Every Girl's Secret Fantasy (9 page)

“R
OSES
.” Sam Campbell smacked a spanner into Pace's outstretched hand, planted the seat of his navy blue overalls on a nearby workhorse and stated, “Women love roses.”

Pace manoeuvred his head out from beneath the hood of the classic Mercedes that he'd worked on the best part of the day. Stretching his back, he gave Sam's suggestion some serious thought.

Was it that simple? A dozen roses and the wall Phoebe had erected between them this past week would crumple and disappear into the sunshine?

Sam knew Pace better than anyone. They'd done college together, had white-water rafted a few times and jumped out of planes on occasion. Every Tuesday they played pool at Pitt Street. Pace trusted this man with his life, and had trusted him today with the story of his rollercoaster weekend with the delectable, frustrating as hell Phoebe Moore.

He'd explained how that Saturday at Tyler's Stream had gone from promising to dead to
electrifying
in a matter of hours. The night they'd spent together had been beyond compare—he believed for both of them. When he and Phoebe had driven back to Sydney they'd
stopped at Brodricks and swapped the Aston for her contracted BMW, which had arrived. Then he'd kissed her goodbye and, waving, she'd driven off. From that time to this, other than one bizarre phone conversation when she'd told him that she was busy over the next few days and would call when she had more time, Phoebe had refused to pick up and speak to him.

He was confused, certainly. Annoyed? You bet. The time for playing those kind of
you-can't-catch-me
games was long over.

“I fronted up at the television studios,” he told Sam, weighing his wrench in his hand. “But she never seems to be there. And they didn't record her show the Saturday just past. I've even knocked on her apartment door.” Perhaps louder than he should have. That old bat Mrs G had popped her jet-rinse head out through her door and grumbled that her young neighbour was away visiting friends.

Pace swiped his brow with the back of his forearm.

Was Phoebe embarrassed that she'd let herself go with him so completely? She needn't be. What they'd shared had not only been better than sensational, it had been inevitable. He'd told her as much. Inevitable, and far from over.

Cursing, he dropped the wrench into the toolbox.

What was she playing at? Did she want him to do loops chasing her? Did she think he'd give up?

“I'm no expert on the workings of a woman's mind,” Sam announced, unwrapping his ham and cheese on rye, “but maybe she's hanging out for more.”

“Hanging out for what?”

Sam shrugged. “A proposal?”

Pace's blood stopped flowing, then he hacked out a raucous laugh. “Who mentioned marriage?”

The office trainee was striding into the garage. His teenage shoulders pinned back, he handed Pace a memo. His mind still on Phoebe, Pace accepted the note and absently thanked the kid.

“I don't want to
marry
her,” Pace announced, scrunching the memo in his hand. “I just want to talk to her.”

“Talk?” With a wry grin, Sam bit into his sandwich and chewed. “Uh-huh.”

Pace gave his friend a look, then remembered the memo and flicked open the crumpled page.

When Pace growled and screwed the paper into a tight wad, Sam asked, “What's up?”

“My brother trying to box me in yet again.”

Would it always be like this? A continual battle? One brother trying to upstage the other? Sometimes he thought it might be better to simply walk away and leave Nick to his spoils. He'd thank God every day for not having to see Nick's face and be reminded of the final tip of the scales that had cast him out and hoisted Nick Junior into the top chair.

But bowing out wasn't an option. This company was a part of him. Nick would never throw in the towel either. The brothers had always duelled and would
continue to do so, Pace feared, until one of them fell and couldn't get back up.

But he wouldn't waste any more brain cells on that battle today.

His brow furrowed, he lobbed the paper ball from one hand to the other as he paced to the far side of the garage and back.

“This thing with Phoebe is doing my head in,” he admitted. And he wasn't completely certain why. If he boiled it all down, Phoebe was just another woman. There were lots of women in the world. In this city, for that matter. Women who wouldn't give him this kind of runaround.

He over-armed the paper ball and it landed in the bin. “If I was smart I'd forget her.”

Sam brushed his hands free of crumbs. “But you can't?”

Exhaling, Pace sank down heavily beside his friend. “Right.”

“Ever consider the possibility that you might have fallen in love?”

“Fallen in—”
Shaking his head, Pace strode back to peer, unseeing, into the engine cavity, his hands clenched either side of the grille. “That's the most ridiculous thing you've ever said.”

Sam sounded reflective. “I haven't been in love since sixth grade, when Kelly McCormick held me down behind the gymnasium and gave me the biggest, sweetest snog I've ever received. For a ten-year-old, Kelly sure could kiss.”

His jaw tight, Pace kept his nose near the oil stick. “Nice story. But I'm not looking to swim the English
Channel, Sam. I just want to splash around and enjoy the water.”

Admittedly, that water was damn fine. To date, the
finest
.

He'd never forget the way his body had simmered with unrefined need when Phoebe had danced and dipped for him that night. Thinking about her warm tongue delving around in his mouth, flicking over his skin, sent the constant tightening in his loins into overdrive.

Straightening, he cleared his throat and eased down the Merc's hood.

“Phoebe and I are beyond compatible in the bedroom,” he confessed. “But no one said anything about
love
.”

The word itself made him feel all itchy and uptight.

Sam kept on studying him, chewing the last of his ham on rye, his coal-black eyes looking unconvinced.

Grunting, Pace waved his friend off. Ah, what did he know?

But he clicked his cellphone from his belt. A walk down the aisle was out of the question. He was too young, too free. They barely
knew
each other. But roses…

He punched in directory assistance for the number of a florist.

Roses he could do.

 

As the stretch limousine pulled up on the glittering forecourt of an exclusive inner city building, Phoebe clutched the evening bag to her chest and tried to control the team of nerves playing jump rope in her belly.
It wasn't too late to pull out of this rendezvous. She could inform the driver she'd made a mistake and ask could he please take her straight back home.

But now that she'd come this far—feeling like Cinderella arriving at the ball—she owed it to herself to see what other surprises lay in store. She owed it to Pace, too. She'd thought he'd give up once he'd won his prize. Thought he'd grow tired of calling when she was constantly unavailable. Wrong. His efforts to see her again had only grown—and to heights that must have cost a small fortune.

She could admit she was flattered by the attention, but not enough to fool herself into believing this was anything more than it was. An encore. Pace was a ladies' man. He'd had a good time that night in her cottage. He wanted to enjoy those same highs again.

Gathering her courage, Phoebe raised her chin.

The naked truth was…so did she.

Looking beyond the limo's window into the building's glittering foyer, Phoebe slipped one of the cards Pace had sent her today back into her evening purse. A moment later the car's back passenger door swung open and the chauffeur assisted her out with gentlemanly grace. After brushing down the folds of her aqua silk gown, she pivoted on her matching high heels, hunting her surrounds for signs of her date.

She held her knotting stomach.

Where was Pace hiding?

 

From inside the hotel Pace gazed on, and he liked what he saw.

Phoebe's gown was cut daringly low at the back, and her silken hair sparkled in the moonlight with a
thousand tiny diamantés. When a sudden gust eddied down the sidewalk, collecting a mini-whirlwind of leaves that funnelled around the fall of her skirt, it lifted the airy fabric enough to reveal a pair of slender ankles that Pace knew intimately. After rearranging her swirling gown, Phoebe stepped towards the chauffeur and must have asked a question—at which he drew a playful finger across sealed lips.

Pace's smile heated his chest. He was glad he'd followed Sam's advice. Glad he'd embellished it to the degree that he had. If a dozen red roses and a card would make Phoebe smile, why not go the whole hog and send twelve
dozen
dozen? He'd organised with the florist for the bouquets to arrive every twenty minutes at the studio. At six o'clock Phoebe had rung to accept his invitation to dinner. He'd told her to expect her ride at eight. Dress was formal.

Ted, the doorman, who'd been standing close by awaiting orders, slanted his head conspiratorially.

“Now, sir?”

Pace straightened. “Yes, Ted. Now.”

The uniformed man shunted back his embossed jacket shoulders and started off.

The Brodricks penthouse, with its impressive city views, imported marble decor and quality furnishings, was usually kept vacant, ready at a moment's notice should one of Brodricks' clients visit and need accommodation. At other times it was free for Nick or Pace's personal use. Since returning home, however, Pace had felt more comfortable in his own home, which sat on a cliff overlooking the world's most beautiful harbour. But Nick's memo yesterday had turned his screws one notch too tight.

He would use this penthouse, and anything else related to Brodricks, any damn time he pleased—and if Nick wanted him to ask permission his brother would be waiting until lolly-pink was his favourite colour.

Outside, Ted introduced himself to Phoebe, then escorted her through soaring glass doors into the building. The subtle sway of her gown was nothing short of hypnotic. She'd looked fabulous in her Tyler's Stream casual white dress, edible in that black lingerie, but at a pinch Pace preferred her in evening wear. The way she held herself, the way she glided and glowed…it stole his breath away.

As his girl swept into the expansive marble foyer, Ted bowed off and Pace in his white dinner jacket stepped up. Spotting him, Phoebe froze, then released a dazzling smile while he closed in.

“I was hoping I wouldn't feel overdressed,” she said, her eyes glistening beneath the lights.

“You're dressed to perfection.”

Her cheeks flushed and she tilted her chin. “The flowers were unbelievable. Thank you.”

“Glad you liked them.”

“I can't imagine how much they cost.” Her brow creased. “You shouldn't have wasted so much money.”

“You liked them.”
She was here.
“It wasn't wasted.”

The flowers were just the beginning.

When his hand cupped her elbow, his chest swelled. “I hope you're hungry.”

As they began to walk, she threw a curious glance around. “Where are we eating? This building has more than one restaurant, doesn't it?”

When she was about to enquire further, he placed a hushing finger to her parted lips. He didn't want to spoil the surprise.

“Follow me.”

After they'd entered a lift, he hit the top floor button and a few moments later was leading Phoebe out onto the carpet of red and gold which blanketed the extensive private foyer of the penthouse floor. He pushed open the door, and the dulcet tones of violin strings drifting on the evening air washed over them.

Curious, Phoebe filed in ahead.

Her fingers trailed over the filigree lacing of an ornate mirror. She gaped at the collectors' pieces of post-modern sculpture housed safely within separate alcoves. She gripped her throat when he escorted her over a glass brick bridge under which dozens of oversized goldfish glimmered within their mother-of-pearl moat. Gazing up as they alighted, she sighed at the classic Swarovski chandelier.

“Pace, how can you afford all this? Even for one night—?”

Her words ran dry when she spotted the string quartet in a far corner of the curved room decorated entirely in white. Four cheery grey heads dipped in greeting, while bows wove musical magic across violin strings.

Pace stole a sidelong look at her amazed expression and his chest expanded as he grinned. Three years ago he might have put together a party—themed, perhaps—with loud music and cocktails flowing. But now, given the company, this was far more his speed. The added touches were well worth it. He felt the sparks of excite
ment shooting off her. What was money if you couldn't enjoy it and have special people enjoy it with you?

And Phoebe was indeed special.

 

Phoebe was speechless. This apartment was light years beyond amazing. The fish, that gorgeous chandelier right out of a storybook, the string quartet!

Light-headed, Phoebe realised Pace was waiting for her beside open balcony doors. Ducking around the filmy curtain he held back, she moved out onto a massive balcony.

Beyond the carved stone railings a blanket of night lights twinkled and the subdued noise of traffic filtered up from far below. The balcony was alive with ribbons of scarlet bougainvillaea and a delicious aroma that sent Phoebe's tastebuds into a frenzy. To her left, a long table was lined with heated
bains maries
and artistic arrangements of colourful fruit, seafood and salads. A veritable
feast
.