[4 Seasons 01] Seducing Summer (11 page)

His declaration that he couldn’t date her
while he was working for her sucked, but she admired his principles. Would he
still be interested in dating in three months’ time when Becky returned? Only
time would tell. Ninety days felt like an awfully long time. How was she
supposed to keep her hands off him until then?

Her lips curving, she daydreamed about his
wry smile and the heat in his eyes as the evening breeze played with her hair
and the seagulls cried around her.

It was only as she reached the end of the
esplanade and turned to make her way back that she began to have the feeling
she was being followed. She couldn’t have explained why. She glanced over her
shoulder and saw nobody out of the ordinary, no suspicious men with binoculars,
no one who turned away hurriedly as they saw her look around.
It appears
someone’s watching me.
Phoebe’s words rang in her head. Her skin crawled,
and her heart rate picked up and began to race.

Dammit, why hadn’t she told Gene she was
going for a walk? No doubt he would have insisted he go with her.

Then she scolded herself for being a wuss.
She wasn’t going to let a few stupid idle threats force her to live like a
hermit, or make her too afraid to go out on her own.

Still, she walked back more quickly than
she’d walked out, and when she finally entered the hotel, she couldn’t suppress
a wave of relief that she’d made it back safely.

After running up the stairs to her room,
she paused outside Gene’s. Part of her wanted to knock on his door and tell him
what she’d felt, hoping for his reassurance.

But she didn’t. Instead, she went into her
room, locked the door, undressed, climbed under the covers, and pulled them up
to her chin, even though it was a warm night.

It took a long time for her to fall asleep,
though.

The next day, they’d checked out and were
on the road by ten o’clock. It was about four to five hours’ drive to
Christchurch. They could have flown, but Callie wanted to call at some shops on
the way, and Gene had to admit to himself he had no problem spending several
hours in the car with her.

Callie offered to drive, but Gene told her
he wanted to earn his money as her assistant, and she seemed to accept it, and slid
into the passenger side without any argument. He got into the driver’s seat,
started the engine, and pulled away, relieved she hadn’t insisted. He needed to
remain in control, just in case a threat came. He’d taken several advanced
driving courses over the years, so he knew what to do if they were chased or
attacked on the road.

At first, he sat stiffly behind the wheel,
determined to keep his wits about him. As the hours passed, though, and the
road became almost empty, he began to relax and enjoy the drive and being with
Callie.

She plugged her phone into the car and
played music as they drove. He teased her about some of the songs from boy
bands, but sang along with her to those he knew—some older alternative rock
and, surprising him, some really old bluegrass.

“My father,” she said when he enquired why
she had those songs on her phone. “He likes all that. He used to play it in the
car whenever we were alone, and I guess I picked up a love of it over the
years.”

Gene said nothing, concentrating on the
road.

After about an hour and a half, they
arrived at Oamaru, and Callie stopped there to visit a boutique lingerie shop,
the manager of which appeared more than happy to stock some of the gorgeous
underwear that Callie showed her. Another hour’s drive took them to Timaru, and
she did the same there, visiting a smaller lingerie shop to tout her wares.
Gene was impressed that she wasn’t focusing only on the large department stores.
She seemed keen to reach out to even the tiniest corners of the country, and he
could only admire her for that.

They continued north along the quiet road
through wide-open fields filled with sheep and cows and, in the distance to
their left, the white-topped mountains of Mount Cook National Park, right out
of
The Lord of the Rings
. For a while, they were the only car on the
road, and it became easy to think they were the survivors of some kind of
natural disaster, the only two people left in the world.

They’d have to repopulate the Earth, of
course, Gene thought as they crossed the long bridge over the Rakaia River.
That would be fun.

“Penny for them,” Callie said, breaking
into his daydreams.

“Too lewd to say.” He glanced at her and
grinned.

She giggled and looked out the window.
Smiling, he returned his gaze to the road. It was good to see her enjoying
herself. He’d seen her face the night before, when she’d become afraid, out on
her walk along the sea front, and it had chilled him.

When he’d arrived at the hotel, he’d
slipped the receptionist fifty bucks and asked her to let him know if Callie
left the hotel at any point, and in the evening the receptionist had found him
in the gym to tell him Callie appeared to be going for a walk. Cursing, he’d
left hurriedly, still in his sweats. Luckily, she hadn’t gone far, and he’d
followed her discreetly until she turned and began to walk back to the hotel.
He’d seen her stop and glance over her shoulder, had seen the fear on her face.
Had she sensed him following her, or someone else? Either way, part of him had
been glad she’d quickened her pace and returned to the hotel. He didn’t want
her to be scared, but equally he’d rather she wasn’t blasé about her safety,
either.

As they passed through Ashburton and headed
east toward Christchurch, the roads became busier, and before long they were
caught up in typical city traffic. The city had suffered heavily in the
earthquake four years before, but it was gradually clawing its way back to
normality, rebuilding itself like a person whose relationship had crumbled and
failed, and who had to learn how to exist again on their own. Much of the city
had been rebuilt, but he tried not to look at the cathedral as they passed it,
finding the partially demolished ruins of the once-beautiful building just too
sad.

They threaded their way through the
streets, heading up past the museum and following the line of the Avon River to
the hotel. In the end, it was nearly five o’clock by the time they finally
parked, got out, and stretched.

“Jeez, that was a long day.” Callie
retrieved her bag from the back of the car. “We should have flown.”

“Now you tell me.” He didn’t really mean
it, though. “Come on. Let’s check in and get some dinner.”

They ate together again, enjoying the view
across Hagley Park and the river. Willows wept over the quiet water, and oak
and beech trees framed the grassy park where people were walking their dogs and
enjoying the summer evening.

Callie went through her itinerary for the
next day, which promised to be a busy one, with several appointments at large
department stores as well as visits to a few boutique lingerie shops. Gene
listened to her talking about her plans, unable to hide a smile at her
enthusiasm. She might not have been the most organized person in the world, but
she was knowledgeable about her business, and she’d done her research on the
shops she was going to visit.

All day, in the car, she’d been bright and
chirpy, and she certainly seemed excited about the next day. As the evening
wore on, though, she gradually grew quieter and more preoccupied, and it wasn’t
long after they finished their dessert before she said she was going up to her
room.

Gene walked with her, hiding his
disappointment. He’d hoped she might agree to stay for drinks in the bar, as he’d
been enjoying talking to her and getting to know her better. Had she taken his
request to wait as a brush-off? Maybe she didn’t believe him when he said he
was interested in her.

When the elevator doors closed, he turned
to her with concern. “Are you okay?”

She leaned against the wall, her shoulders
sagging a little. “Fine, thank you. Just very tired.”

“You’re sure? Not worried about anything?”
He was still hoping she’d confide in him about Phoebe’s predicament and the
threats, but she just shook her head and gave him a small smile. Maybe she
really was just tired. “Anything I can do for you?” he asked. “Order up for
you?”

“No, really, I’m good, thanks.” The
elevator dinged and the doors opened. They walked in silence along to their
rooms, and she swiped her card.

“Callie…” He reached out and caught her
hand. Her fingers lay cool in his. Her hand seemed small. She’d feel small in
his arms, he knew, even though she was taller than average.

She squeezed his hand and released it. “I’m
fine, Gene, please, don’t worry. My mind’s on other things, that’s all. I’ll
see you in the morning for breakfast at eight again?”

“Sure.” He watched her go, feeling
helpless. It occurred to him that maybe her mother had told her about the new
death threat. Maybe the reinforcement of someone being after her had shaken her
up.

Anyway, her mental status was irrelevant.
His only concern was that she was safe.

Yeah
, he
thought as he let himself into his room.
Keep telling yourself that, and you
might begin to believe it.

*

In his dream, a T-rex was pounding on his
hotel door, trying to get in.

Trained to transition from sleep to being awake
in seconds, it nevertheless took Gene a moment to understand it wasn’t actually
a dinosaur, as the door shook on its hinges and the whole hotel groaned. It was
another earthquake, a big one, by the feel of it.

Within seconds of him leaping out of bed,
the fire alarms went off across the hotel. He’d left the curtains open, and
watery light from the half-moon filtered into the room, which was useful because
when he flicked on the light switch, he discovered the quake had knocked out
the power.

Currently naked, he tugged a pair of pajama
bottoms up his legs and pulled a sweatshirt over his head. Shoving his feet
into a pair of Converses, he grabbed his phone and opened the door. Callie
opened hers at the same moment and appeared next to him, a ghost in the
semi-darkness.

“Jesus.” She was white-faced, dressed only
in a thin nightie. “It’s another fucking earthquake.” He could hardly hear her
above the alarms.

“Yeah.” The tremors had stopped, although
it was possible there might be aftershocks. “Come on,” he yelled.

Taking her hand, he led her across the
corridor to the fire exit and they ran down the stairs, joining other guests in
various stages of undress, lit by emergency lighting and the glow from people’s
phones. Luckily, they were only two floors up, and it was less than a minute
before they found themselves on the bank of the Avon, which the moon had cast
in an eerie light. All the color had been bleached out of the scene, leaving
them in a black-and-white movie, a mixture of highlights and shadows.

He hadn’t even checked what the time was
yet, so he swiped his phone. 1:35 a.m. “It felt like a big one,” he said,
bringing up Twitter. Tweets were just starting to appear, reflecting the shock—physical
and emotional—across the city, although nothing yet about the magnitude or
effects. He glanced up at the hotel. There didn’t appear to be any visible
damage, but that didn’t mean the city had escaped untouched.

“Close one,” he said. He looked back at her,
and his heart almost stuttered to a stop. Her bottom lip trembled, and she shook
visibly, her arms wrapped around her waist. Like him, she’d brought only her
phone, obviously not even taking the time to fetch a jacket, and her feet were
bare. Her nightie was one of Rowan’s designs, made of a thin, silky fabric
gathered under the bust and falling to just above her knees, with thin ribbon
straps. It was a pale color with darker butterflies that sparkled in the moonlight,
beautiful but hardly warm, and even on a summer night, the cool breeze was
obviously enough to make her shiver.

“Jesus, Callie.” Without asking, he tugged
his sweatshirt over his head and started to put it on her.

She let him do so automatically, like a
child. He dragged his gaze away from her breasts, cupped in the silky fabric,
maneuvered her arms through, and pulled the sweatshirt down her body. It fell
past her hips, the sleeves hanging over her hands.

“Makes me feel like I’m a gorilla,” he said,
trying to make her laugh, but she seemed in shock, and just turned wide eyes up
to him, still shaking. “Hey.” He lifted her hair out of the neck of the shirt,
then put his hands on her upper arms and rubbed them, once again thinking how
small she felt in his hands. “Are you okay? Callie?”

Callie blinked a few times. Her heart was
racing at a million miles an hour. “I’m… I’m all right. Sorry. I can’t believe
it, that’s all.”

 “Don’t worry, it’s normal to—” He was
interrupted by her ringtone; someone was calling her, at this hour.

She lifted her hand to see who it was.
“It’s Rowan.” She held the phone to her ear. “Hello?”

“Callie? It’s Rowan.”

“Hi. What are you doing up?”

“Just reading, but I have the TV on in the
background and it says there’s been another earthquake. Are you still in
Christchurch?”

In front of her, Gene gestured toward the
river, presumably asking her whether she would prefer it if he walked away. She
shook her head. The last thing she wanted at that moment was to be left alone.
He nodded and stood with his hands behind his back, military-style.

She didn’t know whether to laugh, cry, or
drool over him. Now he’d taken off his shirt, he was bare-chested, and all that
expanse of tanned skin would have been enough to send her senses spinning, even
if she hadn’t already felt as if she were on a carousel. As she’d suspected, he
was muscular and toned, with a definite six-pack of abs and pecs that made her
want to run her tongue over them. He had a manly scattering of body hair, a
distinctive happy trail drawing her gaze to where his pajamas hung on his hips.
Quite clearly, he wasn’t wearing any underwear beneath them.

“Callie?” Rowan’s voice echoed in her ear.

She blinked, remembering she was on the
phone and there had just been an earthquake. “Sorry. Yes, I’m in Christchurch. I’m
standing on the bank of the Avon right now.”

“Are you… You’re not hurt?”

“No, I’m okay. It was loud and the hotel
shook, but I don’t think there’s any damage, although the quake’s knocked the
electricity out.”

“Are you on your own?”

She looked up at Gene again, who continued
to stand as still as if he were on duty. “No,” she said. “Gene’s here.”

“Oh, that’s good. Does he know about last
time?”

“No, I’ll tell him now.”

He raised an eyebrow. She held out a hand
to ask him to wait.

“Thanks for ringing,” she said.

“Okay. You know where I am if you need me.”

“Thanks.”

They hung up. She folded her arms, huddling
into Gene’s sweatshirt, which still held some of his body warmth.

They stood in silence for a moment, half listening
to the hotel staff explaining that they had to have the all clear from the fire
service before they could return to their rooms. People were milling around,
talking excitedly about the earthquake. Callie knew the phone lines would probably
be jammed by now, even though it was the middle of the night, with everyone
trying to contact friends and family to let them know they were okay.

A fire engine roared into the car park,
lights flashing, and firefighters spilled out of it. They’d have to go floor to
floor to check there was no damage before anyone else could go inside. It would
be a while before she’d be under the warmth and safety of the duvet.

She turned and walked away from the hustle
and bustle toward the river, and Gene followed.

“Sorry about that,” she said.

“It’s okay.”

“Rowan was just checking I was all right. We
were here when the big earthquake struck.”

His eyes widened. “You were here in 2011?”

“Yeah. The four of us—Rowan, Bridget, Neve,
and me—had come here for a fashion show. We were having lunch when the
earthquake hit.”

He stared at her. “You were in the middle
of the city?”

“Yes. The ground cracked right under our
feet. We ran down the road and were nearly hit when a supermarket crumbled in
front of us. Actually, Neve
was
hit—she hurt her shoulder quite badly.
She had to go to hospital. The rest of us were okay, but it was horrible.”

She started shaking as she thought of it,
and couldn’t stop. “There were people crying all around us. Entire buildings
crumbled into dust before our eyes. People’s homes were destroyed in seconds,
the walls just wrenched apart. Roads rippled and buckled as if they were made
of plastic. A guy nearby us was crushed by the wall that hurt Neve. I watched
his wife trying to get him to talk, but I knew he was dead.” His sightless eyes
would haunt her for the rest of her life, she was certain.

“Callie…”

“I can’t believe it’s happened again. I’m
like a fucking jinx for this city!”

“Callie. Jesus.” Gene pulled her into his
arms. “It’s okay.”

She rested her forehead on his chest, rigid
as a poker as she fought to control the wave of emotions sweeping over her.
“It’s not okay.”

“No, it’s not. I’m sorry.” He kissed the
top of her head.

That tender gesture was enough to tip her
over the edge, and she started crying.

As the tears trickled down her cheeks and
her chest heaved with uncontrollable sobs, she wondered whether he’d pat her
arm awkwardly, or maybe even move away, embarrassed by her emotion.

He didn’t, though. His arms tightened
around her, warm and comforting, and he rubbed her back with a hand, murmuring,
“Shh, shh, don’t worry, I’m here.”

Callie rested her cheek on his chest, the
tension draining out of her, leaving her limp, like an old piece of celery.
Gene felt solid, though, like a tree trunk warmed by the summer sun, his chest
and arms hard, smelling of body wash and cotton sheets and hot, sexy male.

She’d tucked her arms against her chest,
but as her tears subsided, she splayed a hand on his ribs, unable to restrain
herself from touching him. He went still, and she thought that he might
actually be holding his breath, too. Around them, the hubbub continued—firefighters
coming and going in the building, people talking, phoning, the hotel staff
trying to relay information. But for a brief moment, it faded, and her whole
world became his warm breath on her temple, his strong arms, and his skin under
her fingers.

His chest was wet from her tears, and she
brushed her thumb through the wetness, spreading it a couple of inches across
his skin, his light brown hairs moving and then springing back beneath her
touch. When she exhaled, he shivered, although she wasn’t sure if it was from
the cool air or her breath on his wet skin.

She knew hardly anything about this man,
but she liked him so much. When he’d said he might ask her out in three months,
did he mean he wouldn’t date anyone else until then? She didn’t like the
thought of him going out with another woman, holding her like this, kissing
her.

“She’s okay,” Gene said suddenly over her
shoulder, and she realized someone had asked him if she was all right. “Just a
bit shaken up. Memories of 2011.”

“Yes, there are quite a few people around
here saying the same. Let us know if you need anything. It shouldn’t be long
now until you can return to your room.” The man walked away, his footsteps
crunching on the gravel.

Room, singular. He thought they were a
couple. She supposed that made sense considering Gene was semi-naked and had
his arms wrapped around her.

She should move back now, wipe her face,
and thank him for comforting her. Put some distance between them.

But he didn’t lower his arms, so she stayed
put, and they remained like that for a while, saying nothing, until the
firefighters declared the hotel was safe and everyone could return.

Gene finally loosened his arms, and Callie
stepped back. She wiped her face and turned to go, then felt Gene’s hand grasp
hers firmly. She didn’t complain.

“It was a six-point-five,” the hotel
manager explained as everyone returned, “but deep, and way out to sea. There
doesn’t appear to have been too much damage across the city, and so far
nobody’s been hurt.”

“Thank God.” Relief washed over her, and
she sagged, exhausted.

Gene put one arm around her shoulders,
pulling her against him as they walked back up the stairs, not wanting to wait
with the crowds for the elevator. “Not far now,” he said soothingly.

She was so tired she could hardly keep her
eyes open. She dragged herself up the steps, exclaiming when she stumbled, her
feet refusing to lift. Gene bent and slid an arm under her knees, and lifted
her easily into his arms to climb the last few stairs. Callie held on while he
carried her along the corridor to their rooms. His hair was prickly at the nape
of his neck where it was so short, a little longer as she moved her hand up. If
he was surprised by her sliding her fingers through his hair, he didn’t say
anything.

He bent to swipe her card, then opened the
door. Carefully, he carried her through the doorway, into the room, and over to
the bed. After pulling back the duvet, he lowered her onto the mattress. Then
he covered her back over.

He cupped her face, his thumb brushing her
cheekbone, wiping away the last of the wetness. “I’m just next door if you need
me.”

Callie felt overwhelmed with tiredness and
emotion, and suddenly the last thing she wanted was to be alone. “Don’t go,”
she whispered.

He hesitated, and she bit her lip. What a
stupid thing to say, after they’d had that discussion about waiting until the
time was right. Of course he wouldn’t stay.

But to her surprise, he nodded and walked
around the bed to the other side. He climbed on to lay beside her, on top of
the duvet, and moved close to her. Then he lifted his arm.

Callie met his eyes for a moment, then
shifted flush with him and rested her head on his shoulder. He lowered his arm
around her, tight and warm even through the duvet, and held her close. He
traced a finger around her face, lifting a strand of hair that had stuck to her
wet cheek, and tucked it behind her ear.

“Don’t be scared,” he murmured. “I’ll keep
you safe.”

“I know.” She closed her eyes, and within
seconds the world faded to darkness.