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But she did lift her glass derisively and drank to his toast. It meant nothing, she told herself. She wouldn’t let it. The one thing she was certain about—Quin couldn’t be trusted to commit himself to anything other than making money.
CHAPTER SIX
NOW to the business end of the evening, Nicole thought, as they left the restaurant. The skin-prickling awareness of Quin walking beside her and the treacherous excitement he generated, made it extremely difficult to keep a level head and an objective attitude about what was going to happen when they reached his apartment.
“It’s only a short stroll,” he said amiably, showing no tension whatsoever over being with her.
Why would he?
He was in the box seat, directing the action.
It was okay to want sex with him, Nicole told herself. Take it, enjoy it, then leave it behind you when you go in the morning. Just don’t believe it’s anything else but physical chemistry driving a perfectly natural urge. After five long celibate years she was entitled—as a woman—to feel sexual pleasure again. Probably her highly personal knowledge of how Quin had given it in the past was stirring the desire.
“Look!” His hand curled around her arm to hold her still as he pointed to the shop window they were passing.
“At what?”
Her gaze swept around a display of Australian souvenirs. Being situated here, underneath the marble colonnade, the place was very much an upmarket boutique for tourists. A small group of Japanese were inside, stocking up on gifts to take home with them. There were many such shops around Circular Quay, catering for the same trade. This was an expensive one but beyond that…
“The blue butterfly,” Quin enlightened her. “Come on. Let’s go in and buy it for your tree.”
Nicole’s heart lurched—the shock of his knowledge only dissipating when she remembered he’d queried Jade’s gift to her last night. Jules had explained it although she’d stopped him from saying too much. The butterfly tree was a special thing between her and Zoe.
A fierce wave of protest burst through her mind. She didn’t want Quin associated with it in any way whatsoever. He didn’t have the right to intrude upon it. He hadn’t been part of it, never would be part of it. Yet before she could find suitable words to check his impulsive suggestion, his arm was around her waist, scooping her inside the boutique, and as always with Quin, a saleswoman instantly zeroed in on him.
“We want the blue butterfly,” he said unequivocally.
“Ah yes, a beautiful piece.” The woman smiled at him, then quickly moved to get it out of a glass showcase which contained a menagerie of Australian birds, fish and animals, some exquisitely fashioned in crystal, others delicately made of blown glass with colour swirling through them.
“It’s a Ulysses, native to far north Queensland,” the saleswoman prattled on. “You see them everywhere up around Cairns and the Daintree Rainforest. The natural colour of their wings is an iridescent electric blue, so you’ll get the best effect if you can place this piece where sunlight shines through the delicate glass.”
“We’ll take it. Wrap it up,” Quin instructed.
“Wait!” Nicole cried, frantically trying to come up with a reason to stop this purchase. “It looks terribly expensive. How much is it?”
The price stated was exorbitant. There was probably a huge mark-up on everything in the boutique because of its prime position near the Opera House.
“I can’t accept this, Quin,” she said firmly.
He looked incredulously at her. “After all you’ve accepted from me today?” He shook his head, took out his wallet, extracted a credit card and smiled at the saleswoman as he passed it to her. “Wrap it up. It’s a perfect memento for a momentous evening.”
There was no stopping him from making the purchase. Nicole recognised that. However, she could and would refuse to take the butterfly from him. She kept her arms rigidly at her sides when he tried to hand the boutique bag to her as they left the shop. “This isn’t part of our deal,” she insisted.
“I bet you haven’t got one like it,” he pressed temptingly.
“That’s not the point.”
“What is?”
She flashed a fiercely determined look at him. “I don’t want a memento of tonight.”
A ruthless gleam answered her. “I intend that you find it unforgettable anyway, Nicole.”
Her hands clenched in a blind need to fight off the sense of very real danger to the life she’d made without him. “This will pass,” she muttered in savage resolve.
“It didn’t last time. Which is why we are here now.” His eyes challenged her to deny it.
She couldn’t. No-one else would have drawn her into bartering herself for money. It was because of who he was, what he was, and how unimportant he’d made her feel in the past when his obsession about amassing money had come ahead of everything else. But she was not about to admit that Quin was right. Feeding his ego was not on her agenda.
