IN BED WITH THE BOSS

What he could not see was who had been standing close enough to her to propel her into the damn pool because his full attention had been fixed exclusively on her.

“So the cuckoo almost drowned and I missed it,” a disappointed voice drawled beside him. “What a shame.”

In no mood for Elizabeth Smith’s twisted kind of humor Scott intoned flatly, “You lead a sad life, Elizabeth,” then walked away, over to the almost deserted pool bar and ordered a drink while he awaited Vivian’s return.

By the time the two women walked out of the house again he was the only person left on the terrace. As a foil for each other Vivian’s darkness next to Michele’s flame was pretty much as good as it could get, Scott observed. Then his full attention had welded on Vivian’s transformation from wet and bedraggled to long and curvaceous, a seriously slinky siren which almost blew his edgy control to bits.

She was wearing a figure-hugging strapless black tube of a dress that was nothing short of mind-stopping. For a few seconds he was thrown back to the moment he’d first seen her at that party.

Heat poured into his body. Desire so fierce he did not know how he kept it from showing on his face. Her wet hair had been slicked back and her makeup barely there except for a fresh touch of gloss to her soft full mouth. Her natural beauty just shone out of her, warm, dark-exotic-exquisite.

But as they came closer he saw she looked deathly pale and he knew somehow-instinct-that she was more shaken up by the incident than she was trying to let on. Then he noticed the way she was holding her right wrist in the palm of her other hand and his raging libido altered to raging anger that stung like a blister trying to burn a hole in his gut.

Vivian was responding with a smile to something Michele was saying when she saw Scott slowly straighten his leaning posture from the bar. Her footsteps faltered and her eyes just clung.

“See, delivered back to you all in one piece,” Michele said teasingly. “All you have to do, Scott, is stop glaring like an angry bear and perhaps we can join the others and get something to eat!” And he was glaring, Vivian noticed-glaring directly at her! If he said one small word, offered up one single criticism about how she looked, she thought fiercely, then he would be the next one to land in the pool!

“Why are you holding your wrist like that-?” he launched at her.

Slancing down, Vivian was surprised to discover that she was indeed cupping her wrist in the palm of her other hand, “I-I think I hurt it as I fell into the water,” she lied.

Michele let out a surprised gasp. “Why didn’t you say something?” she asked.

“Too many other things to think about,” Vivian said ruefully.” And it does not hurt as much as I am obviously making it look!” She dropped the wrist to her side to prove her claim. Michele did not look convinced and neither did Scott. He was still glowering at her, the tension in his jaw enough to crush rocks in his teeth. Vivian frowned at him, transmitting a message that had his lush black eyelashes veiling his anger and his lips pressing together over whatever he had been about to say.

“I’m starving,” Vivian said brightly in an attempt to divert attention. In truth she knew she was going to struggle to eat a single thing, and her wrist was really throbbing where it hung limp fingered at her side.

The three of them walked together down the path and into the marquee.Exclusive content © by Nô(v)el/Dr/ama.Org.

People clapped when they saw them arrive, making Vivian blush as she offered up a shy smile.

A quick murmured thanks to her hostess and Michele was rushing off to join her husband. Scott’s hand arriving against her lower back made her arch it slightly at the electric shock contact. If he noticed her reaction he said nothing, guiding her between a series of large round tables towards their allotted table. And he maintained that disturbing contact with her back right up until he had seen her into her seat.

Tension zipped back and forth between them, though Vivian did not quite follow why it did. Whatever the reason, it made her respond over-brightly to the curiosity and interest which flipped backwards and forwards across the table because people were eager to know what had happened to her. She made light of their questions while Scott lounged in the chair beside her with a polite smile strapped to his lips and his dark eyes hidden beneath his lowered eyelids.

When she could not contain a wince as she picked up her wine glass he did not know how he stopped himself from reaching out and taking the glass from her. A curse rattled around inside him because he recognised that his self-control where she was concerned was on a hair trigger. He wanted to catch hold of her injured wrist so he could inspect the damage. He wanted to brush that stray lock of damp hair from her pale cheek. He remembered what she’d said about him always touching her and the stinging tension of grim acceptance to that charge held him trapped like a prisoner, because he was becoming more and more aware of just how much and how often he wanted to touch her.

Giving his restless fingers something to do he picked up his own glass and gulped down a large slug of the rich ruby wine. She was driving him to drink, he mused bleakly. She was driving him to many places, he extended on that, not even hearing that someone had just spoken to him. It was Vivian who brought his attention back to where it should be by lightly touching his jacket sleeve. A tight sting of awareness shot up his arm and, lifting his eyelids, he looked directly into her eyes. For a second-a finely split millisecond-he visualized leaning forward to lay claim to her mouth with a soft, hot kiss.

Her eyelashes trembled and she looked away from him. She knew what he had been thinking, and the tension inside him mushroomed while he forced himself to take note of the people sharing their table. Forced himself to join in.

She was playing this out a hell of a lot better than he was, he conceded as the infernal meal dragged on and on. She only picked at the dishes set in front of her. So did he. Eventually Augustus stood to give a witty speech of thanks to everyone for attending, but Scott found it difficult to raise a smile. And he watched Vivian dip her head a little, exposing the vulnerable length of her slender nape. Tension gripped him, sexual tension. When she lifted a hand to rub at her brow, he watched her fingers tremble, saw as she lowered the hand again that her pallor seemed ten times more pronounced.

And he’d had enough. The decision came to him that quickly. People were starting to stand and move around the room now, so he used the moment to rise to his feet.

Vivian was startled when he cupped her elbow and drew her to her feet but she did not protest when he just turned with her and headed out of the marquee without saying a word to anyone. There was a charity auction to follow the banquet, then music and dancing and a cabaret show put on by attending celebrities, which was to be transmitted to the Lake party by satellite link.

He did not seem to give a damn. He ignored the clicking rush of camera shutters and the TV cameras recording their departure, his long loose stride tempered to suit her smaller steps in Vivian’s borrowed shoes, and his hand was in possession of the curving indent of her waist.

They walked the path up to the house in taut trammelling silence. As they passed by the pool Vivian could not control a small shiver and he reacted to it by drawing her in closer to his side. He was using his phone to speak to his pilot as they stepped into the house. By the time they stepped out of it again by the front door she could see the helicopter coming in to settle on the same patch of lawn it had dropped them off on when they arrived.

A few minutes later, she subsided gratefully into her seat. Her wrist was aching and a tension headache was tugging at the backs of her eyes.

“OK,” he said the moment they were airborne. “Tell me what happened.”

Casting a glance in his direction, Vivian saw that his mood did not look good at all. He was sitting with his long legs stretched out in front of him and a black-suited elbow rested on the window’s narrow ledge.