Nice Girls Finish Last

by Natalie Anderson

  She tried to ignore the sweet feeling streaming from her chest to her limbs because she wasn’t sure he’d ever needed anything from anyone. ‘Maybe the lack of support is what drove you to succeed to the extent you have.’

  She felt him draw breath but he answered lightly enough. ‘Who knows?’

  ‘Is that why you help these boys?’ she asked. ‘You give them the support you didn’t have?’

  He considered it. ‘Not so much support as the skills to take charge of their own destiny. To fight a fight that’s actually worth it. Some of those boys have had it a lot worse than I ever did. But I found sport gave me self-discipline, confidence and strength. It’s okay to get angry, not okay to let that anger screw up your life. It works that way for lots of kids on the brink of losing it.’

  He’d been on the brink? ‘But you chose boxing?’

  He chuckled. ‘You don’t like that? Don’t tell me it’s too violent for you, the rugby PR princess?’ His shoulders shook. ‘I knew we could find something to put you off if we talked for long enough.’

  ‘I’m sure I can think of some other things not to like about you, as well,’ she said tartly. But she was so curious about it. ‘I thought you were too busy to make it to sports practice?’

  ‘I was. But you can beat a boxing bag any time of day and then I found an old guy in a boxing hall who’d coach me at crazy hours.’

  ‘Why did he agree to do that?’

  ‘Because I was angry and he knew that would help me succeed. He was right.’

  ‘Why were you angry?’

  ‘Why is anyone angry?’ he countered cryptically, leaning closer. They were sitting in the country’s largest stadium, but the situation was unbearably intimate. ‘But what about you—what is there not to like about you?’

  There was only one answer to that. ‘I want too much.’

  ‘You reckon you’re greedy?’ His voice rose. ‘Never.’

  ‘I am.’ Emotionally she couldn’t get greedier. She wanted all the attention she’d missed out on.

  ‘If you were greedy, we’d be having sex this second,’ he muttered. ‘Instead you’re holding me at arm’s length even though we both still want it. So why?’ He speared her with that total intensity. ‘You got an evil ex in your wardrobe, too?’

  She blinked. Here it was, her chance to put him off. It would be so easy, because she didn’t have the evil ex, she was the evil ex.

  I had an affair with a married man. I was the other woman. I tried to wreck someone else’s happy home.

  Her excuses—the missing facts—screamed to be heard, too, but she blocked them. It was a sordid tale of utter stupidity. She’d been second best. She’d always been second best. Or worse.

  And hadn’t her own actions simply proved that was all she deserved to be? Because she wasn’t smart. She wasn’t a success anywhere near the league of her siblings. She wasn’t worthy of the same amount of attention. She’d never got those moments of triumph; the celebratory dinners had never been in her honour.

  Her evil-ex story would send him running for the hills. Turn the warmth in his gaze to disapproval because the double standard definitely still existed. Maybe she should just have another quick good time with him. Maybe that was all she was good for. But rebellion against that stereotype burned. Why couldn’t she have a damn good time and the happy ever after? She wanted it all. But the guy to have that with wasn’t lifelong-single-man Seth.

  ‘You’re not going to tell me, are you?’ He finally filled the silence.

  She didn’t want to. Not here, not sitting in the late-summer sun under a sky as vividly blue as his eyes. It was another moment of fantasy and she didn’t want to burst the bubble. Even though she knew she should sever the attraction between them, she just couldn’t. ‘I was young and naïve. Let’s leave it at that.’

  His hand cupped her jaw. ‘I’ll only leave it for another time.’

  At that slight contact she melted closer. Excruciatingly aware of his body, she could almost feel his blood beating against her own. She drew a deep breath, trying to cool the inferno inside, but all it did was burn hotter. As if he could hear her thoughts, her secret wishes, his gaze travelled from her eyes to her mouth. She put her palm on his chest. Pleasure pierced from that lightest of touches. The heat and hard slam of his vitality were addictive. The scent of dawning summer intoxicated her.

  He was irresistible. She leaned forward. She lifted her chin. She pressed her parted lips to his. She flicked his mouth with her tongue.

  She did it. She wanted it. Oh, how she wanted it.

  His response came instantly—but not the one she wanted. His head lifted—away—and in the next second he’d stood and moved to the railing. Well out of reach.

  ‘You’re punishing me for saying no before?’ she asked, confused, then hurt, then annoyed.

  ‘No, I’m proving restraint.’

  ‘I didn’t ask you to.’

  ‘Maybe it’s for me. Maybe I don’t like the way this feels slightly out of control.’

  Her heart thundered.

  ‘That’s some of what bothers you, too, isn’t it?’ he said softly, looking over his shoulder at her. ‘That it’s strong.’

  She was his then, if only he knew it. But he was too far away to feel her head-to-toe tremble. And if he saw it, he gave no sign.

  ‘I’m giving you one last chance to be certain that you want this,’ he said. ‘Because when we end up in bed again, it’s going to be for a while. You need to be prepared for that.’

  ‘No.’ She shook her head. ‘I won’t agree.’

  ‘You will.’

  ‘I told you I don’t want a fling.’ She wanted it to be over. She wanted this wild flood to leave her so she was free to find someone ordinary. Someone who could care for her—just her—the way she ached to be cared for. Not this gorgeous over-achiever who could have every woman he wanted and would. Millions of them.

  He lifted his chin, standing staunch.

  ‘We can have one more night but that’s it.’ She would give herself that much. One more night to see it out.

  ‘Not enough.’

  Her heart stalled. ‘I’m not going to change my mind.’

  He walked up the steps towards the nearest stand exit and she wasn’t sure if he meant her to hear him or not.

  ‘You already have.’

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  HE was right, of course. Lena stood in the small conference room, ridiculously self-conscious in front of the youths. Tension sawed through her nerves and the unseasonably muggy weather shredded her concentration. She tried not to look at the man leaning against the back wall. Just the thought of him had kept her awake all night. And in the few minutes when she had snatched some sleep, he’d haunted her dreams. Oh, how he’d haunted them.

  As soon as she was done she fled back upstairs and put some music on, thumped her keyboard as she worked to get her inbox emptier. Even so, she heard the playful shouts and calls from the kids now out on the field. Then both the music playing and the boys’ noise were drowned by a drumming from overhead.

  She ran to the viewing window. Hail. In late summer. Marble-sized balls of ice pitting the ground. Christchurch was famed for going through four seasons in one day, but this was just ridiculous.

  The boys and Andrew were running off the pitch. But not Seth. He walked behind them, unfazed by the malevolence of the sudden storm, his tee shirt sodden in one second. It clung. He didn’t hide his face from the ferocity of the hailstones; instead—as if he had some sixth sense—he looked up, searching.

  She knew he saw her at the window because he stopped still. Despite the distance it was as if he could see into her soul. And it was burning hot for him. She put both her hands on the glass as if it could cool her. But there was only one thing that could douse her inferno.

  Seth ran up the stairs and sprinted along the stadium’s corridors. He knew he could have convinced her last night but he wanted absolute surrender. Now he knew he had it, but strangely h
is imminent victory didn’t please him. Instead he felt unsettled. She’d opened up a little last night but not a lot. It only made him more curious. He wanted to know everything. And, damn it, his head was so messed he couldn’t find her in this rabbit warren now.

  Finally he got there. She stood exactly as he’d seen her from the pitch. A slim figure at the window in a navy dress with her hair sleek. Motionless, she gazed out at the mad weather. She couldn’t have heard his footsteps over the din of the ice dump. He walked up behind her but kept an inch of space between them, not wanting to get her beautiful outfit all wet. But he reached out and placed his hands over hers, pressed them ever so slightly harder on the glass.

  She didn’t even flinch—she was that tense already, her muscles couldn’t tighten more. So she had sensed him.

  ‘Where are the boys?’ Despite the hail hammering the steel roof, he heard her quiet whisper.

  ‘With Andrew. Going to watch a DVD.’

  ‘Shouldn’t you be with them?’

  ‘In a minute.’

  He took half that minute to catch his breath. His chest ached as if he’d been working out for hours. But he hadn’t; they’d hardly started. Which was how he felt about him and Lena.

  ‘It’s a big storm out there,’ she murmured.

  ‘Bigger one in here.’

  She trembled—some emotion shivered through her from top to toe. Then he felt her force it to stop, tension locking her body still. He couldn’t help himself, pressed a kiss to the juncture of her neck and shoulder.

  ‘Not here.’ Her whisper was a plea. A revelation of torment.

  He felt another convulsion of her hands beneath his and realised that the resistance emanating from her wasn’t against him, but herself. She was holding herself back.

  He breathed deeper to contain the fierce reaction within himself. The things he wanted to do now—to press forward and pin her in place, to slide his hands beneath her dress, to get within her warmth as deeply and as quickly as possible. But as much as he wanted to, he wasn’t going to drag her off for some two-second quickie in a cleaning cupboard. Not here, not now. They both had jobs to do. They both had to concentrate. And he’d meant what he’d said. He wanted more than one night. He wanted more than the frisky play they’d had the other day.

  He wanted time. But that time wasn’t now.

  ‘Have dinner with me,’ he said, unable to release her yet.

  This time the small ripple within her was amusement. ‘Is that what you call it?’

  He’d heard her talk to the players, to the boys. He’d seen her do her stadium thing several times. He’d sparred with her, he’d had awesome sex with her. And her beauty, her knowledge, her enthusiasm and her professionalism all impressed him. But it was the laugh that felled him. Every time.

  But he really meant for them to eat tonight, to converse. Because the snatches of flirt talk they’d shared so far weren’t enough.

  ‘I’ll wait for you after work.’ He forced himself to peel his hands off hers and stepped back. Beneath his ribs he still ached; he didn’t stop to analyse why. All that mattered was seeing her and securing something more.

  Lena bent her head, resting her forehead on the glass; it didn’t ease her fever. She turned, pressing her spine against the pane. He was already at the end of the corridor, determinedly walking away and saving her from committing the cardinal workplace sin of having sex on-site. Because if he’d stayed a second longer, she’d have been begging him to. She couldn’t fight it any more.

  He was waiting for her outside her office at home time. They walked down to his car and he drove them straight into town.

  ‘I am starving,’ he said, pulling into a park that looked three metres too small for his car.

  ‘We’re really going out?’ Lena released the breath from her bursting lungs. She’d been expecting the screech of car metal pranging but the guy seemed to know exactly how close to the edge he could go.

  ‘What did you think I meant by “have dinner with me”?’ His eyes twinkled as he waited for her on the footpath and then walked along with her.

  ‘You know your track record speaks for itself.’

  He just smiled. ‘Are you okay with Japanese?’ He opened a door with a flourish.

  ‘Sure.’ She breathed deeply as she walked into the exquisite interior. She’d never been there before, but she’d heard of it. It wasn’t a restaurant, but a gastronomic mecca for those with overloaded wallets. Even the tiniest piece of sushi was rumoured to have a double-figured price tag.

  The table was already booked, one at the back with the best view out of the window and the most privacy. His planning was nice, not that she’d read anything into it. He wined and dined the city’s most beautiful. They would expect to come to an exclusive eatery like this. It wasn’t that he was doing anything special just for her. But she would still enjoy it.

  Despite the conspicuous lack of prices on the menu, Seth had no hesitation in ordering what seemed like a million dishes. They came out, one after the other, and Lena had to admit she could see why the place was famous.

  ‘Fresh enough for you?’ he teased as she tucked in.

  ‘So fresh it’s almost still swimming.’ She giggled, snaffling another divine piece of sashimi. She sat back to savour it—both the food and the company. ‘How’s it going with the boys?’ she asked him. ‘Do you think it’s helping?’

  She listened as he talked through the highs and lows of the week so far. Asked him about previous ones. It turned out he was still in contact with several of his old ‘graduates’. He’d even employed a couple of them. Another couple had actually gone to university. She suspected he was financially supporting them through it, but he didn’t admit to that.

  Both the food and the minutes disappeared as they talked. The conversation meandered easily, their laughter light and frequent. In part she was more relaxed than she’d ever been with him. In another part of her, the tension was only winding tighter. Inexorably its insistence grew—the pressure building, becoming louder and louder until it was suddenly the only thing she could hear. She looked at him, falling silent as she recognised the same tension banked in his eyes. It was that appetite that needed to be sated now.

  ‘You’re ready?’ He broke the stillness with one of his multi-meaning questions.

  ‘Yes.’

  As they wound their way towards the exit, a light, delighted voice called, ‘Seth!’

  Another diner walked over to where she and Seth had stopped near the door.

  ‘Hi, Rachel,’ he greeted her with a broad smile, an arm around the waist and a kiss on the cheek.

  Lena smiled through the introductions, listened to them briefly chat about people and places she didn’t know. She tried not to stare at the woman, but did anyway. Thoughts tumbled and tormented. Seth was smiling and chatting to Rachel the same as he’d smiled and chatted with the dancers last night—all suave and charming. Only, Rachel was watching him attentively, was more familiar with him, as if she’d been the recipient of other intimacies. One of those willowy types with expensive clothes, she was all class. Not just beautiful, but smart, too. Refined.

  Lena knew it was only a matter of time. She knew what to expect. Seth was with no one woman for long and it was better to be prepared—then it wouldn’t hurt, right? She breathed out to ease the twisting knots in her stomach. Another tension entwined with the one that had been driving her. But hadn’t she planned to be with him on her terms? Maybe she should set her terms out clearly. If she was going to be with a sophisticated playboy, then she needed to be sophisticated herself.

  She smiled as Seth said goodbye to beautiful Rachel, smiled as the blonde insisted he call her sometime, and maintained that sophisticated smile as she bit the inside of her lip and refused to mention the woman once they were alone.

  They didn’t discuss anything as Seth drove to her apartment. Nor did they say anything as he accompanied her in, his hand tightly clasping hers. It was only once the door was shut and l
ocked with them inside that one of them broke the silence.

  It was Seth. He framed her face, lifting it to his. ‘Lena.’

  He kissed her with the kind of intensity that overwhelmed her. So good. His touch made her feel so exquisitely good. Somehow they were in her bedroom already, somehow they were naked already, somehow she was feeling more than she meant to—not just physical excitement. And that could not be good.

  She closed her eyes, that other tension sharpening. Her surging emotions made her vulnerable and her rearguard defence snapped to attention. She might have agreed to his more-than-once insistence, but she was determined to guide the path they were taking. She’d be sophisticated; she’d manage how this played out.

  ‘This is just sex,’ she said firmly. ‘Nothing else. Not even a fling or anything, okay? We’re just fixing the need. It’s just a series of one-night stands.’

  She could feel his smile as he kissed her shoulder. ‘You’re still trying to limit this?’

  ‘It’s not like you want anything more, either. And it’s—’ she hesitated for a second and then quickly said it ‘—not exclusive.’

  He went very still. ‘What did you just say?’

  ‘You heard.’

  He still didn’t move and she swallowed, trying to moisten her sandpaper throat before repeating herself. ‘Not exclusive.’

  He looked up, his hot eyes stripped of humour—furious. He moved quickly, rising to straddle her, his hands on either side of her head.

  ‘You’re a very attractive man and I’d rather not be lied to.’ She defended her position in a rush. Suddenly incensed because she knew it was inevitable anyway. She’d seen how that woman had looked at him. He was a temptation to any woman. ‘I have no claim on you.’

  ‘No, you understand this,’ he said, leaning closer over her, utterly using his size to assert his dominance. ‘I don’t want to be lied to, either. I might not offer commitment, but I’m all for exclusivity. No lies, no betrayal. No one else until this is over.’