Cathy Kelly 6-Book Collection: Someone Like You, What She Wants, Just Between Us, Best of Friends, Always and Forever, Past Secrets

‘Aren’t you hungry?’ he asked, looking at her untouched plate.

She gave a wry smile. ‘Not really. You’ve taken my appetite away.’

Felix pulled her plate towards him and attacked that too. Hannah finished the champagne in her glass and poured more for both of them.

‘Tell me about yourself,’ she breathed.

With most people, that was a difficult request. With an actor, as Hannah was to discover, it was an invitation to declaim a speech as familiar to them as their face in the mirror each morning. Felix loved to talk about himself.

Eating hungrily and drinking big gulps of the champagne, he told her about his career and his hopes. Hannah, trying to keep up with him as far as the champagne was concerned, was enthralled.

He glossed over his youth and family. ‘I don’t talk about it,’ he said, dark eyes soulful as he gazed at hers. But he was happy to discuss everything else. At thirty-seven, he was finally on the edge of huge success. It had been a hard climb, he said, telling her about his stint in an ill-fated British soap and his first film role where his few minutes on screen had ended up on the cutting-room floor. But everything was about to change. A sitcom he had a small part in was growing in popularity and he was suddenly inundated with calls from casting agents. His time had come, Felix said proudly.

It was a life lived in the fast lane, full of parties, premieres, carousing and being one of the beautiful people. But what Felix really wanted, Hannah felt instinctively, was security. He was like her, she knew it. Something in his past had tainted him and made him yearn for a safe haven he’d never had before. She could provide it for him.

The entourage arrived anyway, blowing kisses across banquettes in the Trocadero, waving at friends and waving even more animatedly at enemies.

‘We wondered where you two sneaked off to,’ said the man in the velvet suit accusingly.

‘Privacy is important to me,’ Felix replied blandly.

The entourage sniffed and surveyed the tables beside Felix and Hannah.

‘Sit somewhere else,’ he said rudely. ‘We want to be alone.’

Normally, she’d have hated that sort of rudeness, but it was different with Felix. He was so impossibly handsome and talented that people were drawn to him and the only way to get rid of them was to be brusque.

They’d talked their throats hoarse and the second bottle was nearly empty when the waiter came with complimentary Sambuccas.

‘I couldn’t,’ giggled Hannah, eyeing the small flaming glass of liqueur. ‘I’m drunk already. I can’t imagine what I’d do if I had any more.’

There was an evil glint in Felix’s dark eyes. ‘Can’t you?’ he said.

He’d been lounging back in his chair, regarding her possessively as he ran his long fingers around the rim of his glass. Now he pulled his chair forward. She jumped slightly as she felt one of his hands on her thighs under the table, sliding and pushing her long dress up her legs.

Even in her intoxicated state, Hannah tried to stop him. There were other people around, someone might see.

‘Someone might see you,’ she said, scandalized.

‘So what?’ he enquired, one eyebrow raised sardonically. ‘Let them watch.’

Hannah looked shocked.

‘They can’t see,’ he assured her. ‘There’s a tablecloth hiding us.’

His hand finally pushed her dress up and with one long arm straining, his fingers moved up the silky skin of her thigh covered only by sheer tights. Hannah quivered as his fingers stroked her skin, only half-way up her thigh and yet, if his fingers slid even a centimetre further up, she wouldn’t be able to stop herself from crying out. She couldn’t control the erotic feeling that rushed through her. It was like being hooked up to a machine with electrodes delivering unimaginable pleasure to her erogenous zones. His hand crept further up.

‘Next time we go out, you’ll have to wear stockings,’ Felix murmured. She gasped out loud and then, just as suddenly, his hand was gone. ‘Let’s go,’ he said roughly.

He kissed her in the taxi home, nothing more. Just luscious kisses which melted her insides as his tongue explored hers. Hannah could feel her heart beating like a metronome as she led him up the stairs to her front door. She fumbled with her bunch of keys and giggled quietly at her own stupidity. Felix didn’t giggle. Finally, she managed to insert the correct key in the door and pushed.

‘It’s not Buckingham Palace…’ she began to say as she dropped her handbag on the hall table. She never got any further with her comments.

The front door closed and suddenly Felix was wrapped around her, arms clinging to her, hands probing and trying to pull off her coat. Their mouths were meshed together, lips hard against lips, tongues entwining and twisting in passion. Felix managed to rip her coat off and he began to slide her dress up her thighs. In return, she’d dragged off his jacket and was pulling at his shirt, not caring that buttons were pinging as she pulled, rattling against the floor like hailstones as they fell.

‘You’re beautiful,’ he purred, golden head moving down towards her breasts, fingers burrowing under her dress. Like exquisitely practised Riverdancers, they moved apart long enough to pull off her dress and his trousers. Suddenly remembering that she was wearing that male bugbear – tights – Hannah wrenched them off and thanked some deity she was wearing decent silky black knickers even if her bra was a boring old white cotton one. What a pity she wasn’t dressed to thrill in her coral see-through net rig-out. So she ripped off the cotton bra and looked up to find Felix, clad only in striped boxer shorts, watching her. His body was glorious: lean, rangy, golden and perfectly proportioned. She could see the outline of his erection straining against the fabric of his shorts. In one swift move, he’d grabbed her, lifted her up and carried her to the couch. Then he lay down on top of her, grinding his body into hers in triumph, running his hands over her torso, fingers kneading her erect nipples roughly, burying his mouth passionately in her hair.

‘You’re so beautiful, so sexy, I knew that the moment I saw you,’ he said hoarsely.

If he was turned on to some unbelievable level, he’d met his match in Hannah. The sexuality she’d kept under wraps for so much of her life exploded from her, like a bored tiger that had been in captivity suddenly released into a jungle throbbing with life. Their lovemaking was frantic and fierce, not the gentle, sweet lovemaking Hannah had remembered with Harry. That had been placid and comforting: this was fierce, primal and wild. Felix jammed his mouth against hers, plundering her mouth, desperate to taste every part of her. In turn, she dug her nails into his back when he jammed himself inside her, shrieking with relief at finally having his body become a part of hers. Joined together, they moaned and panted, frantic for release and just as frantic for this incredible lovemaking not to end. A sheen of perspiration coating her naked body, Hannah clung to Felix, pulling him deeper with her arms and legs, wrapping her long legs around his waist until she exploded in a firecracker of orgasm that was savage, primitive and utterly blissful.

As if he’d been waiting for her, Felix groaned, his body stiffened and he came, moaning her name over and over again until he fell on to the couch beside her, dank with sweat and exhausted.

They lay coiled together like puppies and breathed deeply. Hannah felt as if every muscle had been stretched to its limit. Her body was suffused with the glorious afterglow of orgasm and yet she felt at peace, as if this wild thing was what she was born for. Or maybe, she thought, with a pang of sheer adoration, it was Felix she was born for.

He brought her hand to his lips and kissed it softly. ‘You’re wonderful,’ he said.

‘Look who’s talking,’ joked Hannah. ‘I’m so exhausted, Felix. I’m going to fall asleep here.’

‘Bed,’ he announced, getting to his feet gracefully and holding a hand out to her.

The birds were singing some exultant song when Hannah woke the next morning with a dull throbbing in her head from too much champagne. She shifted in the bed and her arm touched Felix’s warm body. It hadn’t been a dream; she beamed with sheer joy. What was a hangover to this feeling of happiness?

Moving quietly so she wouldn’t wake him, Hannah padded naked and barefoot into the kitchen and swallowed two headache tablets with a glass of water. After another glass to slake her hangover thirst, she crept into the bathroom. Her hair was a wild bush around her head, tangled curls in all directions. Her make-up, which naturally hadn’t seen cotton wool or cleanser the night before, was in patchy scales under her eyes. Her mouth was bruised from a combination of fierce kissing and from Felix’s late-night stubble. All in all, the sort of face to normally make Hannah groan. Only, today, something shone out from behind the tiredness, the redness and the panda eyes: something delirious and fulfilled. Her eyes sparkled and her mouth refused to stop smiling. She was happy, in love! She beamed at her reflection. Love, love, love.

After restoring herself to some of her former glory and brushing her teeth until her gums hurt in case she had bad breath, Hannah slid back under the duvet and wriggled over until she was half-lying on top of him. He didn’t appear to wake up, yet one hand moved gently to cup her breast, idly caressing the nipple expertly until Hannah sighed loudly. Felix opened one eye.

‘Are you a morning sex person?’ he asked, his voice hoarse. ‘I’d have thought from last night’s performance that you were a night owl.’

In response, Hannah wriggled until she was lying completely on top of him, exulting in the amazing sensation of her cool naked body against his sleep-warmed one. ‘I think I’m an every moment of the day sort of person,’ she said.

‘Good,’ he replied, pulling her head down to meet his.

Low-angled autumn sun lit up the front of Dwyer, Dwyer & James as Hannah walked towards it, swinging her handbag happily. The office was pretty now that it had been repainted in the firm’s trademark crocus yellow and white. Hannah grinned. Everything felt pretty to her today. The dour-faced traffic warden who lingered at the bottom of the road was practically good-looking today, even though he’d given Hannah a parking ticket the week before. Being in love was a wonderful thing, she decided. Better than rose-coloured spectacles any day.

‘Morning, Hannah,’ said David James, climbing out of his silver Jag.

‘Beautiful morning, isn’t it?’ beamed Hannah.

David eyed her curiously. ‘Are you on happy pills or something?’ he teased.

‘No,’ she said, letting him open the door for her. ‘Just naturally happy, that’s all. You’ll never guess who I met last night,’ she added, knowing she shouldn’t say anything but unable to resist saying his name. ‘Felix Andretti.’

David’s brow furrowed. ‘Where?’ he asked.

‘At the theatre,’ she replied airily. ‘He seems like a nice man,’ she added, hoping for some titbit of information to drop from David’s lips.

‘He does?’ One eyebrow was raised sarcastically. ‘That doesn’t sound like the Felix I know and love,’ he remarked. ‘More of a professional playboy, I would have thought. Nice isn’t the sort of word people use about Felix. They either love him or hate him. Women love him until he dumps them, and men sometimes hate him because he’s so bloody successful with the opposite sex.’