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Aurelie. Liam.
Aurelie Broussard was marrying Liam Wilson.
Liam was the father of Aurelie’s baby.
Liam was getting married.
Why was it so hard to compute?
She’d once had the chance to say yes to Liam. Not to marriage but to something. She hadn’t. She’d said yes to someone else and life had moved on for all of them. And she was okay with that, wasn’t she?
Yes.
She straightened, ignoring the churning riot of recollections and emotions inside. She was happy. And she’d act like it.
‘Fine, thanks.’ Score. Her voice sounded almost normal. ‘How are you?’
‘Stunned to see you.’
Hardly stunned. He was still standing, tall and fit in those blue jeans and soft leather boatshoes and an eye-wateringly bright white tee with seams that had to cling hard to contain his broad shoulders. It ought to be impossible, but the guy was more gorgeous than he’d been back then. But what really stunned her was the glint in his eyes. He blatantly stared—at her hair, over her face, seeming to take in each feature—lingering on her mouth and then dropping below, taking in her figure. Was he sizing her up as he had that very first time they’d met? Back then it had been excusable—he’d not known who she was. But now?
Victoria tensed beneath his inspection, willing her body not to let the remnants of that old attraction show. Because that was all it was, like muscle memory—an imprint of an old infatuation. Not real. Certainly not worse. It couldn’t be.
‘It’s been a long time,’ he said. ‘And, as impossible as I’d have thought it, you’re even more beautiful now.’
Her breath quickened as her body absorbed his words— words that mirrored her thoughts of him. Her system responded so inappropriately. Heat shot everywhere—most of all deep and low in her belly.
Her brain clicked more slowly, taking too long to realise that it was meaningless, just his usual flirt talk. That was all it had ever been. Talk. But he had no right to tease her. Not that she could put him in his place the way she wanted to. Not when it was his fiancée she was working for. No, she was going to remain calm and professional and brush him off politely.
‘You’re looking good too,’ she said crisply. She even smiled. She could handle this unfortunate coincidence and she could handle him. Of course she could.
He leaned against the table right next to where she sat. Her feet tingled, her legs itched. But she wasn’t running, not showing how badly he got to her. She knew he was playing. He’d played with her before. She remembered that exact roguish expression from the first night she’d met him in the guest bathroom at Oliver’s parents’ place. Then, as now, Liam looked like a wicked cat who’d just spied a juicy mouse and he was going to have fun devouring it ever so slowly.
Victoria Rutherford was never going to be a mouse again.
‘Thank you,’ he drawled.
Her eyes narrowed as anger seeped through her polite armour. He really was the same game player? After all this time? Even now he was about to get married?
‘Victoria,’ he murmured softly, as he’d once murmured her name before. Now, as she had then, she steeled her heart.
How could she be this affected again by his mere presence?
Victoria froze as he moved, leaning across her—far, far too close. She held her breath but it was futile. He still smelt of ocean spray, sunshine and freedom. A heady, intoxicating mix that had once made her almost crazy high. The ultimate, forbidden temptation. Her boyfriend’s best friend.
As her client’s fiancé, he was even more forbidden now. So her suddenly over-excited hormones could just go back into dormant mode. Liam Wilson—even if he was single—would never be hers.
‘What are you doing?’ she squeaked—totally mouse— as he came closer still.
His gaze didn’t leave hers; his mouth curved as he moved into her space. She was transfixed by that intense, challenging look. And he was so close now, she could see the individual, unfairly long lashes that framed his dangerously warm eyes.
‘Mind if I take this?’ He pulled the pen out of her clenched fingers with a sharp tug. ‘It’s looking a little like a weapon there. You stabbed me in the heart once. I’m not chancing it again.’
She gaped. As if she’d hurt him? Quite the reverse. He’d hurt her. And Oliver. He’d thrown a spanner between them—damaging the bond that was never fixed quite right after. But he didn’t need to know how much he’d mattered.
‘I hurt you?’ She pulled herself together and faked a light laugh. ‘No woman has ever hurt you.’
A single eyebrow lifted. ‘You think?’ He shook his head. ‘Aren’t I as vulnerable as anyone else?’
‘No,’ Victoria said bluntly.
‘Come on,’ he drawled. ‘You know exactly how human I am,’ he purred.
‘Are you hitting on me?’ she whispered—utterly amazed—and aghast. ‘Seriously?’
When his seven-months-pregnant fiancée was in the building and he was getting married in less than a week?
Screw the prospects this job might bring. As far as Victoria was concerned, Aurelie didn’t need flourishes. She needed a new fiancé.
‘Liam!’ There was a squeal and a vision in white darted across the room. Aurelie really was too swift for a heavily pregnant woman, not to mention perfectly chic and elegant even in her third trimester.
‘Hey.’ Liam wrapped his arms around Aurelie for a tight hug before pushing her back to arm’s length and gazing at her adoringly. ‘You. Look. Amazing.’
‘I look huge but I don’t care.’ Aurelie laughed and leaned closer, smiling openly up at him. ‘And I’m so glad you’re here.’
Victoria’s stomach twisted. Because he was a flirt cheat—not that she was jealous. There was nothing to be jealous of. She was happily divorced. Happily single. The last thing she wanted to do was revisit past mistakes and Liam Wilson had been an almighty mistake.
A mistake that Aurelie was about to make. Aurelie, whose features appeared brighter—her lips shinier. She’d disappeared for those few moments to touch up her makeup? Someone had to warn her about him. Only Victoria couldn’t—she could never go there. Instead she loudly scraped together the blank cards on the table.
‘Don’t worry, Aurelie,’ Victoria interrupted the scene, not wanting to watch them indulge in more PDA. ‘He’s not seen anything.’
Aurelie and Liam turned, the spell between them broken.
‘All the surprises are safely hidden,’ Victoria continued with determined firmness. Why were they looking at her as if she were speaking Martian?
‘I’ve put everything away…’ she faltered.
Something had flashed in Liam’s face—a frown? A flicker of anger? It had passed so quickly Victoria couldn’t decide. And now came the smile—the one that charmed everyone.
‘Yes, don’t worry, I left the groom downstairs.’ Liam jerked his head to the door. ‘But he’ll be up here in a second if you don’t hurry to see him.’
But Aurelie didn’t hurry. She gazed up at Liam, her palm flat on his chest. ‘It is so good to see you. I wasn’t sure you’d come.’
‘I didn’t want to miss it.’
‘Yes, you did.’ She laughed again and patted his chest a couple of times. ‘But I am glad you’re not. Thank you.’
‘Anything for you.’ He winked and gently brushed the back of his hand along the edge of her fine-boned jaw. ‘Now you’d better go stop him from coming up and spoiling any of your surprises.’
As Aurelie left the room Victoria sat in a swelter of confusion and defiance and embarrassment.
‘You thought I was Aurelie’s fiancé?’ Liam walked back towards her, his smile had widened yet he managed to look less friendly.
Could he blame her when Aurelie had said ‘he’d’ arrived and then Liam had walked in as if he owned the place?
‘You thought I was marrying her?’ He stepped closer, suddenly very tall and a lot like a roadblock. ‘And playing you?’
Victoria tried to glance behind him but it was impossible. He was fully in her face and expecting an answer with his eagle eyes. The only thing to do was play it cool. Frigidly cool. ‘Do you blame me for thinking that?’ She arched her brows as if that could make her taller. ‘You have form.’
His eyes narrowed. ‘I could spend some time arguing that, but why bother?’ He stayed in place, right in her space. ‘Just as I was five years ago, Victoria, I’m here as a guest.’
A guest. He truly wasn’t Aurelie’s fiancé.
For a second relief flooded her. But then mortification screamed back. Her cheeks burned under his mocking scrutiny.
Of course she’d thought he was the groom. In the rare moments she’d ever let herself think of him in the last five years, he’d always been the groom. The guy she’d never said yes to and refused to ever regret.
‘Your name wasn’t on the guest cards,’ she said defensively.
‘I didn’t think I was going to be able to make the wedding,’ he explained. ‘That’s why I’m one of the late additions.’ He pointed to the sheet of paper Aurelie had put on the desk.
He hadn’t made it to Victoria’s wedding. She wasn’t sure he’d even been invited. Not after what had happened. It was the only time she’d seen Oliver uncontrollably angry. She’d gone upstairs and the rest of the family had retired to change for lunch. Oliver and Liam had gone outside. Victoria had pressed close to her bedroom wall, secretly peering out of the window.
Liam had taken the blow without putting up any physical defence. The spot on his jaw had reddened, but all the while he’d quietly insisted to Oliver that nothing had happened. That she’d done nothing. That his interruption wasn’t her fault. It had been his mistake alone.
He’d been facing the house. He’d glanced up, seen her. Their eyes connected for one split second.
Withdrawing. Apologising. Leaving.
He’d never looked at her again. Until today.
But had she done nothing? Really? Who had made the bigger mistake? Whose fault was it really? She’d been scared. She’d never had the strength to stand up to any of them—her parents, Oliver. Even Liam. She’d always done as they bid because she’d needed their approval. And all of them had steamrollered over her. But she’d let them—she’d helped them. That wasn’t happening again. Only now she did look at the list Aurelie had handed to her. The third name down?
Liam Wilson.
‘Oh.’ She faked a bright smile. ‘I thought—’
‘I know what you thought,’ he said, easing back into position against the desk. ‘You never thought much of me, did you?’
That wasn’t true but she couldn’t reveal what she’d thought of him all those years ago. She couldn’t admit it then, she couldn’t now.
There were five names on that list: three men, two women—one of whom had the same surname as another of the guests. The other woman’s name was written last, beneath another man’s name. Liam’s name stood alone in the middle there. Was he coming to the wedding without a partner?
She didn’t need to know. She really didn’t. Because it didn’t matter.
That didn’t stop her glancing at his hands—his fisted fingers. Bare knuckles didn’t mean anything for men. Many guys didn’t wear wedding rings or, if they did, only when convenient. And even if they did wear them?
Victoria knew all too well how a wedding ring wasn’t necessarily an obstacle as far as another woman was concerned. Or for a husband who was no longer satisfied in his marriage. Liam’s lack of ring meant nothing. Nor did his lack of date.
But still that unwanted excitement heated her blood and anticipation zinged through her veins. What was she, some teen girl going to meet her fave ever boyband?
But he might be free. And now? So was she. There was nothing to stop them from finally exploring this thing…
Only the ten tonnes of baggage she was constantly pushing in front of her. And the baggage he’d worked into some kind of bullet-proof vest that he wore beneath that easy-come, easy-go attitude.
‘I’m sorry.’ She looked up at him. For today, for all those years ago. For what could never have been and never could be. She’d moved on; she didn’t want to go back to the doormat she’d been. She had plans and they didn’t involve anyone else. Not him. Not any man.
Liam looked right back at her, his mouth curved in that slight, sexy smile. Time shifted—five years disappeared in that unspoken communication. She was drawn right back into those feelings that should have been forgotten—warmth, want, desire.
And she had to get out of there before she did something really dumb.
He wrapped his fingers right round her wrist—halting her just as she moved. ‘I’m not anyone’s fiancé.’ His grip was sure and warm. ‘That means I’m free to flirt with whoever I want,’ he added.
‘Not with me,’ she said huskily, swallowing to ease the dryness in her throat. She didn’t want to flirt with anyone.
‘Yes, you.’ His smile was oddly gentle. ‘You’re not anyone’s fiancée either, or wife.’
So he knew her marriage had ended.
‘I can’t believe you still blush like this—’
‘I’m not here to flirt,’ she interrupted him quickly. ‘I’m here to work.’ The emphasis was for herself as much as for him. She couldn’t afford to be distracted by this quirk of fate.
His gaze rested on her for a long moment, as if he were weighing the truth of her words. His grip remained firm— could he feel her pulse accelerating?
He let her go. ‘Then let’s see you in action.’ He handed back her pen.
As if.
‘I can’t do this with you watching.’ Her palms were damp; she’d already smudged ink everywhere just from hearing his voice. She’d be less competent than a two-year-old with a pack of finger-paints right now.
‘You always had a problem with me watching.’
She tensed, hoping to stop him from seeing her all-over tremble. She had always been aware of the way he watched her. ‘It’s not you,’ she lied sassily. ‘I don’t like anyone watching me work.’
‘In case you make a mistake?’
‘Not at all.’ She lied yet again. ‘I’m not afraid to make mistakes. I’ve made many.’ Too, too many.
‘Then you’re fine to write in front of me. Write my name.’
She shook her head. She wasn’t going to make more mistakes. She had to focus now.
‘You’re still a chicken,’ he jeered.
‘You’re confusing cowardice with being sensible.’ She had always tried to do the sensible thing. No shame in that, right? ‘And with these smudges?’ She held up her fingers. ‘Why would I waste my time and resources?’
He glanced at the table. ‘You’re really into all this?’
