Please be here, please be here, please be here. I practically throw my suitcase back into my own room, and only pause long enough to peer into the mirror and make sure I look semi-presentable. Or at least, not like a total crazy person.

Then I bolt next door.

There’s no answer to my first knock. I take a deep breath and knock again. “Darius? It’s me. Holly,” I add, feeling a little silly. And realizing that I’m probably speaking to an empty room. But if he’s not here, then I’m not sure where else to search for him. I already scanned the ballroom downstairs, before I headed back up here, and he was nowhere in sight.

Then again, I’d probably run for the hills too, if I were him. If I just did what I think he did.

“Darius, come on, I know you’re in here,” I say, even though I’m not sure at all. I raise my fist, about to knock again, when suddenly the door swings open in front of me. I let my arm fall, and gaze up at Darius. If I thought he looked a mess before, he’s certainly in the process of cleaning up now. He’s wearing nothing but a towel wrapped around his waist, his muscled chest bare and glistening with water. His hair, too, is wet, dangling just long enough to reach into his eyes.

He reaches up to push it back, and my hand itches to rise and help him with that. I keep it firmly at my side, through sheer force of will. “What’s so important it involved interrupting my shower?” Darius asks, a single eyebrow arched.

But I know him better than this by now. I see right through his attempted deflection. I notice how he keeps running that hand through his hair, a habit of his when he’s nervous. “Did you do it?” I ask.

“Do what?” he counters.

I spare a glance up the hallway, and he seems to catch me drift. He steps back to let me into his room. The moment I’m inside, he swings the door shut. “Did you tell Alexander all that stuff about the wines being swapped?” Before Darius can deny it, I add, “He came to talk to me just now. He told me he loved my wine. It looked like the same bottle you took from me.”

“He could have found that anywhere, I’m sure,” Darius says, but he can’t quite keep a faint smile from his lips.

Now it’s my turn to frown, this time in confusion. “Why?” I ask.

He tilts his head to one side. “Why what?”

“Why help me? Why throw your own family under the bus in the process?”

He presses his lips together. “I told you, Holly. I can’t stand the idea of my family getting ahead only by playing dirty. Knowing what they did to you… I couldn’t let that go. This business is something I care about, but at the end of the day, it’s just a business. We shouldn’t be sabotaging other people, or stomping on people’s dreams, just to score a few points and ‘get ahead,’ whatever that means.”

“But your father… won’t he be furious, if he finds out it was you? You didn’t have to tell Alexander it was Bantham wine he drank.”

“No.” Darius quirks a smile. “I didn’t. But frankly, a little taste of his own dirty medicine is exactly what my father could use right about now.”

Before he says anything else, I can’t resist anymore. I fling myself at him, wrapping my arms around his neck to pull him down into a hard, fast kiss. It’s over before I know it, but my arms remain locked around his neck, and his slide around my waist, crushing me against him. It reminds me of our first kiss—well, our first kiss since we were teenagers—all over again. Him in the towel in the hot shower room.

I trace my hands over his chest, savoring the feel of how warm and strong his body is against mine. “I can’t believe you did all that for me,” I murmur, facing his chest, not quite willing to meet his gaze.

But he’s not going to stand for that. He reaches up to tuck a finger under my chin and tilts my head back, forcing me to look him in the eye. “Of course I did, Holly. You deserved a fair chance. You deserved to impress Alexander, with all the hard work you did and all the planning you put in. How could I let my own family stand in the way of that?” His smile turns a little sly around the corners. “Especially after what you told me.”

I raise an eyebrow. “You mean when I told you your family sucked and I didn’t want anything to do with them anymore, or…”

He pinches me, and I jump, laughing, but he just tightens his arms around me, pulling me backward, farther into his room, until we’re standing with our arms entangled, bodies pressed together, right at the edge of his bed. “No, silly.” He leans down to kiss me again, softer this time. Slower. His tongue parts my lips, and I let him, my head falling back as I allow him complete control. When we part once more, my breath comes a little short in my chest, and my heart races where it’s pressed against his chest.

But that’s fine. Because to judge from what I can feel, standing here, his heart is pouding every bit as hard as my own.

“When you told me you liked me,” Darius clarifies, and my face flushes bright red, all the way to the tips of my ears.

I forgot about that.

“Did you mean that?” he asks, tilting his head to consider me.

I offer a grin right back at him. “Of course not, silly.” I reach up to run my hands through his hair, tugging his face toward mine, until our foreheads are touching, our mouths inches apart. “I don’t like you, Darius. I think… I love you.”

For a moment, I get to appreciate the stunned expression on his face. Then he kisses me again, hard and desperate, his hands sliding down to grip my hips at the same time, drawing me to him so tightly it feels like I can’t even tell where his body begins and mine ends, we’re pressed so close together. My lips part, and his tongue twines around mine, exploring, possessive, desperate. He wants me every bit as badly as I want him, just as desperately.

I hardly even notice when he lifts me off my feet, when the world tips on its side and suddenly I’m sprawled across the bed with him bent over me, his lips still locked on mine. He draws back, just far enough to kiss my jawline, my neck, nipping lightly at the edge of my ear.

“I love you, Holly Spring,” he whispers, and my toes curl at the same time that my stomach flips, like it’s just soared a thousand feet up into the air all at once. Because I never thought I’d hear him say that, of all people. And because I can tell from his husky, throaty tone just how much he means it.

And because I love him, too, and how the hell did this happen? How did I wind up falling in love with the one person I’d come here most dreading to see?

Darius leans back to catch my eye, grinning again, that dimple of his, the one that always drives me wild, on full sexy display. “And you know, my wines may not have had a good showing this trip, but I don’t think the whole event was a complete failure. Or at least, I didn’t completely fail.”

“Oh really?” I arch a brow, suppressing a laugh. It’s hard not to smile like a total idiot every time I look at him, though. “How do you figure?”

“Well.” He traces his hand along my neck, brushing a stray strand of hair back. Then he cups the back of my neck and draws me toward him, lips poised over mine. I part my lips, anticipating another kiss, but he holds me there, a breath away. “Hearing you admit you have feelings for me was one of my goals this trip, after all. Not to mention getting you into bed. In fact, on the whole, I think I’ve had a more successful weekend than you, all things considered.”

I burst into laughter, unable to help it. But at the same time, I wrap my arms around his neck and tilt my head back, considering him with a wry smile. “Hmm… Well, when you put it like that, Darius Bantham, I must admit, you may be onto something.”