Tara nibbled on the inside of her lip, reminding herself that her plan had been to get away from Lucas—not to sign up for more of the same. She needed to remove herself from the influence of a powerful man who was selfishly pursuing his own interests. He certainly wasn’t thinking about what was best for her at the moment, was he? Only what was best for him.
And yet.
She ran her fingertip over the frosted surface of her water glass. If she looked at it objectively couldn’t this be the best of all possible outcomes? A trip to a glamorous city she was already familiar with, without all the uncertainty of having to fix herself up with a job? Wouldn’t a spell in America provide the inspiration she needed to turn her life around and decide what she wanted to do next?
But still she held back from saying yes because something seemed to have changed between her and Lucas tonight. Something she couldn’t quite put her finger on because she had no experience of this sort of thing. Was she imagining the tension which was stoking up between the two of them, like when you threw a handful of kindling on the fire? She certainly wasn’t imagining the heart-racing feeling she was getting whenever she stared into his gorgeous green eyes—not to mention the fact that her body was behaving in a way which wasn’t normal. At least, not normal for her. Her nipples were aching and there was a delicious syrupy feeling deep in the very core of her. She could feel a weird kind of restlessness she’d never experienced before, which was making her want to squirm uncomfortably on the wooden seat, and she was having to concentrate very hard not to keep wondering what it would be like to be kissed by him.
Was it because they were in the falsely intimate setting of a candlelit restaurant, making her wish she’d chosen somewhere brighter? Or because she’d stupidly decided to wear a dress and wash her hair—as if this were a real date or something? And now she was left feeling almost vulnerable—as if she’d lost the protective barrier which surrounded her when she was working at his house and cleaning up after him.
He was still studying her with an impatient question in his eyes, as if he wasn’t used to being kept waiting. Come to think of it—he wasn’t.
‘Well?’ he demanded.
‘Can I have some time to think about it?’ she said.
He looked surprised and Tara guessed that most women wouldn’t have thought twice about accompanying their billionaire boss to a glamorous foreign city with the offer of a pay-rise.
‘How long do you want?’ he demanded.
Tara chewed on her lip. Should she ask her friend Stella’s advice? She certainly didn’t have anyone else to ask. She’d been so young when her mother died that she hardly remembered her and her grandmother had passed away just before she’d come to work for Lucas. ‘A few days?’ she suggested and gave a little shrug. ‘Maybe you’ll change your mind in the meantime?’
‘If you continue to prevaricate like this, then maybe I will,’ he retorted, not bothering to hide his displeasure. ‘Let’s just get the bill and go, shall we?’
‘Okay.’ She rose to her feet. ‘But I need to use the washroom first.’
Still unable to believe she wasn’t grabbing at his job offer with eager hands, Lucas watched as she walked through the restaurant, his gaze mesmerised by the curve of her calves, which led down to the slenderest ankles he’d ever seen. Suddenly he could understand why men living in the Victorian age had found them highly arousing.
He told himself to look away but somehow he couldn’t. Somehow Tara Fitzpatrick’s back view seemed to be the most beautiful thing he’d looked at in a long time, with those red curls spilling wildly over her shoulders. Her dress was slightly creased from where she’d been sitting but it was brushing against a bottom firmed by hard work and regular cycling—a realisation which was rewarded by an unwanted hardening at his groin. What the hell was happening to him? he wondered irritably. Was it simple physical frustration? Had Charlotte’s unexpected appearance at his house this afternoon reminded him just how long it had been since he’d had sex? He remembered their split, when he’d grown bored with her and bored with bedding her. Because despite the actress’s undeniable beauty and sexual experience, hadn’t making love to her sometimes felt as if he were making love to a mannequin? And there hadn’t been anyone since, had there? Not even a flicker of interest had stirred in his blood, despite the many come-ons which regularly came his way.
With an impatient shake of his head, he glanced at his cell-phone to see what the markets were doing, but for once his attention was stubbornly refusing to focus and when he looked up, Tara was back. She must have attempted to brush the fiery curls into some kind of submission, because they looked half-tamed. Her eyes were bright and her air of youthful vitality made his heart clench with something he didn’t recognise. Was it cynicism? He shook his head, confused now and slightly resentful because he’d come out tonight thinking this was going to be a straightforward exercise and it was turning into anything but.
‘The bill, Tara,’ he said impatiently. ‘Have you asked for it?’
‘I’ve done more than that.’ She gave a wide smile. ‘I’ve paid it.’
‘You’ve paid it?’ he repeated slowly.
‘It’s very reasonably priced in here,’ she said. ‘And it’s the least I can do, since we came here in your car.’
As he followed her out of the restaurant—after a farewell even more ecstatic than their greeting—Lucas found himself trying to remember the last time a woman had offered to pay for a meal. Not recently, that was for sure. Not since those days when he’d had nothing and heiresses had sniffed around him like dogs surrounding a piece of fresh meat. When he’d been forced to leave his fancy school because there had been no money—or so he’d been told. But pride had made him refuse to accept the charity of women who had been hungry for his virile body. He’d fed himself. Sometimes he’d eaten the food left lying around after a meal in the directors’ dining room. And sometimes he just used to go without. Tara had been wrong when she’d suggested he’d never eaten peasant food, he thought, the harsh reminder of those days making his jaw clench as his car purred smoothly down the quayside towards them.
But when he joined her on the back seat the bitter memories were dissolved by a rush of something far more potent. Lucas felt a beat of promise and of heady desire. Flaring his nostrils, he inhaled her subtle scent, which was more like soap than perfume. Half turning his head, he saw the brightness of her hair and suddenly he wanted to tangle his fingers in it. One slender thigh was placed tantalisingly close to his—a gesture he suspected was completely lacking in provocation—yet right now it seemed the sexiest thing he’d ever encountered. He swallowed as desire beat through him like an insistent flame and if it had been anyone else he might have reached out and caressed her. Touched her leg until she was squirming with pleasure and widening her thighs and whispering for him to touch her some more.
But this was Tara and he couldn’t do that because she worked for him. She worked for him. She made his bed and cooked his meals. Ironed his shirts and kept his garden bright. She was an employee he wanted to accompany him to America. She wasn’t a prospective lover—not by any stretch of the imagination. He stared straight ahead, attempting to compose himself as the traffic lights turned red.
Her heart pounding and her shoulders tense, Tara told herself to stop feeling so nervous as the powerful car purred through the city streets because none of this was a big deal. She’d just had dinner with her boss—that was all—and he’d just offered her a job in America, which was a massive compliment, wasn’t it? She’d never been in his chauffeur-driven car before either, and travelling home in such luxury should have been a real treat. Yet she was finding it difficult to appreciate the soft leather or incredibly smooth suspension as they travelled through Dublin. All she could think about was how different Lucas seemed tonight and how her reaction towards him seemed to have undergone a dangerous and fundamental shift. From being a demanding employer, he seemed to have morphed into a man she was having difficulty tearing her eyes away from. For the