Her tummy gave an annoying flutter and she squashed it. She was going to have to be more specific. Brutal even...
‘What I mean is, I know your type.’
‘My type?’
‘Hell, yeah, great in the sack, perfect bedroom material...’ she sent him a scathing look ‘...but beyond that...well, we don’t go there, do we?’
His step faltered. ‘Wow, hung, drawn and quartered.’
She could hear his surprise, feel his unease, and victory surged warm in her veins. Her harsh assessment had hit its mark, hopefully enough to send him running.
And if that didn’t, the hint of her being the relationship kind should do it.
‘You have quite the opinion of men.’
She gave a derisive laugh and turned a bend, the sanctity of Julia’s hotel room now only a few strides away.
‘So, you’re either an anti-male lesbian—’ it was her turn to falter mid-step ‘—or you’ve been burned before. Which is it to be?’
A lesbian...
She laughed with reignited vigour. It wasn’t the first time she’d been mistaken as such. Ever since she’d opted for the cropped hairstyle—one of her many post-break-up actions—she’d been hit on by women and men alike, hoping she swung their way. But she wasn’t about to tell him anything close to the truth.
‘Typical arrogant male—just because I’m not interested in you per se, I have to be a lesbian.’ She’d arrived at Julia’s door and to emphasise her point, she faced it and rapped against it. ‘Now, if you don’t mind, I have work to do.’
He wasn’t moving away. If anything, he was settling in right alongside her—what the fuck?
She didn’t have time to ask what he was playing at; the door swung open to reveal her rather disgruntled-looking client—shit. ‘I’m so sorry I’m late, Ms Larsson.’
The woman visibly cringed. ‘Drop the Ms, makes me feel ancient, it’s Julia...and so you should be,’ she said, shrugging a tan leather jacket over a white T and looking from Zara to her unwanted companion. ‘The pair of you.’
Pair of us?
Zara looked to him and he gave her a bemused shrug. ‘Seems you can’t get away from me that easily.’
‘Oh, good God, Daniel, don’t tell me you’ve hit on my estate agent already?’ The woman’s eyes flashed furiously, their colour strikingly similar to his.
Come to think of it, so was the golden hue to her shoulder-length hair...
‘I wouldn’t call it hitting on, exactly,’ he said, with another one of those annoyingly casual shrugs. ‘We were actually just discussing sexual tendencies.’
‘You’ve got to be kidding me!’ Julia looked at her, cheeks flushing, eyes bright. ‘Seems I owe you an apology too.’
‘You do?’ Zara’s voice sounded faint, her brain rapidly piecing the situation together.
‘This animal,’ Julia said, gesturing to him in mock disdain, ‘is my brother—well, half-brother, to be exact. But seriously, Daniel, vad fan?’
‘Brother?’ she repeated, her eyes sweeping to the man himself, the realisation that she wasn’t going to evade him any time soon setting off a troubling dance in her chest.
‘In my defence,’ he said, a curious frown creasing his brow, ‘she brought it out in me.’
‘That’s your excuse?’ Julia said incredulously, delivering a playful shove that barely moved him, his eyes remaining fixed on Zara’s every bit as curious and heated and very, very interested. ‘If I didn’t value your opinion so much, I’d tell you to just do one and leave us to it.’
‘Seems that makes two of you today,’ he said, his penetrating gaze reaching inside Zara’s mind and triggering a replay of all that she had said with embarrassing clarity. ‘It’s a bloody good job my ego is big enough to take it.’
‘No one’s ego can be as big as yours, storebror,’ Julia said. ‘It’s just lucky your heart is also as big.’
‘And don’t you forget it,’ he said, looking to his sister with open affection now, freeing Zara at last, to breathe, to think, to get with it... ‘So, are we going to take this show on the road? Or are we going to stand here and do more Daniel-bashing?’
Julia gave a giggle and, God help her, Zara smiled, the move easy. Too easy.
‘For the record,’ he added, ‘my preference is definitely for the former.’
And then she laughed. Really laughed.
Charming. Good-looking. Dangerous.
No. No. No.
DANIEL WAS GRINDING his teeth. His arms folded across his front. His body rigid as he leant back against the door that housed what Zara had referred to as an ample bathroom for this size of apartment, in this desirable an area.
He’d say this: desirable or not, you could certainly save time going for your morning constitution while brushing your teeth over the sink. And the shower-over-the-bath—you had to be some kind of contortionist to use it. Why was he the only one seeing these issues?
At least this third property was an improvement on the previous two. It had natural daylight for starters, and no pounding pub or store adjoining.
He watched them cooing over the open-plan living space now—the strategically placed sofa that permitted the perfect view of the park across the road and the minute television that was as big as it could ever be in the space available—and bit into his tongue.
He wasn’t sure what was more painful: The fact he’d been forced to take the estate agency’s car—albeit a classic chauffeur-driven number, but when his state-of-the-art limo was at the ready, seriously, what sense did that make? Absolutely none. Or the fact that his opinion, when he chose to voice one, was counting for nothing, despite what his sister had said to the contrary earlier.
Or was it the fact that any fleeting look or touch from Ms Agent herself and his body stirred.
Yet she’d made it ever so clear it wasn’t happening, not in a million years.
He was now at the point where he was convincing himself his attractive little sister was far more the agent’s cup of tea. Or indeed, her choice of cocktail, the drink suiting her fire so much better. The attention she was lavishing over Julia, totally OTT in his opinion, and yet his sister was lapping it up.
‘So, come on, what do you think?’ came Julia’s on-the-spot question.
They both turned to him expectantly, his sister’s skin annoyingly aglow and happy—she liked it...really liked it. Ah, skit.
He cleared his throat and pushed away from the door, heading to stand between them, careful to keep his eye on the window and the view beyond. ‘It’s...nice.’
He had tried to sound enthused, but the reality was his comment stank, its tone utterly tepid. Funny enough, just how he was feeling.
‘Nice?’ she pressed.
‘The view is good; the location is convenient and—’ he shrugged ‘—nice.’
‘What about the actual apartment?’
He