by Sandra Field
‘Wanting and having are two different things. I freely admit to wanting you, and if I went along with your little plan I’m sure the experience would be…ravishing. However, I’d have to live with myself afterwards, and you wouldn’t be worth the trouble,’ she returned with feline intensity.
To her utter chagrin, he laughed and headed for the door. ‘I shall have great pleasure in making you take that back. Once this is over, you’ll be purring instead of spitting, little cat,’ he added just before he disappeared from view.
Shelby’s smile vanished abruptly. She stared at her hands, which still tingled from touching him, and wondered for a wild moment if she might still be dreaming, but she knew she wasn’t. Gray really had just turned her world on its head.
He was attracted to her. Had been for a long time. Even when he had been following her father’s orders. That just made the sense of betrayal worse. Even his wanting of her came secondary to his work. Now, he thought, because she was still attracted to him, they could have an affair. Of all the nerve! Her blood was absolutely boiling. She was not going to fling herself into his arms, saying, Take me, I’m yours. Oh, no.
She loved him…though for the life of her she couldn’t say why right now. There was no way she could overlook what he had done just because she wanted him physically! How dared he assume she was ripe for the picking? Some way, somehow, she was going to make him sorry for thinking that.
She kept this thought with her as she rinsed her dirty dishes in the sink and stacked them in the dishwasher. Then it was time to go.
Gray met her in the hallway and she couldn’t help doing a double take when she saw him. Added to the black trousers and white T-shirt was a black jacket, from where he pulled a pair of designer sunglasses which he slipped on as she joined him. This was not the conservative businesslike Gray she knew at all. This Gray had wow factor! Good enough to eat and heart-trippingly sexy. Not that she was going to allow that to affect her decision about him.
She looked him up and down with a critical eye. ‘Who would have thought there was a hunk hidden under all those grey business suits?’ she said in mock amazement.
‘You approve?’
‘There’s scarcely a red-blooded woman alive who wouldn’t. You’ll be beating them off with a stick,’ Shelby added with wry honesty.
‘But not you,’ Gray surmised, holding up her car keys. ‘You’ll be driving. Try and keep your concentration on the road, not me.’
She shot him a haughty look as she took the keys and went out ahead of him. ‘Oh, please. You’re not that irresistible.’
‘Good. I’d be quite happy with fairly irresistible at the right time and place,’ Gray returned, shutting the door behind them.
‘And the right time and place would be?’ she asked, calling the lift.
‘I’ll let you know when we reach it.’
Despite her determination not to respond, her nerves gave a tiny leap and she shivered. ‘I’ll be there, will I?’
‘I’m certainly hoping so.’ The lift arrived and they stepped inside.
Shelby laughed wryly. ‘I’ll say this for you, Gray. You’re certainly not lacking in confidence.’
His responding laugh was soft and husky. ‘It’s the only way to get what you want.’
And he had decided he wanted her, she thought grimly. Well, they would see about that.
When the lift stopped, Gray put out a hand to prevent her from stepping out into the car park. He took an all-encompassing look around before taking her by the upper arm and urging her towards their parked cars.
‘I feel foolish!’ she exclaimed, though she kept her voice down instinctively.
His hold tightened fractionally. ‘When you fall at my feet I don’t want it to be because someone’s taken a pot-shot at you!’ he growled back sardonically.
‘That isn’t going to happen for any reason,’ Shelby was quick to point out, using the remote to unlock the car doors as they walked.
‘Put it this way, Red. You have to be alive to resist me. Let’s keep it that way!’
She said nothing, merely climbed into her car and waited for him to join her. It was going to be a long day.
The journey out to her new client was uneventful, if you ignored the snarl of traffic. Once they were through it, Shelby made good time to the address she had been given. It was a very exclusive area. The understated aura of wealth oozed out from the parallel rows of detached houses. Turning into a manicured driveway, she parked the car before the door and turned to Gray, more in hope than expectation.
‘I don’t suppose you’ll be staying in the car?’
‘Not a chance. I need to be where you are,’ he answered, just as she had expected.
Shelby reached for her briefcase and took from it a notebook and pen which she handed to him. ‘OK, here are the rules. You take these and make notes. It doesn’t matter what you write, just look efficient. Above all, don’t say anything. Leave all the talking to me. Got it?’
With his sunglasses on she couldn’t see his eyes, but the twist of his lips told her he was laughing at her again. ‘Down to the last dotted i and crossed t.’
She looked at him doubtfully, but knew there was nothing she could do. ‘This is going to be disastrous. I can feel it in my bones!’ she exclaimed helplessly as she exited from the car. Climbing up a flight of steps, she took a steadying breath and rang the bell.
The door was opened by an elegantly dressed woman of that indeterminate age which could have been late thirties or early forties. ‘Mrs Tyrwhit-Jones? How do you do? I’m…’
‘Shelby Greer. I’m so pleased to meet you at last. Do call me Antonia,’ Antonia Tyrwhit-Jones finished for her in a breathlessly excited voice. ‘Do come in. I’ve heard so much about you. All my friends tell me how talented you are. I can’t wait for you to do wonders with this old house.’
‘I’ll do my very best,’ Shelby responded when she was allowed to get a word in. She could see the woman’s eyes going beyond her to study Gray, who had followed them inside, and saw them widen as he drew her full attention. Much to Shelby’s annoyance, they then turned decidedly predatory.
‘Well, now, who might you be?’ Antonia Tyrwhit-Jones asked with rather more than general interest. Fingering the pearls she wore at her throat, she looked Gray up and down with avaricious eyes.
Shelby experienced a violent wave of unadulterated dislike. Her expressed feelings notwithstanding, she took exception to the woman looking at Gray the way she was. In consequence, her reply was designed to put an end to the woman’s interest.
‘This is Serge. He’ll be assisting me today. Taking notes, that sort of thing.’ She introduced them.
Speculative eyes looked him over yet again as Antonia held her hand out. ‘Pleased to meet you, Serge.’ Gray removed his sunglasses and slipped them into his breast pocket, shook hands but said nothing. The other woman looked curiously at Shelby. ‘I guess he’s the strong silent type. He’s very handsome, though. I just adore a man with muscles.’
Shelby pretty much decided there and then that she and Antonia Tyrwhit-Jones were not going to get along. However, she couldn’t yet afford to turn away a prospective client. Luckily, there were other ways to skin a cat. Taking the other woman by the arm, she drew her aside, leaning in conversationally as she did so. ‘Oh, I know. There’s a catch, though. I’m afraid you’re not his type.’
Automatically the woman raised a hand to her bleached blonde hair. ‘Not blondes?’
Shelby gave her a woman to woman look. ‘Not the right sex,’ she declared in a loud whisper, and caught the sound of a strangled protest from behind her.
Her client was suitably deflated and looked at Gray with a shake of her head. ‘It can’t be true. What a waste! Oh, well, never mind. Now tell me, Shelby, would you like to look at the upstairs rooms first or the downstairs? Or we could have some coffee?’
Having successfully diverted the other woman, Shelby smiled brightly. ‘The upstairs rooms first, I think,
Antonia. Then I’ll make my way down. We can discuss your requirements and any ideas I come up with over coffee later. I like to get an overall feel of the place first.’
‘Just as you like. I’m sure you know best,’ she conceded, though, as the other woman led the way upstairs, Shelby had the feeling Antonia Thyrwit-Jones was not going to be an easy woman to work with.
Having given them a brief tour of the layout, during which she sent Gray more than one wistful glance, Antonia finally left them alone in the main bedroom, departing with a waggle of her fingers. Shelby let her breath out in a whoosh as she relaxed. The feeling lasted for maybe five seconds, then Gray narrowed his eyes on her.
‘Serge?’ he queried in disgust, and Shelby couldn’t help bursting into a fit of giggles.
She hid her face behind her hands. ‘I had to do something. I think she was about to jump your bones.’
‘Well, she isn’t going to do that now, is she? Not when you told her I wasn’t interested in women,’ he growled, moving towards her in a purposeful manner.
In the interest of self-preservation Shelby began to back away. ‘Take it easy, Gray. It was just a joke!’
‘Joke? Do you see me laughing?’ he demanded in a tone that set her nerves quivering.
Shelby continued to retreat as he advanced. ‘Where’s your sense of humour?’
Teeth flashed whitely as he grinned menacingly. ‘Lost under a powerful desire to strangle you!’
‘Would it help if I apologised?’ Shelby asked, just as the back of her knees came in contact with the bed and, unable to prevent it, she sat down abruptly.
‘It wouldn’t help if you grovelled from here to doomsday,’ he growled, hovering over her so that she fell backwards on to the covers. ‘You’re going to be sorry you said that, Red.’
Heart pounding, Shelby stared up at him. ‘What are you going to do?’ she asked breathlessly, moistening her lips with the tip of her tongue. This morning it had been a purely nervous response and she had seen the result. Now she used it as a diversionary tactic, and it worked like a dream.
Gray froze, closing his eyes as he took in a deep breath. ‘You had to do it, didn’t you?’
Shelby smothered a giggle and blinked, feigning ignorance. ‘What?’
Opening his eyes, he speared her on the end of a blue gaze. ‘That sexy little trick with your tongue.’
It was highly erotic, lying on the bed with him looming over her, and her breathing went awry as her senses responded to his closeness. ‘You mean this?’ she asked, doing it again and catching the faint sound of a groan issuing from him. ‘It’s a nervous gesture.’
‘It’s damned distracting. That’s what it is, you little tease!’ Gray corrected as he straightened up and moved away from her.
Sitting up again, hiding an urge to smile, Shelby smoothed down her hair. First round to her. ‘I had no idea I could put you off your stride just by licking my lips.’ Now that she did, she wondered how she could use it to her advantage.
‘Believe me, Red, there are a lot of things you don’t know you can do,’ he informed her cryptically and, not surprisingly, she was intrigued by the notion. There was more?
‘What things?’ she wanted to know, but Gray had said all he was going to. When it came to teasing, he had his own methods. Disappointment had her stomach sinking. ‘You can’t just leave it there.’ She wanted to know what powers she had that could be used against him.
He stared at her, a smile slowly curving his lips. ‘I have left it there. You can’t expect me to do all your work for you.’
Which meant she was going to have to go by trial and error. That could turn out to be hazardous, but he left her no choice. ‘I hate it when you say things like that!’ she complained with a decided sniff of displeasure. Which was water off a duck’s back to Gray, who simply stood there, arms crossed and an inscrutable smile on his face.
‘The trouble with you is you’ve led a pampered lifestyle,’ he told her in the next breath, and Shelby took instant exception.
‘I’ve never been pampered. Indulged from time to time, but never pampered,’ she corrected him whilst she opened her briefcase and took out a retractable tape measure.
‘You mean none of the men you’ve dated have ever bought you things?’ Gray wanted to know, watching her take measurements with speed and efficiency.
Shelby shook her head. ‘I discouraged it. Men who buy you things tend to think they own you,’ she explained. ‘Make yourself useful and take a note of these dimensions,’ she went on, reeling off the figures she had, then going on to add more.
Gray glanced up from the pad he was writing on. ‘Some men never learn that you have to let a wild thing have room to breathe and roam. That way they’ll come to you of their own accord.’
She looked at him in surprise, having been called many things but never that. ‘You think I’m wild? I think I’m insulted.’
He laughed. ‘Don’t be. You’re not wild, but you have spirit. Reining you in would be a crime.’
To her surprise, his words caused a bubbly sensation in her stomach and she pressed a hand over it to settle it down. She couldn’t let him see he had touched a nerve. ‘So, hypothetically speaking, what you’re saying is this. If we were married, you wouldn’t tie me down?’ she asked lightly.
‘Don’t get me wrong. I’m male enough to want to make certain you know you’re mine but, having done that, you would have all the freedom you craved,’ he confirmed, then laughed. ‘Realistically, of course, you and I are about as close to getting married as the earth is from the moon.’
Even though it was entirely what she would expect him to say, it cut her to the quick. ‘Just as well, as I want nothing to do with you, one way or the other,’ Shelby shot back mockingly, hiding her wounds. She turned to the window she had been sizing up.
‘If ever there were two people not meant for each other, we’re them,’ Gray mused, and she glanced over her shoulder.
‘Absolutely. Any relationship requires trust, and you’ve already proved I can’t trust you,’ she informed him with a frosty smile, turning back to the job in hand.
It was a downright shame, because she knew that, given the chance, she could make him happy. However, he had made it more than clear that what he wanted from her had nothing to do with love. Marriage was not even a remote possibility. Which brought his interest down to pure old fashioned sex. Which she had nothing against, and had an idea that with him it would be fantastic. Her heart, though, would still hunger. She hadn’t ever imagined that she would be one to suffer from unrequited love. Life had a way of playing tricks on a person.
‘We’d better get on or Antonia will be back. I don’t think I could bear to see her sending you any more disappointed glances.’
Gray made a growling sound in his throat. ‘Hell, no. The woman makes me nervous.’
Shelby laughed with genuine amusement. ‘Now that I don’t believe!’
‘Trust me, Red, there’s a look in her eye that says she’d like to try and return me to the straight and narrow. You might have to pull her off me,’ he said, very much tongue-in-cheek.
She glanced back over her shoulder again. ‘Don’t worry. I’ll protect you. I didn’t like the way she was looking at you, anyway.’
One eyebrow quirked. ‘I noticed. Why is that?’
She hadn’t allowed for the question, but the answer was easy. ‘Why? Because you’re off limits for the duration, remember?’ Shelby declared dryly. ‘I’m not suffering this thing on my own!’
‘Shame. I thought you might have being going to tell me she was poaching on your preserve,’ he said, shooting her a rakish look.
Shelby very nearly cut her finger as the steel tape shot back into its holder. ‘Ouch!’ she gasped, sucking the damaged digit. ‘You’ve got to be kidding!’ she exclaimed derisively.
Gray’s lips twitched and there was a wicked light in his eyes. ‘It was just a thought.’
She shook her head sadly. ‘Well, you can keep th
ose kind of thoughts to yourself in future. You’re only here because of this ridiculous threat. It changes nothing between us. You’re still a rat. I still despise you, and probably will till the day I die. Which, as you are here to make sure that doesn’t happen too soon, leaves years of hating ahead of me.’
Gray heard her out, then had the gall to smile. ‘If you put as much passion into making love with me as you do into despising me, we’re in for interesting times. OK, then, what’s next?’
Shelby would dearly have liked to throw something at him, but in a client’s house it was out of the question. So she satisfied herself by turning her back on him. Lord, let this be over soon, she prayed, because the way things were going she wasn’t going to come out of it unscathed!
CHAPTER FOUR
SHELBY prepared for the charity dinner with extra-special care. Although it wasn’t the way she had expected to spend the evening, she was going to be with Gray. That being the case, she was determined to look her best. Actually, her unspoken plan was to knock him totally off balance. She wanted him to see what he was missing. What he was never going to have.
She had already bought a new dress for the occasion before the current situation had occurred. It was a shimmering affair in shades of turquoise and green, with tiny straps to hold it up, and was so light she barely felt as if she had it on. Her reflection in the mirror showed her an elegant young woman with perfect make-up, her red hair piled on top of her head in an ageless and very feminine style. A matching stole draped across her neck and over each shoulder, and sandals and evening purse completed the ensemble.
Shelby thought she looked good, but what would Gray think? Would he be smitten? Not that she seriously wanted him to be. She meant what she had said this morning. However, there was nothing wrong in taunting him. That he did deserve. In spades.
A sharp knock on her bedroom door caused her to turn her head quickly.
‘Taxi’s waiting downstairs,’ Gray called out, and her heart upped its beat all of a sudden.
