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Cam’s mouth took on a rueful slant. ‘My father’s decided to upstage Christmas with his wedding on Christmas Eve.’
‘Where’s it being held?’
‘Here in London.’
‘Maybe you could fly up afterwards,’ Violet said. ‘Or have you got other commitments?’ Other commitments such as a girlfriend. Surely he would have one. Men like Cam wouldn’t go long between lovers. He was too handsome, too rich, too intelligent, too sexy. Too everything. Cam had never broadcast his relationships with women the way her brother Fraser had before he’d fallen madly in love with Zoe. Cam was intensely private about his private life. So private it made Violet wonder if he had a secret lover stashed away somewhere, someone he kept out of the glaring spotlight that his work as an internationally acclaimed naval architect attracted.
‘I’ll see,’ he said. ‘Mum will expect a visit, especially now that her third husband Hugh’s left her.’
Violet frowned. ‘Oh, no. I’m sorry to hear that. Is she terribly upset?’
Cam gave her a speaking look. ‘Not particularly. He drank. A lot.’
‘Oh...’
Cam’s family history was nothing short of a saga. Not that he’d ever said much about it to her, but Fraser had filled in the gaps. His parents went through a bitter divorce when he was six and promptly remarried and set up new families, collecting other biological children and stepchildren along the way. Cam was jostled between the various households until he was sent to boarding school when he was eight. Violet could picture him as a little boy—studious, quietly observing on the sidelines, not making a fuss and avoiding one where it was made. He was still like that. When he came to visit her family for weddings, christenings or other gatherings he was always on the fringe, standing back with a drink in his hand he rarely touched, quietly measuring the scene with his navy-blue gaze.
The waitress came over to take Cam’s order with a smile that went beyond I’m your server, can I help you? to Do you want my number?
Violet tried to ignore the little dart of jealousy that spiked her in the gut. It was none of her business who he flirted with. Why should she care if he picked up a date from her favourite cafе? Even if she had been coming here for years and no one had asked for her number.
Cam looked across the table at her. ‘Would you like another coffee?’
Violet put her hand over the top of her latte glass. ‘No, I’m good.’
‘Just a long black, thanks,’ Cam said to the waitress with a brief but polite smile.
Violet waited until the girl had left before she spoke. ‘Cra—ack.’
His brow furrowed. ‘Pardon?’
She gave him a teasing smile. ‘Didn’t you hear that girl’s heart breaking?’
He looked puzzled for a moment, and then faintly annoyed. ‘She’s not my type.’
‘Describe your type.’ Why had she asked that?
The bridge between Cam’s ink-black eyebrows was still pleated in three tight vertical lines. ‘I’ve been too busy for any type just lately.’ His phone, which was sitting on the table, beeped with a message and he glanced at it before turning off the screen, his lips pressing so firmly his mouth turned bone-white.
‘What’s wrong?’
He forcibly relaxed his features. ‘Nothing.’
The phone beeped again and his mouth flattened once more. He clicked the mute button and slipped the phone into his jacket pocket as the waitress set his coffee down on the table between them. ‘So, how’s work?’
Violet glanced at the invitation peeping out of the pages of her book. Was it her imagination or was it flashing like a beacon? She surreptitiously pushed it back out of sight. ‘Fine...’
Cam followed the line of her gaze. ‘What’s that?’
‘Nothing... Just an invitation.’
‘To?’
Violet was sure her cheeks were as the red as the baubles on the invitation. ‘The office Christmas party.’
‘You going?’
She couldn’t meet his gaze and looked at the sugar bowl instead. Who knew there were so many different artificial sweeteners these days? Amazing. ‘I kind of have to... It’s expected in the interests of office harmony.’
‘You don’t sound too keen.’
Violet lifted one of her shoulders in a shrug. ‘Yeah, well, I’m not really a party girl.’ Not any more. Her first and only attempt at partying had ended in a blurry haze of regret and self-recrimination. An event she was still, all these years on, trying to put behind her with varying degrees of success.
But secret shame cast a long shadow.
‘It’s a pretty big affair, isn’t it?’ Cam said. ‘No expense spared and so on, I take it?’
Violet rolled her eyes. ‘Ironic when you consider it’s a firm of bean counters.’
‘Pretty successful bean counters,’ Cam said. ‘Well done you for nailing a job there.’
Violet didn’t like to admit how far from her dream job it actually was. After quitting her university studies, a clerical job in a large accounting firm had seemed a good place to blend into the background. But what had suited her at nineteen was feeling less satisfying as she approached thirty. She couldn’t shake off the nagging feeling she should be doing more with her life. Extending herself. Reaching her potential instead of placing limitations on herself. But since that party... Well, everything had been put on pause. It was like her life had jammed and she couldn’t move forward.
The vibration of Cam’s phone drew Violet’s gaze to his top pocket. Not just to his top pocket but his chest in general. He was built like an endurance athlete, tall and lean with muscles where a man needed them to be and where a woman most liked to see them. And she was no exception. His skin was tanned and his dark brown hair had some surface highlights where the strong sunlight of Greece had caught and lightened it. He had cleanly shaven skin, but there was enough dark stubble to suggest he hadn’t been holding the door for everyone else when the testosterone was dished out.
‘Aren’t you going to answer that?’ Violet asked.
‘It’ll keep.’
‘Work or family?’
‘Neither.’
Violet’s eyebrows lifted along with her intrigue. ‘A woman?’
He took out the phone and held his finger on the off switch with a determined set to his features. ‘Yeah. One that won’t take no for an answer.’
‘How long have you been dating her?’
‘I haven’t been dating her.’ Cam’s expression was grim. ‘She’s a client’s wife. A valuable client.’
‘Oh... Tricky.’
‘Very. To the tune of about forty million pounds tricky.’
Forty million? Violet came from a wealthy background but even she had trouble getting her head around a figure like that. Cam designed yachts for the super-wealthy. He’d won a heap of awards for his designs and become extremely wealthy in the process. Some of the yachts he designed were massive, complete with marble en suite bathrooms with hot tubs, and dining and sitting rooms that were plush and palatial. One yacht even had its own library and lap swimming pool. But, even so, it amazed her how much a rich person would pay for a yacht they only used now and again. ‘Seriously? You’re being paid forty million to design a yacht?’
‘No, that’s the cost of the yacht once it’s complete,’ he said. ‘But I get paid a pretty decent amount to design it.’
How much was pretty decent? Violet longed to ask but decided against it out of politeness. ‘So...what will you do? Keep ignoring this woman’s calls and messages?’
He let out a short, gusty breath. ‘I’ll have to get the message across one way or the other. I’m not the sort of guy who gets mixed up with married women.’ His mouth twisted again. ‘That would be my father.’
‘Maybe if she sees you’ve got someone else it will drive home the message.’ Violet picked up her almost empty latte and looked at him over the rim of the glass. ‘Is there someone else?’ Arrgh! Why did you ask that?
Cam’s gaze met hers and that warm sensation bloomed deep and low in her belly again. His dark blue eyes were fringed with thick ink-black lashes she would have killed for. There was something about his intelligent eyes that always made her feel he saw more than he let on. ‘No,’ he said. ‘You?’
Violet coughed out a self-effacing laugh. ‘Don’t you start. I get enough of that from my family, not to mention my friends and flatmates.’
Cam gave her a wry smile. ‘I don’t know what’s wrong with the young men of London. You should’ve been snapped up long ago.’
A pin drop silence fell between them.
Violet looked at her coffee glass as if it were the most fascinating thing she had ever seen. The way her cheeks were going, the cafе’s chef would be coming out to cook the toast on her face to save on electricity. How had she got into this conversation? Awkward. Awkward. Awkward. How long was the canyon of silence going to last? Should she say something?
But what?
Her mind was blank.
She was hopeless at small talk. It was another reason she was terrible at parties. The idle conversation gene had skipped her. Her sisters and brother were the ones who could talk their way out of or into any situation. She was the wallflower of the family. All those years of being overshadowed by verbose older siblings and super articulate parents had made her conversationally challenged. She was used to standing back and letting others do the talking. Even her tendency to gabble like a fool around Cam had suddenly deserted her.
‘When’s your office party?’
Violet blinked and refocused her gaze on Cam’s. ‘Erm...tomorrow.’
‘Would you like me to come with you?’
Violet had trouble keeping her jaw off the table and her heart from skipping right out of her chest and landing in his lap. Best not think about his lap. ‘But why would you want to do that?’
He gave a casual shrug of one broad shoulder. ‘I’m free tomorrow night. Thought it might help you mingle if you had a wingman, so to speak.’
Violet gave him a measured look. ‘Is this a pity date?’
‘It’s not a date, period.’ Something about his adamant tone rankled. ‘Just a friend helping out a friend.’
Violet had enough friends. It was a date she wanted. A proper date. Not with a man on a mercy mission. Did he think she was completely useless? A romance tragic who couldn’t find a prince to take her to the ball? She didn’t even want to go to the ball, thank you very much. The ball wasn’t that special. All those people drinking and eating too much and dancing till the wee hours to music so loud you couldn’t hear yourself shout, let alone think. ‘Thanks for the offer but I’ll be fine.’
Violet pushed her coffee glass to one side and picked up her book. But, before she could leave the table, Cam’s hand came down on her forearm. ‘I didn’t mean to upset you.’
‘I’m not upset.’ Violet knew her crisp tone belied her statement. Of course she was upset. Who wouldn’t be? He was rescuing her. What could be more insulting than a man asking you out because he felt sorry for you? Had Fraser said something to him? Had one of her sisters? Her parents? Her grandfather? Why couldn’t everyone mind their own business? All she got these days was pressure. Why aren’t you dating anyone? You’re too fussy. You’re almost thirty. It never ended.
The warmth of Cam’s broad hand seeped through the layers of her winter clothing, awakening her flesh like a heat pack on a frostbitten limb. ‘Hey.’
Violet hadn’t pouted since she was about five but she pouted now. She could find a date. Sure she could. She could sign up to one of any number of dating websites or apps and have a hundred dates. If she put her mind to it she could be engaged by Christmas. Well, maybe that was pushing it a bit. ‘I’m perfectly able to find my own date, okay?’
He gave her arm the tiniest squeeze before releasing it. ‘Of course.’ He sat back in his chair, his forehead creased in a slight frown. ‘I’m sorry. It was a bad idea. Seriously bad.’
Why was it? And why seriously bad? Violet cradled her book close to her chest where her heart was beating a little too fast. Not fast enough to call for a defibrillator but not far off. His touch had done something to her, like he had turned a setting on in her body she hadn’t known she’d had. Her senses were sitting up and alert instead of slumped and listless. Had he ever touched her before? She tried to think... Sometimes in the past he would kiss her on the cheek, a chaste brotherly sort of kiss. But lately...since Easter, in fact...there had been no physical contact from him. None at all. It was as if he had deliberately kept his distance. That last holiday weekend at home, she remembered him coming into one of the sitting rooms at Drummond Brae and going straight back out again with a muttered apology when he’d found her curled up on one of the sofas with her embroidery. Why had he done that? What was wrong with her that he couldn’t bear to be left alone with her?
Violet picked up her scarf and wound it around her neck. ‘I have to get back to work. I hope your father’s wedding goes well.’
‘It should do, he’s had enough practice.’ He drained his coffee and stood, snatching his jacket from the back of the chair and slinging it over his shoulder. ‘I’ll walk you back to your office. I’m heading that way.’
Violet knew the tussle over who paid for the coffee was inevitable so when he offered she let him take care of it for once. ‘Thanks,’ she said once he’d settled the bill.
‘No problem.’
He put a gentle hand in the small of her back to guide her out of the way of a young mother coming in with a pram and a squirming, red-faced toddler. The sizzling heat of his touch moved along the entire length of Violet’s spine, making her aware of her femininity as if he had stroked her intimately.
Get a grip already.
This was the problem with being desperate and dateless. The slightest brush of a male hand turned her into a wanton fool. Stirring up needs that she hadn’t even registered as needs until now.
But it wasn’t just any male hand.
It was Cam’s hand...connected to a body that made her think of smoking-hot sex. Not that she knew what smoking-hot sex actually felt like. The only sex she’d had was a surrealist blur with an occasional flashback of two or three male faces looming over her, talking about her, not to her. Definitely not the sort of romantic scene she had envisaged when she’d hit puberty. It was another thing she’d miserably failed at doing. Each of her siblings had successfully navigated their way through the dating minefield, all of them now partnered with their soul mate. Was she too fussy? Had that night at that party permanently damaged her self-esteem and sexual confidence? Why should it when she could barely remember it in any detail?
She had been surrounded by love and acceptance all her life. There should be no reason for her to feel inadequate or not quite up to the mark. But somehow love—even a vague liking for someone of the opposite sex—had so far escaped her.
Violet walked out to the footpath with Cam, where the rain had started to fall in icy droplets. She popped open her umbrella but Cam had to bend almost double to gain any benefit from it. He took the handle from her and held the umbrella over both of their heads. Her fingers tingled where his brushed hers, the sensation travelling all through her body as if running along an electric network.
Trying to keep dry, as well as out of the way of the bustling Christmas shopping crowd, put Violet so close to the tall frame of his body she could smell the clean sharp fragrance of his aftershave, the woodsy base notes reminding her of a cool, shaded pine forest. To anyone looking in from the outside they would look like a romantically involved couple, huddled under the same umbrella, Cam’s stride considerately slowing to match hers.
They came to the large Victorian building where the accounting firm Violet worked as an accounts clerk was situated. But just as she was about to turn and say her goodbyes to Cam, one of the women who worked with her came click-clacking down the steps. Lorna ran her gaze over Cam’s tall figure standing next to Violet. ‘Well, well, well. Things finally looking up for you, are they, Violet?’
Violet ground her teeth so hard she could have moonlighted as a nutcracker. Lorna wasn’t her favourite workmate, far from it. She had a tendency to gossip to stir up trouble. Violet knew for a fact their boss only kept Lorna on because she was brilliant at her job—and because she was having a full-on affair with him. ‘Off to lunch?’ she asked, refusing to respond to Lorna’s taunt.
Lorna gave an orthodontist’s website smile and aimed her lash-fluttering gaze at Cam. ‘Will we be seeing you at the office Christmas party?’
Cam’s arm snaked around Violet’s waist, a protective band of steel that made every nerve in her body jump up and down and squeal with delight. ‘We’ll be there.’
We will? Violet waited until Lorna had gone before looking up at Cam’s unreadable expression. ‘Why on earth did you say that? I told you I didn’t want a—’
He stepped out from under the umbrella and placed the handle back in her hand. Violet had to extend her arm upwards to its fullest range to keep the umbrella high enough to maintain eye contact. ‘I’ll strike a deal with you,’ he said. ‘I’ll come to your Christmas party if you’ll come to a dinner with my client tonight.’
Violet screwed up her face. ‘The one with the persistent wife?’
‘I’ve been thinking about what you said back at the cafе. What better way to send her the message I’m not interested than to show her I’m seeing someone?’
‘But we’re not...’ she disguised a little gulp ‘...seeing each other.’
‘No, but no one else needs to know that.’
You don’t have to be so darned emphatic about it. Violet chewed at one side of her mouth. ‘How are we going to keep this...quiet?’
‘You mean from your family?’
‘You know what my mother’s like.’ Violet gave a little eye roll. ‘One whiff of us going on a date together, and she’ll be posting wedding invitations quicker than you can say I do.’
