Can't Get Enough (16 page)

Bottom line: in the real world, out of claustrophobic elevators where
people were forced to strip down to their underwear, men like Jack
Brook did not look twice at women like her. If only she'd known that
before
she'd let him slide her bra off and slide himself into her, before she'd had the best damn sex of her life.

Why had she given him the opportunity to reject her?

She had a sudden flash of Jack sitting on high—Zeus on his
mountain—laughing at her as she scampered around at his feet like all
the other women in his life.

She was walking past a display in the men's section of a department
store, and she almost ran into the young salesman setting it up. She
stared down at the colorful array of ties the guy was finessing, and
she remembered Jack's refusal to wear a tie to her meeting with
Hillcrest. Suddenly she saw red. It was her meeting, and her client,
and her magazine. And he was working with her. The least he could do
was respect her reading of her client's sensibilities. Determined now,
she turned to the salesman.

"Excuse me. Which would you say is the most conservative tie you stock?
The sort of tie a retired banker might wear, for example?" she asked
silkily.

"Definitely something with stripes. Or a royal insignia. That always
seems to go over well with our older customers." The salesman helpfully
displayed two or three ties for her.

"I'll take that one," she said, pointing to the tie that combined
stripes with a royal insignia. And Jack Brook would wear it if it
killed her.

8

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JACK WALKED BACKinto his office after his last meeting of the day and
groaned at the pile of paperwork Linda had left on his desk: afternoon
mail, letters to sign, blah, blah, blah. He sighed heavily and dropped
into his chair, swinging his feet up onto his desk as he reached for
the pile of mail. His feet knocked something to the floor, and he
leaned sideways in his chair to peer around the edge and make sure he
hadn't broken anything.

His stapler lay on its side on the plush carpet, and he stared at it a
moment. Unbidden, unwanted, unwise, a Technicolor image of Claire
Marsden's lacy bra popped into his mind. Complete with a memory of how
she'd smelled and how she'd felt when he'd pulled her close to remedy
the temptation. Because—really—how was a man supposed to have a good,
solid argument with a woman when all he could think about was burying
his face in her cleavage? And, after that, burying other parts of his
body in her, also. He'd been so close to giving in to the need to touch
her. If he closed his eyes for more than a heartbeat, images of their
time in the elevator flashed back at him. It was the only thing he
seemed able to think about. That, and all the other things he wanted to
do to her. Once was not enough, he was fast discovering, where Claire
Marsden was concerned. At least, that was what his body believed.
Intellectually—well, that was a whole other ball game.

Because it was impossible to remember Claire's spectacular body without
remembering her spectacular temper. The spark of remembered lust faded
as he recalled her insulting insinuation—that he'd told Beck she wanted
him off the magazine. Man, he'd busted his ass being diplomatic with
Beck that morning, explaining how he was loathe to work on something he
wasn't truly contributing to, pointing out his work schedule was
already very hectic, stressing that Claire was very good and very
likely to be able to soothe savage-beast-Hillcrest all on her own.

And she reads that as him setting her up! Which was the problem with
her, when he got right down to it. She was always ready and willing to
read an ulterior motive into everything he did. More trouble than she
was worth.

Insidious and undeniable, the memory of her simple but sincere sympathy
for him snuck into his mind. She'd said exactly the right thing, and
she'd even anted up with a confession of her own so he wouldn't feel
like a complete dick when the doors opened. So she wasn't an absolute
lost cause…. And then there was the sex. He kept coming back to that.
Had he ever been that hot for a woman?

Surely in his teens he'd had encounters that were that hot…but he
couldn't quite remember with whom or when. In fact, all past encounters
paled into insignificance beside what had happened yesterday. It was
even beginning to worry him a little, the way his mind would
automatically drift to those few precious memories of the smell of her
skin, and the sound of her excited breath in his ear, whenever he let
his guard down. He'd nearly embarrassed himself several times in
meetings today. One moment he was discussing deadlines and feature
stores, and the next he was fighting off sense memories of tanned skin
and the wet, voluptuous slide of his body in hers. And as for how his
body had reacted when her shirt had popped open…It had been a close-run
thing, and he'd been forced to seek refuge behind his desk to hide his
desire. The last thing he needed was for little Miss Uptight to know
the potential hold she had over him….

He started as Linda stuck her head into his office doorway.

"I'm going now. See you tomorrow," she said.

He grunted a goodbye, deliberately pulling his attention back to his pile of mail.
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Stop thinking about Claire,he ordered himself. He'd already laid her
ghost to rest last night, when he'd decided not to call her. So why did
she keep rising to the surface of his mind?

Here he was again, reverting to thinking about her as soon as all other
distractions were gone! He'd already walked down this road, and it was
a dead end. Time to move on. With a real force of will, he focused on
his mail, sorting through more than half of it until he came to an
internal mail envelope. Like most internal mail envelopes, the previous
recipient had crossed their name out before reusing the envelope for
another message. He stared at Claire's crossed-out name for a second,
then squeezed the bag, frowning. It felt bulky, not like paperwork.
Mystified, he broke the sticky-tape seal and pulled out a small
shopping bag. The cool slither of silk on his hands clued him into the
bag's contents before he'd pulled the tie out. It was striped, with
some sort of lion and crown etched into it. The sort of tie his
grandfather had always been fond of. He stared at it, genuinely
dumbstruck for a moment. She was a real piece of work. Not content to
have the last word, she'd gone out and bought him the perfect response
to his claim not to own a tie.

Well, she could whistleDixieas far as he was concerned—there was no way
he was wearing a stupid tie. Especially not this particular stupid tie.

Thank God he hadn't called her last night. He'd regretted it earlier
today, even after their fight he'd found it in himself to regret it,
because there was something about her that drew him…But after this? No
way. He and she were chalk and cheese. She'd drive him crazy. He tossed
the tie negligently to one side. He actually snorted his exasperation
and disbelief out loud as he reached for the folder Linda had filled
with his personal mail from his post office box. There were a handful
of bills, but one envelope caught his attention. That was his Mom's
handwriting scrawled across the front of the pale lavender rectangle. A
dead, dull weight settled on his chest as he lifted the flap on the
envelope, knowing full well what was inside: a birthday card.

Just like his Mom. She never forgot birthdays, even though he'd made
his feelings clear on the subject. He almost laughed out loud. He'd
been mostly successful in ignoring the march of time this year. He'd
figured that if he was very careful and skimmed along through November,
he could skip over his and Robbie's birthday.

But he'd still known that it was coming up, just the same—otherwise he
wouldn't have felt that instant weight upon seeing his mother's card.
Otherwise he wouldn't have this well of grief opening up inside him so
readily and easily.

Liquid heat threatened at the back of his eyes, and he pushed himself
to his feet, dropping the card onto his desk, ignoring all that needed
to be signed for tomorrow. He had to get out of there, right now.

THERE WAS A CALLwaiting on her answering machine when Claire got home
from work that evening, and she despised herself for the little thrill
of anticipation she felt as she noted the flashing message light. Maybe
Jack had called after all. Maybe he'd felt as angry and frustrated and
disappointed as she had after their argument.

Then she gave herself a mental slap. There was no way Jack would have
called after the fight they'd had in his office. Or, if he called her
at all, it would only be to give her hell for having foisted a tie on
him,
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despite his insistence that he wouldn't wear one.

But it was her father's voice on the answering machine. She stared at
the small black appliance as he told her that he was in town
unexpectedly. Would she like to catch up for dinner?

She hadn't spoken to her father in months. She sent him e-mails on a
regular basis, mostly because she was determined to do all that she
could to have some kind of relationship with him. Occasionally he
replied, but he rarely commented on her news. Instead he concentrated
on his latest expedition or project, his letters reading more like
press releases than missives from a father to his only child. Warily
pleased, she called the hotel number Harry had left. His voice sounded
unfamiliar and distant when he answered the phone.

"Dad, it's me, Claire," she said.

"Oh, hello, Claire. I take it you got my message?"

As usual, the cool matter-of-factness of his manner stopped her from
saying any of the things she instinctively wanted to say—that it had
been a long time, that she'd been thinking about him. That she was
hoping he could make it to her triathlon final.

They quickly arranged for her to meet him at his hotel for dinner—he
was disinclined to let her take him out to any of her favorite
Melbourne restaurants. In a city that was well-known for its food and
wine culture, Harry preferred to chance the hotel dining room, and she
felt unequal to the task of convincing him otherwise.

She settled for a scaled-down version of her training session for the
evening, and it was only as she was discarding the third top she'd
tried on in ten minutes that she acknowledged she was nervous.
Ridiculous, really—but he was her father, and their relationship was
uneasy at best. Still, he'd made the effort to get in contact while he
was in town. That was something, a change. She allowed herself to hope
that maybe all her hard work in maintaining contact had perhaps gotten
through to him on some level. She was surprised at how old he looked
when they met up in the foyer of his hotel. At sixty, he was very
active and still organized expeditions, even if he didn't lead them
himself anymore. But his hair had thinned, and was now completely
white, and his eyes seemed faded somehow. She had to fight a surge of
emotion as she realized that time was running out for them to
reconcile.

"Claire. Good to see you," he said, leaning forward stiffly to kiss her
cheek. Ignoring his formality, she hugged him, pressing her cheek close
to his.

"How are you?" she asked warmly.

"Good, good. A little annoyed at having to make this extraneous trip to
Melbourne when we're so close to heading off, but these things happen."

Unsure of what he was talking about, Claire followed him into the
dining room and waited till they had been seated before venturing
further.

"You're organizing another expedition, I take it?" she asked.
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Obviously her father was unaware that he hadn't communicated with her for some time.

"Yes. It's a joint Australian-Swiss assault on Everest. We were
supposed to leave next month…but I don't want to bore you with the
details. How is work? And your marathon thingy?" She blinked with
surprise. Her father never tired of talking about his work, and he
never enquired after her life. She struggled to pull her thoughts
together. "Work is good. Busy, but good. We're very close to launching
our first edition of the magazine. And my triathlon training is coming
along well. Just two weeks to go now."

He made the appropriate noises as he studied the wine list, while she
studied his face. Was this truly the breakthrough she'd been hoping for
all her life? Or, if not that, exactly, perhaps the beginning of a
thaw?

"This is the magazine that you devised, the hardware thing?" Another
surprise—he'd read her e-mails, actually remembered their content.

"Yes. It's more home renovation and decoration than hardware, really.
But you've got the basic idea." He shot her an assessing look, then
indicated her menu. "Better hurry up and decide—I can't stand waiting
around for my meal," he said, already signaling for the waiter to come
over. There was a momentary hiatus in their conversation as Claire
hurriedly decided on a salad as entrée and fish for her main, and the
wine waiter poured some wine into her glass—a red, her father's choice.

"So, I guess this Beck character who runs all those magazines of yours must be pretty pleased with you, then."

"Well, he's certainly happy to have landed a new client." She took a
mouthful of her wine, wondering that her father even remembered what
company she worked for.

"But you know him, yes? You've spoken with him?"

For the first time she registered that this was more than just polite interest from Harry. What was going on here?

"I've had several meetings with him, of course. Have you met him
somewhere?" Her father shook his head vigorously, tearing his dinner
roll apart. "No, but I will tomorrow. Just trying to get a bit of a
feel for the man. What do you know of him? Is he a sports man?" Claire
sat back in her chair, baffled and bemused. Why would her father care
what she thought of her boss, or what he thought of her? And why on
earth would her father, renowned explorer, be having a meeting with
Morgan Beck, millionaire publisher?