Chapter Four
Bodie woke the next morning with a smile on his face and a dick hard enough to smash diamonds. Unfortunately, he was also alone. The thought Eleanor might just be in the bathroom was comforting until he rolled to his side and felt how cool the sheets beside him were.
Nothing but the lingering trace of orange blossom.
Well shit…that wasn’t how he’d planned on waking this morning. He’d wanted to feel her soft, warm body draped against his. He’d wanted to touch and stroke her in the morning light filtering in around the edges of the heavy hotel curtain. He wanted to bury himself inside her one last time, then figure out how soon she could get to Sydney and see him so they could do it all over again.
He laughed out loud. It was absurd to be feeling so damn…giddy about a woman after such short acquaintance, but Eleanor had made a lasting impression—and he wasn’t just talking about the nagging pull in his groin or the nail marks on his back and shoulders.
Although a woman who came loud enough to shatter the windows in the room did tend to swell a man’s head.
Both of them.
It was her softness and her lack of…guile that drew him. Her genuine surprise at his interest and her nervous prattle about Victorian hypnotists made him smile even now. It had been a long time since he’d been with anyone who didn’t want something from him. Who didn’t even seem to know who he was.
And that could be seriously addictive.
Bodie rolled on his back with a sigh, ignoring the persistent erection demanding to be serviced. How it was so damn perky this morning after last night’s smorgasbord, he had no idea.
He smiled to himself as he thought about laughing and talking with her into the night, the darkness and post-coital euphoria encouraging her to relax and open up. She told him about her lifelong obsession with everything Victorian, her collection of books on the monarch and the era as well as her collection of historical romance novels. And all about Queen Victoria’s Closet, her online vintage dressmaking business.
He’d talked about rugby. A much easier subject than anything more personal, although rugby was pretty damn personal. She seemed conversant enough in it to make conversation, but she didn’t ask him about his stats or his pay cheques or his endorsements.
Which was a breath of fresh air.
Instead, she asked him what else he would have done had he not played footy for a living, and if he was ever scared on the field, and how often his body hurt. Hell, not even his mother had asked him if his body hurt.
A real breath of fresh air.
And to have a conversation with a woman where his net worth and his rich-ass family weren’t mentioned was so damn good he’d kissed her for it at one stage and then they hadn’t spoken for quite some time.
In fact, they’d had sex two more times, because keeping his hands off her had proved to be impossible and she’d been so damn eager.
Bodie rolled out of bed and headed for the bathroom, wondering about tracking her down. He made a mental note to ask Ryder about her. If she was local, too, and lived out his way then Ryder must know her.
He stood at the vanity and inspected himself in the mirror, his gaze drawn to the livid scratch marks on his left shoulder. He twisted around to view his back, noting the double set of scratches, one on either side of his rib cage. They’d all scabbed and the skin around the edges had pulled taut.
Man. She’d really dug in there. Like his groin strain, he’d barely felt them at the time, but they were tender this morning.
His stomach growled and he headed out to the main room to dress.
Maybe Eleanor was downstairs eating. You never knew your luck in a small town, right?
He saw the note as soon as he neared the bedside table, and his heart skipped a beat as he grabbed the paper and sunk onto the mattress. It was written in a beautiful, feminine flowing script that could almost be calligraphy, and it made him happy just looking at it.
Nothing bad could be delivered in such a pretty hand, surely?
Bodie,
Thank you so much for last night. I had an incredible time. You are an amazingly generous lover and I will never forget the hours I spent in your arms.
I only ask that you don’t tell anyone what happened between us. I know guys like to brag, but I feel that my brother, in particular, may not be so keen on a blow by blow.
Goodbye and thank you. I will always remember the day the city came to the country.
Eleanor (Nell) Davis
Bodie blinked. Apparently, pretty writing could pack a real punch. Like a sledgehammer to the gut.
Holy. Fuck.
Eleanor was Nell? Nell Davis. Ryder’s sister, Nell.
He’d slept with his best friend’s sister?
Jesus. He was going to hell. Best-friend’s-sister-fucking hell. He’d broken the code. Unwritten. Unspoken. But very fucking ingrained. You didn’t bone a teammate’s ex. Or his mother.
Or his sister.
Pretty simple rules, really. And no real hardship. There were plenty of women out there more than willing to be with a rugby superstar. Steering clear of a few was no problem. And yet, somehow, Bodie had managed to screw it up.
Jesus.
Disbelief was starting to morph into irritation as unease pitched through his stomach. Why the fuck hadn’t she told him who she was? The warm buzz that had flowed through his veins since he’d woken evaporated. Every thought and feeling he’d had about Eleanor melted away. She’d known who he was all along.
Had she been playing him?
She had to know what this would do to his and Ryder’s friendship if it was to come out. What that kind of disruption could do to the team dynamic. Had she put on some clueless female act so she could sink her hooks into him? Was he some kind of ticket to the city for her?
He hadn’t got that vibe, but…
Another thought, born from the gnawing worry that had been there since Anna had left, struck. Did she know about his family? About his trust fund?
Fuck. Had he just fallen for the biggest honey pot scam ever? If it was, the goodbye and thanks for the memories letter was an interesting ploy. But she could be playing the long game.
Thank Christ he’d worn condoms.
He shook his head. No. Hell no. Eleanor—Nell—had seemed too damn genuine. He’d approached her for God’s sake. She’d have still been there trying to disappear inside that plant if he hadn’t made the first move, he was sure of it.
God, was his radar for scheming women really that far off? It had taken a huge hit since Anna, but still…
He stood. He had to find her. Had to talk to her.
It took Bodie about fifteen minutes and one overheard conversation in the dining room to ascertain that Eleanor had left the building. She’d hightailed it back to Shady Gums, the Davis family cattle property, at five in the morning.
Were they the actions of a woman who was planning on using him as a meal ticket? He wouldn’t have thought so.
But he still needed to talk to her.
He got the opportunity about half an hour later when he spotted one of Ryder’s sisters heading to the buffet unattended. Liza? Lisa? He couldn’t remember off the top of his head.
Damn it, if he’d remembered the names of his best friend’s sisters a bit better, he wouldn’t be in this predicament right now.
“Hey Lisa.” He sidled up beside her, and she smiled in acknowledgement. So…Lisa it was.
“Hey Bodie, great game yesterday.”
He nodded distractedly, wondering how to approach the subject but knowing he had to be quick. He wasn’t sure how long he’d have her alone in a crowded dining room full of people who all knew each other. “I was wondering if you could give me Nell’s—” He stumbled over the name. She’d always be Eleanor to him. “Mobile number?”
Lisa stopped serving herself scrambled eggs, the spoon paused halfway between the plate and the buffet. She blinked at him, clearly startled by the proposition. “You want Nell’s number?”
Ryder’s sister was a pretty blonde, very attractive, but her obvious incredulity pissed Bodie off. Why he should feel so defensive and offended for Eleanor after she’d lied to him and ruthlessly slept with him, he didn’t know. But he did.
“I was chatting with her last night about some Victorian stuff—”
Lisa interrupted with an eye roll. “Sorry about that. I hope she didn’t bore you to death?”
Bodie stiffened. “Not at all.” Still, she shot him a pitying smile. “I was telling her about this dress my family has in a First Fleet collection and she wanted to know the details, but I heard she’s already left?”
“Ahh. That makes more sense.”
Lisa resumed her activity like the world had suddenly been righted and life could continue. Like some old dress was the only reason a guy would be interested in her sister. But Eleanor was sweet and soft and passionate, and that made her ten times more attractive than her sister.
“Well, I’m not sure if she’ll know what to do when she gets a call from a guy, but she does love an old frock.”
Lisa quickly rattled the number off. Bodie tapped it directly into his phone, thanked her politely, then headed out the front door to call Eleanor in private.
He walked to the edge of the footpath as he called the number. Leaning his shoulder into one of the support poles for the overhead balcony, he glanced up and down the main street. It was deserted at this hour on a Sunday morning.
The phone rang and rang and he didn’t think she was going to answer it when it clicked in his ear and he heard, “Hello?”
She sounded breathless and Bodie shut his eyes trying not to think about how breathless he’d made her last night. “Hello, Nell.”
There was a long silence during which his heart thrummed like a rotor in his chest. He was pretty sure he could hear her brain clanking as it grappled with a solution to this clearly unexpected predicament.
“How did you get this number?” she finally asked.
“Lisa gave it to me.”
“Lisa? You asked Lisa for my number?”
Her panic rang clear as a bell down the line. “It’s okay. I made up some story about an old dress, a family heirloom. She bought it.”
“You know, men in Victorian times weren’t allowed to address women by their first names unless they were engaged.”
Bodie may just have laughed at the nervous reply so similar to her nervous prattle of last night had the sick feeling in his gut not intensified. What did she mean, engaged? Was this where she laid her cards on the table? Where she tried to threaten or blackmail him?
“Are you proposing to me, Miss Davis?”
Her breath hitched in his ear and he liked it. “Look…I’m sorry, okay. I shouldn’t have…”
No, she bloody well shouldn’t have. Bodie went on the attack. “Why didn’t you tell me?” He kept his voice low, but there was no mistaking the streak of grimness. “He’s my best friend.”
Silence hummed down the line between them. “Would you have slept with me if you’d known?”
What the fuck? Was she crazy? “Did it seem like I had some reckless death wish to you?”
Another pause. “No. Which is why I didn’t tell you.”
Her husky voice filled his head and, despite everything, he wanted to be back in bed with her and to hell with the consequences. “Jesus, Eleanor.” He pressed his forehead against the pole. “This is serious.”
“Relax. I’m not going to tell Ryder. I’m not going to tell anyone. And I don’t expect a declaration of undying love from you or a visit to my father for my hand in holy matrimony. I love my life out here just fine. I don’t want any part of yours. Just notch me up as another one night stand—I’m sure you’ve had plenty of those—and go back to Sydney.”
Considering how many one nighters he’d had since breaking with Anna last year, Bodie could hardly be affronted by her assumption, but last night had felt different.
And how the hell was he supposed to face Ryder again?
“Goodbye, Bodie. Thanks for last night. Have a nice life. Don’t ring me again.”
The line hung up in his ear and Bodie pulled his mobile away to look at it, stunned at the turn of events. If Eleanor Davis was after his money or looking to make trouble for him or the team, she wasn’t being overt about it.
He relaxed, his faith in her and his radar restored even if the thought of never seeing her again, never being with her again, put a crazy kind of itch in his blood.
But if that’s what she wanted? Fine. She was Ryder’s sister for fuck’s sake. It was just easier all round.
“Hey man.”
Bodie tensed as Ryder clapped him on the shoulder right on top of the scratch marks his sister had left only hours before. He tried not to wince as a surge of guilt swamped him.
“Where the hell did you get to last night? You find someone to kiss your groin better?”
A spike of guilt stabbed Bodie in the side as he forced out a laugh. “Nah man, I was around.”
Deny, deny, deny. That was his father’s favourite catchphrase. Unless they catch you red-handed, son, it’s your word against theirs. Deny. Bluff. Obfuscate.
His old man was such an asshole.
“You were too busy checking out your fiancée’s ass most of the night to notice shit.”
Ryder laughed. “She does have a spectacular ass.”
Bodie nodded, trying and failing not to think about Eleanor’s ass. Round and soft, the cheeks pale in the dark of the room.
Crap. He was doomed.
…
Bodie was beat. Sweat dripped off him after the gruelling training session. They may have won the city country match on Saturday, but Griffin King, their tough-ass coach, didn’t let them rest on their laurels, especially as they were only halfway through the season. It was Monday and they were back at it.
He sagged onto the wooden bench separating two rows of lockers and reefed his shoes off, groaning as his arms ached. Griff had ridden him particularly hard today. It was almost as if the coach had known all about Bodie’s monumental fuck up on Saturday night.
He wouldn’t be surprised. Griff may have perfected the art of saying very little, but he seemed to see an awful lot. He hadn’t been at the party because Griff never socialized, but somehow he just knew shit.
Bodie stretched out the traps on either side of his neck as the clatter of cleats and the buzz of smack talk swirled all around him. He pulled off his sweat-soaked shirt. He needed a hot shower for his aching muscles. An ice pack for the whack he’d taken to his shoulder during training. And some ibuprofen for his niggling groin.
Although that was nothing to do with rugby and everything to do with the blueness of his balls and the number of hard-ons he’d suffered in the last forty-eight hours. Eleanor’s sweet welcoming softness and her breathy noises of satisfaction had been playing on repeat and his whole groin area ached for more.
“Well hello, hello and what do we have here, gentleman?”
Bodie froze as Lincoln Quinn’s voice from somewhere close behind brought him back to reality. “Spidey’s found himself a hell-cat.”
Fuck. He’d forgotten about the scratch marks.
“Dude? You holding out on us?”
Within seconds, he had a bunch of half-naked, sweaty jocks staring at his back and no comfortable way out of the situation.
Deny, deny, deny.
He was just going to have to put up with their crap and head to the shower as quickly as possible. And avoid Ryder’s gaze altogether. Dexter Blake whistled appreciatively as he inspected them. “On the shoulder, too. That is some serious damage.”
“Yeah man, your mother really goes off,” Bodie deflected to much hilarity from everyone, including Dex.
“Never knew you had it in you,” Tanner Stone, the team captain, said.
“Look a couple of days old to me,” Linc mused.
Which Linc would of course know in his former role as team man-whore, before Em had tamed him.
“You did hook up in Bungindally, you dirty bastard,” Ryder accused. “Didn’t I tell you those country girls are wild? Spill, man.”
Yeah. Nah. Not even if they held him down and all farted in his face. Bodie didn’t think I banged your baby sister five ways to Sunday would go down so well with Ryder.
Hell, he couldn’t even look at his best friend. He stood. “I need a shower.”
There was a bunch of masculine jeers. “Hold the phone, boys,” Tanner said, clearly amused. “It’s serious.”
Bodie’s hackles rose, knowing it could never be anything more than one night because she was Ryder’s sister and oh yeah, she’d rejected him. Right now, with every part of his body bitching at him, it was just another thing pissing him off.
“It’s not what you think.” He reached for a towel and slung it over his shoulder. It hadn’t been a sleazy hook up. Eleanor had been different.
“Nah bro,” Donovan Bane said as he crossed his thick, tribal tattooed arms across his huge chest and smiled cheerily. “You just cut yourself shaving, right?”
The guys hooted out some laughter and exchanged high fives as Bodie rolled his eyes. “Bite me.” He slammed his locker door shut and pushed past the gathering.
“I think somebody already did,” Ryder called after his disappearing back.
Without breaking stride, Bodie flipped them the bird. Their good-natured laughter followed him all the way to the showers.
And that was pretty much how it went for Bodie for two and a half months. Life went on, the ribbing and the questions eventually died down about the mystery woman who’d scratched up his back, and he could look Ryder in the eye now without a spontaneous surge of guilt. But he hadn’t been able to get Eleanor and their night together out of his head.
He knew it was impossible to go there. For a start, she lived a twelve-hour drive away, although that was no real hurdle. It was two and a half hours by plane. The bigger issue was she hadn’t wanted any more to do with him and he couldn’t.
Because Ryder.
But he thought about her often, not even consciously most of the time. She was just there when he was at training or playing a game or at the regular poker night with the guys. God alone knew how many times he’d been to her business webpage just to see what she was up to.
She ran a blog through the site which revolved around her dress projects. He’d read every blog entry and looked repeatedly at every piece she’d ever made for her customers. He was probably the most well-informed elite rugby player in Australia on the difference between a flounce and a bouillonne.
The most interesting pieces, though, were lingerie. Very old-fashioned. How something that covered so much could be so damn sexy, he didn’t know.
It just was.
That find had led to several hours down internet rabbit holes as he researched the subject, ending up on a site that specialised in Victorian pornography. Which, in turn, had given his night time fantasies—of which there had been many—an erotic edge. Eleanor running around in pantaloons and him calling her Miss Davis as he bent her over a chaise, taking full advantage of the open crotch seam.
It had been agony. But he’d accepted that was just the way things were between them—a one-time thing that could never be anything more. Until he received a text out of the blue…
Am in Sydney for five days. Can we meet?
Bodie blinked at the screen. He hadn’t quite believed his eyes when her name had come up and his hand shook—actually shook—as he opened the text. The substance wasn’t exactly stimulating, but what had he expected?
A titty pic? From someone who made frilly neck-to-knee undergarments?
She’d made contact—that was all he cared about, even though he shouldn’t. For a moment, he even let his imagination go to all the places he’d been wanting to go with her since he’d last seen her two and half months ago.
Eleanor. Ryder’s sister.
His fingers gripped the phone harder as he reread the text, his initial hell yeah tempered slightly.
Why was she here? What did she want?
He wasn’t worried about her intentions. He’d long dropped any, admittedly lukewarm, suspicions he’d had of her. He was worried she might be as horny for him as he was for her. What if she’d figured they were in the same city so why not see if he was up for a little fun?
Christ… He almost went blind letting that little scenario play out for long delicious moments. It made sense. Why else would she be looking him up? But. Nothing had really changed. She was still his best friend’s sister and he couldn’t go there again.
Once could be forgiven. He hadn’t known who she was and he could put his hand on his heart and plead ignorance. But twice?
That was a deliberate action.
Still, he couldn’t deny the strong urge to see her again. He hadn’t got to say a goodbye last time so maybe it could be a kind of closure for him. He could take her out for coffee. Or a meal. To a movie if she wanted. They could do that. Indulge in adult conversation over some kind of beverage then say goodbye.
Yeah. They could do that.
Would like that very much, Miss Davis. Where. When?
His finger hesitated over the send button. He wasn’t trying to flirt by using Miss Davis. He was just trying to keep it light between them. Surely after a night in bed with her they were allowed to tease each other?
Fuck it. He hit send. And waited.
Not for long as it turned out, his phone chiming less than a minute later.
Tonight. Six? I’m at the Four Seasons. Darling Harbour. Room 922.
Tonight? In her hotel room. Not down at the hotel bar or at a nearby restaurant, or any of the bajillion highly populated venues in that area? He swallowed.
Bodie had his regular boy’s night poker game at seven but he could call in and see Eleanor first. In fact, it would give him an excuse not to linger. In her room. With a bed.
Fuck. He swallowed again. Was he strong enough? Did he trust that his loyalty to Ryder and the team couldn’t be tested by a woman he’d been fantasizing about in Victorian lingerie for the last two months? Christ…
Why don’t I meet you in the bar at 6?
He sent that without thinking twice—sent it before his libido could hijack his common sense and he ended up in her room, with a bed. The reply was just as rapid-fire as the last.
Can’t. Friend arriving at 6.30. Need to get ready.
Okay. So that made sense. Women were, after all, masters of multi-tasking, and if she was on a strict timeline—as was he—then it meant there wouldn’t be any time or focus on other things.
OK. See you then.
He hit send, his pulse drumming forcefully through his veins, anticipation sitting rock-like in his stomach. In a few short hours, he’d be seeing Eleanor again. All he had to do was remember he was a mature, twenty-six-year-old man, not a fifteen-year-old horn dog.
And if that failed, chanting Ryder’s name over and over should do it.