she had nothing to celebrate and no one with whom to celebrate. Or maybe it was because Zack Knight had come to stand within half a metre of her and every cell in her body was jumping up and down like a hyperactive cheerleader and saying, Yippee!
‘I believe you’re responsible for the flowers tonight.’ His voice was a rich baritone, warm honey rolled over gravel. His eyes did a slow appraisal of her and he added, ‘Beautiful.’
Holly was so fixated on the startling colour of his eyes she couldn’t locate her voice. A smoky blue with flecks of navy in the irises and on the outer rim as if someone had drawn a precise circle around them with a felt-tip marker. She raised her chin a fraction. ‘You don’t strike me as a man who would stop long enough to smell the roses.’
A glint appeared in his eyes like twin diamond chips and the sound of his laugh rumbled down the entire length of her spine. ‘There’s nothing I love more than a prickly rose. The thornier the better.’
Holly tried not to look at his mouth but his smile made her think of how it would feel to have those lips move hotly, temptingly, passionately against her own. His lips were more or less evenly sized with well-defined vermillion borders. Firm and yet sensually sculptured and lethally attractive. And this close she could see the way his stubble peppered his jaw and around his nose and mouth. It had been more than two years since she had touched a man’s face. She hadn’t felt a man’s kiss in so long she could barely recall what it was like any more.
Zack held out his hand. ‘Zack Knight.’
Holly placed her hand in his and a zap of electric energy shot through her hand and straight to her core, buzzing there like a fizzing sparkler. Seriously, she had to get out more. She was acting like a sex-starved spinster, which she was, but still. His hand was warm and dry and large. His fingers closed around hers with the slightest pressure and she couldn’t stop thinking what it would feel like to have those strong masculine hands sliding over her flesh, over her breasts, over her belly and below...
‘Holly Frost.’ She made sure the don’t-mess-with-me tone was back in her voice and yet his smile lifted in a mocking slant, as if he knew how hard it was for her to keep from drooling.
Zack’s hand released hers first, which annoyed her because it made her look like she hadn’t wanted to let him go, which she hadn’t, but that was beside the point. But then she noticed he opened and closed his fingers a couple of times as if her touch had had the same effect on him. Something passed through his gaze—a flicker of surprise or was it intrigue? Either way, Holly couldn’t tear her eyes away from him. The citrus and wood fragrance of his aftershave flirted with her senses, the fresh sharpness as intoxicating as his presence. The deep blue of his sharply intelligent gaze only intensified his commanding presence. He was wearing a blue suit that made his eyes seem all the more striking, and the white business shirt with its casually open collar exposed the strong, tanned column of his throat.
‘Would you like a drink?’ Zack asked.
Holly didn’t need any more alcohol. She was tipsy from just looking at him. ‘No, thank you. I’ve had my two drinks for the evening.’
That diamond glint was back in his eyes as if her saying no had secretly delighted him.
‘Are you driving?’
‘No. I caught a cab.’
‘I can’t tempt you to break your two-drinks-only rule?’
Holly raised her chin and channelled her childhood Sunday school teacher’s prim Temperance Society tone. ‘No, Mr Knight. You cannot tempt me.’
Zack’s you-just-watch-me smile made something in Holly’s belly flutter like a breeze through the pages of an open book. ‘Are you here with anyone?’
‘No. I came alone.’
‘Is that usual for you?’ Something about the tone of his voice made her wonder if they were discussing her relationship status or something much more intimate. Thinking about sex while standing in front of a man as arrantly masculine as Zack Knight was like standing in front of flammable fuel with a lit match.
Dangerous.
Stupidly, recklessly dangerous.
Holly could feel her cheeks heating, her body tingling and her resolve limping away. She stretched her mouth into a stiff no-teeth-showing smile. ‘Don’t let me keep you from chatting up the other guests.’
‘I’m not interested in the other guests. I’m interested in you.’ His statement was underlined with determination and his gaze as steady as a marksman’s.
Holly mentally gave her resolve a pep talk but it was like trying to get a lame horse to finish a steeplechase. On crutches. ‘I can’t imagine why you’d be interested in me.’ Damn it. She sounded like she was flirting.
‘Zack!’ Kendra Hutchinson came click-clacking towards them in her terrifyingly high heels, her voice so shrill she sounded like a beginner on bagpipes. ‘And yay, you’ve found Holly.’ She beamed at Holly. ‘I told him all about you. I hope you don’t mind.’
Holly clenched her teeth behind a polite smile. ‘Why should I mind? If Mr Knight is in the market for wedding flowers, then I’m the woman he needs to call.’
Kendra laughed and shone her orthodontist-perfect smile at Zack. ‘Isn’t she gorgeous? I knew you two would hit it off.’
‘Undeniably gorgeous.’ Zack’s gaze met Holly’s, reminding her of a hunter who had just selected his prey.
‘Holly hasn’t been on a date in two and a half years,’ Kendra said to Zack. ‘Don’t you find that simply amazing?’
What Holly found amazing was how she stopped herself from grabbing one of Kendra’s heels, pockmarking her collagen-plumped cheeks with it and taking out a couple of those bright white tooth veneers while she was at it. She might have vented a little ire about men on her Facebook account now and again but she hadn’t said anything about how long she’d been celibate. That was no one’s business. Who had Kendra been talking to? Jane? Or Sabrina, her best friend, who ran the other arm of Holly’s Love Is in the Care business?
‘Let’s see if I can get her to change her mind about dating,’ Zack said with another I’ve-got-this-nailed smile.
Holly inched up her chin and sent him a haughty glare straight out of a Georgette Heyer novel. ‘You’d be wasting your time, Mr Knight.’
‘It’s my time to waste,’ he said.
Kendra took out her phone and held it up to take a picture. ‘Smile, you two.’
Holly frowned. ‘No. Wait. I don’t want my—’ Too late. The camera phone flashed and clicked. She could see it now. Hundreds, thousands, possibly millions of social media shares with her standing next to Zack Knight with her mouth hanging open as if she were a starstruck teenage fan at a boy band meet-and-greet.
Kendra checked the photo and smiled like a cat standing beside an empty aviary. She gave Holly and Zack a fingertip wave and turned on her spiky heels to join her other guests.
Holly turned to glower at Zack. ‘You should’ve stopped her. That will be all over Instagram or Twitter in minutes. She’ll have us flipping engaged before you know it.’
