With This Fling... (11 page)

Charlotte had never once pictured Gil in the kitchen. Certainly not in a ship’s galley. Nor had Gil ever been quite so delectably dressed.

‘You’re smiling,’ Grey murmured.

‘I know.’ She set her wine on the bench and flowed into Greyson’s arms, burrowing beneath his open shirt in search of warm skin over rippling muscle. She touched the tip of her tongue to his collarbone and tasted salt. He put his hand to her head and held her there for a moment, breathing in deep, before tilting her head back and covering her lips with his own in a kiss that spoke of welcome, and wanting, and a man who intended to savour every moment of this particular journey.

‘Miss me?’ he whispered, between kisses.

‘It’s really not part of the plan,’ she countered and kissed him again. She didn’t tell him that sinking into his kisses felt a lot like coming home. She didn’t say that she’d thought about him far more than she’d wanted to this past week. That she’d envied him his overprotective mother and his lovely ex-fiancée, the work that was his passion, and the surety with which he moved through life. A smart and sexy man who knew exactly what he wanted was a very attractive proposition for a woman who did not.

He filled a gap, as Gil had filled a gap. He fed a need Charlotte hadn’t known existed.

‘I think I’m using you,’ she murmured.

‘That’s okay.’ He kissed her again. This
time she moaned her approval. ‘Blame it on the endorphins.’

‘You don’t recommend that I take at least
some
responsibility for my behaviour?’

‘We have a short-term liaison agreement, remember? Your behaviour is entirely appropriate. You could even—just a suggestion—increase your enthusiasm for my company.’

‘You called, I came,’ she countered, stepping out of his embrace and retrieving her wine. ‘Undress me, make love to me, and I guarantee I’ll come some more. How much more enthusiasm do you want?’

‘Maybe enthusiasm wasn’t quite the right word,’ Greyson said smoothly. ‘Never mind.’

He reached for his beer, leaned back against the tiny galley sink, and studied her intently. ‘My mother phoned this evening to ask me what I was doing this weekend. I told her I was spending it with you. She wants you over for dinner again, some time. Just the four of us, my father included.’

‘Why?’ asked Charlotte warily.

‘Perhaps she feels that she didn’t give you a chance.’

‘She doesn’t have to.’

‘Alas, she doesn’t know that.’ Grey studied her some more. ‘I’ll tell her you’re busy.’

Charlotte lowered her gaze. Had she really
been involved with Greyson, she’d have grasped the olive branch extended. As it was … he could tell his mother whatever he liked.

‘It’s one of the drawbacks of having a nosey family,’ he said next. ‘My mother’s been after grandchildren for years.’

‘Grandchildren?’

‘What’s your position on that?’ he asked and Charlotte glanced back towards him to find his gaze more intent than ever.

‘On grandchildren?’ she said lightly. ‘I can see the appeal.’

‘On children,’ he said. ‘And you having them.’

‘Yours?’

‘Anyone’s.’

‘Again, I can see the appeal,’ she said. ‘And were I in a loving and stable relationship, I might consider children an option.’

‘What if your partner had a vocation that required travel? Would you consider joining him on his travels? You and the children?’

‘Are we talking about a partner much like yourself?’

‘Let’s assume yes,’ he said.

‘It’s not a question I’ve given much thought to,’ she said. ‘Mainly because the plan is to avoid becoming involved with such a man. I’ve a lot of experience when it comes to unorthodox
childhoods, Greyson. I know what worked for me, and what didn’t. I’ll not be repeating what didn’t.’

‘Wouldn’t that make you the perfect partner for such a man?’ he said silkily.

‘That would depend on his ability to forfeit his needs and desires for the greater good of his family when the time came for him to do so,’ she said, equally silkily. ‘Could
you?’

‘Good question,’ he said blandly and peeked into the oven. ‘I think they’re done.’

They ate on deck, bypassing the perfectly prepared table in favour of a starry sky, a playful breeze, and balancing their plates on their knees. It fed Greyson’s need for freedom and Charlotte’s need for escape from difficult questions and impossible compromises. When they were done with the food she relaxed back against the moulded bench seating and stared at the sky. You couldn’t see the stars from where she was in Sydney. Not many, at any rate, and not often. ‘I’m not
against
travel,’ she murmured. ‘I’m very fond of new horizons and experiences.’

‘I see that,’ he murmured.

‘Just not as an ongoing way of life.’

‘Have you ever made love beneath the stars?’ he murmured.

‘Are you changing the subject?’

‘Yes,’ he said. ‘I’ve had enough of the old subject. I’m hunting a new one. Have you ever made love outside, under the stars?’

‘No.’

‘Want to?’

She rose and straddled him, pushing his shirt from his shoulders as she’d wanted to do all evening, glorying in his size and his strength and the lazy intensity he could bring to a moment. ‘Yes,’ she said. ‘I do.’

He didn’t mean to devour her. He hadn’t meant to bring up his mother’s dinner invitation or the subject of children either. Hadn’t meant to make love to her half the night and then again come sunrise because he couldn’t get enough of her. But he did all those things to Charlotte Greenstone and she matched him, passion for passion, and warned him that last time, before her eyes had fluttered closed, that if he didn’t want her committing mutiny, her breakfast had better be bountiful and could he please serve it some time after ten.

‘What did your last Sherpa die of?’ he’d muttered.

‘Boredom,’ she’d mumbled and promptly fallen asleep.

Greyson wasn’t bored.

Exasperated, at times. Astonished by the
sexual pleasure he found in Charlotte’s embrace. But not bored.

He had a plan, formulated last night in between one bout of lovemaking and the next. A stupid plan, half baked and wholly crazy and one he wasn’t at all sure he’d be able to sell to Charlotte as a viable option, given her soul deep aversion to traipsing around the globe according to someone else’s whim. Still, he did have a habit of getting what he wanted. Eventually.

Grey waited until ten-thirty to wake Charlotte from her slumber. He used a mug of the finest highland coffee PNG had to offer to rouse her. He told her the pancakes would be ready by eleven, and that there were fresh towels and toiletries in the bathroom. He thought he heard the words
slave driver
mumbled by way of reply, along with a few other odd words like
incubus, sadist,
and
dead man.

Perhaps she’d been comparing him favourably to Gil.

‘I have a plan,’ he said when Charlotte was wholly awake and halfway through her pancakes and coffee. ‘Will you hear me out?’

‘Does it involve your mother?’

‘No, although I dare say she’ll have something to say about the matter. It involves me going
to Borneo next week to scout locations for the new project. And you coming with me.’

Charlotte chewed slowly and swallowed hard. She reached for her coffee, deliberately stalling for time. Grey kept his mouth shut and let her stall. Press her and he’d lose her. Rush her and she’d bolt. Challenge her and he might just be able to persuade her around to his way of thinking.

‘Why would I do that?’ she said finally.

‘Because it’d give you an opportunity to test your feelings about travel,’ he offered. ‘You’ll get all the vagaries of working a remote location without having to involve your own work. Then if the lifestyle still holds no appeal for you, your work will be exactly how and where you left it. Face it, Charlotte. You’re a little hazy right now when it comes to the direction you want your career to take. A trip like this can’t hurt and might even help clarify your thoughts on the matter.’

She didn’t deny it. ‘What’s in it for you?’ she asked warily.

‘You mean apart from the insanely good sex?’

He won a tiny smile from her. ‘You have a one-track mind.’

‘So I’ve been told. Usually by people who fail to comprehend the bigger picture.’ He sent
her his most reassuring smile, not particularly wanting to discuss his big-picture plans with her at the moment. ‘I’ll pay your way, of course.’

Just like that, her smile disappeared. ‘Don’t be daft.’

‘Why is that daft? My invite, my expense. Your rules, remember?’

‘Those rules aren’t applicable to this situation.’

‘My mistake,’ he said smoothly. ‘You presented your position on the matter of who pays for what strongly enough that I naturally assumed there was no room for movement. You present your position on careers that require extensive travel with equal conviction, but again, I sense uncertainty as to
why
you consider them not to your liking. I leave on Wednesday. Sydney to mainland Malaysia, then a couple of regional flights to get to a little river city called Banjarmasin.’

‘I know it,’ she said flatly.

‘I’ve an interest in the conservation forests there.’

Charlotte picked up her fork and cut into her pancake with the edge of it, deftly liberating a chunk before stabbing it with the end of her fork. She put it to her mouth, chewed, swallowed, and smiled. ‘I’m sure there’ll be plenty there to interest you.’

‘And to interest you?’

‘Well, the monkeys are very sweet,’ she murmured. ‘When do you need my answer by?’

‘No rush. Although some time before Wednesday, obviously.’ He sipped his coffee. ‘Anywhere you need to be today?’

‘Not really. I often spend Sunday afternoon at Aurora’s house. It appeases the neighbours.’

‘If I dropped you back at the marina tomorrow morning, you could be there by lunchtime. Would that work?’

‘I didn’t bring two days’ worth of clothes.’

‘Wear mine.’

‘Are you asking me to sleep over again tonight?’

‘Yes.’

‘So you can convince me to come traipsing with you?’

‘Because I’m enjoying your company and I’m not quite ready to let you go.’ He gave her the truth of his thoughts in that he gave her what he thought she would bear. ‘A short term affair doesn’t by nature have to lack intensity.’

‘So I’m discovering,’ she murmured.

‘Will you stay on another night?’

‘Will you try and convince me to come travelling with you next week if I do?’

‘No.’ Greyson shook his head. ‘My offer
stands but I’ll not badger you into accepting it. That’s not my way. I’m quite happy to leave the question hanging there if you are.’

‘The old elephant in the living room,’ she said with a wry smile.

‘Exactly.’

‘So what would we do with the day if I stayed on?’ she said at last, and watched Greyson’s eyes lighten and brighten with possibilities.

‘Wind’s picking up,’ he said. ‘Have you ever raced a cat under sail?’

They raced the day away and made the most of the night.

Greyson kept his word. He never once mentioned his offer. Instead he made love to her with a focus no other man had ever matched. Passion ruled him, ruled them both, along with greedy abandon in Charlotte’s case, liberally laced with desperation at the thought that this night might be their last.

Morning came too soon for Charlotte but she savoured it regardless, delighting in being wooed awake by wicked promises and exceptionally good coffee. A woman could get used to such treatment, but only a foolish woman would allow herself to depend on it.

She’d thought about joining Greyson in Borneo for the week. One week, what harm could it
do? She had holiday time owing. Time her boss had urged her to take. She had no commitments to pets or to people—no responsibilities at all in that regard. She was a free agent and why shouldn’t she follow her heart—or at least her libido for a time—and see where it led?

Tempting, so tempting, this man’s kisses, as she and Greyson stood on dry land later in the day, saying their farewells beside her baking hot car, and stealing kisses where they could. Charlotte stole a lot of them, a woman bent on gorging herself before a famine.

‘Safe travels, Greyson Tyler,’ she murmured, and if her heart felt as if it was breaking, well, perhaps it was. She stood back and took one last look at him, storing up the memories for later. A big beautiful man with tousled black hair, intelligent brown eyes, more charm than was good for him, and an air of command and purpose that clung to him like skin. ‘I’ll think of you with pleasure and I’ll think of you with regret, but I’ll not be going with you to Borneo.’

‘Why not?’ His turn to move forward, to reach for her and coax every last drop of pleasure from a kiss. ‘We’re good together, Charlotte. Better than good.’

‘I know. And maybe in another lifetime, one shaped by a different upbringing, I’d have
followed you and never looked back.’ She stepped back, out of his arms and the solace she found there and regarded him pensively. ‘You think I don’t know my own mind or that you can change it. Somewhere along the way, I’ve given you the impression that I don’t know what I want from a partner or from this life, and maybe I don’t. Not fully, not with certainty. Thing is, no matter how often I examine the notion of travel or of being with a partner who travels, there’s a resistance there that runs soul deep.’

‘Call me,’ he said gruffly. ‘When I get back.’

‘Greyson.’ She looked away, down at the suddenly blurry steering wheel of her car, anywhere but at him. How had she come to care for him so much in such a short time? Two weeks. Less than half a dozen meetings, and already he was tearing her in two. ‘I can’t.’ Nothing more than a ragged plea for mercy, for he seemed bent on making this farewell so much harder than it should have been. ‘I can’t,’ she whispered again.

‘Then I’ll call you.’

‘Greyson, please …’ She pressed her lips to his, one final farewell. She stepped back and smiled through her tears. Time to go before she begged him to stay. ‘Don’t.’

G
REYSON
T
YLER
wasn’t always an easy man to deal with. He had his fair share of dogged determination. He knew exactly how well persistence paid off. He hadn’t wanted to walk away from Charlotte Greenstone when she’d asked him to. His body had screamed no and his brain had assured him that he could overcome her protests eventually. Only honour had stayed his hand.