Sophia
The inside of the farmhouse isn’t much warmer than the Welsh, crisp, fresh air. The hallway is dark, no lights flicker within the shadows and it’s deathly quiet.
There’s a stillness to this whole place, or maybe the still calm is growing within me. It’s like breathing is possible here, breathing is encouraged. I’d dragged greedily at the air, filling my lungs with startling freshness after the cloying suffocation of my previous life—I want to slob about in my baggy tracksuit and not care who sees, I want to never be told what to do again, or what to wear. I wonder if this place of freezing cold greenness that Blake has brought me to can provide that… more than anything I want to continue to breathe.
The freedom of breathing almost counterbalanced the uncomfortable conversation. Almost. I’ve still been squirming in my seat on the ride here like I’ve got creepy crawlies in my pants, so the new-found freedom of breathing isn’t a plaster to slap on and fix all. As hard as they are though, Blake and I need to say these awkward things, need to tell one another the truth, otherwise where will be? Right now, he is all I have.
He might be all I have but it doesn’t stop me wanting to shrivel up and die with awkwardness as I take in the unknown hallway and clutch onto his hand until my palm sweats.
Blake groans as he comes to a stop within the gloom of the hallway and mutters something about bastards beneath his breath.
Maybe everyone is out. Maybe they heard I was coming and decided to give us some space. I mean, I’m not an expert on this but I’m thinking bodyguards don’t always fly their clients thousands of miles and take them to their mammy’s house.
I have a bad feeling he might be heading for the outhouse again.
The thought of him being sent to an outhouse for being in a foul temper is one I need to lock away and ponder over when I have a few minutes to myself. Not that I want five minutes to myself because that would be five minutes away from him.
Friends.
All I can think about is that kiss. Okay, I’d been on a comedown of considerable force, but that kiss… it’s eating away inside my brain until all I want to do is kiss everything in reach just to practice it some more. I’m not going to make the night before I steal another one from him.
"Everything okay?" I bite down on my lip to stop from smiling at his fidgeting discomfort.
"Yep." He flashes me another one of those blinding grins. I’ve counted five of them since we arrived at LAX airport. The press had gathered like hound dogs, but he’d blocked them with his back, the whole time grinning at me, a secret conversation flowing between us.
I watch him through hooded lids. He’s different here. Maybe it's the lack of uniformed suit, maybe it’s the silent barrier between us slowly deteriorating. Maybe it’s because away from LA I’m no longer under threat. But he’s smiled more in the last twenty-four hours than he has since he returned.
I can take smiling. Smiling is good.
"They are in the kitchen." He nods his head towards a closed door at the end of the hallway. It’s one of those battered dark wooden doors with a wrought iron latch instead of a handle.
I don’t know if I can enter. A room filled with journalists and Hollywood stars sure, why not? A room full of Blake’s relatives, his real life, the one he’s never shared with me…? Well forgive me if I puke.
My expression must say it all because he laughs as he wheels me around. "They won’t bite, I promise. The worst that will happen is that you won’t understand their thick accents." He yanks at the woollen Beanie on my head and pulls at the ends of my braids. I always travel as incognito as possible. Hat, pigtails and sunglasses, paired with a tracksuit normally makes me look like any other woman dying through a long-haul flight out there. I was careful on the flights, just staying in my seat by the window. I’m sure I survived the transatlantic trip without being noticed once I was through LAX. The chances of being tracked down to a Welsh village have surely got to be remote?
I hesitate. His eyes darken, his hands still on my arms, and I think he’s going to kiss me. He doesn’t, instead he pokes me on the end of my nose with his index finger and chuckles.
"I’m home," he calls with a wry fleeting smile. Catching the latch, he gives it a heavy push and the door creaks open with an ominous squeak. It’s like being on the set of a terrible B movie.
A whirlwind of fur smacks us in the face. I try to breathe through the plumes of hair but I end up swallowing mouthfuls of the stuff, coughing as it tickles the back of my throat.
"Matilda! Down," Blake commands. To be honest if he spoke to me that way I’d sit on the spot too.
A giant dog pants, a pink tongue lolls out the side of its mouth as its tail cleans the floor with arcing powerful swipes. It can’t be a dog—surely dogs don’t come this big? But then ponies don’t slaver quite like this. Blake gives it a quick scratch before straightening. The dog’s not happy with the lack of attention and keeps barging at Blake’s legs, but he ignores it as he looks at the two-legged inhabitants of the room.
My knees knock together. Get a grip, Sophia. But how can I get a grip when I’ve never done this before?
Five pairs of expectant eyes stare at me, stalking on sticks as a unison of, "Oooh’s" meet my ears.
I blush hotter than I ever have before. The faces are all a blur as I fall into a flat out panic.
Blake rolls his eyes and I clutch for his hand. His fingers give a reassuring squeeze and I bitch slap myself with a mental right hook. "Guys, pack it in," he says, "Sophia, don’t worry, they will remember their manners in a minute and stop gawping."
A woman, probably around my age with ebony hair the same as Blake’s squeals a high-pitched wail, fanning herself with her hand. "MAAMMY!" she hollers. "Blake’s brought a girl home." I’m a shining beacon of humiliation as she stares at me with an ecstatic grin of excitement. "It’s not just any girl, it’s SOPHIA JENNINGS." She screeches and I wince, wishing my hair was down so I could hide behind a curtain.
A woman with a knot of grey hair has her back to the room as she stirs a pot on a stove. She turns, her dark blue eyes sweeping the length of me. This woman shouts 'No Shit' without even speaking a word and the crimp of her lips tells me she’s not thrilled at what she sees. Shit. Blake’s mother… she hates me and I haven’t even spoken yet. "Blake." She nods at her son. "Nice to see you."
He drops my hand, stepping forward and pulling the rounded figure of his mammy into his arms, squeezing her tight. "Sorry about the short notice, Mam, Sophia," he motions to where I’m exposed, all eyes on me, "needed some help."
A throat clearing cough pulls my attention from the dominating force of Blake’s mum. A guy, younger than Blake, perhaps by a couple of years, pushes a paper across the battered kitchen table.
Blake groans and snatches it, crumpling it under his arm, but it’s too late. I see the headline in its bold print. SOPHIA FALLS OFF THE WAGON.
I snatch the paper, wrestling it from Blake’s grasp, causing a snort from around the table. The grainy image shows me being lifted into a car, my state of wellbeing clearly on the inebriated side. How did someone get a picture of me leaving Johnny’s? How did anyone know I was there?
You can’t see Blake’s face, but mine is all too obvious. Blake spins for the guy who I assume due to his muted similarity to Blake, is his younger brother. "Good one, Shayne. Sometimes you are such a dick."
With a cracking slap, Blake’s mum smacks Blake around the back of his head. "No foul language in my kitchen." Holy crap.
Blake pulls a face which in all honesty is probably the most adorable thing I’ve ever seen, all scowling broodiness and wounded soldier, and Shayne smirks.
"I’m Bernie." Blake’s mum introduces herself while Blake rubs the back of his head with his palm, muttering under his breath. "There will be no drink or drugs in my house, is that clear?"
Well that’s blunt. I flush and stutter. "Oh no, I’m clean. I’ve just got my ninety-day sober badge." Her eyes fall with emphasis on the paper clutched in my hand. "Uh, I was drugged. I, I, didn’t do it on purpose." Oh God, I’m lying to the woman, this is disastrous. A burn of shame rips through me: shame for the lie, shame for the fact I fell off the wagon in the first place. Raising desperate eyes to Blake, I find his unfathomable gaze watching my face.
"That’s enough," he snaps and even I’m shocked at the commanding tone he holds in his voice. Hell, I thought I was the only one who he bosses around. Apparently not. "Sophia, I will introduce you to this rabble later when they’ve remembered their manners." His tone softens. "I’ll show you to my room, you must be exhausted."
Bernie folds her arms across her chest. This woman is a force to be reckoned with. Her disapproval rolls off her in visible waves. "I’ve put her in your room. You," she sends Blake a pointed look, "are in the outhouse."
Blake’s mouth falls open before he can school his expression to hide his gall. His siblings, or whoever the gaggle is sitting around the table, twist their head between Blake and his mother as if they are at Wimbledon watching the final on Centre Court. "Sophia, would you mind waiting in the hallway for a moment, then I’ll show you the way?"
"Uh, sure," There’s not much else for me to add. I walk out the kitchen like a naughty child.
I’m only stood there for a moment, my hands thrust into my tracksuit pants, staring at a framed hand drawn crayon masterpiece and listening to muffled hisses from the other side of the door, before he comes storming out, his face as black as night. "Looks like you are in my old room."
I snort a bubble of laughter and squeeze his elbow. "Your old room is fine," I assure him.
"Hm." Is the only response I receive.
"This is where you grew up?" I turn slowly, taking in the white walls and black blind. There's nothing here: no keepsakes, no photo’s, no trophies.
"Yep." His face softens and a fleeting smile chases across his face. "It’s spectacularly boring, isn’t it?"
I give a negative shake of my head. "No, it’s just I always thought my upbringing was nondescript, in and out of hotels, condo’s changing with every film set," I sigh, "but I wasn’t the only one."
His weighted gaze meets my eyes then my mouth, and he shifts uneasily from one foot to the other, rubbing his jaw with his hand. "Thing is, Soph, my upbringing was a long time ago."
I roll my eyes. "Are you still stuck on the age thing?"
He turns me for the bed. "When you were born that bed was a single, and I was sleeping in it as an eight-year-old boy."
I shake my head, twisting in his arms. "Eight years is nothing. You forget I’ve grown up in Hollywood where anything goes."
His hands slide along my skin until they rest on my shoulders. "I grew up in Wales, where things like age are never forgotten."
I kiss him. Just like that. I lift onto my toes and press my lips against his. A gentle press of my mouth, chaste and sweet. He groans, tying me into his arms, pressing me into his chest, his mouth opening and fitting with mine in a heated response.
We are all tongues, teeth and murmured sighs. Blake kisses like nothing I’ve ever known. It’s a sonnet. Equal parts hard and softness. Half exploration, half reciprocation. It’s a dance of the sweetest, slowest kind. When he sucks my lower lip between his teeth, I groan a feral growl, and a ferocious burn explodes in my chest. Flourishing into a wild fire, it spreads to my toes when his teeth graze the sensitive skin of my inner lip. I clench my thighs together hoping it will dissipate the heat pooling there but it only makes it worse.
"Blake," I whisper his name, lowering my mouth to his neck. He tastes faintly of soap, hot skin and travel. It does crazy things to the fire in the pit of my belly, stoking and fuelling it until I’m burning like a firework on Guy Fawkes night.
His gaze lifts to mine, but it’s blurred and distorted with desire.
Understanding ripples through me in waves. He wants me, just as much as I want him. I press myself closer until I can feel the firm outline of his arousal digging into my hip.
A sharp thump hits the ceiling and we jump.
"Fucking hell." He sighs, a ragged edge underlining his exclamation as he drags himself away from my grasp. "Do you want to tidy up or anything?" He waves at my tracksuit. "Then I think we should do the proper introductions, Amanda won’t forgive me otherwise."
"Your sister?"
Reaching forward, his thumb sweeps over my lip. I think it’s a highly erotic move until I realise he’s wiping away a smear of post kissing drool. "It’s been a battle to stop her visiting LA. Well, not this time, but you know, before."
"She could have come." It would have been nice to have a girl my own age around.
Blake chuckles. "Not a chance. She would have let slip all my secrets, would have ruined my bodyguard street cred."
I smack him lightly on the chest, my hand meeting a solid surface. "You know all my secrets."
It’s supposed to be a joke. I mean until he left five years ago he knew me better than anyone, yet his face falls. "I don’t know everything, Sophia, but I want to."
He could undress me with his bare hands and it would be less erotic than that statement.
Shaking off whatever thoughts are swirling through that brain of his, he smooths his hands down my shoulders. "Listen, Sophia, I need to tell you something. Explain something."
"Yes?" This looks like the merchant of doom arriving to rain on my snogging parade.
Is he blushing? I peer closer. Yes, he is. I wait as patiently as I can, bouncing softly on the balls of my feet.
"It’s just…"
"Come on, Blake. I’m dying here, spit it out." Okay. Patience isn’t a virtue I hold.
"It’s just it’s been a long time since I had a girlfriend." His eyes flicker to mine."
Girlfriend.
Holy crap. My head!
Girlfriend.
His eyes widen. "No, I’m not assuming anything." He runs a hand through his hair, scattering dark waves until they flick at random angles. "It’s just for me there is a clear line between sex and something more. And it’s not often I do the something more."
Never have I been so speechless. The intensity of his burning dark gaze heats my insides until I’m a swirling pool of lava. I want to run my hands over every firm inch of him, learning the shape of him with my fingertips.
A few long moments pass. We watch and wait. Neither of us moving.
Finally, I nod, unsticking my tongue from the dry roof of my mouth. "That makes two of us."
He offers me a smile that borders on the edge of shy and holds his hand out for mine. "Come on, I’ll introduce you to the Hendersons."
I laugh loudly, the intense atmosphere disperses into a fine mist and disappears. "Isn’t that a TV Show, back from the day? Meet the Hendersons?"
"Shut up, Soph."
"Just saying. Actually did you know I got offered the remake once?"
"Sophia?"
"Yes?"
"Shut up."
His mouth crushes onto mine and I groan against his tongue. Try as I might I can’t stop from asking myself what it would be like to have a real boyfriend.