Читать книгу Romantic Getaways Collection - Liz Fielding, Christy McKellen - Страница 14

CHAPTER FOUR

CALEB MANAGED FINE by himself in the shower, despite the sharp pain that shot through his chest every time he moved his left arm. Checking over his body now that he was naked, he was shocked to see how much of it was covered in angry-looking bruises. It made him realise just how lightly he’d got off considering he’d been hit by a motorbike.

Or so he’d been told.

He still couldn’t remember a thing about it.

Tamping down on the now familiar swell of unease, he wrapped a towel tightly around his waist and stared at himself in the mirror, tentatively touching the raised bump in his hairline where he’d hit his head. Perhaps all his errant memories were trapped in the bump and when it went down they’d be released back into his brain.

He shook his head at himself, wondering where his normally sane self had disappeared to. He really didn’t feel like himself at the moment. There was a strange sense of having lost something heavy from deep within him, as if a weight he’d been carrying around had lifted from his body and was hovering somewhere over his head.

Or perhaps the accident had just knocked all the sense out of him.

Whatever it was, the best thing he could do right now was carry on as normal. There was no way he was letting a slight blip in memory and a small fracture stop him from functioning properly.

Giving his reflection a firm nod, he turned away from the mirror and left the en suite.

He expected to find Elena waiting there for him and was preparing to bat away any help she tried to offer and prove to her he wasn’t as frail and vulnerable as she clearly suspected he was, so was surprised—and, if he was honest, a little disappointed—to find the room empty.

The sound of voices floated in through the open bedroom door and he heard the swish and click of the front door closing, then the gentle pad of feet on the hallway tiles as someone walked towards the bedroom.

‘Oh, you’re out,’ Elena said as she emerged in the doorway, her cheeks flushing with colour as she eyed him standing there with just a towel slung around his hips.

He suppressed a smile as she averted her gaze and pretended to be studying a picture on the wall next to her, as if making a point of not staring at his half-naked body.

‘Who was at the door?’ he asked.

‘Benita.’

‘What did she want?’

‘She brought your mobile phone over, which you’d left on your desk. She thought you’d want it, but I told her you wouldn’t be dealing with anything work-related today because you need to rest.’ She turned to look at him now, her expression serious. ‘I also said that you wouldn’t be back in the office for a while.’

‘You did, huh? Well, unfortunately, I don’t have time to be off work right now.’ He held out his hand. ‘I’ll take the phone.’

When she flashed him an I-don’t-think-so expression he added a determined, ‘Thank you.’

‘Caleb, I really don’t think you should—’

‘I’m not interested in what you think,’ he said, feeling irritation prick at the back of his neck.

But, instead of handing the phone over like most people would have done when he used that tone of voice, she crossed her arms and fixed him with a hard stare.

‘There is no way I’m giving you this phone tonight. You need to rest and get a good night’s sleep and you’re not going to do that if you’re worrying about what’s going on at work without you. I’m sure you’ve hired an exceptional team of staff and they’re more than capable of handling things there without you for a couple of days.’

He glared at her in disbelief. No one ever talked to him like that and it was rather shocking to have her facing off with him, especially here in his own home. In his own bedroom.

‘How do you intend to stop me from taking it from you?’ he asked, putting on an amused smile to cover his incredulity.

She didn’t even blink. ‘By doing this,’ she said, lifting open the front of her blouse and sliding the phone down inside the neck, so that it nestled in between her breasts.

He swallowed hard. There was no way he could physically try to take it from her now. Even though he ached to. Very much.

‘Cute,’ he growled, his frustration coming over loud and clear.

She smiled serenely. ‘Someone has to save you from yourself.’

‘I don’t need saving,’ he ground out, folding his arms.

‘I beg to differ. I know you, Caleb; you’ll work all night tonight to make up for the time you lost in the hospital.’

He frowned. ‘How would you know that?’

‘Because you regularly worked through the night when we were at university to make up for any time you lost.’

‘That sounds like me,’ he said slowly, as the unsettling feeling of not remembering his university days bit at his nerves again.

‘So I’m staging an intervention. Again.’

‘Again? What else have you kept so close to your chest from me?’ he asked, raising a suggestive eyebrow.

Her jaw appeared to tighten and she frowned. ‘I mean it’s not the only time I’ve had to point out that you work too hard, that’s all,’ she said, looking a little uncomfortable now.

Despite the fact he could probably have held both of her wrists in one hand and easily retrieved his phone, he could tell from the steely look in her eyes that she wouldn’t tolerate such behaviour.

Frustration pinched at him. He was going to have to let her win this one.

‘Right, well, now that’s settled I’ll leave you to get dressed,’ Elena said, her mouth twitching at the corner with what looked like suppressed amusement.

She was enjoying ordering him around. Damn her.

As soon as she’d walked away he strode to the door and swung it shut with a little more force than was entirely necessary.

Okay, so he was grateful to her for helping him get out of the hospital, but he had the unsettling feeling he would have been better off staying there if this was the kind of treatment he was going to have to put up with for the next couple of days.

* * *

Elena walked out of the room with blood rushing loudly in her ears. She couldn’t quite believe she’d just hidden his phone down her top, but it had been obvious he wasn’t going to allow himself to rest if she didn’t force him to. After an accident like this he needed time to recover and heal. Especially as it appeared his memory still hadn’t fully returned—even though he was clearly trying to brush that tiny detail under the carpet.

She was painfully aware that she’d know the moment it all came back to him because she’d probably find herself out on her ear.

Though hopefully that wouldn’t happen any time soon.

The phone pressed uncomfortably against her breastbone as she walked away from him and as soon as she reached one of the spare bedrooms she removed it and stuffed it under the mattress at the side of the bed she always slept on. If he came into the room to look for it while she was asleep—just the thought of that gave her the jitters—he’d have to lift both her and the mattress up in order to get to it.

Not that she believed for a second he’d actually do that. He was too proud. She had wondered for one panicked moment earlier though whether he’d ignore her insistence that he took the evening off work and stuff his hand down her blouse to grab his phone, but luckily decorum had prevailed. She gave a little shiver. That would have been altogether too much to handle. She’d already been struggling to hold it together in his half-dressed, badly bruised presence, and his touching her like that would have tipped her right over the edge. Into what, she wasn’t quite sure. But it was definitely better not to find out.

Flopping back onto the bed, she ran her hand over her eyes, which felt gritty and sore with tiredness. She was exhausted now after all the stress of the day, not to mention the tension she was carrying around with her, worrying about her staff and the fate of her business.

There was a loud rap at the door and she sat up quickly, smoothing her hair away from her face, not wanting Caleb to see any kind of chink in her armour.

He strode into the room, thankfully dressed now in a pair of faded jeans and a casual shirt, which fitted him so well she suspected they must have cost a fortune, despite their lived-in appearance.

‘Will you be okay sleeping in here?’ he asked, his eyes scanning the room as if checking for anything that might be wrong with it.

‘Yes, thanks, I’ll be fine.’

‘Okay, well, if you’re not going to give me my phone back I’m going to watch TV in the living room for a few minutes, then go to bed. You’re welcome to join me—’ he shot her a wicked grin ‘—watching television, I mean.’

‘Er...no, thank you. I have a bit of work to catch up on, so I’ll stay in here so I don’t disturb you,’ she said, giving him a strained smile back and trying to ignore the warmth blooming between her thighs at the mere suggestion of sharing his bed. The most disconcerting thing was that she wasn’t entirely sure whether he was genuinely flirting with her, or just teasing her to get his own back for her phone-hiding stunt.

She guessed the latter, knowing from experience how much he struggled with not being fully in control of every situation.

‘How’s your head now?’ she asked, keeping her hands folded in her lap so he wouldn’t see how nervous she was having him loom over her while she sat on the bed.

‘It’s fine. I have a low-level headache but pieces of my memory seem to be coming back now.’ He looked away from her as a strained expression flitted over his face, proving to her that she’d been right about him trying to hide how unsettled he really felt about it.

She wanted to reach out to him, to somehow soothe away his worry with her touch, but she was acutely aware that it would be entirely inappropriate considering their former relationship.

‘I’m sure it’ll all come back soon, perhaps after a good rest.’

He nodded, his expression now coolly nonchalant. ‘I hope you’ll be comfortable in here,’ he said brusquely. ‘There are some T-shirts in there if you want something to sleep in,’ he added, waving towards a wardrobe on the other side of the room.

‘Thank you,’ she said, touched that he was concerned about her comfort. ‘Is there anything I can do for you?’ she blurted as he began to turn away from her.

His slow, loaded grin made her insides swoop but she ignored the feeling, continuing to look at him steadily until he shook his head.

‘Nothing, Elena. I’m fine. I’ll see you in the morning.’ And, with that, he turned on the spot and exited the room, leaving his tantalising, clean scent hanging in the air behind him.

Flopping back onto the bed again, she took a deep calming breath, willing her heartbeat to slow down. It was so unnerving, being here in Caleb’s house as a guest. She almost didn’t want to go to sleep in case she woke up to find him back to the beast of a man she’d encountered this morning in his meeting room.

She’d enjoyed seeing the small flashes of his personality coming through since they’d left the hospital though and part of her ached to join him in the living room and push him to show her some more of them.

But she knew, deep down, that that could be a dangerous game to play.

No, she’d leave her door open to keep an ear out for him in case he needed her, but it was probably best to give him a bit of space now.

After getting washed in the en suite in her room and changing into one of the large, soft cotton T-shirts Caleb had loaned her she slid beneath the sheets and lay listening to the low murmur of the television in the other room, feeling exhaustion dragging at her eyelids until she could no longer keep them open.

She slept fitfully, her dreams punctuated with disturbing images from the accident.

Waking up in the early hours with her heart racing, she had a sudden panic that Caleb might have had a turn for the worse in his sleep and she slipped out of bed to tiptoe silently to his room to check on him. Pushing the door open quietly, she was confused to find his bed empty and looking as though it hadn’t been slept in all night.

Where was he? Had he left the apartment without her knowing?

Blood pulsed hard in her head as she moved quickly down the corridor, checking the other rooms, which all appeared to be empty, then ran into the living area, her heartbeat erratic now.

Relief rushed through her as she spotted him lying on the sofa nearest the windows with a laptop perched precariously on his lap, breathing gently, his face smoothed of its usual fierceness in repose.

She stood and watched him sleeping for a while, letting the still and silent darkness envelop her as she tried to get a handle on the intense rush of feelings that cascaded through her.

She’d cared so deeply for him once, had thought at one point that her future would be with him by her side, but then she’d blown it, naïvely choosing the safe—boring, as Caleb had called it—option instead.

Looking at him now, she realised with a surge of emotion that she missed him. So intensely it hurt. Over the intervening years she’d been able to quash the waves of regret she’d experienced in her weaker moments, but she knew now that she still craved the elated, excited way he’d made her feel, like a habit she couldn’t kick.

She wasn’t here to get him back though, she told herself sternly, forcing herself to unclench her fists as she walked quietly over to where he lay to lift the laptop off his lap so she could take it back to the bedroom with her—just in case he woke up and decided to keep working. It was highly unlikely he’d ever trust her again, not after the way she’d let him down.

He was altogether too proud for that.

But she was determined to make it up to him somehow. Perhaps, if she was lucky, once he was better he’d remember this time they’d spent together and decide it was worth giving their friendship another chance.

Tiptoeing out of the room, she glanced back briefly to where he lay sleeping, his chest rising and falling in a steady rhythm.

All she could do now was hope for the best.

* * *

Caleb woke bleary-eyed from such a heavy sleep it took him a few moments to figure out where he was.

As the room came into focus he realised he was lying on the sofa in his living room.

Huh, strange.

Levering himself up to a sitting position, he felt a twinge of pain in his chest and the memory of waking up in the hospital yesterday after an accident came flooding back. As did the baffling appearance of the beautiful woman who had turned up to take care of him. A woman he couldn’t remember ever seeing before in his life.

Though he knew her. He knew her.

And why did he feel as though there was something more to their friendship?

Feeling his heart rate begin to rise, he forced the perturbing question out of his head for now and turned his attention to what he usually thought about upon waking instead.

His business.

He hadn’t intended to work for long last night—just wanting to make sure he hadn’t missed anything important whilst he’d been at the hospital—and had brought out the laptop he’d had stashed under the coffee table, feeling a sense of relief that Elena hadn’t noticed and confiscated that too. After skimming a number of things that didn’t require his urgent attention, the words beginning to blur together in front of his tired eyes, he’d come across a message from Benita that had made him start with worry, causing him to wince with pain as his cracked rib complained.

He’d turned the problem over and over in his mind for a while, desperately trying to keep his attention focused on solving this hiccup, but his tired brain had had other ideas, insistently pulling him into a deep, overpowering sleep.

He was awake now though.

Reaching down onto his lap where he’d left his laptop, he was confused to find it wasn’t there. He sat up carefully, mindful of his damaged rib, and felt along the floor next to the sofa, guessing it must have slipped off his knee whilst he was asleep.

‘Looking for this?’ came a softly chastising voice from the other side of the room and he turned his head to see a woman—Elena—standing there with his computer held between her hands. Her brow was creased and her expression guarded.

‘I thought you were going to give your poor brain a rest last night so it had a chance to recover.’

He shrugged and swung his legs off the sofa, then stood up carefully, turning to face her. Twisting his body was not at all comfortable at the moment.

‘Like I said, I don’t have time to take a break right now.’

She huffed out a sigh. ‘Why not?’

He threw up his hands in frustration, wincing at the twinge of pain this caused. ‘Because there are things going on that need my immediate attention.’

‘Like what?’

Clearly she wasn’t going to give up her questioning. He wasn’t entirely sure he could trust her with details about his business, but something in him, something he couldn’t identify, told him it would be okay to talk to her.

He sighed. ‘I need to convince a potential American supplier of my small appliance-sized battery that I’m an easy and reliable person to partner with,’ he muttered, folding his arms and rocking back on his heels as he thought about the problem again.

‘Apparently he has concerns and is considering backing out of a meeting I’ve taken great pains to set up while he’s over here in Spain. He’s supposed to be coming to Araya Industries on the last day of his visit and I’d hoped to persuade him to include one of my rechargeable batteries in their product range.’

Walking over to the kitchen, he opened the fridge and extracted a carton of orange juice, which he held up towards her to ask if she’d like some. When she nodded, he grabbed two glasses and poured them both a good measure of it.

‘According to Benita, his PA let slip he’d heard a rumour about me being a difficult man to work with and is considering taking a meeting with one of my competitors instead—who is apparently the stable, patriarchal type that Carter prefers to work with.’ He put the carton back into the fridge and slammed the door shut, noticing her jump a little at the forcefulness with which he did this.

Taking a calming breath, he picked up one of the glasses and handed it to her, then grabbed his own and took a long drink from it.

He really needed to keep his cool here if he was going to get on top of this problem. Especially as he was still having a bit of trouble thinking straight after the accident.

‘The fact that I don’t have a partner, let alone a wife, is troubling to him,’ he said, running a hand over his face, trying to wake himself up a bit. ‘But if I can convince him I’m a good bet it could be a hugely lucrative deal that would give us a strong foothold in the American market.’

‘How are you going to do that? Convince him, I mean,’ Elena asked, looking at him from over the rim of her glass.

‘I’m going to offer to take him and his wife out for dinner tonight and show them I’m not the ogre they seem to think I am,’ he said decisively.

‘You’re going to meet them on your own?’

He hesitated, thinking about this. ‘It’s better if I don’t make it too business-formal, so I don’t think I should take anyone else from the office,’ he said slowly. ‘It needs to be a more laid-back affair.’

‘But you’re concerned it might confirm his suspicions about you if you turn up on your own.’

His gaze snapped to hers. How did she seem to know what he was thinking? It was as if she could read his addled mind.

She shrugged a shoulder. ‘I know you don’t remember, but I run my own manufacturing engineering company in England and I’ve been in a similar situation before. In my experience it’s better to have someone else to make up a four, especially if he’s bringing his wife.’

He ran a hand across his jaw, frustration needling him. ‘I don’t have a girlfriend at the moment and I haven’t worked with Benita long enough to build up a convincing rapport with her.’

‘No,’ Elena said, making it sound as if taking Benita would be the last thing she’d suggest.

‘And it would be helpful to have someone who knows something about the industry and how to behave in business meetings already,’ he said as an idea began to form in his head.

‘That’s true, especially as your memory isn’t exactly at its best right now.’

‘So that only leaves one person,’ he said, folding his arms and giving her a pointed stare.

‘Who?’ she asked, frowning at first, then widening her eyes as she caught on to just what he was suggesting.

‘That’s right, Elena. You.’