incapable of fooling people into thinking she was more self-confident than she actually was. She really needed the latter if she was going to stand a chance of pulling off the deception of a lifetime. And if she couldn’t do it in the land of make-believe, then where could she? If she just didn’t have this stupid cold to add to everything else. Who flew halfway across the planet to a place twenty degrees warmer than home and ended up with a cold? She felt awful. So much for the theory that she would feel more confident away from home, where nobody knew her…
But therein lay her immediate problem. Because the man making his way across the beautiful lobby of the Beverly Wilshire knew her all too well. A decade ago he’d known every inch of her body intimately, and had held her heart in the palm of his large hand—the same heart that now jumped in joyous recognition and then twisted in regret at how comfortable he looked in their surroundings.
Cassidy was incredibly jealous of that.
Will didn’t so much as bat an eyelid at the white marble, the large chandelier, the carved wooden elevator doors or the polished brass and black accents. I belong here, his confident stride said silently. But then Cassidy couldn’t remember a time when there’d ever been a place he hadn’t had that air of self-assurance. He’d always had a way of carrying himself that practically dared people to say he was somewhere he didn’t belong.
That confidence, and the hint of potential danger if pushed, had added to his potent sexuality from the very beginning as far as Cassidy was concerned. Add boyish good-looks and a smile that could genuinely melt female knees…He’d been the flame and she the moth. But to see him so at home in a place where she felt so very lost…Well, it just widened the already cavernous gap between them, didn’t it?
Ridiculously, it hurt. When it really shouldn’t have. Not after so long…
His bright green gaze sought her out and brushed nonchalantly from her head to her toes and back up again, forcing her to suck in her stomach and silently pray that he couldn’t see any sign of the foundation underwear she’d struggled her way into. Like every woman Cassidy knew, every inch counted in times of crisis—even though she had absolutely no idea where those missing inches had been relocated to. With any luck Will would keep their meetings to places where there was air-conditioning, so she stood a better chance of not passing out in the California heat and the thin air of Los Angeles. Restricted circulation plus bunged-up nose didn’t exactly give her a head start…
Mentally she crossed her fingers.
‘Cass.’
He held out a ridiculously large hand when he got to her, and for a second Cassidy looked down at it with an arched brow, as if confused by what she was supposed to do with it. They were shaking hands? Like complete strangers? Really?
Okay, then.
Surreptitiously swiping a clammy palm on her hip, she placed it in his; the heat of long fingers curled around her cooler ones, sending another jolt of recognition through her veins to her heart. Good to know her body hadn’t forgotten him either. She tried to think professional thoughts. It wasn’t easy. But she had to work with this man.
Will let go of her hand somewhat abruptly. ‘Recovered from your flight?’
‘Yes. Thank you. I think it’s easier this way than going back.’
‘Happy with the hotel?’
‘How could I not be?’ She glanced around, but couldn’t stop her gaze from shifting back to study him. Still boyish. He hadn’t aged a day. How was that fair?
Will nodded, and glanced around him the way she had. ‘It has a history firmly tied up in Hollywood. Dashiell Hammet wrote The Thin Man here. Elvis lived here while making movies at Paramount, and they’ve had everyone from members of the British royal family to the Dalai Lama stay at one time or another.’
‘That’s nice.’ Inwardly she rolled her eyes as the words slipped off the tip of her tongue. Eloquent, Cassidy. Way to go. But, however foolish she felt, it was nothing in comparison to how stunned she was by his coolness. It was like talking to a tour guide. An uninvolved, unattached and in fairness disgustingly good-looking tour guide. But nevertheless…
‘I thought you might appreciate it.’
Cassidy lifted a brow again. Meaning what? That she should be thanking her lucky stars she was here in the first place? True. But she didn’t need to be made to feel as if she’d been invited to Tinsel Town by some miraculous accident. Some timely miraculous accident, she corrected. Because she couldn’t have needed a break more if she’d tried.
He was right, though. She’d been as thrilled by the hotel as she had by her first glimpse of the Hollywood sign on the hill. Located only a few steps away from the glittering shops of Rodeo Drive, she knew the famous hotel’s ornate European façade, with its distinctly rounded awnings and rows of sculpted trees, was straight out of the pages of Hollywood history—not to mention being the site of one of her favourite films of all time. It was just a shame she wasn’t going to be there at Christmas, when they reportedly did an outstanding job of decorating, transforming its exterior into a dazzling display of twinkling lights.
By then she’d probably have been discovered as a fraud and sent home with her tail between her legs—back to eating rice and pasta like she had in her student days, while she’d waited for her grant money to arrive. Only this time she’d be waiting for meager pay-cheques that couldn’t support the debts she had after caring for her father before he died. Well, now, there was something to look forward to.
‘Ready?’
She nodded as Will swung a long arm in invitation and allowed her to step ahead of him. Squinting at the bright light outside, she took her sunglasses off the top of her head moments after Will donned his. A California necessity, she’d discovered since she’d landed. And as much of a status symbol as everything else, judging by the designer wear everyone but her had shading their eyes.
Silently, they turned right—Will matching his longer stride to hers—then right again at a major light, until they approached a strip of nice-looking semi-casual restaurants. Will’s choice was an ivy-covered courtyard, where the maître d’ greeted him by name and held out chairs for them before unfurling linen napkins onto their laps and handing them leather-bound menus with a flourish and a small bow.
Cassidy fought the need to giggle like a schoolgirl. At the grand old age of thirty, she should be more mature. ‘Well, this beats cheese sandwiches in the park.’
Thick dark lashes flickered upwards from their study of the menu. They brushed his deeply tanned skin once, twice, and then he quirked his brows a minuscule amount and continued reading. ‘That was a long time ago.’
Seeing him again, it felt like yesterday to her. But she didn’t say that. Instead she allowed herself a moment to surreptitiously examine him while he made a decision on what to eat. Had he got sexier as he’d got older? Yes, she decided, he had. Darn it. Men were known to do that. Wasn’t the fact he was more successful than her, richer than her and plainly more confident than her enough? At least one of them had got it right. Small consolation, though.
It was tough not to be as mesmerised by the sight of him as she had been at twenty. And twenty-one. And twenty-two. From the thick dark hair that curled disobediently outwards at his nape, all the way down the lean six foot three of his body, he was one of those guys blessed with the ability to mesmerise woman. Who could have blamed her for the crush she’d had from a distance for over a year? Or for how shy she’d been when he’d first talked to her
