Roses For Sophie (7 page)

No wonder he'd thought it was all a huge joke.

‘This is just incredible. I should've recognised you when you said your first name. Felix did, didn't he?'

His hand moved in a dismissive gesture. ‘You were expecting someone else, and I look a little different with shorter hair.'

He sure did.

What happened now? She couldn't stop staring at him while she beat herself up about her ignorance. Heavens, she'd asked him how much he'd wanted for his silence! This man was probably wealthier than her grandfather.

‘Sophie, let's get back to your problem.' He reached for the bottle of wine and re-filled her glass. ‘Only a couple of months ago, your grandfather contacted me with a business proposition.'

‘He did?' That was news to her and it made her uneasy.

‘I don't think I'm breaking any confidences when I tell you it regarded the sale of diamond mines in the Northern Territory.'

‘Oh.' The knot of tension in her neck eased just a little. ‘They're part of his personal holding. Carlisle Mining doesn't have anything to do with that.'

‘My point is that if your grandfather was happy to do business with me, I think he'd more than approve of a relationship between us.' He shot her another devastating smile. ‘I'm the perfect solution to your problem.'

Speech deserted her as she still struggled to absorb the truth of his identity and her brain went back over all the conversation they'd had since she'd been shown to his table. He wasn't just some drop-dead gorgeous guy earning his living as an escort. Logan Jackson moved in the same privileged world she did. He wouldn't betray her to the press and he wouldn't be interested in her fortune, but he was interested in her.

‘I'm here, more than willing to be your lover.'

Could she handle it?

Again she felt the pulsing of her feminine need. She wanted this man as her lover. Thinking he was a gigolo, she'd been able to deny that need — just. As a total stranger there would have been no way she'd allow herself to trust him. Now she knew this was not about business for him and that he wouldn't expose their affair to the media, she was very tempted. Would it be so wrong to give into her desires? They were both adults. She wanted him and he wanted her.

Her. He wanted her, not her wealth.

A delightful warmth and a surge of hope stirred within her.

‘You should eat, Sophie. Your food's getting cold. Of course, we can always make an exit right now that convinces every other diner that we simply had to leave because we couldn't keep our hands off each other.'

No. It was too soon. She had to hold herself back because to give into her desperation would send him the wrong sort of message. She didn't want him to assume she was an easy conquest. In reality she'd only ever had two lovers, and she couldn't give in to her mad lust for Logan until she knew she could keep it under control and not get hurt in the process.

Trying to hide the turmoil of passion that seethed within her and wanted to break free, she picked up her cutlery and made an attempt at eating so nobody watching would think anything was amiss.

‘Tell me why you feel compelled to lie to your grandfather. Why not just tell him to stop interfering in your personal life?'

The probe into her personal life almost made her choke on her food. Should she tell him? Logan Jackson would understand the pressures she faced.

Gnawing relentlessly on her lower lip, she regarded him intently. What did she know of Logan Jackson? He was mega rich and owned diamond mines in Canada's north. Vaguely she recalled he'd been captured by some rebel group in Africa, but that must have been about the same time she and Jake had separated — a time when she'd deliberately stopped reading papers and watching news bulletins because she'd been heartily sick of their divorce making the headline news.

Logan had been in the news again more recently. He'd been instrumental in having the UN sign a treaty outlawing the purchase of conflict diamonds. The man was motivated to help those in need. He'd put his life on the line for others. Surely she could trust him?

He reached across and took one of her hands in his. ‘You must have a good reason for going to the lengths of hiring someone to play the role.'

‘Why should I trust you with something that's so personal?' she asked as the stroking of his thumb on her inner wrist sent a quiver of longing through her.

‘Because I might just be the answer to all your problems.'

Heaven help her. She could listen to that deep bedroom voice all night. Instead of denying it, she found herself wanting him to persuade her to trust him.

‘Felix has seen us together, Sophie. I've committed myself to attending this weekend event with you. You don't have to look any further for someone to take, and you won't have to worry that the true circumstances of our meeting will be revealed to your grandfather or the press. '

On the surface, he did seem to be the answer to her prayers.

‘However, I want to know your motivation,' he persisted.

Her motivation. Just where did she start?

She hesitated, closed her eyes, then took a giant leap of faith. ‘My grandfather's been diagnosed with bowel cancer.' The words she'd kept bottled within her, the truth she didn't want to face alone and hadn't shared with anyone apart from Sue, just tumbled out. Tears stung her eyes and a huge knot of sadness lodged in her throat. Suddenly it was all too much. She wanted to be back in Logan's arms on the dance floor, being held secure by him, moving to the romantic music and forgetting everything apart from the sensual awareness flowing between them.

I can't take comfort from him
, she told herself firmly.
I'm in public and I've only just met this man
. Somehow she had to bite down on her despair and once again find that tough exterior she'd learnt to present to the world to protect her privacy and conceal her deepest thoughts and emotions.

‘I'm sorry to hear that,' he told her simply as he squeezed her hand.

The empathic gesture was nearly her undoing and she took a little while to compose herself. Logan seemed to understand. He didn't push her. He didn't try to gloss over what she was feeling, nor did he seem awkward about holding her hand quietly while she got herself together. In those moments, her appreciation of him grew and her trust in him blossomed.

She looked out at the view of Sydney but didn't focus on any of it. ‘He's looked after me almost all my life. He's only ever wanted me to be happy, and he's terribly worried that when he…' She just couldn't say it. Even though she knew it was inevitable, she just couldn't face the fact that her grandfather was booked in for radical bowel surgery and might not survive. Removing her hands from Logan's, she fumbled around in her handbag until she retrieved a handkerchief. As discreetly as possible, she dabbed at her eyes and wiped her nose. ‘He's booked in for surgery next week. At his age he may not survive, and his dying wish is to know that I'm in a relationship that could lead to marriage.'

The jerk of Logan's body was so unmistakable as she said the word
marriage
that she almost laughed.

‘Don't worry, Logan. I'm not ever planning on marrying again,' she said with a tight smile. ‘I just need him to think I am. Do you still want the role?'

Silence stretched as she waited for him to respond. How would he react? Say, ‘
Nice to have met you, good luck finding someone. I'll get the bill'
? After all, Logan Jackson was a renowned playboy, and as much as he'd made no secret that he wanted her in his bed, she didn't kid herself for a second that the notch he'd carve in his bedpost if he had her would be anything more than that — another notch.

‘Why don't you want to get married?'

His question was not the outright denial she'd expected. She lifted her focus away from where she was putting her handkerchief back into her clutch bag and looked at the serious expression on his face.

‘I just don't, okay?' There was a limit to how much personal information she'd divulge to this man.

His eyes narrowed. ‘Are you still in love with Jake Formosa?'

‘No.' She'd never been in love with Jake.

‘But you haven't recovered from your divorce.' His regard was intense.

She sighed. After just having resolved not to, for some unknown reason she now felt compelled to explain herself to Logan. ‘I was secretly engaged to a guy who bought and sold horses for my grandfather before I married Jake.' She heard the hurt in her tone and immediately chastised herself. That had been over and done with years ago. She'd had a lucky escape from Peter.

‘Why secretly?'

Summoning up a firmer voice she focussed on her wine and told him, ‘My grandfather would never have approved, and it turned out that he would've been right. My fiancé was a fortune hunter who was more in love with the prospect of my inheritance than with me.' Looking up she gave him a small, rueful smile. ‘With the fortune you've amassed, you must've met plenty of women whose primary goal is to snare a rich husband.'

‘No surprises there.' His response was a calm agreement, but there was a hard, brief flash of something in his eyes that suggested there'd been something particularly unpleasant in his past as far as that area went.

‘So, you were engaged to a fortune hunter,' he summed up, ‘then you married Jake Formosa, a man who had a fortune and didn't need your money.'

‘Now I'm divorced.' She shrugged as if her marriage to Jake had been inconsequential.

He considered her, seeming to weigh up her attitude toward her divorce. ‘Definitely no plans to marry again?'

‘Make that a resounding no.'

‘Why?'

‘Once bitten, twice shy,' she said.

Silence between them stretched. ‘How do you feel about kids? Don't you want to marry and have children one day?'

‘No.' She spoke the word sharply and looked away from him, admonishing herself for the slight hitch to her voice that may have given away how desperately she wished she was one of the lucky ones destined for a marriage, family and a happily-ever-after ending.

‘You don't like kids?'

Oh, damn it! How on earth had the conversation turned so personal so quickly? How had this man managed to cut straight to the two most sensitive areas of her psyche? She didn't have to answer him, and she was damned if she was going to reveal her reasons for not marrying to a virtual stranger.

‘You must like kids,' he reasoned. ‘From the little I've heard of you, you work hard for a whole range of children's charities.'

‘My goal is to run Carlisle Mining. I don't have time for children of my own,' she asserted.

And I'm going to keep telling myself that so I don't feel like I'm missing out on the one thing I've always wanted more than anything.

He shook his head as she raised her wine glass once more to her mouth for more alcoholic fortification.

‘I can't see it,' he said.

‘Pardon?'

‘I don't buy your Ice Princess image. I think you cloak yourself in that frost for self-protection.'

He was too close to the mark. ‘You know nothing about me, Mr Jackson.'

Although his expression told her he believed he could read her far better than she thought, he didn't debate the point. Silence stretched a little as he drank some of his own wine.

‘Okay,' he conceded. ‘You say you're too interested in your career to have a family, but why are you so anti-marriage?'

‘I didn't say I was anti-marriage. I simply don't believe I'll ever meet someone who can offer me what I think would be essential for a good marriage to survive.'

‘What are those essentials?'

‘A good mix of love, respect, trust, friendship and passion.' She hesitated, struck again by the ease with which he drew out her responses. It was really weird but she acknowledged that something in her wanted him to understand her. ‘I don't want to make another mistake and end up in the divorce courts again, with my personal life as front page news.'

‘Unfortunately making headline news is part and parcel of being wealthy and influential,' he reasoned with first-hand knowledge.

‘I'm also never going to lay my heart out again to be trampled on.'

‘Jake Formosa trampled on your heart?'

‘No!' Nothing could have been further from the truth. ‘That's certainly not what I meant.' Now she was agitated. ‘If you must know, I was referring to my former fiancé.'

‘Why did your marriage to Formosa fail?'

‘No comment.'

He picked up his wine glass but replaced it before he'd taken a sip. ‘Would you marry again if you didn't expect love from a marriage?'

‘Are you for real? Who doesn't expect love from a marriage?'

‘Hear me out.' One hand moved up in a staying gesture. ‘What if you found someone you could respect and trust, who could be your friend and who you were deeply attracted to? Would you consider marriage then, Sophie — if love was the only element that was missing, but you could have all the rest?'

She looked away from him, focussed on the plates of food in front of them that had been largely untouched, and thought about his words.

Even to her own ears, her voice seemed to come from a long way off. ‘I'm not sure it's possible to have all those elements without love. Surely it would be love binding the friendship and the passion together?'

He looked at her thoughtfully as though he were digesting and analysing every word she said from several different angles.

‘Not necessarily,' he disagreed at last. ‘After our brief acquaintance I believe I've judged your character well enough to know that you're someone I could respect and trust, and I believe we converse easily enough and that we could also become friends. As for the passion, I think you feel too that it will be explosive between us. I believe we could have all that without love.'