Jack Riordan's Baby

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‘No?’ Jack adopted a puzzled look. ‘It was okay for me to go there last night.’

‘Last night was a mistake.’

‘Right.’ Jack pretended to consider it. ‘So the whole scene: the absence of any electric lights, the incense-scented candles, you virtually naked, I’m to believe it was all a mistake?’

Rachel’s chin dipped. ‘Yes.’

‘Why don’t I believe you?’

She sniffed. ‘Because you’re too arrogant to think anything else?’ she suggested, and he sighed.

‘What are you saying? That it was for someone else?’

That thought had just occurred to him, and he didn’t like it. But to his relief Rachel was too desperate to defend herself to lie.

‘No,’ she said fiercely. ‘I don’t sleep around.’

‘Meaning I do?’

‘If it fits.’

‘It doesn’t,’ he snapped, momentarily angered by the unjust accusation. Then, calming himself, he went on, ‘So it was all for my benefit?’

Rachel shifted uneasily. ‘If you want to think that,’ she muttered.

‘What else am I supposed to think?’ Jack lifted his hand, and in spite of her instinctive withdrawal he caught a strand of her silky hair and tucked it gently behind her ear. ‘I didn’t realise you were so needy.’

Rachel caught her breath. ‘I’m not needy!’

Jack’s fingers trailed from her ear down the smooth column of her throat to the low vee of her vest. ‘You can’t deny you wanted me last night.’

Rachel lifted her head. ‘I—wanted a man, yes.’

Jack shook his head. He badly wanted to untie the shirt that hugged her midriff and slip his hands into the low waist of her trousers. But in spite of what she’d said he didn’t think she’d let him do that, and he didn’t want to destroy this tenuous relationship by rushing things. Instead, he contented himself with watching the way her nipples hardened against the fabric of her vest, remembering how delicious they’d felt rolling against his tongue.

‘Look,’ he said, after a moment, ‘we have to talk about this. You can’t expect me to ignore what happened and go on as before.’

‘Why not?’

‘Why not?’ He stared at her frustratedly, his eyes darkening to the deepest shade of jade. ‘Because it was good between us,’ he said thickly. ‘And I want to do it again.’

‘No.’

Jack lifted his hand then, but although Rachel took an involuntary step back all he did was rake back his hair with an angry hand. ‘So what now?’ he demanded. ‘Do I wait until the next time you feel like screwing me? Or do I get a say in the matter?’

Rachel’s face burned. ‘Don’t use that word.’

‘What word? Screwing? Well, that’s what it was, wasn’t it? I made love to you, but you screwed me!’

‘No!’

‘Yes.’ Jack closed his eyes for a moment, striving for control. ‘I should have known better than to think it was anything else.’

Rachel quivered. ‘Well, what did you expect?’

Jack scowled. ‘And that means what, exactly?’

Rachel took a deep breath. ‘Haven’t you forgotten Miss Johnson? What is she now, by the way? Your secretary? Your personal assistant? Oh, yes. Personal assistant just about covers it. She—’

‘Karen doesn’t work for the company any more,’ he interrupted her.

Rachel stared at him disbelievingly. ‘Since when?’

‘Since George Thomas fired her.’ Jack hadn’t wanted to get into this right now, but he knew it was inevitable in the circumstances. ‘What can I say? She was no good at her job. We had to let her go.’

‘So how did she—’

Rachel had started to ask how Karen had known where Jack was and what he was doing, but then stopped herself. How silly was that? Just because the woman didn’t work for Fox Construction any longer it didn’t mean that Jack had stopped seeing her. He must think she was stupid if he thought that by telling her Karen had been dismissed she’d believe he’d ended their affair.

‘How did she what?’

Jack had picked up on her unfinished question, and Rachel spent several unfruitful seconds trying to think of something else to ask.

‘Um—how did she manage without a reference?’ she asked at last. Then, seizing on his look of incredulity, ‘Oh, right. You wrote one for her. What did you say, Jack? Performs poorly in the office but makes up for it in bed?’