us both, but I won't be bought." Her cheek was immediately cold as he dropped his hand.
"Just open the damn thing. It's no big deal."
Ai didn't care about the present. Why hadn't he kissed her? Was this his way of punishing her for not joining him on his trip? She absently took the bag from him, and inserted her hand into the iridescent, gossamer-thin paper inside.
She pulled out a delicate rose quartz box the size of her palm. It was crusted with pearls, what looked like pink diamonds and intricately woven gold leaves. It was feminine, delicate and quite unlike anything he'd give her before.
"It's exquisite." Ai looked up at him. Please don't just stand there with that hateful cold look on your face. "Thank—"
"Go upstairs and wait for me," he said coldly. "I have to make a few calls."
Ai gave him a narrow-eyed look before turning on her heel and leaving the room. She left a drift of joy and disappointment in the room behind her like an invisible ghost.
He should have given her more diamonds. She'd liked the earrings he'd given her before. He'd been thinking of her when he saw the tiny jeweled box. But Keigo'd seen the disappointment in her eyes when she'd pulled out the damned box. She'd expected jewelry. Something she could wear and show off. Damn. He rubbed the ache between his eyes.
He'd watched her bounce in, her bright figure reflected in the small mirror on the wall beside him. He squeezed his eyes shut as her fragrance drifted closer and closer. God, when she'd walked in, he hadn't been able to turn around without making an absolute ass of himself.
If he had, he would've grabbed her and held on tightly. He would've inhaled the sweet familiar scent of her hair and brushed his mouth across her velvety cheek. He'd ached so, missing her.
His need for her was alarming. What the hell was this? It was more than sex. He was addicted to the taste and feel of Ai. Addicted to the touch of her hands. Hell, he didn't care where she touched him. Didn't care whether it was sexual or not. He wanted her hands on him. Who would have thought that touching could become so damn addictive?
It was easy for Keigo to express himself with sex. Sex was physical, immediate, the meaning unmistakable. His insatiable desire for Ai was a clear indication of his... Keigo grit his teeth. What? God only knew, nothing as clear cut and simple as physical desire described what he felt for the infuriating woman upstairs.
He didn't understand this emotional churning, or the mental upheaval of titanic proportions he'd been experiencing in months since he'd seen her. Instinct warned he was in way over his head and sinking fast.
He glanced at his watch. Eleven minutes had passed. He turned for the stairs, warning himself to slow down and not appear more eager than was financially advisable. The woman turned him inside out, but she didn't have to know it.
Keigo winced when he recalled his crude question to her about just thinking about sex. Hell. He was the one who thought of nothing else. He walked slowly up the curving staircase, his footsteps as heavy as the frozen rock in his chest.
Only the light beside the bed broke the darkness. The room was empty. He could hear water running in the bathroom. Keigo shrugged out of his suit jacket and loosened his tie. He and Ai had never taken a bath together. Their coupling was always too fast and hard to waste a moment. Keigo felt his arousal despite the bone-weary exhaustion that dragged at his shoulders and made every step seem a mile.
He envisioned Ai up to her chest in foaming water, holding out her arms to him wearing bubbles and a smile. He moved into the luxuriously appointed bathroom.
She was still fully clothed. The brilliant orange, red and yellow skirt trailed onto the black-tiled floor as she sat on the top step near the edge of the tub, her fingers testing the water.
"You're not naked," he said more harshly than he intended. Steam had filmed her face and neck with a pearlescent glow.
"Not yet." She stood and wiped her hands on a towel she'd draped on the heated rack next to the sunken tub. She moved towards him with that lithe, catlike grace that made his mouth water. Her fingers finished loosening his tie, tossing it behind him.
She stripped off his shirt, tossing it the way of his tie. Her hands felt cool against his stomach as she unbuttoned, unzipped and managed to draw down his shorts with his pants.
"What d—"
Ai stopped him midword. "Keigo?" She curved her palm against his cheek.
"What!"
"You're behaving like a jerk." She reached up on her tiptoes and gently kissed his mouth. "I know you're tired. Just don't say anything for a while, yes? Tonight, let me be a friend, even if you are behaving like an ass." She methodically removed the rest of his clothing. "The closer we get, the harder you try to push me away. Sometimes you push too hard and it hurts. So, tonight we'll just be friends."
How had she known he'd been struggling? How was she able to see through to him? Keigo bracketed her face with both hands, closed his eyes as if in pain and then opened them to look down at her.
Ai pulled his head closer, kissing him open-mouthed. He buried his fingers in her hair, swiftly turned the kiss into a prolonged, nonverbal apology.
Eager for her taste, Keigo allowed Ai to take the initiative. Her tongue slicked along the seam of his lips and he opened his mouth to her. She tasted achingly familiar. For a moment, he couldn't bear to move as she brushed her soft lips over his and tasted him with her tongue.
She angled her head and tunneled her fingers though his hair, holing him where she needed him, not that he was going anywhere. She kissed him back boldly, aggressively. Her tongue mated and dueled with his.
They were both breathing hard when she lifted her head.
His forehead dropped to rest on hers, and his arms looped around her slender waist, "I know I don't always respond to you appropriately, but can we be 'friends later?" he murmured roughly.
TBC...
