‘Declan,’ she finally murmured, loving the sound of his name in her voice.
He pulled her even closer. She could feel the strength of his thighs, rock hard with muscle. ‘I spent all evening wishing you were with me,’ she murmured, then pulled back in his arms, needing to see his face.
His arms dropped from around her, leaving her bereft. Then he cupped her face in his large hands, hands she noticed were stained with traces of paint—blue, green, white all mixed in together—and smelled vaguely of turpentine. He caressed the little hollows in front of her ears—such a simple gesture yet it sent shivers of pleasure to her deepest core.
‘I spent all evening regretting I wasn’t,’ he said hoarsely.
She met his gaze. ‘I’m glad. I mean, I’m glad I’m not imagining this...this thing between us. These...these feelings.’
Declan groaned and her heart gave a painful lurch. He was going to fight it all the way. ‘I...don’t know what to do about...about you. I wasn’t expecting, didn’t—’
‘Didn’t want...’ she supplied the words for him.
‘That’s right. I didn’t want the life I’d made for myself disturbed. Then you burst into it, flooding light into the shadows in which I existed.’
She swallowed hard against a sudden lump of tension in her throat. She didn’t know how to reply.
He looked deeper into her face. ‘But eyes that have become accustomed to the dark can...can be dazzled by too much light too quickly. They blink and wonder what hit them.’
‘Like a bat,’ she said.
Shelley stilled, mortified. Where had that idiotic comment come from?
Declan stilled too. His eyes widened as he stared at her. And then she realised he was shaking with laughter he was fighting a losing battle to suppress.
‘I... I’m sorry,’ she stuttered. ‘I can’t believe I just said that.’
‘First a vampire, now a bat. You really do see me as a creature of darkness, don’t you?’
He let go his laughter and she couldn’t help but laugh alongside him though it felt forced. But when the laughter spluttered to a halt, stopped, she berated herself. ‘Why do I say things like that? Why don’t I think before I speak? I’ve been told often enough.’
‘Because you’re you, delightful and unique and I wouldn’t have you any other way.’
She sniffed back threatening tears. ‘Really?’ A niggling voice deep down inside her prodded her—was that ill-timed comment her way of deflecting emotional confrontations she wasn’t at all sure she was equipped to handle?
‘Yes,’ he said. ‘Really. I’ve laughed more since I’ve known you than I have since...since heaven knows when.’ He sobered. ‘Don’t change—promise me?’
She nodded. ‘I... I promise.’
‘Now how about we go inside out of this chilly garage?’ he said.
‘Yes,’ she said. She went to add: It’s hardly the most romantic place on earth but bit down on the words. There had been no mention of romance between them.
He put his arm around her shoulder and steered her towards the door. ‘You can think of some other dark creatures to compare me to. Maybe something that lives under a rock.’
Of course she took him literally and started to think of actual creatures that lived under rocks before she realised that was not what was required. ‘Not for one second will I compare you to a centipede or a slug.’
‘And I so appreciate that,’ he said. ‘Vampires and bats have a certain black glamour that slugs definitely do not.’
They laughed again as he walked her, with his arm still around her shoulders, into the house. Lights switched on automatically ahead of them but she immediately felt oppressed by the stillness, the vague mustiness of unlived-in rooms. She wanted to extend her time with him this evening but not here, not in this place so marked by tragedy and loss and dreams unfulfilled.
‘Did you...are you going to bed now?’ she asked, immediately wishing she’d said sleep and not bed with all its unspoken connotations.
‘No. You?’ He tightened his grip on her shoulder.
She shook her head. ‘I’m still way too wired up from the party. Can I...can I interest you in a herbal tea or coffee—I don’t drink coffee at night but you might want coffee—and perhaps a muffin? I baked banana muffins the other day and have them in the freezer. I just have to heat—’
Those dark brows drew together. ‘Did you say banana muffins?’
She nodded, wishing now she hadn’t brought up the subject. Not when she never wanted to admit how she had snuck into his house in her pyjamas and spied on him as he’d worked out.
‘Strange, that,’ he said. ‘I thought I could smell banana muffins in my kitchen. That inter-connecting door is meant to be odour, sound and light-proof.’
She froze. ‘Maybe...maybe you’d better get the door checked—the seals might need attention,’ she finally managed to get out.
‘I will,’ he said.
‘Let’s go through,’ she said.
‘I don’t have a key. The apartment is your private place.’ She’d wondered if he’d maintained access to the apartment, was glad that he hadn’t.
‘I... I have the key on the key ring in my purse,’ she said.
The apartment seemed a sanctuary but somehow smaller with Declan’s tall, broad-shouldered presence taking up so much room. She stood near him in the living room, suddenly very conscious that they were alone in complete privacy.
A meaningless fling. The words echoed through her head and her body tingled in all sorts of places at the thought of what that might entail. He hadn’t offered one, why shouldn’t she?
Not meaningless but without commitment—commitment she very much doubted Declan was prepared to make, despite the kind words he’d said about her lighting his darkness. She wanted him so much.
She turned to face him, thrilled to the desire for her she saw smouldering in his eyes. Her shawl was long gone and she knew from all the compliments she’d fielded at the party that she quite possibly looked the best she ever had in the blue dress.
But she’d been the one to deny the possibility of a fling. She would have to be the one to suggest it. She took the few steps needed to close the distance between them. She wound her arms around his neck, drew his face close and kissed him, her lips parted in a sensual invitation he accepted with a hard, hungry possession.
Pleasure and anticipation throbbed through her as she welcomed his mouth, his tongue, his passion. His hands slid around to her back, hard and exciting on her bare skin. She slid her hands from his neck so she could push off his jacket, tug his T-shirt from his belt with impatient fingers, splay her hands flat against the warm, solid muscle of his chest, feel the rapid thudding of his heart.
Her breath was coming in short, ragged gasps echoed by his. She wanted him so badly it was an ache. Every physical instinct she had screamed at her to proceed. To let Declan caress her—and her caress him back. To rid themselves of their clothes. To stagger into the bedroom locked in each other’s arms and fall together on the bed. To bring each other’s body to the peaks of ultimate pleasure.
But her instincts for common sense, for self-preservation, overrode them and begged her to stop this before it went any further. It was too soon—not just for her but for him.
She’d never been one for sex without emotion, without love. And she sensed that would never develop if the physical took over while the emotional lagged so far behind. Oh, but she wanted him so much she burned with it.
But as his hand grazed the side of her breasts, as her nipples tightened to hard points and hunger for him throbbed through her body she knew she couldn’t go through with a fling of any kind. That way lay certain heartbreak and she should have realised it before it got this far.
Meaningless would never be for her, no matter how you masked it.
She broke away from the kiss, panting. It was an effort to speak. ‘Declan. No. I mean... I mean... I mean stop.’ That sounded like such a cliché. ‘I don’t w
ant you to think I’m a...a tease but I can’t go further than this. I thought I could. I want you. Want you more than I could ever have imagined but—’
He pulled away immediately, his breathing ragged and harsh. ‘But you’re not ready.’
She struggled for the right words. ‘Are you? I would make love with you in a heartbeat but I don’t think either of us is ready for that...that complication. Not now. Not yet. Some time I hope if you...when we...’ She did not want him to think she was assuming they would work towards being a couple—though there was nothing she wanted more.
He paced the width of the room and she could see it was an effort for him to restore his equilibrium. ‘You’re right. It’s too soon. I’m only just getting used to the thought of another woman—you—in my life. I don’t want to hurt you.’
He took the few strides necessary to bring him back to her. Then groaned in a wrenching anguish of frustration that called to her too and planted a hard, hungry kiss on her mouth. ‘But be in no doubt how much I want you. How difficult it is for me to stop.’
This was a man who knew how to love. She was prepared to wait until he felt able to love again. No matter how long that took.
She stepped back before her resolve broke and she flung herself at him and begged him for anything he was prepared to give. Another deep breath restored the beating of her heart to something less erratic.
‘How...how about that muffin?’ she asked, desperate to change the subject.
‘Satisfy a different kind of hunger, you mean,’ he said with a wry twist of that mouth she wanted so much to kiss and kiss and kiss again.
‘That’s one way of putting it,’ she said.
* * *
Declan watched Shelley move around the small kitchen with the same efficiency of movement she gave to her work. A warrior who could cook—and cook well. She’d put the frozen muffin in the microwave and a delicious—and familiar—aroma was wafting its way to his nose. He was hungry. All his appetites had diminished in the intensity of his grief after Lisa died. But Shelley had awoken them and they came raging back. Especially his hunger for her.
She’d kicked off her shoes before she went into the kitchen. But she still wore that tantalising blue dress. He had to stop fantasising about stripping it off her, of releasing those chains that were all that held it together. She was wearing panties under the dress, he’d ascertained that in his first explorations. But no bra. Unhook that chain and the dress would fall to the floor leaving her in just panties and her silver stilettos—and then not even them.
He forced himself to think thoughts other than of undressing Shelley and carrying her into the bedroom. He leaned against the countertop.
‘Tell me about the party,’ he said, though he had no real interest in it. She’d come home to him and that was all that counted.
‘I met a television producer. A friend of a friend of Keith’s. He was really nice.’
Jealousy speared him. ‘I’ll bet he was.’ What male wouldn’t be nice to Shelley in that dress?
‘Not in that way,’ she said, shaking her head. ‘He was there with his wife, and she was really interesting too. He produces a lifestyle show for one of the cable channels. As soon as he heard what I did he asked me would I be interested in being their gardening presenter. They want gardening to be seen as younger and...and sexier.’
Declan couldn’t help his growl of possessive jealousy. ‘What do you mean “sexier”?’
‘Not me. Well, yes, maybe me, in that I’m young and female compared to the older guy they already have who is retiring, but they want to appeal to younger viewers who might think of gardening as something for their grandparents. He said he was excited about me because I was...well...attractive but also authoritative and knew my stuff.’
The growl subsided. ‘Fair enough.’
‘I was really flattered that he was interested in me.’
‘Of course he’d be interested in you. Why wouldn’t he? He must have thought all his Christmases had come at once. What did you say to him?’
‘I told him about my plans to go visit the gardens in Europe.’
‘So you’d put those plans on hold if you were to take him up on the offer?’ Which would give him more time with her.
‘I’d have to audition first before there would even be an offer,’ she said.
‘You’d be a natural for it,’ he said.
‘That’s what he said,’ she said with a delighted smile. ‘He also said they could work around my travel plans if need be, that I can pre-record a series of segments filmed at those famous gardens. It would be like bringing them into the viewers’ homes.’
‘You obviously like the idea,’ he said, knowing he sounded stilted but unable to do anything about it. She would leave here no matter what he did and he couldn’t stop her. Not until he had something to offer her.
‘I do,’ she said. ‘Gardening is really hard physical work. I don’t know that I could do it for ever. This could be a really wonderful opportunity to still do what I love but in a different way.’
‘It’s certainly worth considering,’ he said. Anything that might delay her departure would be worth considering.
He helped her to carry the chamomile tea and plate of muffins to the coffee table. Then sat down beside her. She kept a polite distance away from him but he pulled her close and she snuggled in next to him with a contented little sigh that pleased him inordinately.
‘Aren’t you going to have a muffin?’ he asked as she sipped her tea. ‘Mine is absolutely delicious.’
She shook her head. ‘Too tired to eat,’ she said. ‘The muffins are for you and I’m glad you like them. I thought you might.’
The muffins were everything he’d hoped his ill-fated muffin delivery would have been, and more.
She put down the pretty old-fashioned teacup that he doubted was part of the apartment’s inventory. ‘I’m even too tired to drink the tea—which is fine as it’s meant to help you sleep and I don’t think I need any help. I was digging and moving shrubs all day and it’s way past my bedtime. It’s suddenly hit me.’ She stifled a yawn with her hand.
He pulled her closer and she snuggled her head against his shoulder. He could not resist dropping a kiss on her hair, inhaling the fresh, sweet scent of her. It was intoxicating.
‘Tell me more about what the television producer said,’ he asked.
‘Well, the studio is in Sydney but they shoot at gardens all around the country. The producer was really interested when he heard how familiar I was with Victoria. There are some really beautiful gardens in Victoria, South Australia too. I reckon some of my former clients would love to have their gardens showcased. Or just used as a location for me to demonstrate gardening techniques.’ She yawned again and her body relaxed against his. ‘People don’t know...don’t know...about pruning and...and stuff,’ she murmured and her voice trailed into nothing. Her breathing became deep and even and he realised she had fallen asleep.
He held her there for a long time until he started to get sleepy too—blessedly sleepy. Carefully he shifted on the sofa, planning to slide off and help her lie down. ‘No. Don’t want you to go. Stay with me,’ she whispered. He wasn’t sure she was even awake. But he didn’t want to leave her either.
Declan tried to get comfortable but both he and Shelley were tall and the sofa wasn’t long enough. His leg started to cramp.
There was only one thing to do. He got up from the sofa, despite her sleepy protests, then swung her effortlessly into his arms and carried her through to the bedroom. He pulled back the quilt and laid her on the bed, her honey-blond hair spilling out over the pillow. She shifted and opened her eyes, though they were unfocused and again he wasn’t really sure she was awake. She held out her arms. ‘Stay with me. Please.’
He would stay just until she fell into a deep sleep—a luxury that had been denied him for too long.
Cautiously, he took off his shoes and lay down next to her. She immediately burrowed close, pressing
the length of her body against his.
I’m sorry, Lisa, he said in his mind, feeling as if he was betraying her memory, but immediately had the feeling that she wouldn’t mind at all, that Lisa was giving him her blessing.
He held Shelley close as he in turn drifted off to sleep.
* * *
Declan awoke to morning sunshine filtering through the blinds to find Shelley spooning into his back, one arm wrapped around his waist, the other resting above her head on her pillow.
He was aroused. How could he not be with her breasts pressing into his back, her long, slender legs entwined with his, her sweet womanly scent heady and exciting? He placed his hand on her bare shoulder and she murmured throatily in her sleep as she pressed herself even closer. But it would not be right to stroke her into arousal to wake her by—
He rolled onto his back, gently disengaging her arm. The sunlight picked up glints of gold in her hair and her make-up was smeared dark around her eyes. Her lips were slightly parted as she breathed deeply and steadily. He had never seen her look more beautiful.
It was the first deep, refreshing sleep he had enjoyed for two years. He felt deeply content and...he sought to describe the feeling that overwhelmed him as he lay there so intimately close to Shelley, but could only come up with happy.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
SHELLEY LOVED EVERYTHING about Declan’s garden and was immensely proud of the restoration work she had done. Spring was taking over—the crab apple tree in a froth of delicate pink blossom, daffodils that had naturalised over many years coming up in golden drifts in the lawn, the scent of daphne replaced by that of old-fashioned white freesias.
The restored dry stonewalls and hedges delineated the concept of separate garden ‘rooms’ that made the space such a delight. She had even uncovered a small kitchen garden with an espaliered lemon tree growing flat against a wall, a rosemary hedge and herbs, including sage, tarragon plus three different varieties of thyme. She would plant annual herbs like basil and coriander if she thought anyone would use them in their one season of growth. Declan? He’d told her he rarely cooked but he might have use for fresh herbs. She must ask him.
Hired by the Brooding Billionaire Page 13
