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And it wasn’t only that. There was something about this Sebastian Savas that intrigued her. Maybe it was knowing he had a family. Maybe it was watching him deal with this sister. It wasn’t a short conversation they were having. And Sebastian wasn’t as perfunctory and dismissive as he was at work.
I hate it when you cry, he’d said.
The Sebastian from work wouldn’t have cared if the whole design team had burst into tears.
Intriguing, yes. Not that she was actually interested, Neely told herself firmly. Just…curious. And appreciative—in a purely academic, architectural way.
He was still annoying. He owned her houseboat. He thought she’d paint it pink. And he believed she was sleeping with Max!
She narrowed her gaze at him. He ended the call and tossed the phone down again, then stood there a moment, staring in her direction. But somehow Neely didn’t think he was even seeing her.
What he was seeing, she didn’t know.
And then her own cell phone rang.
“Hey, what’re you doing?” Max asked.
She smiled. “Trying to convince Sebastian Savas to sell me Frank’s houseboat.”
“What?” He sounded as shocked as she had been last night when Sebastian had walked in the door.
“Long story,” Neely said. She saw Seb turn to come back into the living room. “I’ll tell you later.”
“Tell me at dinner,” Max said.
Ordinarily she would have begged off. She had gone sailing with Max yesterday. They were going out again tomorrow. Of course she was glad he was getting a life after years of having his nose to the grindstone. But his entire life shouldn’t revolve around her.
“I’ve heard of a great sushi bar,” Max tempted her just as Sebastian walked through the door and gave her a narrow suspicious look.
On the other hand, why not?
“I’d love to, Max,” she said delightedly.
Sebastian’s jaw tightened.
“See you at seven,” she trilled and hung up. “Max and I are going out for dinner,” she told him, just in case he hadn’t heard.
“Lucky you.” His voice was flat.
“Yes, indeed,” Neely said brightly. “We’ve had so much fun getting to know each other.”
“I’ll bet.” A muscle ticked at his temple.
“He’s found a new sushi bar he says we have to try. I have a bit of work to do, but I couldn’t say no. He made me an offer I couldn’t refuse.” Was she laying it on too thick?
Sebastian’s expression was stony. “Did he.” It wasn’t a question.
“Mmm.” Neely gave him one more cheerful smile. “I think I’ll take Harm for a run, then come back and get ready.” She grabbed Harm’s leash and started toward the door. “Bye-ee.”
“Robson?” Seb’s voice, hard and flat turned her right around again.
“Yes?”
“You want to buy the houseboat?”
Her heart quickened. “Yes. Of course. You know I do.”
Sebastian’s hard mouth twisted. “Make me an offer I can’t refuse.”
CHAPTER FOUR (#ulink_320efb55-b934-5846-87ae-0f2b42720d42)
MAKE him an offer?
Like what?
Like what he supposed she was offering Max?
She wanted to strangle him. Or punch him. Or do whatever was necessary to wipe that knowing look off his handsome face.
Instead she went out with Max and grilled him about the man who owned her houseboat.
“You’re interested?” Max asked. “In Seb?”
“I am not ‘interested’in Sebastian Savas,” Neely said, still hot under the collar from Sebastian’s remark. She picked at the spider roll on her plate, poked it with her chopstick the way she’d like to poke Sebastian. “Not the way you think. He just annoys me.”
“Why? Are you still ticked because he thought you wanted everything pink?” Max grinned as he regarded her over his bottle of Japanese beer.
“Not ‘thought.’ Thinks! He thinks I’ll paint the houseboat pink!”
“Oh, I doubt that,” Max said easily. “He’s just giving you a hard time. Maybe he’s smitten.”
“Hardly.” Neely sniffed. “He thinks I’m sleeping with you!”
Max’s laughter was so loud and sudden that half the diners in the small restaurant turned to look at their way.
“It’s not funny!” Neely fumed. She did stab her spider roll then. And her kappa maki for good measure.
Max shrugged and lazed back in his chair, still regarding her with amusement. “You could tell him you’re not.”
“I did,” she muttered.
He didn’t say anything, just smiled and sipped his beer.
Neely glared at him. He grinned. “He has a dirty mind,” she said after a moment.
“Probably. He’s a man,” Max said. “And he thinks I’m in danger of succumbing to your charms.”
She blinked and stared. “You knew?”
Max lifted his shoulders. “He didn’t think much of me bringing you on as the living-space designer for Carmody-Blake.”
“You asked him?”
Max shook his head. “Didn’t have to. He volunteered.”
Sebastian was lucky he wasn’t her kappa maki then. She’d poked it to smithereens. “How dare he?”
“He was looking out for my welfare,” Max told him. “Thinks you’re out to get your claws into me.”
“How dare he?”
“He understands the appeal of a pretty woman.”
“He doesn’t think I’m pretty. He thinks I’m weird. And he doesn’t like what I do.”
“Maybe he wants you.”
Neely looked at Max, horrified, at the same time she remem bered that odd stab of awareness she’d felt this afternoon when she’d come into the living room and spied Sebastian up on the ladder. “Don’t be ridiculous,” she said now.
“Just saying.” Max finished his beer.
“Well, don’t,” Neely retorted.
She didn’t want to think about Sebastian that way. And she cer tainly didn’t want to think about him thinking about her that way!
Not that he was, of course. It was all in Max’s head.
But the awareness wasn’t.
She felt it again later that night. She spent the evening at Max’s discussing the Blake-Carmody project. It was the work she’d have done at home anyway, but it was actually better to do it with Max. It was nearly eleven when she got home. She took Harm out for a quick walk, then went upstairs to get ready for bed at the very moment Sebastian was coming out of the bathroom. His hair was wet and he was bare-chested this time, though he was wearing his jeans, thank God.
No matter, she still felt that unwelcome sizzle of awareness. And it seemed like every time she saw him now he was wearing less. Her cheeks warmed at the thought.
He raised a brow. “Have fun?” His tone was sardonic.
“I did,” Neely said, keeping hers flat.
“But you didn’t spend the night.” The brow went even higher.
Neely, remembering the eviscerated kappa maki, wished she had a chopstick on her now. She gave him a brittle smile. “It’s a work night.”
His expression hardened. “Nice to know you have some standards.”
“Indeed I do.”
He stepped past her to go into his room. The hall was narrow and he was close enough that she felt the heat emanating from his bare flesh as he passed. The sensation was almost magnetic, drawing her toward him. Quickly Neely stepped back.
He paused, one hand on the frame, as he opened the door to his bedroom. “I’m leaving for Reno as soon as Frank and I close on the houseboat at the bank.”
“Rubbing it in?”
“Just telling you. I won’t be back until Friday.”
“Good.”
A corner of his mouth tipped. “I thought you might think that.” He paused. “If you need anything—”
“I’ll ask Max.”
His knuckles tightened on the door frame. “Of course you will. Sweet dreams, Robson.” Amazing how much disparagement a man could get into so few words.
Neely ran her tongue over her lips. “Same to you, Savas.”
His bedroom door shut with a hard click.
Not until it had, did Neely breathe again. Even so her knees still wobbled. And for the first time she wondered if maybe she should spend the week looking for another place to live.
So what if she was sleeping with Max Grosvenor?
What did he care?
Well, he didn’t, Seb assured himself as he tossed clothes into his suitcase preparatory to tomorrow’s trip to Reno. Unless it interfered with the good of the company, it made no difference at all.
All the same, he was glad he was leaving. That way he didn’t have to be around to watch.
It had been bad enough before—when he’d simply caught glimpses of Neely Robson waltzing into Max’s office during the day. He’d been annoyed when they left together sometimes in the evening. And, yeah, he’d felt downright irritated Friday when Max had come late to their meeting because he was out sailing with a woman half his age!
But it had been worse over the weekend. At least when he was in Reno, Seb wouldn’t have to watch her chatting to Max on the phone while she fed the kittens. He wouldn’t see her razor on the shelf by the shower and wonder if she’d shaved her legs before she’d gone off with Max.
And he wouldn’t have to see her run out the door and down the dock to meet him when he came to pick her up.
Not that he’d been watching…
He’d been minding his own business upstairs in his bedroom, putting some books on the shelves of the built-in bookcase, when he’d just happened to hear the front door shut and had glanced out to see her dance away down the dock, waving madly at Max who was coming to meet her.
Max hadn’t been exactly reluctant, either. The grin Seb saw on his face was one of pure joy. And when she reached him, damned if he hadn’t wrapped his arms around her in a fierce hug.
Boss and employee?
Yeah, right.
Just good friends?
Not even close.
Not that they were claiming any such thing. They weren’t claiming anything at all.
They didn’t have to, Seb thought, banging his suitcase shut.
