Falling for the Guy Next Door

by Claire Robyns

  “Mango and passion fruit, actually.”

  She spun her chair back to Jack.

  At the same moment, he stepped forward to press a tall ice-misted glass into her hands. His thigh wedged between the skirts of her sundress. Their fingers brushed as her hand closed over the glass and he didn’t release. The sensations prickled to her very core. Apparently, being spitting mad at the man did nothing to quell desire, because it flickered along her veins and heated through her blood. Their eyes met and held. Her smile softened without permission as the moment stretched and neither looked away. The charge between them was so much more than electric chemistry. It spread through her like a deep muscle massage, thrilling and soothing, jostling her hormones while lulling her soul.

  His thumb stroked a slow, sensual path along hers as he took his time releasing the glass into her custody.

  When he stood back, she fought the urge to press the ice-cold glass to her throat to cool her blood and freeze the other cravings. Okay, she’d never pretended to herself that she was over him.

  She took large gulps of the fruit cocktail and gave her back to him again. She simply had to deal with this small lapse. Stay mad.

  Her eyes skipped to Finn as he approached, smoothly engaging with his guests without allowing them to stop him as he worked a path toward them.

  Finn greeted Jack with one of those slide-slide-curl handshakes, then set those Irish blue eyes on her and grabbed her nearly clear off the stool in a bear hug. “I feel as if I haven’t seen you in a month.”

  “You haven’t.” she said with only the softest rebuke. “You’ve been all work and no play for ages. Say, is that—” She prodded her chin in Isobel’s direction. “Is that one of Izzy’s cousins?”

  “Probably. The dragon brought a carriage load of Devaulls with her,” he said, glancing over. “Yes, that’s Freddie.” He looked back at her, his usual easy humour not quite reaching his eyes. “Or Lord Frederick to us lesser mortals.”

  “She actually came in the ducal carriage?”

  “Reality calling.” Finn flicked her lightly on the temple. “They drove down in one mean mother of a Bentley.”

  “She does own a ducal carriage.” Megan protested.

  “Don’t remind me,” Finn groaned, then turned to Jack. “I wasn’t sure if you’d be around for the opening. Glad you could make it.”

  “Same here,” Jack said. “This place looks impressive.”

  “You should see the Hydra Tanks.” Finn’s broad smile filled with pride. “I’ll take you on a quick tour, if you like?”

  Jack set his glass on the counter. “I just need to take a leak first.”

  Megan folded her arms, giving him a loaded look at his double standards. If she were a lesser woman, she’d demand he first finish the drink he’d insisted on. He missed her look completely, however, as Finn pointed him toward the amenities. And the more space they kept between them today, she reminded herself, the better.

  Finn rested his elbows on the bar counter behind, his gaze roaming over the room.

  “Jack’s right,” she said. “What you’ve achieved here is pretty impressive. Congratulations, Finn.”

  He dipped a smile at her, and once again she sensed the underling strain there. She put it down to the stress he’d been working under, but then he tilted his head away from her and his jaw clenched. “What does she see in him?”

  He was looking at Isobel and Ian.

  Megan considered the couple. Ian was from London and she’d only met him a couple of times. She could only comment on what she saw and the little she knew. “Good looking, charming and rich?”

  “His chin is weak,” Finn remarked mildly, as if he were talking about the weather. “And I don’t trust charm, always makes me wonder what they’re covering up behind all that slick talking.”

  “Okay.” She drew the word out, giving him a puzzled look.

  “And he’s a bloody banker,” Finn went on in a brooding tone. “He might have money now, but odds are he won’t hold onto it for very long.”

  “Down, mama hen,” she said as understanding dawned. He’d never stirred himself much over the other men Isobel had dated, but then she hadn’t been about to marry any of them. “Your chick is all grown up and ready to fly the coop.”

  He raised a brow at her. “What does that mean?”

  “You’ve always been fiercely protective of Izzy,” she sighed.

  “You don’t think she’s rushing into this?” he demanded. “How long have they known each other? Six months?”

  “Fine, you make a valid argument.” She put a comforting hand on his arm. “There’s not much you can do about it, Finn.”

  “Maybe it would be best if the dragon gets her way.” His gaze found the tall figure of Isobel’s grandmother. “If Izzy gets married up in Sussex, at least I won’t have to watch.”

  “Don’t fool yourself,” she said gently. “Wherever Izzy gets married, you’ll be there.”

  Of course, it wasn’t just Isobel getting married. It was Isobel moving away to London. Starting a new life that might possibly involve Finn less and less. Megan tried to think of what more she could say, but then Jack was weaving his way back to them and her stomach clenched. There was nothing to say. No words to console when someone moved on and left you behind.

  Lady Henrietta looked their way, her haughty gaze skimming over Megan and stopping on Finn. She raised her hand.

  “I’m being summoned,” Finn muttered and gave Jack a grimace as he joined them. “Want to come meet Lady Harry?”

  “Lady Harry?”

  “Lady Henrietta is such a bloody mouth full.”

  Megan swatted Finn on the arm and rolled her eyes at Jack. “He’d never call her that to her face.”

  “Damn right I wouldn’t.” Finn grunted. “Not unless I wanted my liver diced and sliced and fed to her prize Corgis.”

  “Charming as she sounds,” Jack said, “I think I’ll pass.”

  “She’s perfectly harmless and Finn needs you there.” Megan prodded him in the back, finally finding something to grin about today.

  “As soon as you see a gap,” Finn told Jack as he led the way, “mention the Hydra Tanks. That’ll be my cue to…” His instructions faded into the general chatter.

  Jack glanced at her over his shoulder with a pained expression. She shrugged, waving him on. His gaze held hers and even across the room, she felt the warmth and responded to the familiar intensity of that gaze that always singled her out, wherever they were, whatever they were doing. Pure pleasure rippled through her before she could stop it, softening her mouth, softening her own expression. She snapped her gaze from the magnetic force, but the pull remained, tugging heavy at her heart.

  “What was that?” Kate’s voice at her ear was a whispered hiss of excitement.

  Megan froze for a split second, then put on a solid smile and whirled her stool about. “What was what?” she asked, puzzling her brow for added effect.

  “Seriously?” Kate snorted. She pulled back, shaking her head when Megan didn’t bite. “The hand grazing? Eye trailing? Ringing any bells yet?”

  Megan hated lying outright to her friend, but she was desperate. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  Kate clasped a hand over her mouth, her eyes rounded wide. She leaned in again. “You are so doing it.” She removed her hand to reveal a beaming smile. “About bloody time.”

  “Shhh.” Megan slid from the stool and tugged Kate along the length of the bar and through the first door they came to. It led to a narrow foyer with a double-volume arched ceiling made of tinted glass and three further doors opening in different directions.

  Kate didn’t wait for them to reach any of the inner doors. She dug her heels in on the tiled floor and grinned. “This is so freaking fantastic.”

  Megan sucked in a lungful of air. Kate had the nose of a bloodhound and once she thought she was onto something, she never let go. “Okay, but we are not doing it. It was only the once,” sh
e said.

  “I knew it.” Kate punched a fist into the air. Then her elation ebbed. “What do you mean, only once? Have you lost your mind?” She grabbed Megan’s hands in hers and gave her a look that was unrelenting to the point of hardness. “I’ve watched this brewing between the two of you for years and now it’s finally broken. That deserves a little more than one night!”

  “You told me to jump into bed with Jack and get him out of my system,” Megan said. “I did it.”

  “What I meant was: jump into bed with him and make yourself comfortable.”

  Megan slid her hands free and wrapped her arms around her body. She glared at Kate. “Now you’ve lost your mind.”

  “Have I?” Kate pushed her hands through her hair, looking frustrated enough to tear it out. “This is Jack. You’re a fool if you honestly think you can wash him out that quickly.” Her voice was as tender as her words were harsh.

  “This is Jack. He blows in and out and Corkscrew Bay’s no different from the hundreds of other places he’s left and never returned to.”

  “He doesn’t seem to be blowing anywhere in a hurry.”

  “Give it a day or two.”

  Kate’s brow creased. “What if you’re wrong?”

  She couldn’t afford to think that way, because, “What if I’m right?”

  “So, you’re not even prepared to fight?”

  The air expelled from Megan’s chest, leaving a cavity that felt like the size of a crater. For Kate, there was no obstacle that couldn’t be overcome. The only thing that stood between wanting and having was the length and breadth of the fight to cross that bridge. But Megan couldn’t fight this fight. That would mean hope, and hope festered into rungs of expectations, urging one to climb to the very top…and when she reached the top, Jack would still leave.

  She tilted her chin at Kate and said in her sternest voice, “There’s nothing to fight for.”

  “Bullshit.”

  “Fine! But Jack never sticks around and that’s a fact.”

  “Facts are fluid.”

  Megan’s mouth dropped. Even for Kate, this was a little too dog-headed. “Your brain is fluid.”

  “One fact,” Kate said. “Come on, give me one set-in-stone fact.”

  Megan rolled her eyes and said the first thing that popped into her head. “The sky is blue.”

  “Until a blanket of thunder clouds turns it black,” Kate whipped back. “Or until the sun sets and blazes pinks and oranges across the horizon.”

  “Very clever,” Megan snorted.

  “I’m not trying to be clever, Megs, I’m trying to show you that under a certain set of conditions, anything can change.”

  “Except Jack and I have already been here,” Megan said softly. “Earlier this year… January. We spent one night together and he left.”

  “Bastard.”

  Megan merely raised a brow. Enough said.

  Clearly not. Kate shook her head and dropped her gaze. “You never told me?”

  Megan knew she was merely processing the new information and not upset. They’d been best friends since pre-school. With that kind of longevity and in a town this size, they’d both learned the importance of claiming a little private space for themselves now and again.

  “You would have chased his ass around the globe,” Megan said, “and hauled it back to stand trial for his crimes.”

  “You bet.” Kate’s eyes came up with a blue sparkle.

  “There was never any crime. Jack is thirty-one and he’s never settled down. That’s not going to change and I knew that before I jumped into bed with him, then and now.”

  “Okay.” She stared at Megan for a couple of heartbeats, then shrugged. “But it’s not as if you have to be in Cornwall to write. What’s to stop you from travelling the world with him?”

  “Maybe the fact that he hasn’t asked?”

  “We’ve already established that facts are fluid.”

  Megan gave her a wan smile. It wasn’t as simple as packing a bag and hopping onto Jack’s merry-go-round. She’d discovered firsthand that it wasn’t places, towns and countries Jack was running from; it was from people, attachments and commitment. Everything she’d seen and learnt about Jack in the last two years, and the little she’d picked up from Frank’s scarce conversations, reinforced her mind. But she wouldn’t confide that in Kate. It seemed too intimate, too much like baring Jack to the bone.

  What she did tell Kate, however, was another truth. “I’d love to travel extensively.” Even more so with Jack at her side. “But I can’t do it the way Jack does. I want to visit places, not live the rest of my life amongst strangers. So even if he did ask—” which he wouldn’t “—we’re just not suited.”

  Her little speech, however, didn’t deter Kate. “I’ve read every story, starting at grade school, that you’ve ever written and—” She put a hand up to stop the protest forming on Megan’s lips. “Yes, fiction, I know, but I also know you back to front and there are pieces of you thrown into every word you write.” She dropped her hand and grimaced. “I just thought, between you and me and Isobel and, hell, even Finn… I always thought you’d be the one to risk everything for love.”

  Love? She’d already crossed the halfway mark to loving Jack. If she lowered any more barriers, there’d be nothing to stop her tumbling into a free fall with no return. “Obviously, you were wrong.”

  “What are you waiting for? A rock-solid guarantee?”

  “Of course not,” Megan scoffed. “I’m not waiting at all.”

  But now that the suggestion was out there, she couldn’t shut it down completely. Was that what she was doing? Jack was still here, wasn’t he? He hadn’t scampered in the night. She wasn’t blind. Jack cared for her, she knew that much. She didn’t need a declaration from him to know what she saw in his eyes, what she read between his words, what she felt when wrapped in the warmth of his undivided attention. So, he hadn’t made any promises. She knew he wouldn’t stick around much longer. But what if…?

  “You’re right.” Kate huffed an impatient sigh. “You’re not waiting, you’re stagnating. It took you and Jack a year to get to your first kiss. We’ll all be on retirement before you take the next logical step.”

  A shiver bristled along Megan’s spine. Not because of her friend’s interference, but because the next logical step was Jack stepping out of her life. “You mean well, Kate, but Jack and I have never fit a regular relationship pattern.”

  “And you’ll never know if you could create a brand new pattern because you’re not prepared to see how far that can take you, maybe all the way into forever?” The way Kate spoke, Megan had nothing to lose.

  Megan closed her eyes for a moment on Kate’s fantasy, the one where everything you ever wanted was only an arm’s length away. She gave it a delicious minute, then opened her eyes on reality. How could she contemplate anything with a man when she didn’t even trust him to stay past the morning?

  Jack stood chatting with Isobel and a cluster of people whose names he couldn’t remember. There was a lord and two ladies thrown in there somewhere, so he assumed at least some of them were family imported for Lady Henrietta’s cause. The Duchess had railroaded Finn for a good half hour before they’d made their escape. The tour of Finn’s aqua spa was impressive, but Jack hadn’t been able to give it the attention it deserved. Just as he couldn’t concentrate on the conversations winging around the circle he stood in.

  He couldn’t keep his eyes off Megan. Couldn’t keep his thoughts off what had gone so wrong. Damn it all. He’d seen her gaze soften on him from across the room when he’d walked off with Finn. He knew what desire looked like.

  This was ridiculous.

  He excused himself from the group and made his way to Megan’s side. Their gazes collided before he reached her and the connection lit her eyes and warmed her smile. For the seconds before she shut it off at the source.

  He greeted Isobel, then dipped his head and spoke near Megan’s ear, “We need to talk.”r />
  “I’m listening,” she murmured.

  “In private,” he growled.

  His lips brushed an unintentional kiss along her cheekbone as she slid her eyes up to him.

  Warning flashed in those green depths. “I’m sure it can—”

  “Now,” he said quietly, cupping her elbow in his hand to lead her outside the main entrance. She must have realised this was a deal breaker, because she came along meekly.

  The glass doors swished closed behind them, cutting them off from the noise but not from inquisitive eyes. Jack walked two paces ahead, down the steps and onto a narrow path overhung with leafy boughs.

  “Jack!” she called after him.

  He didn’t turn, didn’t pause, kept following the path through luxury log cabins scattered far apart between pine trees that grew thick and tall. He rounded a sharp bend that cut the main lodge from sight. In one fluid movement, he grabbed Megan around the waist and stepped off the path, deep into the shadows of the pine forest, and backed her up against a tree.

  He slammed his body flush up against her, one hand pressed to the trunk above her head. He gripped her chin with his other hand and tilted her face to him. His thigh wedged between hers, her quick breaths rubbing pebbled nipples against his chest. She blinked into his eyes, again and again, and then her lids grew heavy, her breaths slowed to the beat of his pulse, and her lips parted.

  He brought his mouth down over hers, sucking in that plump lower lip, plunging inside to taste. His kiss was urgent, demanding, invading. Designed to remind her of exactly how far from over they were.

  A moment later, he had his proof. She melted into his limbs, her arms reaching around his back, her mouth softened with desire and the desperate heat in her kiss overtaking his own urgency. His fingers speared through her hair and the taste of her swarmed his blood. The rush, the urgency, slowly gave way to a warmth that saturated his entire being. He eased up on the kiss, his lips slanting over her mouth a few more times before he withdrew to look into her eyes.