“You don’t?”
Amusement lit up his green eyes and lurked at the corners of his mouth. He snorted. “You’re kidding, right?” And when she continued to stare at him he shrugged a heavily muscled shoulder. “I’m a guy. We’re allergic to weddings.” Her eyebrow rose up her forehead and he chuckled. “Okay, I’m allergic to weddings.”
“Then why come?”
“I heard the food’s great.” He must have noticed her expression because he laughed and said, “I promised Greg I would.”
When he laughed, golden flecks lit the green depths of his eyes. Like sunlight shining through water. “And you keep your promises?” she asked to distract herself from the feel of his hard body against hers and what it did to her.
Something indecipherable came and went in his expression and the golden lights winked out. “Don’t you?”
“I asked first,” Lilah countered, and instantly wondered at the shift in the energy around them. His eyes turned somber as they slid over her face before moving to the ballroom. She didn’t know why but she got the odd impression he wasn’t seeing the opulent room with its flickering candles and laughing guests. As though he’d withdrawn somewhere she couldn’t follow—somewhere a lot less cheerful than a hotel ballroom in uptown Spruce Ridge.
His jaw flexed and she felt like she was intruding on a private moment filled with pain and bleak memories. “Some promises are impossible to keep,” he murmured, and dropped his hand. Lilah shivered at the abrupt loss of heat and cursed herself for caring.
Something must have happened to put that haunted look on his face, she thought, fighting the urge to turn and wrap her arms around him. Luke Sullivan didn’t need her concern. He was big and hard and capable. And dangerous. Very dangerous, she reminded herself. At least to her peace of mind. So when a young resident appeared beside them and asked her to dance, she accepted, suddenly eager to escape Luke Sullivan’s disturbing presence.
She didn’t know why she sent him a silent look over her shoulder. She certainly didn’t need his permission. But when he shrugged and said, “I don’t dance,” before turning and disappearing from the ballroom, she couldn’t help feeling rebuffed.
Fortunately the resident made it impossible to brood and before long Lilah was laughing at his bad jokes as he twirled her around the dance floor. Finally, after a dozen dances with as many new partners, she laughingly cried uncle and escaped out the French doors into the warm night.
A few people were scattered around the torch-dotted terrace and Lilah wandered over to the low stone balustrade. She looked out into a night as dark and lush as black velvet—a night perfect for romance and moonlit trysts. Frangipani and night-blooming camellia scented the balmy air while solar-powered lights led a rambling path through the extensive gardens to a pool, glowing like blue magic in the darkness. To her right the well-manicured lawns rolled towards the lake, slumbering like a sea of ink beneath a fat yellow moon.
The scene might have come right out of a movie if memories of the previous night hadn’t flooded her mind. She shivered and rubbed her arms just as someone came up beside her. A jacket dropped around her shoulders in an echo of her thoughts but even before a smooth voice solicitously murmured, “You’re cold,” in her ear, she knew it wasn’t the man she’d been thinking about.
Lilah bit back a grimace and looked up into Peter’s handsome face. Just when she’d decided he’d lost interest, here she was cornered on the terrace in the dark. By her boss. What joy.
And from the look in his eyes she’d have to think of something fast if she wanted to escape with her job and her integrity intact. Something like an aneurysm or appendicitis. Or maybe mad cow disease. People tended to get a little paranoid when the words “mad” and “cow” weren’t being used to describe a crazy woman at a Bloomingdale shoe sale. But then she reminded herself that he was a doctor and would know he’d have to eat her brains before contracting it. She couldn’t see that happening in the next five seconds.
Dammit. She was trapped—by good manners and his hands on her shoulders.
“Finally,” he murmured, like she’d been waiting all night to be alone with him. Yeah, right. In the moonlight his golden hair gleamed almost as brightly as his smile. Like an angel—or some equally perfect celestial being. And if she were any other woman she might have been charmed. But she wasn’t. She had too much history with men like him to ever forget that he was married—and used vulnerable women.
“It’s been torture, sitting alone,” he said deeply, rubbing her arms, and for the second time that night Lilah felt herself pulled back against a man’s warm chest. But whereas Luke’s chest had felt wide and warm and oddly comforting, Peter’s just felt … vaguely threatening.
“Miss me?”
And that was Lilah’s cue to escape. She faked a shiver and seized the excuse to pull away. “I’m cold, maybe I should go in.” His hands prevented her attempts to slide his jacket off her shoulders. They also kept her swathed in a cloud of expensive cologne and the cool calculation of a practiced seduction. Lilah shivered, this time it was genuine. She had an awful feeling the man had no intention of letting her go without a struggle.
Closing her eyes, she drew in a steadying breath and pushed memories of another man and another seduction attempt from her head. Damn. She really needed this job but Peter was making it increasingly difficult for her to remain polite when what she wanted to do was turn and knee him in the nuts and bolts.
Turning abruptly, she backed up against the balustrade and fought the urge to vault over it.
“Dr Webster,” she said, deciding to confront him and risk being fired. “You’re … um … my boss and … and married.”
He hummed in his throat and stepped closer, dropping his hands onto the stone behind her, caging her with his arms and body. She had to press her hands against his chest and lean back to keep a few inches between them.
“My wife doesn’t care,” he explained with a smile, as though her protests amused him. God, as though her protests aroused him. “She does her thing and doesn’t interfere with mine.” He leaned forward to kiss her mouth but she turned her head at the last moment and his lips glanced off her cheekbone. “It suits us both.”
“Well, it doesn’t suit me,” she said briskly, and grabbed his wandering hand before it could reach her breast.
He sighed and shifted back a little. “Don’t tell me you’re one of those women?” He sounded a bit annoyed, as though she was playing hard to get when she should be flattered by his attention. Lilah felt her jaw drop open.
“Excuse me?”
He must have heard something in her voice because he sighed and straightened. “All I’m saying is you’ve been sending out signals all night.” What? “I’m not the only man to pick up on them, Lilah.”
“Signals?”
His mouth slid into a charming, coaxing smile. “I am, however, the only man with enough balls to follow through.”
Lilah stared at him as though he was speaking an alien dialect. Besides, the last subject she wanted to talk about was his … well, that. “What are you talking about?”
He sighed impatiently. “You’re not making this easy, sweetheart.”
Sweetheart? “Easy?”
“You’re lucky I saw you slip away.” She spluttered and he chuckled. “Let’s not waste time,” he cajoled gently, framing her face in his hands. “We can go back to your place, or get a room at the hotel if you prefer. Your choice. But you should know …” he paused and smiled meaningfully “… I can do things for your career.”
Lilah stared up at him