was, but she really, really didn’t want to listen to Sensible Remy. She wasn’t any fun …
‘How long are you staying in Bellevue?’ he asked, distracting her from her crazy thoughts.
Remy looked at the functional, no-frills watch on her wrist. ‘Ten hours or so? I’m hitting the road at first light. Do you live in the area?’
He nodded. ‘Are you travelling alone?’
She knew that he was fishing—could see the attraction she felt echoed in his eyes. ‘Yep, just me.’
‘It’s a nice holiday … touring the wine country,’ he replied, his tone so bland that she wondered if she was perhaps reading him wrong.
Then his hand moved across the bar and his thumb stroked over the pulse-point of her wrist, which instantly bolted at his touch.
Holy hell, she was playing with fire, she thought, staring at his strong, broad hand on her pale wrist. Unable to pull away from his touch, so simple and so devastating, she used her other hand to pick up her wine glass and lubricate her mouth.
‘So, how has your trip been so far?’
Same voice, but his eyes were on her mouth and the gunmetal-grey had turned smoky with passion. How could he keep his voice so smooth while she was a maelstrom of nerves and lust and attraction? Kiss me, already, she wanted to beg.
No begging allowed, Sensible Remy whispered in her ear.
‘Oh, I’m not on holiday … I’m a professional vagrant.’ That sounded better—a little breathy but there had been words in a sentence. Pretty impressive, really.
His thumb on her wrist stopped. Noooo!
‘Want to explain that?’ he asked.
She couldn’t. All she could think about was the effect he was having on her and her desire to get him naked, to have her hands on that warm, muscled, masculine flesh. There was no way to verbalise that three years ago she’d lived in New York, that her doctorate in computer science had landed her the position of youngest Chief Information Officer of a Fortune 500 company. Ever.
She’d had an apartment in Manhattan, worked eighty-hour weeks, had an ulcer the size of a fist and had been prone to panic attacks. She’d been discontented, unhappy, unfulfilled. Bitchy, demanding, impatient. She could never tell him that it had taken her landing up in hospital to realise that she was working herself to death. And for what? A fat pay cheque and her mother’s approval?
Could he even begin to understand why she’d given up everything because she hadn’t liked what she’d been doing or who she’d been doing it for? That she’d run? To Europe, and then Africa, Asia? And when she hadn’t found what she was looking for in foreign places—that nebulous, indefinable something that would make her life make sense—she’d come home to see if she could find it by travelling through her own country.
Seeing that he was still waiting for an answer, she shrugged and bit the inside of her lip. ‘I’ve been travelling for a long time.’
‘Why?’
She tipped her head and shoved her tongue in her cheek. ‘I’m trying to find myself—to work out why I do the things I do and make the choices I make.’
His lips quirked at her dramatic tone. ‘Any luck with that?’
‘Absolutely none,’ Remy replied in a mournful voice. And even while she was mocking herself she silently admitted that she was starting to become slightly concerned that she never would.
‘And how do you support yourself and your gas habit?’
That amazing thumb had resumed its rhythm on her wrist. She could no more pull her hand away than she could adjust the temperature of the sun.
Savings, investments, property … She’d worked so hard that she’d never had time to spend any of her ridiculously huge salary. She earned enough in interest and dividends and rental, and from the occasional virtual consulting job she took, to allow her to keep travelling for a long, long time. If she was really lucky she would find whatever it was that she was looking for soon—in Portland, maybe, or in the next town she visited.
‘When I need to I find work.’ There were always IT consulting projects popping into her inbox—some of which she took on, if they were interesting enough.
‘Doing …?’
‘This and that … I’m a hell of a cook—and, for the record, a really bad waitress.’
He laughed again and she felt her womb contract. Why was getting this hard-eyed, hard-bodied man to laugh such a kick? Such an incredible turn-on?
‘Good to know.’
‘So … what do you do?’
Bo lifted his eyebrows. ‘What do you think I do?’
The corners of his mouth lifted in a sexy little smile. Was he flirting? He was so contained that she couldn’t be sure, but she’d give him the benefit of the doubt.
‘I’ll play that game. Well, you look marginally intelligent,’ she teased. ‘Accountant?’
Bo pulled a face. ‘Ugh!’
She pulled a face too. ‘Lawyer?’
‘Double ugh!’
She tapped her finger against her lip. ‘So, not an accountant or a lawyer? I’d still say that you’re in management.’
‘Yeah.’
And she just knew that he was the top branch of a very tall tree. She couldn’t imagine him taking orders from anyone. He was too controlled, too alpha … not her type at all. As a long-term prospect, she clarified. Along with her career she’d also given up on love and her dreams of happy-ever-after with a nice man followed by a couple of kids. She’d finally—finally!—learnt that, despite what people said, love, trust and approval were conditional—very much dependent on what she delivered.
So three years and two months ago she’d stopped playing that game, and she now kept any new relationships simple. Most of them were transient and fleeting anyway, due to the fact that she was constantly on the move.
And this was pure sexual heat shimmering between her and Bo: passion, lust and incredible chemistry.
Remy lifted her head from watching his thumb on her wrist—so fascinating, so thrilling!—and her eyes slammed into his. She swallowed at the heat and passion rolling through them and sighed when Bo lifted his hand and that magical thumb brushed her full bottom lip.
‘So sexy,’ he muttered as his other hand gripped her thigh.
Remy looked down at his hand and could easily imagine those tanned fingers on her breast, that wide hand sliding over her hip, under her bottom, lifting her to him …
Then he leaned forward and his mouth touched hers … warm, wonderful. Remy, shocked and surprised and utterly turned on, had to
