His Last Chance at Redemption (16 page)

An image of Lexi and Ty lying on the carpeted floor of his private library drawing and laughing together the afternoon before came into his mind. At the time he’d been reminded of images of his own dysfunctional childhood but what had stuck the most was that, rather than feeling awash with the cold sweat of fear he’d felt when he’d first seen Ty at the childcare centre, he’d felt something else. Something calmer. And for the first time he hadn’t seen Sasha when he had looked at his son.

Yes, maybe it was time to sit on the chair—at least for an hour here and there between work.

‘I can’t stay. I have to work tomorrow.’ Lexi’s words sounded loud in the loaded silence and he frowned. What she had to do was to get back into his bed, but right now he didn’t think she’d be too amenable to that suggestion.

She couldn’t stay. Not when all he wanted was for her to help him out with Ty. Already her heart was racing at the thought of spending more time with Leo, her mind telling her all sorts of fanciful things. That she cared for him—more than cared for him. Which she didn’t, of course. She just wasn’t the type to have casual sex and her mind automatically wanted to attach meaning to what they’d done last night. It was what had happened with Brandon. Back then she had ignored her instincts that had warned her he was a player and convinced herself she was in love with him. Thankfully, she was mature enough to see the potential for that now, but still … staying in this man’s orbit would be like putting Ty in a chocolate shop and telling him he couldn’t eat anything.

‘Don’t you have someone else who can take care of the centre in your absence?’ he asked.

‘Sure. I’ll call up one of my many minions, shall I?’ she tried to joke, but it fell flat.

‘You must have other staff who can take over in case of emergencies.’

‘I do. But this isn’t an emergency and I also have a business proposal I need to write.’ A proposal she had planned to work on this weekend and hadn’t touched!

‘A proposal for what?’

Lexi was so tense at being this close to him and not letting on how much he affected her she nearly stormed out. Only he would likely follow and answering him was undoubtedly quicker.

‘A new childcare centre Aimee and I want to open.’

‘You’re expanding?’

His surprise was obvious and she didn’t know whether to feel pleased or insulted!

‘Not if I don’t get the current building problems ironed out.’

He regarded her thoughtfully and the room grew hotter. ‘I will help you.’

‘What? How?’ She shook her head. That was the last thing she had expected him to say.

He looked at her with benign patience. ‘Lexi, I run a global company. I think I might be qualified to help you with a business proposal.’

She hadn’t thought of that.

‘It’s what I believe you English call a no-brainer,’ he continued. ‘You help me, I help you. And it will make up for your refusal to let me pay you for the past three days.’

Lexi mulled this over. She wanted her new childcare centre more than anything else and Leo was supposed to be an incredibly savvy businessman, but … could she really stay on with last night still lying heavily between them? She squirmed a little and told herself if it meant getting her new business up and running, of course she could.

Maybe …

‘What time frame are we talking about?’ she asked, standing behind the chair facing his desk.

Leo smiled as if she had already agreed and her lips pinched together. ‘I don’t expect what I need to do to take more than a couple of days.’

‘I’ll need my proposal completed by Friday,’ she told him smartly.

‘We’ll do it tonight.’

Lexi sucked in a breath. ‘And it’s just business, right?’ The question was out of her mouth before she’d fully thought it through and it landed between them like a dead weight.

His smile hardened. ‘Are you asking me or telling me?’

Lexi could feel her heart galloping behind her breastbone and she just hoped he couldn’t see it. Because what had happened between them last night—the way he had treated her this morning—made her feel too raw, too vulnerable for her to risk sleeping with him again.

‘Telling you.’

He nodded stiffly. ‘Then I will, of course, respect your wishes.’

‘Thank you.’

‘Sudovolstviyem, moya milaya.’

Lexi didn’t know what he’d just said and didn’t ask for a translation, just watched as he walked out of the room with the lithe grace of a world class athlete and took all the oxygen in the room with him. Then she flopped onto the chair she’d been gripping like a life buoy.

Well, that was easy. But what had she expected? That he would put up an argument? Insist on sleeping with her?

She felt flat and heavy and strangely deflated and yet she should be happy. Leo was taking his responsibilities as a father seriously and he was going to lend her his vast experience in business to help make one of her dreams come true. What more did she want?

‘I
THOUGHT
the plan was for you to look over my proposal.’

Leo looked across at the frosty woman holding onto the railing on the pool deck as if it were the only thing keeping her alive.

‘And we will. But first there is a magnificent sunset to enjoy and an even better dinner to eat.’

‘I’m not very hungry.’

‘You didn’t eat lunch.’

‘How do you know that?’

‘My chef makes it his mission to inspect each plate that is returned. He pays particular attention to the full ones.’

‘I wasn’t hungry then either.’

‘And the sunset?’ ‘What about it?’

‘You haven’t disparaged the sunset yet.’

Her lips twitched at his attempt at humour. ‘I’m working up to it.’

Leo smiled. After their tense meeting in his office earlier he’d decided there was no way she would be sleeping alone while she was on his yacht but that perhaps he needed to make up for his earlier behaviour and woo her a little. Not that she was making it easy in a fitted blouse and short summer skirt that drew his eyes to her shapely legs and made him want to lay her across the elegantly set table beside the pool and
have his wicked way with her. Frankly, polite conversation was the last thing he felt like right now!

‘Work up to it while we eat,’ he suggested, gesturing for her to take a seat at the table. She eyed it as if it were a guillotine and he hid a smile. She was a definite challenge and one he was surprised to find he didn’t mind rising to.

‘I think someone must have misinterpreted your intentions when they set this table,’ she murmured almost to herself.

Leo glanced at the gleaming silverware, crystal glasses and a centre candle waiting to be lit. It was a romantic setting and just as he’d ordered.

‘It’s not to your liking?’ he asked as he held out her chair.

She sat, but was careful not to brush up against him. ‘It’s a touch intimate.’

‘Not for what I have in mind.’

She met his eyes sharply as he sat down opposite her. ‘Which is?’

‘Let’s eat first. I always find I argue better on a full stomach.’

Lexi laughed despite herself and told her heart to stop its unruly fluttering.

‘Would you care for wine tonight?’

She needed something to ward off the charming man opposite her and nodded up at the waiter holding two bottles in his hand.

‘Red or white, ma’am?’

‘White. Thank you.’ She watched as her glass was filled with sparkling wine and realised she was finding excuses not to look at Leo lest he see how affected she was by the sight of him, the golden rays of the dying sun turning him into a bronzed god. His blue eyes were brilliant in his tanned face, his muscular legs accentuated by the low-riding denim jeans, the sexy casual top … Jeans? Since when did he wear jeans? And why, oh, why, did he have to look so good in them?

‘You’re wearing jeans!’ She knew she sounded accusing and took a fortifying gulp of wine to hide the gauche comment.

He looked down at himself. ‘You don’t like them?’

No, she didn’t
like
them—she
loved
them.

‘You don’t normally wear them to a business meeting.’

He smiled. ‘How’s the wine?’

Lexi recognised that he was changing the topic—again—and noticed his own glass had been taken away.

‘You’re not drinking?’

‘I don’t drink alcohol.’

She gazed at him and wondered if he recognised that his decision to abstain from alcohol was just another way he was different from his father and scolded herself for still trying to find things about him she liked.

The waiter returned with a plate of tempting seafood and, despite her misgivings, Lexi found the whole dinner to be sublime. The chef delivered a six course
menu degustation
of light seafood and vegetarian dishes that couldn’t help but imbue a sense that all was well with the world.

Lexi flopped back in her chair and eyed the man opposite her in the flickering candlelight, the quiet evening only broken periodically by the slap of a fish as it broke the surface of the sea, and the soft lilt of jazz music that played through the yacht’s complex sound system.

Leo seemed relaxed as well and surprisingly the conversation had flowed easily. He’d told her a little about his travels and his business and had asked her plenty about her own, getting her to explain some of her ideas about where she wanted her business to go. She’d felt a little self-conscious at first but he’d proven an avid listener and was one of the few people whose eyes didn’t glaze over when she went on and on and on about her passion. Whenever she was out with Aimee and this happened her friend would slice her hand dramatically
across her throat to let her know when she was boring the pants off her listener.

‘I don’t think I told you that you look extremely beautiful tonight. I like your hair down.’

Lexi’s heart lurched in her chest and she told herself to calm down. He was paying her a compliment, nothing more.

She stared at him and did her best to feel composed but he was like a sublime male animal relaxed back in his chair, his eyes intent on her face, making her think about how he had looked as he’d risen above her last night and entered her body. How he had felt in her hand. Big … almost impossibly big.

‘Nothing to say, angel,
moy
?’

My
angel, he said. But she wasn’t his and never would be and maybe that tiny hint of wishing it otherwise meant that she’d had just a little too much wine.

‘Maybe—’ she cleared her throat ‘—we should just get on and look at my proposal.’ She made to get up and collect her laptop from the sofa she had dropped it onto when she’d first come out on deck but he waylaid her with his hand on her forearm.

Lexi stilled as his thumb brushed across the underside of her wrist, tingling sensations causing goose bumps to rise up on her skin and a shiver to ripple all the way down her spine.

‘What’s the rush?’

The rush was that she was becoming seduced by the balmy night, the candlelit table, the soft music, the wine, the man … Oh, boy, the man!

‘Come. Dance with me.’

‘Leo, I can’t do this.’

‘Sure you can. You stand in the circle of my arms, put your hand in mine, and then you let me lead.’

He smiled wolfishly and she gave a short laugh. ‘Very funny.’

He stood up and came around the table towards her. ‘Let me show you.’

He grabbed her hand and pulled her to her feet. ‘Leo, don’t. I can’t think straight when you touch me.’

His smile was one of pure male satisfaction. ‘You know the secret to a man’s heart.’

‘I don’t think it’s your heart that’s affected by that comment.’

His arm came around to the small of her back and he started moving her in time with the music. ‘Maybe not my heart, but another major organ is definitely involved.’

‘Only a man considers his
ego
a major organ,’ she said loftily.

He laughed and Lexi felt as if some foreign being had invaded her body and switched off her brain. What was she doing flirting with him like this? He didn’t want her. And, even if he did, could she sleep with him again without being swamped by her insecurities? And did she want to? No …

‘Leo, please … don’t play games with me.’

His eyes narrowed and she looked away. ‘Someone hurt you. Someone other than your father.’ His quiet concern made her stumble and he gathered her even closer against him, her heart pounding out a litany that was totally out of time with the music.

She felt ridiculously safe in his arms—which was like saying a bunny was safe with a wolf—but did she feel safe enough to talk about Brandon?

She hesitated and remembered all that he had told her the night before. ‘I was younger and he was immature—I was too, I guess. We met at university, in the library, and he was persistent. It wasn’t till later that I found out a couple of his friends had made a bet that he couldn’t get me into bed … We were intimate a couple of times but … sex has never been my forte and he soon found someone else.’

Someone else to take her place before he’d even told her their time together was over!

Leo swore. ‘He was your first lover.’

Brandon had been her
only
lover besides him. Not that she was going to tell him that.

‘Lexi?’ He stopped moving and took her chin between his finger and thumb and forced her eyes to his. ‘He was your only lover.’ The statement was made with quiet conviction and she cringed.

Oh, God, was it so obvious? ‘I never knew nights on the Aegean could be so balmy,’ she announced cheerfully as she tried to pull her chin away to look out over the sea.

He tightened his grip, his eyes boring into hers. ‘He made you feel inadequate?’

Finally
the man asked a question. And if she could be more embarrassed she didn’t know how. ‘Can we
please
talk about something else?’

‘Lexi, you are the most beautiful, sensual woman I’ve known and last night was …’ He hesitated. ‘
Moy bohze
, I get hard just thinking about last night.’ He swore softly. ‘I get hard just
thinking
about
you
!’

Lexi was shocked by the vehemence in his tone. ‘Is that unusual?’