Chapter 4

Brayden

Although she was under-dressed by money standards, Harper looked magnificent to me. She was a little pale, not having been home long enough to acquire her tan yet. She wore a low-cut blouse and I got an eyeful, which was exactly the revival elixir I’d been hoping for. Her girls had always been my ultimate fascination and the standard by which the other women had been judged. Harper had them, hands down. Or, hands on, depending on how I chose to picture them.

“You look fabulous,” I told her and her skin was pale enough that I detected her blush. “You make me want to bend you back and kiss you right here in the lobby.”

“Don’t hold anything back, Bray, just speak your mind, why don’t you?”

She’d been the only one I ever let get away with calling me “Bray.” It reminded me too much of a mule. Collin tried it once and even though he was older and bigger than I was, I’d punched him in the nose and he’d backed off.

“I can see you still haven’t gotten in touch with your inner self,” I observed as I guided her toward the Cabana, my hand at the small of her back. She was considerably shorter, and I had to stoop a bit to keep it there.

“And I can hear you still delight in tormenting me,” she popped back. Her head turned, and I caught a glimpse of those fiery green eyes. If she’d turned much more, she would have seen my crotch and I would have lost all advantage. Shit, but she could make me hard.

I signaled Bert, the maître d, to take us to my table. I made a mental note to have a couple of tables removed, to leave more space in between. Harper was navigating them like a wave over sand, but I was feeling clumsy. Maybe it was her graceful body that gave me that impression. One thing was for sure. My obsession for her hadn’t diminished with time. If anything, I wanted her more than ever before.

We sat with goblets of a rosé I’d been saving for a special occasion. Bert had set up a privacy screen. Too many people wandered over to say hello so they could claim a close relationship. I’d made a lot of friends over the years and most of them were wealthy or influential. Politics, entertainment, big business, tech; there was someone for everything I needed.

“So, you own all this?” Harper was watching me, and I knew she knew who I was at my core. There was no need to try to impress her.

I nodded and tried to look humble, but it wasn’t a look I did well. Women liked power and that had become my signature look.

“How did you pull that off?” she asked in a voice that made me feel like I was in high school again.

“I started small,” I said and we both choked a bit on our wine. I’d always teased her about being petite and had suggested I might be too big for her, sexually speaking. Those were the days when I was young and stupid, but she was a virgin, so she believed me. My offhand comment echoed in our memories. I tried to recover my fumbled words and started again.

“A friend I met after high school was a partner in flipping a house. He hired me on and taught me a lot about the business. I finally put enough cash together to flip my own, and it just got bigger from there. Rinse and repeat, as they say.”

“Do you still flip?”

I tried to ignore her double entendre and recognized that she’d lost much of her innocence since I’d seen her last.

“Do you?” I came back at her.

“No, I still like boys.”

I felt like an idiot and that was one place where I couldn’t afford that look. “C’mon, Harper. Are we going to be tit for tat all evening? Take your best shot. Tell me what an ass I was and how sorry I should be for moving on.”

“Don’t have to. You just said it quite well.”

I decided to change the subject. “So, how did you come by the job of nanny to someone like Bernadette? She doesn’t have as much class as you do in your little finger.”

She laughed, and it sounded like bells. I remembered that laugh so well. “I wouldn’t know about her, but I do know that I needed a job, fast, and hers got me back home. Enough said.”

“Hey, Harper, I was sorry to hear about your mom.” She nodded her thanks. “And your dad?” She just shrugged. That was enough said on that topic. I’d never cared for her dad much and after her mother died, the general gossip was that when Harper was out of state, he’d become a drunk and disappeared.

“How about your family?” she asked politely.

“Mom and Dad are fine, living in California.”

“California? Why not stay here where it’s warmer?”

“I don’t know. I guess maybe they needed to just be away.”

“From…?”

I looked down, arranging my words. I didn’t want to tell her everything. Not yet. It was still too soon.

“Is it Collin?” she asked, sensing that the bad boy had grown unrulier with age.

“Well, hell, he never was an angel. He pokes his head in when he needs something. In fact, he texted the other day and said he’d be coming for a visit in the next day or two.”

“You won’t mind if I say I could do without seeing him?” She was trying to look sympathetic but talking about Collin was like talking about her father. There were some people better left undiscussed.

“No, I don’t particularly look forward to seeing him myself, if you want the truth. But you never know and after Cory…”

She sat up straight. Her hand slid across the table and her brow furrowed. I had flashbacks of that tiny hand and its soft, agile fingers that had fondled me. I snapped back as she asked, “What about Cory?”

I could tell she hadn’t heard, but she had always been ultra-sensitive and knew me well.

“Cory married Sylvia Barnham, do you remember her?”

She nodded. “Sort of.”

“They were skiing, Aspen, four years ago. Freak accident, the cable sheered and their lift chair fell. Both died on impact.”

“Oh, my god, Brayden! I never heard! I’m so, so sorry.”

I nodded and my heart was heavy. “Like I said, you just never know.”

“I remember Cory as being very sweet.”

“As opposed to me or Collin?” I was trying to lighten the mood.

“Both of you,” she said without hesitation.

“You ever going to let me out of that doghouse?”

“Nope.”

We both smiled at that, and she looked out the heavily-tinted windows toward the water. “It’s a nice life you’ve made for yourself here, Brayden.”

“Thanks. It could have been better.”

“How’s that?”

“With you.”

“You going to start that again? Look, Brayden, you were the one who walked away. Don’t forget that.”

“You’re hardly likely to let me.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” She was getting prickly. The past was not a subject we could handle well – at least not yet.

“Nothing,” I said and my gaze drifted to her open neckline. I could feel that soft flesh sandwiched around my dick, and I wanted to make a deposit between them. I looked up and she could see the desire on my face. It wasn’t making her happy, that much I could see.

“You men are all alike,” she said, denouncing the male sex as a whole.

“You men? Or just me?”

“All of you. That smarmy little Ripley has his eyes on me already. I’m not sure Bernadette is aware or grateful, but she’s not doing anything to reel him in.”

“Has he said anything?”

“Just some slimy little remark about wanting to get to know me better. Bernadette just about wet her pants when she discovered you and I had known each other. I get the idea she thinks you could help Ripley’s career if you took an interest.”

“Ha!” I blurted. “The world would be better off with a few less Ripleys in it. Anyway, I don’t know anything about the guy and if he was in a position to be in business with me, believe me, I’d know about him.”

“When did you get to be so arrogant?” she asked plainly and my own words echoed in my head. She had a point.

“Sorry. Just keep your distance from that asshole. He thinks he’s got the world by the tail. I don’t even think he earned his money.”

“She says he inherited from a distant aunt.”

“See there? He’s got no integrity,” I summarized him with my least flattering observation.

“And you do?” She was staring at me straight on, her body stiff and unfriendly in her reminder of the ass I’d been.

I turned the tables. “I suppose you’ve had your share of men in your life.” It was a conclusion I’d made, and I knew I’d intended it to hurt her.

“No.”

“Why not?”

“Why should I? Men can’t be trusted. I’ll do better on my own,” she declared and I felt as though she’d thrust a knife into my chest. The atmosphere that had so recently been warm and friendly had turned icy and distant. I didn’t like that new feeling and wanted away from it. I was glad we’d gotten to the bottom of the wine bottle.

I signaled Bert, who came and moved the privacy screen. I stood up and went to pull out her seat but she’d beaten me to it. She was smoothing out the creases in her skirt and as I towered over that low-cut blouse, I felt a warning buzzer go off in my head. This one could have me if she wanted to. It wouldn’t take more than a crook of her tiny, white finger and I’d be at her knees, my hands parting that sweet pussy I’d dreamed about for so long.

I walked to the elevator with her and when we emerged onto her floor, I stayed with her as we approached her room. I tried to wait until she was safely inside and then walk away, cool and unconcerned, but I couldn’t do it.

“Damnit, Harper!” I pulled her against me and she didn’t pull away. She leaned into my chest, just as she’d done so many years earlier. I could smell the skin I remembered so well and then I kissed her, kissed the lips I’d remembered and felt the round body that filled me in all the right places. It was difficult to breathe without wanting her. I was having trouble maintaining perspective. “What if I come in so we can chat a little more?”

She knew what I was asking. Her face was flushed, and her lips were swollen and rosy-ringed from my kiss. I knew, no, I begged the fates to tell me she was on the verge of taking me into her room.

I was wrong. She whispered, but in a terse tone, “I said no then, and I’m saying no now. I’m worth so much more than that.”

“It’s not like that,” I rasped, but she had already slid her key card through the lock. The door opened, and then she closed it in my face. The warmth of the moment was sucked from the energy around me. I felt abandoned, but there was no one who could take that away except the one woman with those emerald eyes and breasts upon which I longed to sleep. I looked like a rejected fool, standing in the hall of my own resort.

“Damn! I fucked it up again!” I said aloud to myself and headed toward the elevator. I turned once when I thought I heard a click. I could have sworn it had come from her door but I must have heard it wrong. There was no one there. There was just empty space—more than enough to drown my heart.