Carolina Girl (33 page)

“Lovemaking isn’t the same as sex?” he
replied in surprise.

She almost giggled at his tone. Relaxing, she returned his
hand to her breast. “That may depend on the participants’
intentions. Women like sex well enough, although I hadn’t realized how
good it could be until you came along.”

“Flattery will get you everywhere.” His voice
was bone dry against her ear. “So now that you have me where you want me,
what do you want out of me?”

Stung by his implication that she wanted a return on her
investment—like his former girlfriend, presumably—Rory stood up. It
was high time she learned to assert herself in personal relationships as well
as business ones. “Not casual sex.”

She wanted sex all right. Her whole body felt cold and empty
now that they no longer touched. But she needed more than sex.

Clay looked suitably startled. Predictably, his confusion
turned into a frown. “I don’t know about you, but I’m not
ready for rings and commitments.”

She probably wasn’t either, because they represented
risks she wasn’t ready to take, although a few soft words might have
persuaded her differently. But as he’d pointed out, he wasn’t good
with words. Or people. And she didn’t have the time or patience to teach
him. Not when she was so confused that she hurt inside. “I don’t
think either of us knows what we want, so let’s just leave it at
that.”

In confusion at her conflicting emotions, hurting more at
his blunt rejection than she thought possible, she shoved past entwining
branches in retreat. She hoped she wasn’t scaring any turtles into not
procreating just because her own ticking biological clock had started ringing
shattering alarms.

She’d known all along that he just wanted sex. That
was why she’d tried to keep this to a business partnership. But she no
longer wanted just a business partnership, and it was killing her inside.

It wasn’t within her abilities to teach him how to do
personal relationships. She wasn’t certain how to make them happen
either.

o0o

Abandoned, Clay didn’t follow. He couldn’t see
Aurora well enough in the moonless dark to know where she’d gone, but he
sure as hell could feel the emptiness where she had been. The evening was
sultry, but he felt cold.

She didn’t want casual sex. How the hell was he
supposed to take that? There wasn’t anything casual about what
they’d shared.

He’d thought they were getting along pretty well. She
hadn’t complained about his interfering brothers. She’d had an
excellent grasp of the business contract he’d had the lawyer draw up, and
she hadn’t objected to his keeping all creative rights to his programs.
She didn’t even seem to mind his bad communication skills, until now, at
least.

He’d tried to maintain a businesslike relationship in
front of family, although he’d had some difficulty with that lately. It
irked him every time she smiled and chatted up another man. That had never
bothered him when Diane had done it. Probably because he’d thought the
expensive rock on her finger was proof of fidelity.

He was walking straight into the same open pit
again—expecting a career-oriented female to have anything more in mind
than the next step on the ladder to success. Maybe she was waiting to see if he
was just a rung or the whole ladder. Who the devil knew?
Not casual sex
sounded like an invitation to commitment to him, and he wasn’t ready to
go there.

So maybe he was falling back into an old pattern of
thinking. There was comfort in that. If he took the time to consider how much
love Aurora possessed and how little she was like Diane, he’d have to
reconsider a lot of things, most of them unflattering to himself. He was
hurting too much to go there right now.

Wounded, he retreated into his shell.

o0o

The day after the meeting with the Binghams, Aurora answered
the kitchen phone. Cleo’s voice leaped through the receiver, conveying
both concern and curiosity. “All right, what have you been feeding
Clay?”

Aurora frowned, glanced at the front room, where Cissy
worked alone, and shook her head. “He’s not here to feed. I thought
he must be involved in something at your place.”

In truth, she’d been living in terror since he
hadn’t shown up at their door first thing in the morning, as he’d
done lately. What if she’d insulted him and he’d gotten mad and
caught a plane back to L.A.?

What if he had only wanted sex, and now he’d lost all
interest in her and the company and the swamp and...?

She known better than to become involved. She had to go back
to the city and work. She’d known Clay would—

“He’s up on the courthouse roof taking the clock
apart again.” Cleo interrupted her panic. “I thought maybe you knew
what set him off. TJ’s threatening to go up after him.”

“Oh.” Unwilling to let Clay’s family know
the extent of their involvement—if two nights of sex could be called
that—Rory tried to keep her voice calm. “I just gave him some food
for thought. If TJ’s restless, tell him to threaten a few zoning
commissioners. They’ve called a meeting next week in hopes of forcing our
hand before we have enough Binghams on our side.”

Business was something she understood, something that didn’t
involve emotional chaos. Maybe she wasn’t any more ready for a
relationship than Clay. But a cold terror ate at her heart at the thought of
never seeing him again. She hoped the sinking feeling in her middle just had to
do with the corporation and the future, not a relationship he obviously
didn’t want.

“As long as I can tell Jared and TJ that Clay’s
thinking and not blowing up the clock, I can arrange that. How many people
would you like at the meeting?”

“Jam the house. The Binghams we’ve brought
together are refusing to sell to anyone until they’ve had time to examine
the issue. If the zoning goes for condos, then the Binghams might be better off
selling out.”

Saying good-bye to Cleo, Aurora hung up.

“Clay sick?” Cissy called across the room.

Of her, maybe, but Rory couldn’t say that. Was she too
forthright? Too bossy? She probably expected too much. She’d hoped Clay
was different, but what would it matter if he was? He had his own agenda, and
he’d done everything possible to show her that a relationship
wasn’t part of it. She ought to be relieved at his honesty.

She squeezed the turtle eraser in her pocket and tried not
to place any sentiment on the silly gift. He gave her erasers and tomato plants
and lobsters instead of romance. That ought to tell her something.

“He apparently got tired of the business end of the
software,” she said with a shrug, “and he’s out pounding
nails. Now that “Mysterious” is in the hands of production, there
isn’t much he can do here anyway.”

She would not weep at hopes she’d never allowed
herself to have. She’d never believed she had a chance at love and
romance like other women.

Instead, she needed to plan the future she’d expected
and not think about the man on the courthouse roof, the one who had the power
to change her heart if he’d only open his.

Picking up the cordless, Aurora wandered back to her
bedroom. She was glad they’d had that little discussion yesterday.
He’d reminded her that she had more important things to consider besides
mooning over a man like a sex-crazed adolescent. She had her own life to live.
She didn’t have to sit around waiting for Clay to decide how he wanted to
live his.

Feeling abandoned for no good reason, Aurora opened her
address book and began placing calls.

o0o

Do you wanna dance? Put your red dress on and be ready to
shake your tail feathers. Tonight, tonight. 7 P.M. Be there or be square.

Be where? What red dress? Her suit? And tail feathers? The
man was surely insane. Maybe he’d baked his brains on the roof today. But
her stupid heart did another one of its flip-flops of pure joy as she stared at
the screen. They didn’t have a relationship. He only wanted sex. But
she’d missed him today.

She hadn’t realized how much she could miss the way
Clay listened intently, not interrupting until she’d had time to spew out
everything boiling inside her, waiting until she was ready to hear what he had
to say. She even missed his skewed perspectives that made her look at things in
a new light.

She missed the heat of desire in his eyes when he looked at
her that made her zing even when she was creating financial statements.

Straining her memory for old songs from the radio, she
tapped out,
I can dance, but this devil wears a blue dress.
Let him
figure out where she was wearing it. She was still too relieved at knowing he
hadn’t disappeared into the ether to care about details or to overanalyze
her reaction.

Did the message mean he was taking her dancing? Did this
mean he’d decided to date? Did she want to date? She didn’t know
what she wanted, she conceded. She just recognized after his absence today that
Clay—in any form—was crucial to her precarious balance right now.

He was crucial to a lot of things, but she was averse to
risk taking, and Clay was a risk wilder than spending a million dollars on hope
and pink elephants. Money could be had anywhere, but her heart was
irreplaceable.

That wouldn’t keep her from dancing. She
couldn’t remember the last time she’d gone. She’d taken some
swing lessons when that had been popular, but she’d never had much of a
chance to use them. Would a busy man like Clay have learned swing?

Tonight! Irritating man. Did he think she ought to drop
everything at his whim? She should have told him no, except she couldn’t
think of a musical reference.

She scanned her closet, frantically realizing she had
absolutely nothing to wear dancing, especially if she didn’t know where
they were going. The blue dress was made for swing, with lots of swirly skirt.
She couldn’t think of a single place around here that it was suitable
for.

“You’re slamming drawers and doors like you have
a big date.” Mandy appeared in her doorway, watching with curiosity as
Aurora threw the blue silk dress aside and tugged out a black one.

“Where do people go dancing in this town?” Of
course, her niece wasn’t old enough to go to bars, so what would she
know?

“They have a deejay at the Monkey on Saturday nights.
And they still have shag dances at the harbor pavilion. Old people
stuff.”

She didn’t need to be reminded that she would be
over-the-hill shortly. Rory flung an old sundress that was too small for her at
Mandy. “If you’re not here to help, go away.”

“Ooh, it
is
a big date! With Clay? That rocks.
You have to wear something really kick-ass for a guy like that.”
Shouldering Rory aside, Mandy investigated the contents of her closet.
“This stuff sucks, you know it? Don’t you have anything besides
suits?”

So her whole life was work. So shoot her. “Go away,
little girl.” Now she was talking in oldies. She was losing her mind.

Before she could shove Mandy out of the way, her niece
reached in and grabbed a skirt shoved to the back of the closet. “This
one! Do you have any halter tops?”

“To wear with shorts.” Aurora held up the
blue-flowered wraparound silk skirt and considered it dubiously. It was the
next best thing to a sarong. She didn’t know what had possessed her to
buy it in the first place. It was too frivolous for work.

“Bare bellies are the bomb!” Mandy insisted.
“I’ll have something, if you don’t. White or navy would work,
don’t you think?”

“If you’re taking fashion advice from Mandy, my
advice is, don’t.” Cissy appeared in the doorway to study the
situation. “You have to weigh a hundred pounds and be ten years old to
wear the stuff she wears.”

“Mo-o-ommmm!” Mandy waved the skirt on the
hanger. “This is not for ten-year olds. Aunt Rora will look
bitchin’. Where’s that white stretchy top Gladys gave you? The one
you said is too big?”

Cissy raised her eyebrows, checked out the skirt, and
disappeared to the other half of the trailer. Rory double-checked her closet,
praying for something more suitable. She couldn’t wear a sarong and a
halter top. She’d look like an Amazon.

Cissy returned with a silky knit halter top. “You wear
this, and his eyes are going to pop out,” she warned.

“That’s it, that’s the one!” Mandy
shouted with glee. “A blue necklace. A choker? Or one of those big
pendants with a blue stone? Where’s your jewelry box? Or you can wear my
beads.”

Caught up in the whirlwind of advice, Rory showered, washed
her hair, and let her sister and niece dress her as if she were going to the
prom. What did she have to lose? The million dollars was already tied up, and
if Clay didn’t like prom queens, that was his loss.

If she repeated that to herself often enough, maybe
she’d believe it.

They pulled her hair into a French braid, created a choker
of a string of seed pearls and a fake sapphire from a pair of earrings, found a
pair of dangling seed pearl earrings, and Rory produced a pair of strappy
low-heeled sandals that wouldn’t require stockings. Casual, yet elegant.

“Whooeee, Clay won’t know what hit him!”
Mandy danced around, inspecting her handiwork, while Cissy propped her hip
against the bed, nodding approval.

“What he thinks doesn’t matter. What the two of
you think is more important. Do I look like an idiot? Are people going to fall
down laughing when they see me coming?” She felt safe encased in suits,
but this outfit revealed all. She eyed her cleavage and exposed navel with
skepticism, but it was the way the knit clung to her breasts that had her
wishing for a bulky sweater.

By the time the doorbell rang, Mandy had them laughing and
examining Cissy’s closet. Mandy raced to answer the door while Rory tried
to steady her nerves. It was just McCloud. She shouldn’t read anything
more into this than a night out and maybe a good time.