Resisting Nick (Wicked in Wellington) (8 page)

She was no stranger to escapism. Hadn’t she had to escape from her parents’ death, and her grandmother’s? And then find distractions all through the long years caring for her grandfather? A quickie affair with one good-looking guy should be a cinch. Especially if she didn’t let it get serious.

She stowed her jacket and bag in her locker. Should she knock on Nick’s closed door? Maybe not—perhaps he had an important visitor or was on the international call he’d mentioned. Smiling, she returned to reception, opened the email program, and keyed in ‘Mother-to-be safely delivered. Also car.’

He replied almost instantly, ‘bring 2 coffees.’

She wrinkled her nose. He was back to his high-handed self.
 

‘You and who?’ she typed.

‘You and me.’

So no important visitor or overseas call. She returned to the staff-room and glared at her reflection in the mirror by the lockers while the coffeemaker did its thing. And couldn’t resist smudging on another drift of eye-shadow, spritzing a tiny spray of perfume into the air and leaning into it, and pulling the zipper of her red top down a few inches so a little skin showed.
 

Just because the weather’s warmer now
.
 

She turned back to the machine. Seconds later the hairs lifting on her scalp told her Nick had arrived. She was now so tuned in to him that his almost silent tread on the carpet and the slight movement of the air in the room were enough. The warm weight of his hands settled on her hips as she stood facing the machine. “Don’t make me spill this,” she warned.

“Wouldn’t dream of it.”

One hand stroked upward, firm and sure over her spine and shoulder. Every inch of her he caressed came alight with pinpoints of pleasure, and she pressed backward like a cat seeking comfort. He squeezed her nape, a small but possessive gesture, and she turned. He stood far too close, hand now sliding to cradle the side of her face. His thumb grazed over her lower lip, backward, forward, in a languid slide. Sammie closed her eyes.

“Don’t,” she whispered.

He dropped a kiss on her brow and released her. “Come and see my house, then. The weather’s behaving.”

“As long as you do too...”

“No guarantees there.”

She pushed a coffee toward him, and he grinned as he took it from her. “You trying to keep my hands occupied, Sammie?”

“Something like that,” she muttered, picking up the other mug and trailing him back to his office.

Big architectural drawings now covered the low table. Nick squatted in front of them and set his coffee down. Sammie stayed a step behind, checking out the way his jeans cupped his butt and the white T-shirt stretched over the long muscles of his back.
 

Sure, he had all the gear and the know-how to sculpt himself to perfection, but that perfection was a knockout. If she hadn’t been holding her coffee, her hands might have gone wandering in return.

He pulled a yellowed and battered sheet of paper from beneath the others, and she drew closer.

“Original frontage,” he said, pointing to the carefully detailed veranda with its turned timber posts and railings. “She still has that same door, but the paint’s long gone.” He stroked a finger over the intricate panels. “I’ve bought a wreck, Sammie, but a wreck with real potential. Until a couple of years ago the farmer who owned it used the ground floor for storing hay bales and stock feed.”

She exclaimed in distress and bent lower to examine the drawings. The house was a two-storied double-bay villa, once very grand. The floors were traditionally laid out with a central passageway and staircase. The architect’s signature and the date 1904 were appended in ornate copperplate script.

“Hay bales? What a travesty.”

His eyes crinkled at the corners as he smiled. “You won’t think that when you see it.” He shuffled a collection of much newer plans on top of the old drawing. “We’ll take these with us and you can compare them with what currently exists. Then if there are any queries you’ll be up to speed.”

“You’re putting a lot of trust in me,” she said doubtfully.

“Nah, you’ll cope. You’ve got a good brain. I just need you to use your common sense and deflect some of the rubbish calls away from me.”
 

He bounced up from his squat, and her eyes measured the length and strength of his legs. What would they feel like pressed naked against her own? Her throat constricted.

“Drink up and we’ll beat the rush-hour traffic onto the main coast road.”
 

She sipped. “So what are you having done?”

“Huge refurb. All the original house needs a lot of TLC. But I’m building on at the back, which is where the views are. That area’s wasted on utility rooms and bedrooms.” He sent her a hint of a grin. “Who needs a view from a bedroom? You’re either sleeping or too busy enjoying yourself to stare out the windows.”

Sammie coughed on her gulp of coffee, picturing Nick’s long sun-striped back rising and falling against white sheets as he made love to some fortunate woman. Her eyes met his wicked dark gaze, and the sparkle of sexy suggestion there. He was deliberately winding her up. “Nothing wrong with busy,” she said, looking away.

“Happy to get busy with you any time, Sammie.” He left a couple of seconds’ silence, then apparently thought better of teasing her further. He pointed to a large squared-off extension on the plans. “I want the living areas there.”

She cleared her throat, sipped again, and nodded. “Makes sense.”

“You can see right down to the South Island and across to Kapiti Island. Or you will once we’ve taken some tangled old trees out of the way.”

She tried to drag her brain onto tree trimming, but that enticing picture of him emerging from the sheets wouldn’t desert her. The slow rhythmic pumping, the way his shoulders bunched and relaxed, the searing sexuality of a beautiful man in his prime doing what he’d been put on earth for.
 

Her internal muscles trembled and twitched as though he was sliding inside
her
, weighing her down on that tumbled white bed, making her arch up against him with every long languid thrust.
 

She set her half-full mug down on his desk beside a roofing tile catalogue, not daring to look at him. Too real. Too vividly explicit.

She was grateful when his mobile intruded. He reached across to the desk for it and glanced at the caller ID.
 

“Evan—good timing. How’s it going there?”

Sammie relaxed enough to pick up her mug again, only half listening to his conversation. Should she leave? But her attention spiked when he said, “Just on our way out now. Will you be there for another half hour? I want you to meet my new P.A., Sammie.”

He sent her an amused glance, black eyes wandering over her red top. “No, she’s a girl. Can personally guarantee that.”

She tried not to react. To keep her expression neutral, her smile hidden.
 

“Yup—a brain as well as a body.”

Her heartbeat stuttered for a moment. He thought that about her?

“Stop it!” she mouthed at him, but he simply relaxed back into his chair, hooked one foot up onto his other knee, and let his slow grin spread until it was the broadest of smiles. She easily saw why women found him irresistible, but Tyler’s words about him never getting serious clanged a warning in her brain.
 

She’d known it from the start. He was a player, not a serious prospect. That was fine—she didn’t have serious time to spare for him. But a short term affair? A few days of flirtation and no-doubt incredible sex, and then a regretful goodbye before she flew off on her long-delayed travels? That enticing cocky grin positively begged to be kissed.

“Yup,” he said to the builder, eyes still on her. “We can do that.” He fingered the tile catalogue. “I’ll bring it with me.”
 

He reached for a grey document tube, pushed it across to her, and indicated she was to roll up the plans. She swallowed hard and drained her coffee mug.

“This one too?” She held up the original old drawing.

He nodded. “Okay matey, see you in thirty.” He pocketed the phone. “Yes, that one especially.”

“You should make a copy and keep the original safe. Frame it and hang it in the house when it’s finished.”

He shot her a considering look and then nodded again. “As I said—a brain as well as a body. Can you copy it for me before we leave?”

She smiled inwardly at his repeated compliment, left the new plans on the table, and carried the old one out to reception. It took two passes to get the whole image. She made two copies and then trimmed the overlaps, taped the halves together, and returned to Nick’s office.

“Where can you store this?” She handed him the old version. “Somewhere flat until you take it to the picture framer’s. Or I will, if you like?”

His dark eyes caressed her as she turned aside, set one copy on top of the new plans, rolled them up, and inserted them in the document tube. Two days ago the sensation had unnerved her. Now it felt like foreplay.
 

“Leave it there for now.” His voice sounded a shade huskier than earlier.
 

Sammie’s bones buzzed as she registered the sexy timbre.

“No-one comes in except the cleaners,” he continued. “And they don’t touch what’s on my desk. Ready?”

Readier than you know...

“I’ll grab my bag and jacket,” she said, glancing at her watch and trying to appear cool. “Are we done for the day?”

Nick grimaced. “You are. I’m not.”

“Pity the poor old boss...”

“Not so poor any more, and not so old, thanks.”

She laughed as he crossed the office and pulled the door further open. He stood just far enough back to let her pass, but she had to squeeze by quite close. She almost bumped hips with him, and her red top brushed against his snowy T-shirt, dragging gently as it caught on the soft knit fabric. A frisson of anticipation shimmered through her. God, he smelled good.

“Who’s on duty?” She turned aside to put some distance between them.

“I’ve let Heidi and a couple of the others know we’ll be out together.”

And what are they going to make of that?

“See you downstairs,” he called as Sammie headed for her locker.

CHAPTER EIGHT

This time he waited beside the sleek black car, door open, ready to play the attentive escort. The independent woman in her wanted to scoff, but somewhere in the primitive sensual side of her brain, it felt nice being treated with such courtesy. Grandpa had always done that. For a moment, she ached with the recent loss of him, then pulled herself back to the present. This was no Sunday drive with Grandpa.

Nick touched her arm as she sat, and the warmth of his fingers burned through the red fabric of her sleeve. “Want me to stow those for you?”

She handed him her bag and the document tube, and he leaned in close and tossed them onto the back seat. His scent drifted across the small gap between them, and she angled her head slightly so the smooth curve of his bicep stroked past her cheek when he pulled his arm back.
 

He looked down sharply, as if to check he hadn’t hurt her, and Sammie met his eyes and said, “Oops.”
 

“You looking for trouble, Sammie?” he asked before closing her door with a thud.
 

Was she? She leaned back into the seat, not really knowing
what
she was looking for, but enjoying her low-angle view as he strode around the front of the car. His chest and shoulders caught the sun, beautifully defined. The muscle cut under his stretchy white T-shirt looked magnificent, and she gave a small sigh of appreciation before he opened his door.

Trouble? Yes, he’d be trouble. No doubt about it. Hot dangerous trouble that might singe her very soul.

He sat, and looked across at her—face serious, eyes full of chocolate shadows. Suddenly he looked a lot more like the Nicky of old. The boy with the smoldering ‘I want’ expression who had so thrilled and discomforted her when she’d been younger.

She shrugged. “I won’t be here long enough for much trouble.” She bit her lip and cursed her runaway tongue.

He sent her an unreadable grunt and a slight lift of one dark eyebrow.

“We’ll see.” Which left her on edge and wondering. “Ready to rock’n’roll?” He revved the engine and the car howled with glee and vibrated with barely leashed energy.
 

To her surprise, he drove circumspectly, pulling into the late afternoon traffic with ease and navigating Wellington’s sometimes narrow streets like a model citizen. So much for expecting a macho demonstration of power and aggression.

But the moment he hit the expressway he floored the accelerator and the Ferrari snarled and sprang away from the surrounding vehicles, arrowing ahead like a bullet. The throaty roar of the engine and the huge surge of speed drew an unwitting gasp from her, and Nick laughed with all-too-evident enjoyment.

“Thought you might like to see what she can do. I bet you didn’t get a chance when you took Tyler home?”

“As if!” Her heart thudded double-time as the rush of adrenaline hit.

He eased off the accelerator and the car drifted back to something approaching the speed limit. “So this trouble you’re not staying around for?”

Uh-oh. He’s not going to let that slide?

“Sorry. Silly comment.”

“Out of your deep dark subconscious, Sammie. Where the things you really want lurk, just waiting to surface.”

She glanced across at him, disconcerted, and saw one corner of his mouth kick up into that wicked grin again. His gaze held hers briefly before he turned his attention back to the road.

“You want me Sammie, you can have me. I’d have broken the law to have you at the orchard. In fact maybe I did break the law. Skated close anyway. Would that have been classed as ‘unlawful carnal knowledge’ if we’d been found out?”

“No!” she choked. “No way, Nick. No-one could have accused us of that.”

“Accused
me
.” He shook his head slowly, gazing far ahead at the traffic. “You had me under some kind of spell.”