Swallowing hard, Sylvie took it from him.
‘You could have posted it to me,’ she told him in a small voice.
‘Alex wanted it delivered in person.’
‘It’s a long drive... I could... Would you like something to drink...to eat...?’
‘Coffee will be fine,’ Ran told her shortly, following her as she automatically started to walk into her small living room.
The bottle of wine Wayne had brought with him was still on the table, her own glass nearly empty, and Sylvie saw the hard look Ran gave it as he walked past her work table.
A wooden divider separated the living room end of the room from the small kitchenette, and Ran leaned against it as Sylvie bustled about making them both a cup of coffee.
‘You’ve lost weight,’ Ran told her abruptly when she finally handed him his mug. ‘It is just sex this friend of yours is dealing in, isn’t it, Sylvie...?’
As the meaning of his words sank in Sylvie put down her own mug of coffee, her face burning with indignation.
‘I’m not taking drugs, if that’s what you’re suggesting,’ she told him angrily. ‘I’m not that stupid, Ran.’
She closed her eyes momentarily, thinking painfully of David and the waste of his young life. No, drugs would never be something she would be tempted to use, and it hurt her that Ran thought she might.
The buoyancy and joy she had felt earlier had all gone, evaporated, burned away in the raw heat of Ran’s anger and contempt. Suddenly she felt slightly tired and sick—the combination of no food, alcohol and too much painful emotion, she guessed miserably.
As tears filled her eyes she reached out impulsively, her fingers curling round the soft fabric of his shirt as she pleaded despairingly, ‘Ran, why does it have to be like this between us? Why...can’t we be friends...?’
‘Friends...?’
She shrank back as she heard the bitterness in his voice.
‘And what kind of friendship do you propose that we should have, Sylvie? The same kind you share with your friend who’s just left? What’s wrong? Isn’t he satisfying you in bed? Do you need someone to compare him with? Because if so...’
Sylvie had had enough.
‘That’s not what I meant at all,’ she cried out. ‘I hate you, Ran... I hate you,’ she told him tearfully, the child surfacing over the adult she had wanted to be...had wanted him to see... as she pummelled furiously at his chest, desperate to break down the barrier he had thrown up between them.
‘Sylvie, stop it.’
As Ran caught hold of her small fists and held her away from him Sylvie realised what she was doing. Shamefaced, she started to look away from him, tensing in his hold when she heard him curse softly under his breath, and then suddenly he was sliding one hand into her hair, holding her head still as he bent his own towards hers, his breath fanning hotly against her face, her lips, his mouth...
His mouth!
In the shock of feeling Ran’s mouth actually caressing her own, Sylvie immediately forgot everything which had preceded it—their quarrel, his anger and contempt—and remembered only her love for him!
Instinctively she moved closer to him, opening her mouth beneath his, responding joyously and passionately to his kiss, naively believing that despite everything that had happened he must care for her after all; he couldn’t be kissing her like this and not do so, could he?
Innocently she pressed her body even closer to his, shivering in ecstatic pleasure as she felt her own response to his nearness. Beneath Alex’s shirt, her breasts swelled and hardened; blissfully she anticipated Ran touching them, caressing them.
‘Ran.’
His name was a soft plea whispered against his lips, her tongue-tip delicately touching them, exploring, tasting. She could feel him shuddering against her and, greatly daring, she darted her tongue into his mouth, seeking and then finding his, motivated, driven by instinct rather than knowledge; but the effect of her innocent exploration on Ran was so explosive that initially it took her off guard, half shocking and wholly exciting her. His hands started to move possessively over her body, down her back, shaping her waist and then moving lower to urge her lower body even closer to his as his tongue lunged repeatedly into the soft moistness of her mouth, carrying her inexorably to the point where she no longer had any control over either her emotions or her physical responsiveness to him, teaching her just what a world of difference existed between her own shyly tentative exploration of his mouth and his passionate male possession of hers.
Against her body she could feel the hard outline of his, and her whole body burned with virginal excitement as it registered and recognised the sensual heat of his physical arousal; the reality of what was happening between them rolled over her, engulfing and totally possessing her as she gave herself up willingly to its domination. She wanted to see him, touch him, taste him, absorb the reality of him with every single one of her senses. She wanted, needed, craved, to be fully a part of him; to have her whole body melt in the heat of their mutual passion so that she could be totally absorbed into him. She wanted...
With a small moan she wrenched herself away from him, her whole body trembling as she looked into his eyes and told him, begged him, ‘Ran... Not here... I want... Take me to bed...’ she whispered, her face flaming with the directness of her own request. But there was pride in her eyes, not shame, as she looked at him. Why should she feel ashamed of loving him so much? After all, he was the one who had kissed her... held her...
‘Sylvie...’
The unexpected harshness in Ran’s voice unnerved her a little, but she refused to pay any heed to it. Instead she walked up to him and, holding his eyes, very deliberately reached out and touched his body, intimately, there, just where she could see the way his arousal, his erection, was straining against his jeans.