The Right Mr. Wrong (6 page)

‘You haven’t given them a chance?’ he pushed.

‘What was the point? I know exactly what would happen. Look at Stella.’ She was too scared. If they didn’t have her address, she wouldn’t hope for contact. She couldn’t be disappointed.

‘Right.’ He nodded. ‘Well, what about her? Have you tried to get in touch with her?’ His voice raised enough for Nico to turn and frown at them.

Vivi took a step back from the others and sent Liam a frown of her own.

‘I thought about it.’ But she hadn’t wanted to come begging. She’d wanted to succeed on her own first. And she had. Then she’d made some friends at work. They’d become her family. And why would Stella want to get in touch with her? She’d walked away and never looked back. Never once thought to call her little sister.

‘But you never did?’ Liam had an intent, almost disapproving, solemn look on his face. ‘You’re so unforgiving.’

Vivi folded her arms across her chest. ‘No, I’m not.’

‘You are.’

‘Stella never once tried to get in touch with me. My parents told me that if I left, not to bother coming back.’ Hell, hadn’t Liam heard that? Her mother had shouted it so loud half the world must have.

‘You’ve never said anything awful in the heat of the moment?’ Liam asked quietly.

There was a silence and she sent him a look. Then sighed. ‘Trust me. I know they’re not interested. They’re the ones who are unforgiving. When Stella left, I saw what they did to her stuff. Why would I do that to myself? Why would I knock on the door only to have it slammed in my face?’

‘So you’re afraid,’ he said softly.

‘No. I’m just not stupid. Besides, I don’t have the time. I’m too busy—’

‘Doing everything for Gia.’

That again? ‘Gianetta’s been more of a friend to me than anyone in my family ever has,’ Vivi pointed out. ‘And believe me, I understand that the relationship I have with Gia is a business one. If I annoy her, I’m out the door.’ She knew what she had to do to survive. And survive she would.

‘Okay.’ He blew out a big breath and then cleared his throat. ‘So what do you do for Christmas?’

Oh. She couldn’t help the guilty grin. ‘I work. What about you?’

‘I work.’

She laughed. So not surprised. That Christmas they’d had together had kind of killed the spirit. When you had people screaming at you, it didn’t make things festive.

‘Can you two be quiet, please?’ Nico glowered at them.

Vivi bit back her smile and went to ensure the lunch caterers were going to make it past security. It seemed the monsters needed feeding.

An hour later she was exhausted—having checked and double-checked that all the special orders were fulfilled. She’d lost sight of Liam for a while, presumed he’d gone to do some work somewhere. She wished she could escape for a bit too. The constant demands from the ‘talent’ were wearing.

‘Hey, have this.’ Liam appeared at her side and offered her a steaming cup.

‘Oh, thanks.’ She took a careful sip and smiled as the flavour hit her taste buds—peppermint tea? She couldn’t believe he’d found some. What surprised her even more was that he remembered it was the only tea she drank—that he’d noticed she’d not had any of the coffee. He’d sat up with her that night she’d been making Christmas decorations for Oliver’s mother. He’d kept her laughing. He’d teased her about the tea. He’d offered...more than he should have.

‘Not everything changes, right?’ He stood beside her, dangerously intimate.

‘No,’ she said ruefully. ‘I guess not.’

Another hour went by. Another change of bikini for Alannah, new trunks for the men, more adjustments with the lighting and the spray-on mist-to-look-like-sweat. Vivi fetched, carried, stood—all with Liam at her side making amusing comments and general chat. Until Nico was fully engaged with another set-up.

‘I thought you’d gone back to Oliver,’ Liam said quietly.

She went completely cold. ‘Oh, no.’ She shook her head. ‘No.’

Liam turned away from the models, angling so he could see her face. ‘Do you wish you’d said yes to him that day?’

‘No.’ She didn’t hesitate. ‘He wasn’t right for me either.’ She braved looking at his face as she said that last.

He looked thoughtful. ‘I saw him recently.’

‘
Oliver
?’

‘Yeah.’ Liam grinned at her squawk. ‘He bought one of my boats.’

‘Oh. Great.’ Vivi swallowed back her shock. ‘He’s well? And happy?’

Liam nodded. ‘Married and climbing his way to the top of an investment bank. Exactly on the track he’d always wanted to be on.’

Yeah, it was that same life plan. Just with a different woman.

‘So he’s done okay through the recession?’ Vivi shook her head at her own stupidity. ‘Of course he has—he’s bought one of your boats.’

And he was happy. That was good. She wouldn’t have been happy with him and she knew she’d have made him unhappy too. ‘I’m glad he’s doing well,’ she said, meaning it. But she was thrown that Oliver and Liam were still...
friends
? Well, she supposed it figured. Mates before dates, right? Then she remembered. ‘I’d forgotten you’d gone to work for his family friend...’ She frowned, confused. ‘But when did you move to Italy?’

Liam had straightened up and faced back towards the models. ‘I never worked for the friend.’

‘Yes, you did.’ She turned towards him to read his face. ‘That’s why you were there that Christmas. How you got the visa to come to England. Oliver got you that job. You were starting in the new year—you were going to Cowes.’ Oliver’s family had pulled strings to get Liam a job with a close contact in the yachting industry there. She’d thought it would be okay—truth be told she hadn’t thought about it at all.

‘They rescinded the job offer. I found other work.’

Her blood ran cold. ‘When?’ She fought the churning sensation in her gut. ‘When did they rescind the offer?’

‘A couple of days after we left.’

‘But—’ She broke off, oddly breathless. ‘You’d signed a contract.’

‘They found some loophole. What was I going to do—fight it?’ He laughed.

But it wasn’t funny. She stared at him, a horrible hurt feeling inside. ‘You never told me.’

Liam kept looking beyond her, at the scene Nico and Gia had staged. ‘I hadn’t seen him for years until he came to buy the boat. He asked after you.’ Liam sighed. ‘He wondered how you were getting on.’

Had Oliver thought she and Liam were still together? ‘What did you say?’

‘I didn’t. I thought you’d gone back to him, remember? I was totally thrown when I found out the wife he’d been going on about wasn’t you. Turned out neither of us knew a thing about you. Then I did a couple of searches, but it seemed you’d vanished.’

So Liam had then searched for her? Why?

‘How did you hide?’ he asked.

She grasped onto that—trying to keep the conversation light, trying not to dig deeper into something that seemed a lot like a giant can of worms. ‘With all this social media it’s supposedly easy to track anyone down. From the fifteen kids in your first ever class at school to the three hundred in your uni lecture hall. You can find anyone and everyone with a quick Facebook look, right? Unless you consciously change. I shortened my name. Shut down all my accounts. Cut my hair. Became someone new.’

‘Vivi.’

She nodded. ‘It took a while, but I became the person I wanted to be.’ She’d worked in a stationery store to start with but wanted to get into design. She’d loved drawing and doing graphic design on the computer. But it wasn’t for her to do fashion at university. That was a hobby, not a career, her father had lectured. Doing French hadn’t exactly been much of a career option either. But she could type and organise and she’d picked up computer systems quickly. She learned to get what she needed from other people simply because she had to. ‘I got an admin job in Gia’s office.’

‘And then you showed them what you could really do.’

‘I worked so hard,’ she said.
How
she’d worked. ‘And it’s been worth it.’

‘So you’ve proved yourself?’ He gazed at her.

‘For
myself
. Not anyone else.’ She frowned. ‘When was it you saw Oliver?’

‘A couple of months ago.’

Her heart thudded. ‘So, is that why...?’

‘I never liked how it ended between us. I thought it’d be interesting to see what had become of you since then.’

Interesting
. ‘So you’re combining business with something personal. Looking up an old flame? This is merely curiosity?’ It was silly but somehow it hurt. What was he going to do now—report back to Oliver and the others?

He stepped closer, turning to face her again. ‘I don’t think this is
merely
anything.’

‘Vivi, where the hell is the bag with the power strips?’ Nico’s shout echoed around them.

Vivi tore her attention from Liam, turned away. And tried to stay away while she processed what she now knew of the past. Liam losing the job offer and never telling her. He must have been so worried—she’d known he didn’t have money, didn’t have a family... He didn’t have much of anything.

And she’d shouted at him. She’d left him.

Eight hours later she was so, so tired. The shoot was taking for ever. She walked off the boat, walked down the back of the boatshed where it was dark. She could hear Nico ordering Alannah about, Gia adding her views. The stylists flitted around like moths. A cast of thousands—and Vivi was supposed to be the one at the back ensuring every single one of them was happy and had all they needed.

Too bad. Right now she needed a break. From Gia’s demands. From Alannah’s. From Liam.

From the way he watched her. From the way he made her feel—so hungry, so yearning, so turned on all the time. It was insane. She sank into a pile of sail bags in the furthest corner she could find. Her body ached from tension and sleeplessness. She’d steal a few minutes. Five. Then she’d be ready to handle them all again. Handle him.

* * *

Liam grimly stopped himself hunting round for Victoria. He didn’t need to stalk her. But fifteen minutes later she hadn’t come back to the spot where she’d been watching the shoot. He wanted it to be over. He wanted to be alone with her. Truth? That was all he’d wanted. He didn’t give a toss about publicity photos and magazine spreads.

He’d been a fool to think it was a stint of celibacy that had made him so hot the first night he’d seen her again. No woman had ever had the effect she had on him. The minute he’d found out Oliver had no clue where she was, that no one knew anything about her... He’d needed to find her.

Ten minutes later he couldn’t cope with her absence any more. He went searching. He found her right at the far corner of the boatshed, curled up in a pile of gear, sound asleep but looking horribly uncomfortable with her head at that angle.

Very carefully, quietly, he bent down. Holding his breath, he gently lifted her and slid in beside her, pulling her back to rest against him. He gazed down at her pretty but pale face. She hadn’t stirred. Which meant she had to be exhausted.

She worked too hard.

That was something he understood. He’d been working too hard for too long as well. He’d been obsessed with building a company, a basis for a future. Security. She had too. They’d viciously fought that last day—her wants versus his. But it turned out they were incredibly similar.

He’d not realised how much she’d sacrificed and risked to go with him. She’d not understood how desperate he was for money. He’d not told her about the email rescinding the job offer—it had landed in his email account two days after they’d left Oliver’s family home. It had meant he had nothing to offer her. He’d felt utterly useless and absolutely determined all at the same time. He’d been so desperate to secure something for his future. For theirs.

But he’d been too proud to admit it all to her. And she’d got angry with him—that he was expecting her to just ‘fall in’. He’d thought she was full of bravado that last day when she’d yelled that she didn’t need him or anyone and she’d prove it. He hadn’t believed her. He’d thought she’d gone back home. Back to her stifling parents. Back to Oliver.

But he’d been wrong. And she had proved it. Changed her name, her look. Built a career. Worked incredibly hard. Turned her back on everything.

He frowned. You couldn’t turn your back on everything for ever.

And at heart Vivi Grace was still Victoria Rutherford—generous, caring torment who spent her life pleasing others. He’d tried to tell himself it was just sex that drew him to her. But it wasn’t lust filling him now. There were so many more, conflicting, emotions. Amusement, annoyance,
concern
. He’d thought he had this figured out. Now he didn’t know what he was going to do with her.

Well, he did. Kissing her the other morning had brought it home. He wanted her. But what he wanted, even more than that, was for her to want it. For her to ask.

Just once. To complete their history.

* * *

Vivi wasn’t just warm and comfortable, she was lax and hot. She breathed in deep, the scent filling her lungs. Salt air, strong man. She opened her eyes and gasped. He wasn’t just with her, he was beneath her—encircling her. His arms were around her, his chest below her cheek.

She looked up at him, trying to read his beautiful eyes. They were dark, but lit by that fire. The sharp planes of his jaw roughened by short stubble. She wanted to stroke it with her fingertips to feel it; she wanted to touch her lips to his.

There was nothing she wanted more than his kiss.

‘Something you want?’ His voice was so low, she felt it more than heard it.

She said nothing. He knew already.

‘Victoria?’

She lived in London. He lived in Italy. She didn’t want a relationship. Nor did he. This time she was certain of where this would go, when it would end. With such firm parameters, she’d be okay, right? This would bring closure. She’d expunge the remnants of that lust, reveal it really wasn’t that good, and she could prove she had control of her emotions. Able to enjoy a moment.

It could only be a moment.

‘Something you want?’ he repeated.

‘Kiss me,’ she breathed.

‘Nico?’ Alannah’s piercing voice shattered the moment just as she lifted her chin to press her lips to his.