I shivered, and an inaudible content exhale escaped my nostrils.
Leaning into me, he whispered with a soft, warm breath, “please?”
I quivered a second time. His hot breath on my skin ironically made me tremble into cold combustion.
I turned my face away from him. I did not want him to see me as I closed my eyes. After all, it would show him the gratification of what his breath and voice, his hands on my bare skin, and his proximity did to me.
His words and his closeness were like the touch of a petal ever so lightly on my skin.
I stepped back fast enough as if he burned me. I couldn’t comprehend or handle how I felt. I needed the albeit compact space for a clear head; I wanted it.
“I…” I started to say, but stopped short of the sharp no that was at the tip of my tongue.
I tried again, opening my mouth to say no, but couldn’t. I looked at him finally, aiming at his eyes as if I would find the answers to the indecision that plagued me.
It should have been a natural no. Before that day, it would have been. But that day had been all about intuitive steps. Or maybe it was him; perhaps it was just him. There was something about Mr Clarke.
“Are you done?”
“What?” I blinked, pulling myself from my thoughts.
“Are you done with the mental battle going on up there?” He said, using his chin to point at my head.
I sighed, knowing a fluent rejection of his request should have been my answer. I knew better, but I found myself saying against my better judgment, “yes, I’m done. Dinner for two it is.”
A ghost of a smile flashed on his face before it disappeared all too quickly. It was as if he didn’t know how to hold a smile. He was pleased; that was unmistakable.
Little did I know I was giving into my future.
Little did I know I was giving in to the unstoppable. Little did I know I was giving into the start of something new, something remarkable, a life-changing force. Something that was going to bleed me before it made me.
But it wouldn’t be long before I knew it.
Chapter 5
“Go in,” he ordered, pointing at the VVIP entrance.
I looked at the bulky and intimidating East Asian bouncer, who stood like a billboard at the door of the private space. He narrowed his eyes at me, but immediately moved aside on spotting Mr Clarke.
Stepping into the private space left me feeling self-conscious about my dress code. I held back an exhale because I looked barely dressed compared to the women I spotted in their dresses.
The room was more extensive than it looked from the outside. It was a five-star restaurant, and I didn’t miss the fact that just as the bouncer shut the door behind us, the noise from the club seized. It was like walking into a new world.
Taking in the classic simplicity of the Victorian room distracted me from whatever Mr Clarke was saying to someone, until he touched me. I almost jumped out of my skin, not at all used to the sensations I felt from his touch.
“Yes?” I asked with a hitched breath.
“Come.”
I let him lead me and realised soon enough that we were not being directed to any of the tables. Rather, we were led past them.
“Where are we headed to?” I asked quickly, not sure why not knowing made me nervous.
“Patience.”
I pressed my lips together. I did not like his response.
We finally entered another room, which was even more private than the previous one. There was a neat dark oakwood table standing in the middle of the room with two opposing chairs.
Yes, I should have been patient. We took our seats.
“Red wine, Champagne or White wine or the usual?” The waiter pointedly asked Mr Clarke, who then looked at me in question. Clearly, he came there often enough to have a usual.
“Champagne, please,” I answered because I needed something sweet.
“Your preference?” The waiter inquired.
I attempted to reply when I stopped short. I didn’t know a lot of champagne because I was a red wine drinker. I only socially had champagne, where I wasn’t required to make choices. I looked at the table, searching for a drink menu that was nowhere to be found.
I returned my gaze to the waiter who didn’t look as irritated as I would have been, had I been in his shoes.
“House champagne,” I replied, knowing every dining business had to have a house specialty.
Mr Clarke chuckled at me as he said, “Actually we’ll have the Armagnac de Brignac.”
It was pure torture between the time the waiter left and when he came back with our drinks. It wasn’t that we were alone, it was that I was acutely aware of him, and the fact that he was staring at me.
He did so unashamedly, ravishing me with his eye, while I looked everywhere but at him.
It was the same thing George did, and that only brought out irritation from me. But from Mr Clarke, it made me tense, it made my heart beat faster, my eyes see clearer, my lips fuller, my tongue drier.
It was why I let out a silent prayer of thanksgiving when the waiter came back with the big glossy and shiny bottle of Armagnac de Brignac, and poured it into two champagne flutes, leaving the rest on the table as I stared in astonishment. The bottle looked overly and maybe unnecessarily exuberant.
I swallowed, telling myself it was all okay, and it was just champagne.
A waitress came in and gave us a menu each. It was something that would have helped a few minutes earlier. She stood a little away from the table to wait out our order.
“Everything on the menu is closely priced. Order whatever,” Mr Clarke said, having spotted the look on my face that showed him my apprehension.
I rolled my eyes in my head. It wasn’t my first rodeo, and my brother liked pricey restaurants like the one we were in.
He had assumed wrong, and I didn’t bother to correct him. My apprehension was more about the lack of familiarity with the menu.
I decided to pick the joint Kobe and Matsusaka Steak, which was the only familiar thing I found on the menu. I refused to pick something too alien, which would end up being the equivalent of two spoons of rice.
“Zina,” he called.
“Yes?” I answered, storing my order in the back of my head, while doing my best to ignore how his deep raspy voice blew out my name like an air kiss.
“You are hungry.”
I nodded slowly, my growling stomach had given that away.
“Correct me if I’m wrong, but you don’t come across as the kind of woman who counts her calories.”
“I am not,” I replied with a proud smile.
“Good. We’ll have the five-course meal.”
“Is that so?” I asked with an arched eyebrow.
He didn’t answer.
“How would you know what I like?” I demanded.
The smirk that moulded on his face told me I’d opened a trap for myself. He corked his head sideways. “I would like to think I know what you like Zina,” he paused in what I knew was for the effects. “What pleases you.”
I gulped, hearing the sexual innuendo in his words. He certainly looked like he knew what all women liked, what pleased them, what pleased me.
“You can handle that, can’t you?” He asked, almost like he was challenging me.
My brain irked for a reply. A simple yes couldn’t come out, not at first. Not while irritation and sexual attraction fought a battle in my spirit, body, and soul.