How to Win a Guy in 10 Dates (5 page)

She was in up to her knees now, skirt bunched up, tucked under her short denim jacket. Standing still, as the moon slid up the sky, and emerged over the tree tops on the opposite bank.

‘Look, Ed.’ Her voice was urgent, and she was pointing upstream. ‘The moon’s lighting up the water.’

‘I told you you’d like it. And moonlight swimming is something else.’ He hesitated, not knowing whether to push it. ‘You don’t have to do it, but I’m going in.’

He flung down the towels, shrugged off his shirt, whipped down his jeans, and two seconds later he let out a shout as he stormed in, and the icy water hit his skin and smacked the breath from his body.

***

Buff naked man alert!

And even if it was almost dark, what a body!

The deep breath Millie drew as she saw Ed hit the water went on forever, but still didn’t seem to be giving her enough oxygen. She shook her head, raised an eyebrow in the shadows, and smiled silently, as she watched him gasping at the chill, his head bobbing as he jack-knifed in the silvery water.

‘Careful you don’t drown, I don’t have a lifeguard certificate!’ she called, shouting anything to cover her confusion.

And that had pretty much sealed it. She was going to have to go in too. There was no way on earth she could stand here and watch him emerge from the water. It had been bad enough sitting next to him in the Land Rover, watching his lean tanned forearms wrestling with the steering wheel. The sight of him naked would push her already surging hormones beyond the danger zone and out the other side.

Back there, the thought of swimming with him had set her alarm systems jangling, until he’d found her hand. That couldn’t have made her move faster if he’d been electrically charged. But going phwoaaarrr at the sight of a hunky male was one thing. Acting on it was something else entirely. One strict no-go area. Or it was when she had her rational head on. Despite the warmth of the air she shivered again, chewing her nail as she struggled to work out the ambiguity of her reactions. Traveling along those bumpy rutted lanes seemed to have knocked the sense clean out of her.

‘If you’re coming in, fast is the only way to do it!’ He was thrashing around, still facing the bank. ‘That way you don’t feel the cold!’

Thanks for that Mr Mitchum. She damn well would be fast, not because of the cold, but because she had to take him by surprise. But what to wear? She weighed up the options. Shorts and vest? Knickers and bra? None of the above?

Playing for time. ‘What’s it like in there?’

‘Cool!’

Were those his teeth chattering? Just do it. Hadn’t he just told her back there he wasn’t going to be sticking around? So she had very little to lose. So much to gain.

Three seconds, she was down to her underwear, one more and she was slicing through the water, her whole body shrieking with shock.

‘Watch out banshee, don’t put your head under, or you’ll mess up your cut!’ He was laughing at her now, lunging towards her, splashing exuberantly. ‘Good or what?’

She was wading, water up to her shoulders, laughing, shivering, juddering, gasping, not caring that he was in front of her now, gathering the strands of her hair that were dripping round her shoulders, and bunching them around the back of her neck.

‘Chilly.’ Her teeth rattled as she slid to a halt. ‘Like you said.’

She shuddered, wildly. Nothing to do with the cold. Knowing she should back away, splash away, run away, anything to put distance between her and this man who was tipping her force field upside down, his mega attraction dragging her to him, when she knew she should be running for the hills. And her limbs refusing to make any movements at all as she drank in his sculpted cheekbones, glossed with moonshine, that sexy sardonic twist of his lips, those damp locks of hair dangling over his forehead.

Now he was smiling, and her stomach was doing somersaults. Reaching out, she put one quaking hand on his upper arm to steady herself. Her touch met with his deliciously slippery skin, and the flex of deep muscle. The other hand went on his shoulder, then slid along, around, slithering onto his back, catching the shudders reverberating up his spine in her fingers, as her heart banged crazily against her ribs. Holding her breath, she pushed her hand into the wet tangle of his hair, and the undulations of his skull were firm and real under her finger tips. She knew that this time it wasn’t a dream, because his breaths were hot and ragged on her cheekbone.

Reaching up, grazing her mouth along the stubble, she found the edge of his bottom lip, feathering with her tongue, teasing, asking, demanding. And all the time, he was still, remote, stony, standing like a shivering statue.

She shifted, jerked as the length of his erection banged against her pelvis.

‘Sorry.’ One mumbled apology

‘Don’t be.’ His growl was feral. ‘I’m not.’

Then his mouth slid over hers and she dived deep into the tangling, demanding vortex of his kiss. Hungry. Starving. Longing for the taste, pushing her breasts against the rock of his chest, sliding her calf around the sinews of his thigh, reveling in the raw heat of his mouth.

This was real. The gruff moan in his throat as she tugged on his hair was real, the pressure of his hands on her waist as he lifted her was real.. Buoyed by the water, she wrapped her legs tight around his waist, locked her arms around those rippling shoulders. And boy, the volcano of desire, pounding between her legs was real, as she moved against his pelvis. Letting her eyes slide upwards to check the moon was still there, finding it blurred by the aching need in her body.

Then, she suddenly found that she could breathe again.

And she was rocking, gently, moving against him as he was striding towards the bank, the air cold on her emerging skin.

And then he was disentangling her, unwrapping her legs, unhooking her arms, and as her dangling feet hit the mud of the shore, he bent, flipped her a towel, and she knew it was over.

MILLIE always got up extra early on Thursdays. With no classes to distract her, she liked to exercise Cracker at day-break, then hammer on with her box making. But this morning she was doing more thinking than gluing, and more cursing than thinking. And if that wasn’t enough, she was running short of material for her French-themed line. She’d severely under-estimated how much she was going to need.

Another tri-colour bit the dust, as she slammed her fist into the table. She growled, and a half-finished box flipped across the surface, toppled off the edge, and skidded across the tiled floor. ‘Marie-frigging-Antoinette!’

‘See you tomorrow.’ That’s what Ed had shouted after her as he’d shot off in a spray of gravel last night. ‘See you tomorrow.’

Just the thought of it made her furious. She’d put herself out there, taken a risk, totally against her better judgment, and he’d thrown it back in her face. All her fault. She should have kept a grip of herself, not jumped him like some sex-starved harpy, not assumed that just because for an instant she’d had an inexplicable urge to eat him whole, it was reciprocated. It had been utterly humiliating, being carried from the water like a kid, but it served her damn well right for deviating so far from her plan. Last night had been one bad, bad call. Her life-plan was there for a reason, and she should darn well stick to it.

See you tomorrow? She snorted disgustedly. How about – not if I see you first mate?!

And just to prove she meant business, she’d put on her scrattiest playsuit, and left her hair unbrushed.

Not that she was expecting callers.

She heard the knock first, then the clunk of the door handle. Then the rasp of his voice sent her heartbeat into overdrive.

‘Anyone home?’

This far through the day and no contingency plan for if he walked in. She really wasn’t functioning properly.

He sidled in, looking as if he’d just stepped out of a Vogue ad. ‘I’ve brought salad. Thought you might like to give me that twirl.’

And her legs turned to jelly, though this time she was the one growling.

‘You’ll be lucky!’

Noticing the fallen box on its side on the floor, he stooped to pick it up, turning it nonchalantly between his fingers.

This one already had her ABB signature stuck firmly in place.

No way was she up for questions about her Amelia Brunswick Brown alter ego, the moneyed parents, the running away. She’d made the hardest decision of her life when she was Amelia. Not that she’d ever forget that. She lived with the burden of it every day. But she’d made her new start as her abbreviated-alias, Millie Brown, and it was imperative she kept Amelia hidden.

‘I’ll take that, thanks!’ She snatched it, and spun it back onto the work table before he had time to blink.

One grin turned to grimace, a roll of his still-too-dark eyes, then moving on to the kitchen, he plonked down a carrier from the deli in town, and a pretty glass bottle of something fizzy. ‘Have you eaten today?’

She desperately scraped her fingers through her hair, regretting the playsuit choice now. ‘Nope.’

He sniffed his disapproval, pushed one delectable dark wave off his forehead. ‘It’s bad to skip breakfast, even if you have just got up.’

She was open-mouthed, reeling at the onslaught, knees weakening, despite her best life-plan resolutions. ‘I’ve been up since five, if you must know.’

Now he was the one with the surprised face, already settled in though, back against the work surface, legs crossed, arms folded, as if yesterday never happened.

‘Jeez, you must be starving! Grab some plates then, and we can dive straight in.’

***

‘Have you got grated carrot?’ He pushed the plastic container across the table towards Millie, as if vegetables were going to make anything better. If he had wondered how that delicious pout would look when she seriously wasn’t happy, now he knew, in spades. Even worse than at the hospital.

He’d counted on difficult, not impossible. So, how to rescue the situation once you’d blown a girl off, even if it was for the best of reasons? If he hadn’t pulled out of that kiss when he did, he’d have been inside her within a minute.

‘Olives and tomato?’

She nodded. Took it in silence.

‘Dressing?’ Ditto.

The trouble was that last night she’d spun him so far out of control that the only thing he’d known to do was stop. He cleared his throat.

‘Last night, in the water … ’ He had her full attention immediately, and withered slightly under her grey-eyed glare. ‘I didn’t want to stop … ’

‘So why did you?’

Reproachful. One step easier than accusing.

‘It was going too fast. There was too much heat. You must have felt it?’

‘Maybe … ’ Relenting. A touch.

‘I needed to be sure you wanted … ’ Not quite right. He cleared his throat. ‘I needed to make sure our aims coincided – before we went any further.’

The tiniest twitch of a secret smile. ‘And?’

‘I told you before, I’m a short term guy, I don’t do commitment.’

‘Huh … ’ One snort. Of recognition?

‘The way I work, there’s no obligation, and no disappointment. No emotion, no broken hearts, no-one’s let down.’ He baulked inwardly at this impromptu mission statement, polished like he paraded it on a regular basis. ‘It’s a win win situation.’

‘Ah.’ She nodded slowly. Narrowed her eyes. ‘You mean a kind of friends with benefits thing?’

He hesitated. Big time.

She really didn’t get this, did she? Since when had he felt the need to explain himself to a woman about sex anyway? And since when did yesterday’s mascara smudges look so sexy?

‘Less of the friends, more of the benefits I’d say, majoring on the pleasure.’ And so much tidier than saying ‘sex for the hell of it’.

He caught her tell-tale eyebrows as they flew skywards. This had to be a whole new ball-game for her.

‘Thanks for explaining. I’ll give it some thought.’ Gently chewing on Parma ham, lips curving into a smile, but for herself, not for him. Eyeballing him straight now, as she fiddled with one slender, slipping shoulder strap. ‘Like I told you before, I don’t really have space in my life for guys right now, however they’re packaged. Put last night down to the water and the moonlight, it was an aberration, and I promise it won’t be happening again.’

Great. She was talking, even if she was back to the no-guy track.

As if anyone who’d had her legs locked around them would believe that.

‘More asparagus?’ His eyes had snagged on her shoulder. Bare. Lightly freckled. And what was she wearing? Definitely no corsets today, no underwear at all, judging by the speed of his pulse, the just-got-up look acting like a come-to-bed look.

‘Are you still in your pyjamas?’

She held an olive between her fingers, gave him mouth-watering glimpses of her tongue and perfect teeth, as she stripped the flesh off the stone before she deigned to reply. ‘Nope, this is day-wear. A one piece shorts playsuit, elasticated at the waist, the perfect combination of comfort and practicality.’ She flashed him her first full-on grin of the day. ‘The rabbits are ironic, by the way.’

‘Rabbits?’ Who the hell said anything about rabbits?

‘Yellow and green ones, in the print, see?’

As she leaned forwards to show him, he missed the rabbits, caught the glorious thrust of bare breast through the fine creased cotton, and was fiercely reminded how tight jeans and erections didn’t mix, especially not on bar stools. Casually, he slid to stand, to ease the problem.

‘So, if we’re done with the salad shall we progress to the pole?’

Sauntering across, coming to rest with his shoulder against the wall. Possibly a rash move, given the constriction difficulties he already had, but it was a distraction. Not that he thought there was the remotest possibility she was going to oblige, but somewhere along the line getting a spin from her had become a challenge, and he knew how he was with challenges.

‘Okay. You win.’ She was coming towards him now, all self-contained, self-assured.

All in control.

And then he was picking his jaw off the floor. First at the way she caved, then at the way she rose high onto her tip-toes, stretched out one easy arm, grasped the pole, followed with a bend of her knee, a twist of her ankle, and then swung, elegantly, arching, oh-so-slowly. Spinning, one, two, three mind-blowing revolutions, before she pushed gently back to standing again. Easy as, and sexy as hell, even though there was nothing overtly sexual about it.

One compliment, reverberated low in his throat. ‘I like it.’

‘Me too.’ She shuffled her shoulders, shifted her feet, stood back. ‘it's fun, it’s great for fitness. And it’s empowering.’

Too true. Certainly gave her power over him. Hell, right now he’d have done anything she asked. Because there she was, all rough and unkempt, so different from his usual type, yet somehow the dizzying haze of sexuality she exuded, was knocking him off balance

‘So what about the lap-dancing that’s not lap dancing? Will you show me that too?’

All mixed up with an un-nerving dose of vulnerability. That had to be was what was throwing him.

‘The Burlesque? You think it’s about sleaze, don’t you?’ And she was back to accusing. ‘What you said yesterday about me making a living by taking my clothes off?’ Facing him square now, she rolled her eyes, shook her head, and gave another of those huffy sighs he was becoming so familiar with.

‘And it’s not?’ Eyeing the corset tossed lightly on the sofa, and mentally pouring her into it.

‘Burlesque is different. It’s always been about entertainment, and glamour, and aesthetics, not just about striptease. The stars of the thirties were independent, successful women, who dreamed up amazingly innovative performances. Today’s Burlesque is a modern take on that, it’s about women celebrating who they are, rather than conforming to stereotypical ideas of beauty. You don’t have to be a tall, skinny model to succeed – it’s more about expressing individuality. Every dancer has her own special thing.’

‘So do you perform in public?’ The thought sent an unexpected snake of prickles down his spine, and not in a good way. His throat constricted, and it seemed like forever as he held his breath, waited for her reply.

‘It has been known, but not any more. And never all the way.’

‘And you had a thing?’

‘Mine was cream. It began as a joke, and kind of caught on, but I’m not in the performance league. I joined the Burlesque Club in Freshers’ Week at Uni, and it went from there. All I do is spread the word, have fun, and ultimately make women feel better about themselves. Whether its classes, or Hen Parties, I teach women the moves, give them a taste of the glamour, and show them how to express themselves so they can feel attractive. Feeling desirable is very empowering for a woman.’

Panic over. He was breathing again. ‘I don’t doubt it.’

Though quite why he was panicking was beyond him.

She shrugged. ‘Times have changed. Women these days don’t wear high heels because they want to please men, they wear them because they want to please themselves. Women who are powerful in their everyday lives can take one step more, and have that bit of extra sensual power over men. Or they may choose not to bother, of course.’

Like she had.

Except she had been bothered enough to kiss him. Twice. Two explosive kisses that made him dive in to capitalise on the women in control line..

‘If you are serious about being truly independent, you really need to perfect the art of no-strings sex. That you would find empowering, and fun.’ He commented, waiting to see where it got him.

‘Really … ’ Biting her lip, suppressing a smile. Was she mocking him here? ‘Like you were suggesting earlier?’

‘I’d promise to be temporary, and something tells me there’s lots of heat to burn.’

Gently suggestive. Paving the way, hoping for a shift.

‘Thanks for the offer. I’ll get back to you if I decide I’m interested. Don’t hold your breath though.’ She watched him, coolly detached now, as he moved back to the kitchen, neatly stacked the remains of lunch in the fridge. ‘Did you bring dessert?’

Always leave them wanting more.

Except she didn’t. Apparently.

‘Dessert’s later. I’ll pick you up at seven.’

And for the first time he was sensing that the way forward may not be as simple as he’d planned.

***

‘So what kind of a dessert girl are you? Let me guess?’

They were in a wine bar in town, the sort with artfully mismatched chairs, a chalk-board on the wall, and a clientele who looked effortlessly perfect, even though Millie suspected they’d spent a long time getting that way.

Ed wagged the desert menu at Millie, and narrowed his eyes in a way she wished he wouldn’t, simply for the sake of her rapidly descending stomach.

‘You definitely won’t choose sticky toffee pudding, and something tells me it won’t be the crumble and custard either, even though it is rhubarb.’

Yet again, she’d relented, caved, and here she was, melting under his gaze, hanging onto every chocolatey syllable, with her heart squishing as she noticed his broad tanned fingers slipping on the back of the menu card. Glory, she could fall here. But she was damned determined she wasn’t going to.

‘And I know it won’t be the sundae, even though whipped cream might have been your thing.’ He tapped his thumb nail on his almost perfect teeth. ‘I’d have asked you for a full meal, but I knew you wouldn’t come. Your hair looks nice up, by the way.’

Blushing at his compliment was not the best idea either, especially when she’d put in such an effort to look sophisticated, to counteract him catching her in her playsuit earlier. And damn, for how well he read her, after knowing her such a short time. Disgustingly perceptive. No way would she be here if he’d asked her to commit to more than dessert.

‘Got it!’ His eyes crinkled into a triumphant grin, as he tossed the card on the table. ‘You’ll go for the crème brûlée!’

‘Always do.’ She spun him her lightest smile. ‘My grandmother is French.’ As if that explained anything. At least it filled the acres of silence left by her shock at his accuracy. She picked up the menu, screwing her face up as she pondered. ‘I’m going to guess you’ll have the ginger tart, to match your eyes.’