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CHAPTER SEVEN
OWEN sat back in his chair, letting the debate wash over him as two of his young design team warred over the best way to progress a new program they were working on. They had a meeting with the client in just an hour’s time and they had to decide before then. He watched disinterestedly as they both tried to secure his vote with impassioned speeches aimed in his direction. He wasn’t really listening.
He hadn’t seen Bella leave this morning. Figured she must be on an early shift at the café she was working at. The fairy dress that had haunted him all night was slung over one of the chairs so he knew she hadn’t skipped out on him already. Although he suspected she wanted to. He studied the fabric, saw her in it in his mind’s eye. The outfit was demure, no parents would object, and yet she looked so damn sexy, so edible. Like a silver-wrapped bon bon—one that he wanted to unpeel and devour in one big bite. No wonder she was asked if she did adult parties. He’d been awake all hours, still seeing her in it—and the curve of her breast almost not in it.
She had this whole slightly incompetent thing going—she had a car that looked as if it had a bad case of multicoloured measles and tyres so bald you could practically see your reflection in them. As for the hard-boiled eggs … He could still feel the mortification that had emanated from her in great waves. It hadn’t been hard not to laugh. Unlike her neighbours and the firefighters, he’d seen under the blushes to the hurt beneath, and the fear. The clarity of it all surprised him. He wasn’t usually one to tune into the deep feelings of others, but with her it had been so acute he’d almost felt it himself. And crazily he didn’t want her to feel alone. He didn’t want her to be alone. Alarming, when being alone was the one thing he liked best.
But she’d been faced with a situation where she’d been feeling desperate—desperate enough to come home with him, because he knew she hadn’t wanted to. And that, despite those occasional signs pointing the other way, made him keep the brakes on.
She hadn’t wanted to see him again—had deliberately given him the wrong number—and then had been forced to accept his assistance. Assistance he’d been careful to offer casually—knowing instinctively that if he’d come on strong she’d refuse and he hadn’t wanted that. Because he was certain there was still a strong attraction there—she might not like it, but the chemical reaction between them was undeniable.
Now, somehow, he was going to find out why she didn’t like it, and then he was going to get rid of it.
It slowly dawned on him that the room had descended into silence. They were all looking his way. And then he saw that the attention of his team wasn’t on him or the lack of conversation. They were all fixated on a spot over his shoulder.
He heard slightly laboured breathing and turned to look behind him. And he was glad he was sitting down. Because the zip on his trousers was instantly pulled really tight. If he were to stand it would be obvious to all the world what this woman did to him. As it was he might have given it away with his mouth hanging open for the last—how long was it already?
She was standing only a few paces into the room, the door to her bedroom open behind her. She was wearing an old, thin, white tee shirt. It was oversized, the sleeves coming to her elbows, the hem only just covering the tops of her thighs. Good thing it reached even that far because that, it seemed, was it. Her only other adornment was a thin white cord coming from each ear, in her hand the tiny MP3 player. Even from this distance, in the silence of his colleagues, he could hear the faint strains of the music playing in her ears.
He clawed back the ability to move and glanced at the table, catching the surreptitious smiles between his workers and saw Billy openly staring at her. He couldn’t blame him. He swung his face back towards her himself, unable to look away for long.
Her mouth had opened. She might have apologised but it wasn’t audible. He saw her take in another deep shuddering breath. And then she turned, and walked back into the bedroom. As she’d moved her breasts had moved too, making it more than clear that there was no bra on under there.
‘Excuse me.’ Her voice was louder that time, her profile fiery as she darted back into the bedroom.
Owen stared after her. She had surprisingly long legs for someone who really wasn’t that tall. He remembered them around his waist and wanted to wrap them there again—preferably now.
Instead he turned his head back to his team.
‘One sec, guys,’ he managed to mutter. He swivelled his chair right around before standing so his back was to them as he rose. Gritting his teeth and praying for self-control, he headed after her.
She was across the other side of the room, but turned back to the door as he entered. He glanced about for a moment to buy some more control time before looking at her again. The glance took in her rumpled bed. It didn’t help his focus.
‘I’m so sorry,’ she mumbled, cheeks still stop-sign red. ‘I was listening to my music and didn’t hear you all out there.’
‘I should have warned you, but I thought you’d gone. We have meetings up here every so often.’
All he wanted to do was slide his fingers under the hem of that ratty old shirt and find out for sure if her bottom truly was as bare as her legs were. Looking down, he could see the outline of her nipples. Her glorious, soft warm breasts that he longed to cup in his hands and kiss as he had that magical night on Waiheke.
He was twisting up inside with the effort of trying to control his want, knowing he had to get back to that meeting when all he wanted was to back her up against the bed and take her. The way he was feeling right now it wouldn’t take long. Just a few minutes. Fast and furious.
But he knew it wouldn’t be enough. He needed longer with her—he needed a whole night.
‘I’ll be on my way in a moment.’ She was still mumbling.
He looked into her face then and the hunger in it jolted him. She was staring—as if she hadn’t seen him before, her silvery blue eyes wide. He wondered if she knew how transparent they were. The desire shone in them, the dazed surprise as she looked him over. But at the back of them he could also see hesitation. And that was the bit he didn’t understand. What had happened that night? And how could he right it? Nothing could happen until he did. He wanted her as willing and as wild as she’d been at the beginning.
So with sheer force of will he turned away, and, acting as normally as he could, went back to his incredibly boring meeting.
When she emerged from the bedroom the next time she was clothed in the black trousers and shirt he figured was her work attire. He rose and walked her to the door, shielding her from the overly curious stares of his colleagues. He bet they’d be curious. They’d never seen a woman here before. He was glad she’d emerged from one of the spare rooms. He knew he had a reputation for short term, and that was a reputation and a reality that he wanted to keep. It was a good way of keeping gold-diggers at bay. But he wasn’t glad about the way Billy was still eyeing her up.
‘Are you going to the café?’ Of course she was, but he wanted to have some sort of conversation with her, wanted to hold her there for just a fraction longer.
She nodded, still not looking at him, clearly eager to escape.
‘But you haven’t had breakfast.’
‘I’ll have something at work.’
