the time, it had made sense to stop, he argued silently. But now, as he hungered for more...he shook his head. Maggie had always had the ability to tie him into knots and now she was doing it again. Damn it, he was a different man than he was ten years ago. Stronger. Smarter. He wasn’t about to let her call the shots again. He would be the one in control of the situation while they were together next week.
But the voice inside his head began to laugh. Control. Good luck with that.
He ruthlessly stifled that mocking voice. So maybe he hadn’t always had a firm grip on things when he was with Maggie before. Things were different now. He still didn’t trust her as far as he could throw her, which was pretty far, seeing as how she’d lost some weight since he’d last seen her. She was just as beautiful, though. Maybe more so. When he first looked up and saw her standing in his office doorway, she had taken his breath away. She’d always had that power over him, but he was older and wiser now and not about to fall for her charms again.
He wouldn’t mind kissing her again, though, and was momentarily distracted by the searing memory of his mouth on hers. And it went without saying that he would do whatever it took to get her into bed with him. He was a red-blooded man, after all. Didn’t mean he cared about her or anything. It was just something he’d be willing to do if the occasion presented itself—and he had every intention of making sure that the occasion presented itself.
Absently, Connor checked the time. Damn, he only had twenty minutes before Jake would show up to drag his ass out to shop for a new suit. He figured he’d better get some real work done in the meantime so he’d be ready to go when Jake got here. His brother had already warned him that he’d be on the phone with the Scottish lawyers this afternoon, and that always put Jake in a foul mood.
The lawyers from Edinburgh had been trying to convince one of the MacLaren brothers to fly to Scotland to take care of the details of their uncle Hugh’s estate. Whoever made the trip would be stuck there for weeks. But that wasn’t the real reason none of them wanted to go there. No, it was because Uncle Hugh had been a hateful man. Jake, Ian and Connor couldn’t care less about the terms of Hugh’s last will and testament, despite the fact that they were his beneficiaries, in a manner of speaking.
Even though Connor and his brothers had grown up around Point Cairn in Northern California, they’d been born in the Highlands of Scotland. They were the sons of Liam MacLaren and heirs to Castle MacLaren. But when Connor was a baby, their uncle Hugh, an evil bastard if ever there was one, swindled their father out of his inheritance.
Their dad never recovered from the betrayal and died a few years later, leaving their mother, Deidre, a widow with three young boys to raise. Unwilling to live in the same area as her despised brother-in-law, she moved with her boys to Northern California to be near her sister. Connor had no memory of any other home except the rugged hills that overlooked the wild, rocky coast of Marin County.
Connor stared out the office window at the stunning view of the Golden Gate Bridge and the Marin shoreline beyond. Maybe in some small way, their uncle had done them all a favor because Connor couldn’t imagine living anywhere else in the world. Hell, he never would have met Maggie Jameson otherwise, he thought, and then wondered if that was a good thing or a bad thing. He wasn’t ready to decide on that one, but he couldn’t help smiling in anticipation of spending the following week in a hotel suite with the gorgeous woman.
* * *
By the time she arrived home, Maggie felt relatively normal again. Her heart had finally stopped hammering in her chest, and her head had ceased its incessant buzzing. All that remained from Connor’s onslaught was a mild tingling of her lips from his devastating kiss.
Mild? That was putting it, well, mildly. But never mind his kiss. What about his demands? For someone so risk-averse, Maggie still couldn’t believe she’d entered the lion’s den and put herself in such a perilous position. After all the lectures she’d given herself and all the positive affirmations she’d memorized, she had taken one look at Connor and practically rolled over, allowing him to take hold of the situation and make choices for her.
She pulled her car into the garage next to the barn and walked across the circular drive to the large ranch-style home she shared with her grandfather. The afternoon sun barely managed to hold its own against the autumn chill that had her tugging the collar of her old suede jacket closer to her neck. She still took a moment to appreciate the land that rolled and dipped its way down to the sheer bluffs that overlooked the rough waves of the Pacific Ocean. Despite some sorry choices in her past, she had to marvel at her own good luck. She was home now, living in a beautiful house in a magical location. Her darling grandfather, despite some tricky health issues, was still kicking, as he liked to put it. She was proud of herself, proud of how she’d finally arrived here, both emotionally and physically.
Connor MacLaren had no idea how much it had cost her to show up at his office door with her hat in her hand, and Maggie had no intention of ever revealing that to him. She’d fought too hard to get to where she was today, and she wasn’t about to gamble it all away on some tingling feeling she’d received from a simple kiss.
She jogged up the porch stairs and into the house, where she checked the time on the mantel clock. Her grandfather would be out in the barn milking his goats. Dropping her bag on the living room chair, she went to her bedroom to make a phone call. She was determined to avoid sharing a hotel room with Connor—even if it was a luxurious penthouse suite, as he had emphasized more than once.
But when she called the convention hotel to make a reservation, she was told that they were sold out, just as Connor had warned. And when she called the next closest hotel, she was quoted a price that was so far out of her range she almost laughed out loud at the reservationist.
She merely thanked her instead and hung up the phone. Then she spent a few minutes at her computer, searching for information. Finally, with nervous fingers, she dialed Connor’s number.
“MacLaren,” he answered.
“It’s Maggie and I’ve been thinking, Connor,” she began. “It’s probably best if I commute to the festival from home after all. Grandpa isn’t well and I’d rather be home each night to see him.”
“I’ve already talked it over with my mother, Maggie,” Connor replied dryly. “She plans to stop by your place twice a day and spend the night there, too. I know Angus won’t put up with two women fussing at him day and night, so you’ll be doing him a favor by staying away for the week.”
“I’m not sure if—”
“And besides,” he continued in steamroller fashion, “you’ve already agreed to be my date for the week, remember? In exchange for which I’m going to give you a lot of money. I think that’s a pretty good deal for you.”
“Pretty good deal,” she echoed darkly.
“Maggie, I explained all this to you and I thought you had agreed. I’m going to need you to accompany me every day, starting with breakfast meetings and going into the late evenings with all the social events I’ve got to attend.”
She frowned into the phone. “You never liked all that social stuff before.”
“That was true ten years ago,” he said smoothly. “Now I figure it’s a small price to pay to get what I want.”
“The price of doing business?”
“Exactly. And it won’t hurt you to be seen with me, Maggie. It’ll be good for your business to meet the people I know, too.”
She
