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‘Exactly how limber are you with those nice, long, slim fingers?’
‘Eleven seconds—limber enough.’ The tip of her tongue came out, ran across her plump red top lip. ‘But I can go slow.’
Scott’s nostrils flared with the scent of her, the triumph of it. He edged closer, until they were almost but not quite touching. ‘I’d like to see you go fast…and slow.’
She raised that eyebrow again. And, God, he knew—just from that—she would be awesome in bed. He was going to have to find out. Maybe tonight…
She tilted her head back. And there was a challenge in that. ‘That’s going to depend.’
‘On…?’
‘What you’re offering.’
He was about to suggest they consider an early departure to negotiate the ‘offer’ when—dammit—Willa materialised, with Rob beside her. Okay, maybe she hadn’t materialised—maybe she’d walked quite normally across the floor and he’d been too busy gagging with lust to notice. But, whatever, the interruption was so ill-timed he wanted to punch something.
‘Kate, I’m so glad you’ve met Scott,’ Willa said, all warm and thrilled and happy. ‘He’s not likely to be a client, though—he’s the confirmed bachelor of Weeping Reef!’
Scott only just held back the wince. Because that made him sound either gay or like a player. Rob, at least, had the grace to wince for him and clap the hand of sympathy on his back.
Kate couldn’t possibly think, even for a second, that he was gay. Not after the conversation they’d been having.
On the other hand… A player? Yeah, he admitted to that. But he liked to do his own warning off of women who had happily-ever-after in their sights—with charm and skill and softly negotiated ground rules that meant everyone had fun right up until the goodbye. He didn’t need his friends making public service announcements to scare away prospective bedmates before he even got to the first kiss.
‘Let’s leave it at bachelor, shall we, Willa?’ Scott suggested through slightly gritted teeth.
Willa, oblivious, turned to him. ‘Oh, are you not a confirmed bachelor? I thought you said friends with benefits was as far as you ever intended to go? Not that there’s anything wrong with that. At all. Of course.’
Scott stared at Willa, speechless. Rob blew out a not laughing, I promise breath. Kate was biting the inside of her cheek, in the same predicament as Rob.
‘After what happened in the Whitsundays I—’ At last Willa stopped. Blushed very prettily—as Willa did everything.
Scott was still staring, frozen, praying she was not going to finish that.
‘Oh,’ Willa said. ‘Well. Anyway. Kate is the best family lawyer in Sydney, as well as being a wonderful, kind, compassionate—’
‘Thank you, Willa,’ Kate interrupted smoothly. ‘But I’m not quite ready for sainthood.’
Scott, unfreezing, saw the flush of pink that slashed across Kate’s high cheekbones—not pretty, stunning!—and decided it was time to take control of the conversation and get his seduction back on track.
Leaning into Willa conspiratorially, he said, ‘I hear Kate’s also a Rubik’s cube champion.’
Kate choked on her punch, trying—again—not to laugh.
And somehow that made Scott want her even more. He needed to get her away from everyone immediately. Out onto the deck into that particular corner that he knew from previous forays at Willa’s harbourside mansion was very private, screened by a giant pot plant.
But any chance of getting Kate alone was snatched from him by another of the old Weeping Reef gang, Amy, who landed in their midst—because Amy never merely appeared anywhere—accompanied by her flatmate Jessica, who’d become an honorary gang member despite never having been near the Whitsundays.
Seduction plans were officially on simmer—but not off the heat. Half an hour—that was all he needed. Half an hour and Kate Cleary would be his.
Amy gave Scott a smacking kiss on the cheek before enveloping Kate in a hug.
‘Kate!’ she squealed. ‘It’s been an age.’
Kate laughed as she returned the hug. ‘Well, two weeks, anyway—you didn’t drink so many mojitos at Fox that you’ve forgotten?’
What the hell…? Scott wondered if he was the only one of the group who’d never met Kate. Well—him and Willa’s brother, Luke, who was still in Singapore. Was this some kind of Weeping Reef conspiracy? Would Chantal turn up at last—because God knew how he’d deal with that—and Brodie? He could picture Brodie sauntering over, snatching the heart of another of Scott’s women…
Not that Kate was Scott’s woman.
Jessica and Kate were hugging now. Okay—this was officially out of control. Even Jessica knew Kate?
‘It wasn’t the mojitos that were news at Fox,’ Jessica said. ‘It was one very particular martini.’
The blush was back on Kate’s cheekbones. ‘The less said about that the better,’ she said with a theatrical shudder.
Scott was suddenly desperate to hear the story. ‘You don’t like martinis?’ he asked—only to have Willa, Amy and Jessica burst out laughing.
He looked at Rob, who gave him a don’t ask me shrug.
‘It was a dirty martini,’ Amy said, putting him out of his misery. ‘Bought for her by Barnaby, my arch nemesis at work, who just happened to be drinking at Fox too. Blond, blue-eyed and gorgeous—that’s Barnaby. Thinks he’s God’s gift to marketing. And to women. And to be honest, he kind of is. Just not to Kate.’
Kate shook her head, laughing, as though batting the subject away.
‘It was the way he said “dirty”,’ Jessica put in, helping herself to a glass of punch. ‘It’s one thing being presented with a dirty martini. It’s quite another to have it presented with a slimy pick-up line. “Just how dirty do you like it, baby?” Yep—that would make any woman want to jump you. Not.’
More laughing from the girls as Kate covered her eyes with a hand.
Rob was practically cringing. ‘Seriously?’
Willa kissed Rob’s cheek. ‘Not all men are as evolved as you, Rob.’
Rob turned to Scott. ‘You ever used that one?’
‘Dirty martini? Nope. And, given the reaction Barnaby got, I doubt I ever will. Although in my youth I did once embarrass myself with a comment to twin girls about a Ménage à Trois.’
Jessica’s eyes bugged. ‘Twins? Like…a real ménage à trois? Or is that the name of a fancy-pants cocktail?’
‘It’s a cocktail,’ Scott assured her. ‘And delicious, apparently—because, as it happens, they both ordered one and made very…approving…noises.’ He cleared his throat, all faux embarrassment. ‘As they sipped, I mean.’
‘They ordered one apiece—with a side order of you?’ Amy asked, batting her eyelashes outrageously.
Scott smiled. The lazy, teasing smile he reserved for flirty moments with women he wasn’t ever going to take to bed. ‘A gentleman never tells a lady’s secrets.’
He saw something flash across Amy’s face. Something like…distress? But it was gone so quickly he wondered if he’d imagined it. And the next moment she was laughing again.
‘Well, anyway, enough with the “in my youth” talk. If I’ve got my arithmetic in order you’re twenty-seven—one measly year older than me. And I’ll have you know I still consider myself to be in my youth.’
An odd gasping sound from Kate had Scott turning to her. It looked as if she’d spilled punch on her dress, because she was brushing a hand over the bodice. It must have been only the tiniest drop—he certainly couldn’t see any sign of it—but the next moment Willa was ushering Kate to the guest bathroom and Amy was asking Rob what exactly was in the punch, because she’d never seen Kate’s nerves of steel so much as bend before, let alone be dented.
The punch, apparently, was a combination of vodka, white wine, white rum and champagne, with an occasional strawberry waved over the bowl—that did not sound girly! It was a miracle everyone in the house wasn’t stumbling around breaking bits off sculptures, staggering into walls and pitching face-first into pot plants.
But Scott had a feeling the potency of the brew was not the problem with Kate. She’d looked sort of shocky. Surely not because of that harmless ménage à trois talk? She was too sophisticated for that. It would take him two minutes, tops, to explain that away. Which would leave him twenty-eight minutes to charm her out of her panties.
But twenty minutes later Scott hadn’t managed to get near Kate. Every time he took a step in her direction she moved somewhere else. As if she was on guard against him—which was crazy. Almost as crazy as what the sight of her loose-hipped, strolling, rolling walk was doing to his testosterone levels. Sexiest walk ever.
At the twenty-four-minute mark, as he made what felt like his hundredth attempt to reach her and she replaced the stroll with a dash—an actual freaking dash—towards a small group of people whose average age looked to be a hundred and four, he realised she really and truly was on her guard.
Oh, my God.
He was chasing her and she was running away. This had never, ever happened to him before.
And as he watched her, trying to figure out what the hell had gone wrong, the last six minutes of his self-allocated thirty minutes’ seduction time ticked away…and she was gone.
Disappeared. Like Cinderella, but wearing both of her take-me-now shoes.
He fingered the card she’d given him.
Weird. Very, very weird. A mystery. What had he said? Done?
Well, Scott loved mysteries. And challenges. And women who wore red lipstick.
And he was suddenly very certain that this thing between him and Kate Cleary—because there was definitely a thing—was not going to end with a drop of spilled punch and no explanation.
He looked at her card again, noted the address—a block from his city office.
Easy.
CHAPTER TWO (#u2431157c-33d9-5605-940e-d342979ef081)
KATE LET HERSELF into her apartment, tossed her bag onto the couch, kicked off her shoes, wiggled her toes…and let out a tortured groan that had nothing to do with her sore feet and everything to do with the divorce party.
Which had been a disaster.
She couldn’t believe she’d been smut-talking about a stapler and a Rubik’s cube. As bad as Dirty Martini Barnaby! Flirting with that hot, gorgeous hunk like a horny teenager.
And then to discover that the hot, gorgeous hunk practically was a horny teenager…
She let out another tortured groan.
Not that twenty-seven really was teenaged.
But she was thirty-two, for God’s sake! A my way or the highway woman of thirty-two!
She opened the French doors and stepped onto the expansive terrace of her apartment. She’d chosen the apartment for the view—not the Harbour Bridge in the distance, even though that was her favourite Sydney landmark, but the boats. Something about them, bobbing gently in Rushcutters Bay, soothed her. The escape daydream, she called it. Sailing away from her troubles to a world of possibilities. A world of adventure…
She tried to bring herself back to earth by reminding herself of the time she’d forced the husband of one of her clients to sell his boat and hand over half the cash and he’d cried like a baby. But even the memory of that less than edifying spectacle couldn’t stop her thinking about adventures and possibilities.
And tonight, very specifically, the possibility of an adventure with Scott Knight.
The image of him was so clear in her head. That killer body—tall, broad, strong. The slightly spiky mid-brown hair. The alertness of his cool, pale green eyes. That I’ve got a secret smile that was kind of calculating…and somehow intriguing exactly because of that. She’d wanted to twist him into a sexual pretzel the moment she’d heard his lazy, drawling voice—a voice so at odds with the alert intelligence in his eyes it was almost a challenge.
But…twenty-seven years old?
She covered her face with her hands and let fly with one more tortured groan.
Pent-up need—that was the problem. It had been a long time between…cocktails. Dirty Martini, Bosom Caresser, Between the Sheets, Sex on the Beach or any other kind. A damned long time.
Well, she clearly couldn’t be trusted to see Scott Knight again until that pent-up need had been met. She would have to make sure any Weeping Reef gathering was Scott-free before attending. In fact, she’d go one step further and stick to girls-only catch-ups when it came to Willa. So just Willa, Amy, Jessica and the other girl she had yet to meet—Chantal—if she ever showed. No Rob. No Scott. Luke was in Singapore, and the other guy whose name started with a B—Brady? No, Brodie—hadn’t turned up at anything yet. So the whole girls-only thing was definitely doable.
And in the meantime she would find some other man to twist into a sexual pretzel. Someone like Phillip, a barrister who was happily divorced, suave, cultured and—at forty years old—mature. In the right age ballpark.
Then she would let the girls know she was taken, word would find its way to Scott, and that would be that.
Yes, Phillip would do very nicely. She would give him a call on Monday and arrange to catch up with him at the bar near her office for a Slow Comfortable Screw. A Strawberry Stripper. A Sex Machine. Or…or something.
Monday morning for Kate began with an eight o’clock client meeting.
Kate always felt like cuddling this particular client. Fragile, timid Rosie, who crept into her office as though she’d like a corner to hide in. Rosie was so intimidated by her husband she couldn’t even bring herself to tell him he was making her unhappy—so how she was going to raise the subject of divorce was anyone’s guess.
It was not a position a Cleary woman would ever find herself in!
Her frustrating meeting with Rosie reminded Kate how happy she was not to be married. And that, in turn, prompted her to get to the task of calling the equally gamophobic Phillip to arrange that bar meeting. A highly satisfactory phone call that took four businesslike minutes.
Two meetings later she made herself a cup of coffee and opened her diary to recheck her schedule…and blinked.
Blinked, blinked, blinked.
She called her no-nonsense, indeterminately aged, absolutely superb assistant. ‘What’s this appointment at twelve-thirty today, Deb?’
‘Hang on…’ Keyboard clicks. ‘Oh, Scott Knight. He called while you were with your eight o’clock. Said he’d mentioned a lunch appointment when he saw you on Saturday night.’
Kate slumped back in her chair, awed—and depressingly delighted—at the presumption of it.
‘Oh, did he?’ she asked, trying to sound ominous.
‘So he didn’t?’ Chuckle. ‘Well, I did wonder why you hadn’t mentioned it to me, but he sounded… Well, let’s keep it clean and say nice, so I made an executive decision and slotted him in.’
‘Yes, he does sound “nice”,’ Kate said dryly, and smiled at Deb’s sudden crack of laughter.
‘Want me to cancel him, hon? Leave you to your takeaway chicken and mung-bloody-bean salad?’
Kate opened her mouth to say an automatic yes—but into her head popped an image of Rosie that morning. Diffident. Nervous. Panicky. Dodging her husband rather than telling him their marriage was over.
And hot on the heels of that came the memory of her own behaviour on Saturday night, dodging Scott at Willa’s party. So unnerved by the force of her attraction to him she’d mapped out an actual plan for seeing only Willa, Amy and Jessica. Crazy. She should be able to see her friends whenever and wherever she wanted, without giving a second thought to whoever else might just happen to be in the vicinity.
As if she couldn’t handle a twenty-seven-year-old!
And on her own turf…in her own office? Easy.
