Читать книгу The Love List - Eve Devon - Страница 7

‘So in between rescuing damsels, what is it you actually do?’

Ethan heard Nora ask the question from where she’d nervously set up camp outside her executive bathroom door. Whatever she’d taken from his reference to family loyalty had had her relenting and agreeing to show him the presentation after he got changed into a suit.

Ethan braced his hands on the marble vanity and stared hard into the bronze-toned mirror in front of him.

What was it he actually did?

Allegedly he was in the business of helping people. Whether he continued to get to do that was another matter altogether after the risk-assessment report was filed.

Turning away from the mirror, he searched his bag for his wash kit. He didn’t know what all the fuss was about. He’d got the kid out, hadn’t he? Like any other member of the team would have left him there if there’d been even the remotest chance of getting him out. He hadn’t placed anyone else in danger. Surely the important thing was that Pietro was alive and hopefully back with his family by now—not whether going into that building had been reckless and against protocol.

Ethan turned back to the mirror and ran a hand over his day-old stubble, realising he didn’t have time for a shave anyway.

God, he was tired. The insomnia was getting really bad. But he’d deal with it. No need to make it complicated. No need to dwell.

Angling his head toward the door he went with the job he hoped he would still have after the report was submitted, rather than the job title stamped on his passport. ‘I work for a charity that organises disaster relief. I go to whichever disaster zone I’m deployed to and help provide shelter, water, food, etc.’

Silence.

He wished he could see her reaction. He was willing to bet she was standing on the other side of the door with a sexy little ‘v’ etched into her un-Botoxed forehead, her tempting mouth dropping open slightly in shock.

‘And you’ve come back recently?’ she asked.

‘Via a quick stopover to see my brother, yes.’

‘Where is it you’ve been?

Ethan blew out a breath. ‘Northern Italy.’

‘Where the earthquake was?’

‘Yeah.’ Ethan deliberately kept his eyes open to stop the memories flashing before his eyes.

‘So…you have a really important job, then?’

‘If you want to think so,’ he said lightly. He smiled, imagining it might be a little hard to reconcile what she’d just heard alongside her previous judgement of him.

‘So…the Love Rat must have done something really bad to necessitate you coming home and then here.’

Huh. Clever.

His smile turned wry. He supposed he couldn’t really complain about the Love Rat tag she’d used for Ryan. It was quite the accurate description of the brother he had known before Ethan had deliberately started working so hard; he hadn’t had time to keep up regular contact.

He wasn’t going to hide from telling Nora where Ryan was. It was why he was here. But right now he had an opportunity placed before him that meant he didn’t have to think about the situation he’d left behind in northern Italy or about how seeing his brother really made him feel. Right now he wanted to do something he knew he could do, and do well. And if it helped burn off the latent energy so that maybe at some point later today he’d be able to sleep, even better.

Probably after he got some sleep things would go back to feeling simple and he’d stop worrying that his boss was going to judge him negatively for something any decent person would have done.

Realising he’d left his other bag behind, he called out, ‘Can you pop through to reception and pick up my garment bag, take out the blue suit and bring it to me?’

‘What did your last slave die of?’

Ethan looked in the mirror, liking how her harrumphed tone put the twinkle back in his eyes. ‘Happiness when I came out of the bathroom naked to fetch my own clothes?’

As he started removing jacket, top and jeans, he tried to make out more dark mutterings from the other side of the door before it was opened a notch and his clothes were pushed through the tiny gap and dumped on the chair inside the door. A few seconds later the door opened a little bit wider and she mumbled, ‘There was no tie in your bag.’

‘Oh, yeah. Don’t use them.’ He had no problem meeting her curious gaze and as her eyes dropped lower to take in his chest and the ink that wrapped around his right pectoral and shoulder, his grin grew impossibly wider. ‘Too restrictive.’

She shut the door firmly between them.

He chuckled. He might be suffering from insomnia, but even the fug of running on empty hadn’t diminished the spark of attraction between them.

Unbuttoning the white shirt, he shucked into it.

Settling back into life after a deployment was always hard. Granted, he usually had the satisfaction of knowing he’d done a good job and all he could to help.

This time everything was different.

This time…well he wasn’t willing to take that one out of the box for analysis quite yet. All he knew for certain was that for the first time in a long while he’d questioned his ability to make a situation better and he’d questioned his ability to keep doing a job he loved so much. Especially during the hours when he’d been talking to Pietro, trying to figure out how to get them both out. Shaking his head, he put the suit on and determined to think about something else.

For his brother to track him down and make contact was unusual, but when the first phone call from Ryan had come, Ethan had remained calm.

Relaxed.

Calm always got him through deployment. And relaxed had always got him through dealing with his family, and in particular, his kid brother.

He’d accepted that phone call with the deliberate laissez-faire attitude his brother was so expert at, and when Ryan had told him he was in trouble, he hadn’t asked near enough questions.

Ethan was going to carry the guilt of that for a while, no matter that in his opinion his brother hadn’t ever known what real trouble was. Never saw what Ethan saw every day in his work. Ryan’s version of trouble could be alleviated by him simply growing up and changing his attitude.

His brother had had to call a second time before Ethan properly computed what was going on. By then, coinciding with being called into his superior’s tent and told to take some leave while they filled out their report, the last thing he had been feeling as he packed his bag to take the plane home to the UK, was calm and relaxed.

Ryan needed his help. Of course Ethan would help.

Any concern over the fact that his own future hung on the outcome of a report could be relegated to second place.

He only hoped getting Sephy King on board with his idea to help his brother wasn’t made more difficult by her older sister, Nora.

Nora King.

He wasn’t sure what he’d expected. Not a princess in skyscraper heels with defiant fiery button-brown eyes and the dreamiest, creamiest, palest of complexions, though.

She was the living embodiment of the corporate females he deliberately avoided these days, but there was something about her that slammed right into him, leaving him a little breathless. Even with the business-as-usual façade she wore, he could see the struggle she was trying to survive underneath. How she couldn’t quite hide the fact that grief had stripped her bare and she didn’t know what to do about it.

He’d seen that same hollowed-out shocked look on people’s faces when their worlds had exploded and they’d been left to try and rebuild what they could.

Combing his hair back from his face, he thought about the woman on the other side of the door. He really shouldn’t, but damsels in distress being something of a rarity these days, he felt like indulging himself.

Probably not the wisest move; especially as the plan had been to sort things for his brother, so he was ready to go and finish the job he’d started if he got the call from the charity. When, he got the call from the charity. He wasn’t going to waste energy thinking negatively.

Nora was standing by her uncluttered glass desk when he entered the office, her head angled towards his luggage as if trying to absorb all the information about him she could by osmosis. It occurred to him that no woman should be able to look that regal while having a shoe stuck to her hand, but Nora made it look easy. And sexy. Or maybe the insomnia was finally tipping him over the edge.

Buckling his belt he walked over to the garment bag and took out a pair of formal shoes to put on. He supposed if he was going to be back for a while he’d have to get used to being suited and booted again.

Doing this presentation for her and taking her to hospital to get her parted from her shoe would definitely help take the edge off the restlessness that came with being back.

Maybe taking her out afterwards would help keep that restlessness at bay. Especially if he took her somewhere colourful, lively, relaxed and about as far removed from the crumbling half-finished job he’d left behind him.

His gaze swept over the rigid set to her shoulders and the way she sucked on her bottom lip. On second thoughts, perhaps he’d take her somewhere quiet. Intimate. No distractions.

‘I can’t believe you don’t have a tie with you,’ she said.

‘You’re lucky I have the suit with me.’ He usually travelled lighter, but he’d had the King’s world in mind when he’d packed. If he wanted their help, he’d figured a bit of conformity would ease the way.

‘I don’t know why you would bring a suit but not a tie,’ she continued.

Ethan smiled inwardly at the genuine suspicion in her voice. He bet Nora liked her guys bound by the formality. Traditional. Safe. Boring. He caught her watching him out of the corner of his eye. ‘So what do you think?’ he asked. ‘Brush up as well as the next guy?’

Nora seemed to consider his question seriously. What? Was she actually weighing him up against every other guy? The notion had him wanting to puff out his chest and give her something a little more concrete for her to use in comparison.

Slowly she walked over to him, her fingertip tapping against her lip and everything within him stilled. He felt the air displace softly as she lifted her arm to brush a piece of lint off his shoulder.

‘You’ll do.’

He breathed out. ‘So glad you approve,’ he said, his voice deeper with her so close. ‘I guarantee you Eleanor Moorfield will.’ He liked that that brought her head up. Liked the spark that flared briefly in her eyes before she got herself under control. ‘You want to show me this presentation, Princess?’

She really looked as if she didn’t. Great, in the short space of time that he’d been changing had she lost confidence in him? He should have told her about his other job. ‘I guess now is a good time to tell you that when I’m not volunteering for the charity I run a chain of deluxe leisure facilities.’ He shoved his hands into his trouser pockets, unused to having to sell himself quite so much. ‘I’m not a virgin at talking to potential clients.’

Nora regarded him silently for a few moments and mumbled an, ‘Okay,’ as she rounded her desk to switch on her laptop and bring up her presentation, then gestured for him to sit down and read through it.

A whole sixty seconds passed before she suddenly said, ‘Wait. You’re part of Love Leisure?’

‘I guess you could say that I am Love Leisure. Problem?’

‘No. No, of course not.’

Despite not liking that she looked more impressed by what he’d just revealed than she had sounded when he’d told her about being a disaster-response team member, he still found himself wanting to alleviate any doubt. Love Leisure’s success was paramount in providing enough income so that he could volunteer as a rapid-response team member on pretty much a full-time basis and as it was his name above each of the branch doors, he intended to keep it successful. ‘I have good people in place so that the business runs like clockwork while I’m away, but I do keep my hand in when I’m back. You don’t need to worry. I can do this.’ He returned his attention to reading through the entire pitch, nearly getting to the end before the nervous foot-tapping beside him became too pronounced.

‘This is fine. I can work with this.’

‘Hang on. If it’s only fine—’

‘Relax,’ he reassured when the foot-tapping started going into triple-time. ‘You give good presentation.’ He loved the way she blushed. He exited the PowerPoint presentation and logged into a business-networking site so that he could search the designer’s profile. ‘So where are you meeting this Eleanor Moorfield?’ he asked.

‘The Savoy. She has a suite.’ Nora glanced at her watch. ‘We can talk some more about KPC on the way.’

‘You’re not walking in those?’ Ethan said, pointing incredulously to her feet.

Nora glanced down at her shoes. ‘What’s wrong with these?’

‘They’re not a little difficult to walk in?’

‘I am a woman, Ethan. I can walk in any shoe you put in front of me.’

‘Okay, let me put it another way: have you actually seen what the weather is like outside? You’ll ruin them before you get halfway there. We’ll take my rental. What are you doing?’ he asked as Nora reached across the desk for her phone.

‘Calling Eleanor’s assistant to tell her it won’t be me doing the presentation.’

‘Don’t do that. Don’t give her any opportunity to cancel. She won’t mind if I show up in your place. Trust me.’

Nora looked at him as if he’d used the dirtiest two words in the English language. He caught the glimmer of something at the back of her eyes and wondered whether she was actually going to let him do this for her. ‘Come on,’ he said picking up the laptop before she had time to think. ‘We can go over everything in the car.’ As she followed mutely alongside him, he wondered if it was him she didn’t trust, or herself. Except, she was CEO of a company that had been going for decades. You didn’t rise to that position without being good at what you did. Well, you could rise to that position, he thought, glancing once again at the portrait of her father as they headed out, but you couldn’t keep that position. Not if you weren’t good.

By the time they pulled up outside the Savoy, Nora was looking pale and pensive. Ethan went through the presentation highlights again. It didn’t seem to help. If anything, she looked as if she was about to pass out.

‘You don’t look nervous,’ she accused. ‘Why don’t you look nervous?’

‘What is there to be nervous about? This will be a cinch.’ He shot her his most disarming smile.

‘And there was me thinking that nerves helped a person perform better.’

‘Interesting, but I’ve never had any complaints about my performance.’ He tried not to laugh as her eyes transformed into huge saucers. ‘Look, I’m good at thinking on my feet. I promise not to give the company secrets away and I won’t sign anything put before me. I’m going to go in now.’

Nora glanced at the valet patiently waiting to take the car. ‘Where shall I wait for you?’

‘How about the Starbucks across the street? When you see the car being brought around, you’ll know I’ve finished.’

‘Okay. Good. That’s good.’

Ethan released his seatbelt and was about to open the car door when he felt Nora’s hand, or rather, her shoe, on his forearm. ‘Ethan, thanks. I realise it may not look like it, but I really do take KPC incredibly seriously.’

‘No problem.’ He opened the car door and scooped up the laptop. He nodded towards a hotel doorman to open the passenger door for Nora and walked confidently towards the hotel’s entrance.

Forty minutes later he was getting into the car, impressed with the speed with which Nora had managed to sprint across the road in the shoes she was wearing, to be at his side.

‘Well?’ she queried.

‘How about we get in first,’ he said.

‘So get in already,’ Nora answered, jogging around to her side of the car to pull open the car door and slide in gracefully, which amazed him all over again, considering she still had a large bag covering her arm.

She waited a nanosecond for him to pull out into the traffic. ‘Well?’

‘It was interesting. I think it went well.’

‘You only think? Damn it. I knew it. Cancelling would have been better. What was I thinking, letting some complete stranger take over? I mean just because I’ve heard of Love Leisure, it’s not remotely the same industry as property services.’

‘Little joke.’ He smiled as he heard her inhale. Turning his head to briefly look at her, he said, ‘Relax, it went well.’

‘Oh.’ The confidence in his voice seemed to appease her a little. ‘What’s in the goodie-bag?’ she asked, craning her head to the back seat, where he had placed the large glossy, burgundy, signature Moorfield bag.

‘Something that tells me I know the meeting went well.’

She remained silent, but against the hum of the car’s motor he could practically hear her brain chugging away, trying to decide between staying polite and demanding to know what went on with Eleanor Moorfield.

‘So what happens now?’ she finally asked.

‘Now we wait.’

‘Oh.’ There was a lengthy pause and then he felt her turn her head towards him. ‘In case you haven’t worked it out already, I’m not that good at the whole waiting thing.’

Ethan stopped at the traffic lights and turned his head, grinning from ear to ear and feeling invigorated. ‘I’m sure I can come up with a way to pass the time.’

‘I have to tell you,’ Ethan told Nora as he eased the car out of the hospital grounds an hour later and headed back into traffic to drop Nora off at her office. ‘Your definition of a debriefing and my definition of a debriefing differ considerably,’

Bad jokes and double entendres aside, Nora was still having trouble believing how deftly he’d organised someone to see her in the casualty department after insisting on waiting for her. He’d taken one look at how quiet and uncomfortable she’d become the closer they got to the hospital and, once more, assumed the knight-in-shining-armour title. A couple of those artfully aimed sexy smiles of his and she’d bypassed triage and was being ushered into a cubicle for treatment.

‘Maybe I’ll have to check out your version, one day.’ Oh, she did not just say that! If the chemicals they’d put on her hand to melt the glue had tongue-loosening properties, oughtn’t they to warn a patient about that?

Ethan flashed her a hot, private smile and Nora tried to concentrate on breathing evenly. She really had to stop this now. This flirting thing she had going with him. Now would be a good time to remember that flirting, and everything that usually came after, was off her To Do list for the foreseeable. She didn’t have the time. Couldn’t afford the distraction. Look what happened to her when she tried to multi-task.

Admittedly it had been a while since she’d indulged in more than flirting. Her eyes squeezed shut as she remembered Sephy’s comment from last night—that if she wasn’t careful, outside of a work context, she’d forget how to talk to men altogether. Coming on top of the rest of the lecture she’d received from her younger sister, the comment had stung. Nora sighed. As if Sephy hadn’t known that accusing her of being a workaholic, who’d put her grief on hold, wasn’t going to put her in the best of listening moods. She knew Sephy’s little digs were designed to sneak under her shield and penetrate, but after the disaster of her last relationship Nora knew that relationships weren’t for her. She had much clearer goals. Until she was back on an even keel at KPC, work came first, second and third for her.

‘How’s the hand?’ Ethan asked.

His question had her turning her attention to his own hands as they rested competently on the steering wheel. Any idea of work flew straight out the window as she wondered idly how those hands might feel against her skin, smoothing their way up and over her naked flesh, from hipbone to breast.

Nora blinked, squirmed against her seat and looked down at the bag, now containing the remnants of her shoe.

‘Okay,’ she said, determined to shake off the attraction she felt for him. Peering closely at the hand in question, she cleared her throat and forced some more words out. ‘No lasting damage. It was a close-run thing, but thanks to the wonders of modern medicine, well, chemicals, actually… Turns out I probably could have done it DIY with the nail varnish remover.’ She sighed dramatically as she opened the bag carrying the rest of the shoe she had embarrassingly asked to keep because it was vintage Moorfield. ‘To be honest, I think I’m experiencing a little separation anxiety.’

Ethan’s deep laugh trickled over already hyper-sensitised nerve endings and left her feeling as though someone had left a window ajar in her heart. She had a desperate need to keep busy. To be doing many things at once. Anything to stop her nerves jangling at the idea of what a kick it was to make this man laugh. Honestly, the sooner she was out of his car and breathing in some normal, heavily polluted, air, the better it would be for her sanity.

Now that she didn’t have to worry about missing out on pitching to Eleanor, Ethan’s scent was staging a staggering assault on her senses, causing her to behave completely out of character. It was time to rein herself back in, she thought, as she suddenly realised whereabouts they were. ‘Oh, this leads straight to the back entrance of KPC’s offices. It’s about a hundred yards up on the right.’

Ethan stopped the car as the lights changed and Nora’s mind raced to try and come up with something to break the crazy sense of anticipation creeping in.

‘Eleanor really said she’d be in touch within the next couple of days?’ she asked, her voice higher in pitch than she would have liked. She had a feeling her babble-rate was about to grow exponentially, and she hated the fact that a simple attraction was the explanation.

‘She really did.’

‘As soon as I get back to the office I’m going to call a couple of contacts. I have a few buildings in mind for headquarters and then I need to look through the information she gave you about where she wants to base her manufacturing. There are a couple of options that become available mid-March. And there’s something special I want to try and get for her, right in the middle of London’s fashion district. Sort of baroque-meets-boutique, but with plenty of ground-floor space. All polished floorboards, wrought-iron work everywhere and bevelled windowpanes. High-end but perfect romantic style for a flagship store. Modern office complex and concrete and glass shopping mall is not the way to go. I’m fairly sure I’m right about this.’ Finally running out of steam she glanced across at him but he was concentrating on the signals ahead. The lights changed and as Ethan drove forward, Nora’s hands moved against the bag sitting on her lap. ‘So we’re coming up to the office. There’ll never be any parking around at this time of day. You can drop me off in the middle of the—hey.’

Ethan calmly drove until he reached the next junction, turned the car around and drove back so that he could ease the car to a halt right outside the back entrance to her offices. Where, for the first time in recorded history, there was an empty parking space, complete with meter. He switched off the engine and calmly turned to look at her.

‘Do you know, I have a feeling you were about to nip out into the middle of the traffic and run off, and all without setting up a meeting to discuss Ryan.’

‘Oh. Well.’ She couldn’t quite meet his eyes. How could she have forgotten who it was that had brought him to her office this morning? Was she so obsessed with KPC at the moment that nothing else could intrude? Or was it that in the space of a hundred yards, it had become awkwardly apparent to her that breathing in his scent and getting herself all stirred up was making it impossible to concentrate on anything but him. She needed to get out of this car. She needed space to be able to clear her head. Sephy was right. She really was out of practice at talking to men. ‘So. Thank you for this morning. If I could grab my laptop and the information Eleanor left you with..?’

‘What’s the hurry?’

‘No hurry. Well, I do have a lot of work to do. Why don’t you phone me with a time for us to discuss Ryan. You must be really exhausted by now—’

‘I’m really “something” right now. Not sure “exhausted” is the word, though.’

‘Sorry. I didn’t mean to come across as rude. I—’ she tailed off when she saw smouldering blue eyes track their way to her lips. I have to get out of this car before I do something properly stupid, like climb over onto your lap, grab you by the lapels of that sinfully sexy blue suit you fill out so well and give in to this insane need to touch my lips to yours.

She was being utterly ridiculous, of course. She was supposed to be offering up a business-like thank you. Not wanting to devour a man she’d just met. Maybe if she hadn’t caught sight of his chest packed with all that tight, hard muscle in her bathroom. Yes, Nora. Absolutely blame the pecs. But honest to God, he’d looked so good standing there, was it any wonder she’d lost her professional A game?

Biting down on her bottom lip again she tried to ignore his scent. The smile. The body. When he wasn’t using all that muscle helping people he was probably working out in his own gym. Yes, that body…she mentally swooned, picked herself up and gave herself a little slap.

Never mind the package, get with the programme. None of this should be on her radar right now. Her sole focus should be on KPC. ‘I don’t know how to thank you for all your help.’

‘You don’t?’

At his quiet, teasing question, Nora dragged her gaze to his. Oh, not fair. It turned out that when Ethan Love actually wanted a person to know what he was thinking, he had no problem letting his eyes do the talking.

She simply didn’t understand why he was able to affect her so, but his charm offensive was leaving her with no other option than to hastily erect her official Deflector Shield.

‘Ethan, I—’

‘Have to go?’ he asked with an indulgent smile on his face.

‘Uh-huh.’ Like soonest. A few minutes more and she’d be simpering, whimpering and quite possibly whispering heated instructions as to where he could put those beautiful hands of his.

What on earth was wrong with her? She closed her eyes and pictured herself surrounded by her Deflector Shield. The one she employed when she panicked that she was getting side-tracked from her goals in life.

‘Okay. You’re excused,’ Ethan said grinning. ‘It was nice meeting you, Princess. I’ll be in touch.’

Nora looked at him suspiciously. Perhaps he was bored bouncing off her official Deflector Shield because he seemed to be letting her off the hook. Which was a good thing, she reminded herself. He was Love-Rat’s brother.

Way, way too complicated.

Tearing her gaze away, she refused to acknowledge the slice of bitter disappointment that she felt. She glanced up at the impressive steel and glass construction that housed KPC. That was where she belonged. Not down here in this intimate space with a man who slipped past her Deflector Shields and was connected to her family.

She let the seatbelt drag through her fingers as she released the buckle, and, muttering a heartfelt ‘thank you’, exited the car.

She was halfway up the shallow steps at the rear of the building when she heard his amused and oh-so-casual, ‘Oh, Nora?’

She couldn’t help herself. Her head whipped around at the sound of her name, which sounded like a warm invitation on his lips.