Acting Brave (Fenbrook Academy #3) (47 page)

When we got there, though, the first thing I did was to run to Nick’s room. He wasn’t there. I cursed under my breath.

“What’s up?” asked Ryan from behind me.

“Nothing.” I put on a false smile to reassure him but, as soon as I turned and saw him, it changed into a real one. God, he looked so good, and it was finally going to happen…
but Nick, what about Nick?

I took a deep breath. I was worried about Nick, but there was nothing I could do until he either showed up or replied to one of my messages. And I finally had Ryan
right there
, strong and gorgeous, and he wanted
me.
Just for once, I decided, I was going to give myself a break. I wasn’t going to let my past ruin it. Tonight would be about us.

I showed Ryan to the living room and then went into the kitchen, my heart thumping so hard I thought it was going to jump out of my chest. I quietly closed the kitchen door. And then I took off the dress.

Jasmine was back in the driver’s seat and this is what she
did.
Ryan wasn’t going to know what hit him. I’d give him the full Jasmine Experience.

There wasn’t a mirror in the kitchen, but I took a look at myself in the handle of the oven door. Pale skin. Long red hair. Black bra and panties and gray hold ups. High, high heels, also black.
Ooh la la.
But still not enough. It needed something….

I dug in the cupboards. I had one somewhere. I’d literally never used it. Clarissa had bought it for me for a present but toast was as close to cooking as I ever got so it had remained buried ever since....
there!

I shook out the apron and put it on. Oh, wow. The front was low enough that it was just a bounty of cleavage for him and the bottom flapped around my thighs, covering me demurely at the front but leaving me completely exposed at the back. He was going to love it.

“Ryan?” I called softly. “Could you give me a hand in here for a second?”

He came through the door—God, he was so big I was surprised he didn’t have to duck his head. And, for the second time that night, his jaw dropped.

I put one hand on my hip and gave a little wiggle. Then I made my voice low and throaty and looked up at him through half-closed eyes. “I think I burned the muffins,” I husked. “I’ve been a
bad
girl.”

His eyes took in my breasts, bulging over the top of the apron. My hips and ass, their curves exaggerated by my pose. My long, nylon-clad legs.

“Maybe you should spank me,” I drawled.

His mouth opened and closed a few times, but nothing came out.
Hmm. Maybe he prefers the good girls. He is a cop, after all.
I stood upright and let my eyes go big, the picture of innocence. “I’m so
messy!”
I trilled in a good approximation of a British accent. “I’ve got cake mixture
all over
myself!” I moved a little closer to him and started to lick my fingers clean.

“I—” said Ryan. “Um…”

Hmm.
He didn’t like slutty cook or posh British cook. Maybe...ah! I had it. I stepped right up to him and then turned around so my back was to him. “Untie my apron,” I told him.

I felt the apron strings pull tight, then loosen as he undid the knot. I lifted it over my head and tossed it on the counter, then turned to him. He drew in a breath as he saw me in just my underwear.

“Now,” I said. “My name’s...
Gwen.
And you’ve just caught me selling my body in an alley.” I changed tone, my voice plaintive. “Oh, officer! Don’t arrest me! This is my third time—I’ll go to jail!” I grabbed his shirt. “Please, officer—I’ll do
anything!”
I slid down his body to my knees, holding his gaze the entire time. My hand slid over the bulging outline of his cock. Hard as rock and just as impressively sized as I’d remembered it from when we shot the bedroom scene.

But something still wasn’t right. He was staring down at me with obvious lust in his eyes, his breathing fast, but he looked troubled. I unbuckled his belt and started working at the buttons of his fly. “Is this okay, officer?” I said. “Or do you need me to bend over the hood?” I got his fly all the way open and slid my hand inside, smoothing the cotton of his jockey shorts over his cock. He caught his breath, but he still looked uncertain. “Tell me what you want,” I whispered. “We can do anything. I can be anybody.” I slid my hand into his shorts—-

And suddenly, his hands were under my arms, hauling me up. I staggered a little in my heels as I stood and he had to grab my shoulders to steady me.

“What? What’s wrong?” I ran a hand through my hair. “Is it the voice? Would you prefer a Russian chick? I do a great Russian chick. I even did it on stage once.
I am Svetlana! I vant to go to America!”

“No!” He staggered back from me, his hands out. “Just...
stop!”

Silence descended for a moment.

“Is it...me?” I asked, my voice cracking. “Do you not like me?”

“Yes!” he said. “God, yes!”

“Then what...I mean, I thought we…” I was flushing, now, and I hated that. If there was one thing that normally didn’t embarrass me, it was sex. “I thought we both wanted this.”

“We do! I do! But—”

“Is it something you...
need?”
I pressed close to him and grabbed his arms. “Ryan, it’s okay. I’m
very
broad-minded.” I dropped my voice to a whisper. “Do you want to tie me up? Do you want me to...beg?”

“No!”

I furrowed my brow. Oh! I got it. Big, strong guy, position of authority. It kind of made sense. “How about I tie
you
up?” I asked. I let me voice grow cold and disdainful. “I’ll let you kiss my shoes, you horrible little worm!”

“No! Neither of those!”

I blinked and looked up at him, exasperated. “Then...
what?
What am I doing wrong? There must be
something
you like!”

He shook his head and stared at me. “I like...
you.
That’s what I want. You.”

It slowly sunk in. “Oh.”

He put his hands to my face, stroking my cheeks. “Can you just
be you?”

I thought my stomach had dropped through the floor.
Me?
Because I knew he didn’t mean
Jasmine.
He meant
Emma.
He meant the me he’d seen through to, underneath my disguise. It was just what he’d asked for, back in his apartment.

Emma never had sex. Sex was a Jasmine thing. Jasmine
was
sex. I’d created her when I’d first arrived in New York and she’d been there ever since, protecting me, insulating me from men and their base desires. That’s why I’d slipped back into Jasmine tonight. I’d told myself it was because she was the expert, because Ryan deserved the Full Jasmine Experience. But now I realized it wasn’t that at all. I’d slipped back into Jasmine to protect myself. Sex through Jasmine was safe because it wasn’t real.

And because it wasn’t real, I never really felt anything. Pleasure, sure. But not the deep emotional connection other people had. That was what he wanted.
Real
sex, like two people in love should have.

I wasn’t sure if I could still do that. Emma hadn’t had sex in over three years. And the last sexual contact she’d had was—

I took a deep, shuddering breath. I could feel Jasmine falling away from me, Emma rising to the surface. Scared. Timid. But ready. She wanted this.

I
wanted this.

“O—Okay,” I stammered.

He rubbed his thumb across my cheek. “Are you sure?”

A deep, warm certainty filled me. All the time I’d wanted him, all those
Ryan Moments.
It hadn’t been Jasmine. It had been Emma. And I wanted him now, more than I could say.

“We don’t do this until you’re ready,” he told me. I could tell he understood. He didn’t know the full story, of course, but he’d realized that the Full Jasmine Experience was something I’d created to shield myself. And that was something
I
hadn’t even realized, until right then. He knew me better than I knew myself.

“I’m ready,” I whispered. And I was. I could feel my body shifting gears and, under Emma’s control, everything felt strange and unfamiliar...and good. I glanced down at myself in wonder. My boobs, seconds before, had been just...
things.
Seduction objects. Things I could jiggle and thrust out and tease men with and, yes, get pleasure from. Now they were...
me.
Real and alive and throbbing.

I was waking up in my own body, after three long years. And that body was aching for his touch.

I tilted my head up toward his and he moved instinctively down to me. I only closed my eyes at the last second and I nearly melted when I saw the look he was giving me. Deep, scorching lust...and absolute love. He’d meant what he said. He hadn’t wanted Jasmine. He’d wanted...
me.

And then our lips were meeting and it wasn’t like any of the times before. For the first time, there was nothing between us, nothing separating my soul from his. Every brush of his lips on mine sent crackling arcs of fire straight down to my core and every second we stayed connected made them build and build. I didn’t want to breathe. I couldn’t stop. I could feel every cell in my body coming to life, every square inch of my skin suddenly aching with need. I was locked in, addicted to him.

Our lips were apart but our tongues hadn’t even come into play, yet. We were too busy tasting each other, breathlessly wanting more,
more,
both of us getting drunk on the feel of the other one. It was like no kiss I’d ever known, like being joined to a person on an utterly different level. Was this what I’d been missing, all these years? I’d only kissed—only fucked—through some other, artificial person. This was
real.

We didn’t break the kiss until I was weak and heady from the lack of air. I looked up at him and just let myself hang there, clinging onto his shoulders. He took my weight easily, sliding his hands around my waist to hold me up. We stared at each other and it was almost as if we were meeting for the first time. He was seeing me exposed and vulnerable, without any of my defenses, without any of my fake confidence. Just me. And he said, “God, I want you.
You.
Just like this.”

I pressed myself to him, molding my body to his. My groin pressed hard against his thigh and then brushed the throbbing heat of his cock. I could feel how hot I was, too, beneath the thin fabric of my panties, the two of us separated by just a few millimeters.

I started to run my hands over his body, pressing hard, smoothing them over the hard muscles of his back, the swells of his biceps. Just touching him, even through his shirt, made me breathe fast, every contact between my palms and his unyielding flesh making my heart race faster. My face was flushed and my mouth was open. I realized I was panting. I wanted to trace every angle of him, every line.

His jeans were already gaping open. I pushed them the rest of the way down and then, as he kicked off the tangle of fabric and shoes, I went to work on his shirt. He’d already ditched his jacket in the living room, so all I had to do was make my way down the buttons and that glorious, strong chest would be mine. But my fingers couldn’t move fast enough, clumsy, and shaking in my excitement. By the time I reached the last few, I was almost ripping them off their threads.

His hands cupped my shoulders, his rough thumbs stroking my smooth skin again and again. He started to toy with my bra straps, lifting them just a little and rubbing at the skin underneath, but he didn’t try to take it off yet. He was letting me take my turn undressing him.

His shirt came open and I wrenched it back off his shoulders, pressing myself up against him as he shoved it down his arms. By the time it hit the floor, I was already running my hands over his chest and back, smoothing over the firm plates of muscle and stretching up to kiss him. This time, his tongue invaded my mouth immediately and I welcomed it in, a little groan escaping me as I felt it plunge between my lips. I twisted against him, my breasts rubbing across his chest, and he groaned in return.

Both of us were in just our underwear, now. He suddenly bent his legs and, wrapping those thick arms around me, lifted me off the ground and up onto his waist. I wrapped my legs around him, my groin nestling hard against his abs. The same thing we’d done when we’d filmed the bedroom scene...except this time, it was for real.

He started toward the bedroom.

I broke the kiss. “Wait,” I said breathlessly. I didn’t even know what I was going to say until I said it. “Not in there.”

He stopped in the hallway. I jerked my head toward the kitchen. “Back in there.”

He frowned, puzzled.

I sort of shook my head to indicate I couldn’t explain and he nodded and carried me back through to the kitchen. I was glad because it would have been difficult to make him understand that the bedroom was where Jasmine had sex, all boudoir chic and wicked promises. I wanted this to be different. I wanted this to be for Emma.