Chapter Six #3
Confused, Sammy, fork poised in mid-air and mouth half-open, was excruciatingly aware of Leo watching her as she ate a mouthful of the delicious beef and celeriac pie.
Leo watched her. It was an intoxicating sight.
She was so unlike any woman he had ever been attracted to before.
He could imagine that she was the sort of woman who came with all sorts of fairy-tale daydreams and unrealistic fantasies about happy-ever-after and soulmates.
The sort who secretly collected bridal magazines and dreamed of having a dozen kids.
A woman who came fully equipped with high moral values, which was why, he was forced to concede, she was so disapproving of him.
Disapproving but not immune.
With instincts that barely registered on any kind of conscious scale, Leo knew that.
It was there in the tide of colour that flooded her cheeks whenever he looked at her for a second longer than was strictly necessary.
Like now.
It was there in the way she lowered her eyes and half turned away when she was caught looking at him.
And it had been there in her reaction to him every single time he had touched her.
She’d quivered, as if her whole body had suddenly come alive with an undercurrent of electricity over which she had no control.
Sammy cleared her throat and frantically tried to find something innocuous to say to break the sudden electric tension stretching between them.
‘You...you were going to tell me what you were chatting to your lawyer about. When Ms Jamieson got me to one side. Um...’
‘Was I?’
‘Stop...stop looking at me like that.’
‘Like what?’ Leo raised his eyebrows in amused query.
Squirming because she was so out of her comfort zone, Sammy licked her lips nervously and looked away. ‘Is there something you want to say about, um, about the way I look?’
‘Yes,’ Leo said gravely and Sammy’s eyes flew towards him in sudden consternation.
‘You said that my choice of dress was...that you liked what I had selected to wear.’
‘Do you want honesty from me?’
‘I don’t know. Maybe not.’ Sammy was blushing furiously.
‘Okay.’ Leo shrugged.
The conversation resumed on less contentious matters.
Leo had been to the country several times, although only to Melbourne twice, and over the rest of the meal he proved a witty companion, full of interesting anecdotes about the places he had been.
She truly began to appreciate the extent of his vast wealth as he told her about the properties he owned, scattered across the globe.
She listened, asked questions and kept thinking, did she want his honesty?
What did he think he had to be honest about?
‘You might as well tell me,’ she said in a rush, putting down her fork next to the chocolate brownie dessert she was halfway through.
Leo had known that sooner or later she would ask him to explain what he had meant, although if she hadn’t he had resolved not to push the issue.
He was attracted to her and there was a danger in that situation.
He had agreed to this charade, and to his father’s choosing her as a candidate to help pull it off, because he had known that she would be a safe proposition.
Sex complicated things and he had not wanted complications.
Eventually persuaded by his father to undertake this mission, he had come to the conclusion that in and out as fast as possible would be his approach.
Complications of any sort were to be avoided at all costs.
He signalled for the tab to sign but didn’t take his eyes off her face. ‘There is a small bar area farther along from the restaurant. They serve very good coffee.’
Sammy nodded. ‘Just say what you have to say,’ she half pleaded, tripping along beside him as he led the way to the cosy sitting area which, presumably, he had used before when he hadn’t been in the suite with her.
It was a perfect place to work in peace.
Secluded, quiet, tucked away in a spot that was far from noise and crowds.
The fact that he was shying away from telling her what he had to tell her said something. It said that he knew she wouldn’t be happy with whatever it was he had to say. Maybe his lawyer had said something to him during that little chat they had had when the meeting had come to a close.
She felt like a trainee about to be told that she hadn’t, unfortunately, passed her probation because her work had not been up to scratch.
‘When I agreed to do this—’ he waited until she was sitting and then sat opposite her, adjusting his chair to accommodate the length of his body ‘—I decided that you were as ideal as it got for the job.’
‘I know.’ Defensiveness had crept into her voice.
‘You knew how to get to me because of Mum. You knew that the money would be invaluable and you knew that my dream was to start my own freelance business so you had a good idea of what you could put down on the table to ensure I was left without much of a choice.’
‘Spare me the victim speech, Sammy. You could have said no. We all have choices.’
‘You thought I was convincingly ordinary,’ she elaborated with grudging honesty. ‘Have you decided that I’m just too ordinary? Because I don’t know how I can overcome that. I can’t turn into someone I’m not.’
Leo looked at her for so long that she began to fidget. ‘You’re not what I’d expected,’ he said silkily. ‘I’m seeing things I never saw before when we happened to bump into one another in the past.’
Sammy’s mouth ran dry. She opened her mouth to say something but nothing emerged.
She had no idea where he was going with this.
She felt as though she had deliberately jumped into the path of an unstoppable train and would have to live with the consequences.
If she could break eye contact she might be able to do something sensible like stand up and leave, but she couldn’t seem to do anything but stare.
‘There’s something about you,’ he murmured roughly, his sharp eyes taking in every small reaction in her expressive face.
He’d never made a pass at any woman without knowing the outcome in advance.
In fact, he’d seldom had to make passes at all.
But this was different and he felt a swift adrenaline rush as he contemplated laying his cards on the table without fully knowing how she would react.
He wanted her. It made no sense and it was a nuisance, but she appealed to him in ways that were visceral and primitive and beyond his control.
He knew that he could keep trying to impose common sense but wouldn’t it just be easier to scratch that itch?
They were both adults and he suspected that she was as interested in exploring the chemistry between them that had blown up as he was.
The fact that he wasn’t entirely sure, instead of being a turn-off, had fired up his libido even more.
‘Something about me?’ Sammy squeaked.
‘You’re sexy,’ Leo admitted in a roughened undertone. ‘I can’t seem to look at you without wondering what it would be like to take your clothes off.’
Sammy was having severe trouble breathing. Was he joking? Was this some kind of sadistic lead up to something really offensive he wanted to say?
‘Of course I’m not,’ she breathed shakily and he reached out and played with her fingers, toying with them and sending her scattered nerves every which way.
‘And not just when you decide to make the most of your fantastic figure,’ Leo assured her.
‘So this has created a situation I hadn’t banked on having to deal with.
’ He shot her a crooked smile that sent her blood pressure doing all sorts of irregular things.
‘We’re sharing a bed,’ he told her bluntly, ‘and I’m not going to beat around the bush.
I want you. And I sense you want me, too. ’
‘Do you?’ Sammy’s voice was barely audible. ‘I... I don’t...’
‘No?’ He leaned forward suddenly, catching her by surprise.
He reached out, hand curving at the nape of her neck, and drew her towards him.
It was as if she had been hovering like a satellite circling a magnetic force which was warm and bright and irresistible and now that magnetic force was pulling her in and she wanted to go.
She could barely gasp before his mouth covered hers and his kiss was long and gentle and she fell into it with the ease of a hapless swimmer getting caught in a whirlpool. It just sucked her in. She closed her eyes, shifted closer, knew that she should push him back but couldn’t find the strength.
He thought that she was sexy.
Her fingers trembled as they came into contact with his dark hair. This was the riskiest thing she had ever done in her entire life. Nothing else came close. He was so out of her league that they barely inhabited the same planet and yet here she was, kissing him and never wanting that kiss to stop.
She moaned softly.
This was her fantasy guy, the guy who had played a starring role in her adolescent daydreams.
A guy any woman would give her right arm to find herself in a clinch with—just like this one.
A guy who wasn’t hers.
Cold, brutal reality asserted itself and she tore herself away from the embrace. She was shaking like a leaf. Her lips felt swollen and bruised from where he had kissed her and she had to resist wiping the back of her hand across them.
This wasn’t about love or even affection. She was in a make-believe situation with a make-believe fiancé who would never have looked at her twice under normal circumstances.
Suddenly he found her sexy?
Hilarious. She had met him countless times over the years and he had never found her sexy on any of those occasions. Maybe his eyes had changed over time, maybe he needed specs.
Overcome with mortification at how easily she had leapt to that kiss, she was brutal with herself as she wrapped her arms around her body and looked at him.
‘I don’t want to... I’m not interested...’
‘Sure about that?’
‘And I think it’s best we just put that behind us and remember that we’re...remember that this isn’t real.’
‘The engagement isn’t real,’ Leo affirmed in a low, husky voice.
‘My wanting to get you into bed, on the other hand, couldn’t be more real.
’ He abruptly sat back and relaxed into his chair.
‘But if you want to kid yourself that it’s a one-way street, then that’s fine by me.
Moving on to what you asked me, I was talking to my lawyer about Adele. We meet her tomorrow.’
Head spinning from the change of subject, Sammy could only stare at him.
He’d drawn her in only to suddenly drop her from a great height and he couldn’t have been clearer in telling her that he might fancy her, and she still found that impossible to imagine, but he could take her or leave her at the end of the day. It was up to her.
Her brain struggled to focus on what really mattered.
‘Tomorrow.’
‘She will be delivered here to the hotel at lunchtime. It’s been quite an achievement and Gail fought tooth and nail against it but she lost. She only found out when she spoke to her lawyer after the meeting today.’
He stood, waiting for her to follow suit. They were about to head for the bedroom, for the king-sized bed that would suddenly feel as big as a matchbox after what he had said. Her skin tingled at the prospect of getting into it with him.
‘Don’t worry,’ he murmured, reading her mind or maybe her expression of full-blown panicked apprehension, as they headed for the bank of lifts to take them to their suite.
‘I’ve never forced myself on a woman and I don’t intend to start now.
I have work to do when we get back and by the time I get into that bed you will already be sound asleep.
Unless, of course, you decide that sex between two consenting adults who are attracted to one another is worth exploring.
..’ He laughed when she pointedly ignored him and grazed his finger along her cheek, keen eyes watching the heat of her reaction.
‘Sweet dreams,’ he called as she disappeared into the bedroom but before she could shut the door on him. ‘And don’t forget—we’re engaged... It’s only natural to take things to their final conclusion!’