Sun Kissed (Crane Series)

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What Jennifer Talbot hated most about business travel was the actual business of traveling—and the unpleasant surprises that cropped up from time to time when she was too tired, jet-lagged, and far from home to deal with them.

The man lounging in the outdoor spa appeared to be one of those unpleasant surprises. Not that he wasn’t gorgeous with that barely civilized, raw-sex Aussie appeal, and she wasn’t displeased that Cameron Crane, the CEO of Crane Surf and Boogie Boards, wanted to see her so soon after her arrival in Australia.

It was just that Jen had stumbled out of the cab from Sydney Airport believing the address she’d been given was a hotel. Her travel clothes were rumpled, her feet seemed to have swelled inside her pumps, her eyelids were scratchy from lack of sleep, and her temper was seriously frayed. What she needed was a very large bottle of water, an even larger bed, and about fourteen hours of uninterrupted sleep.

What she had was her client, Cameron Crane, whom she’d come a very long way to do business with, gazing at her like she was one of those prawns Aussies liked to throw on the barbie: as though she were some luscious bit of food he was contemplating devouring in a couple of bites.

“G’day. Welcome to Australia,” he said, steam wafting back and forth across his face giving him a dreamy, fantasy quality. His dirty-blond hair was longer than necessary and curled roguishly at the ends. He sported a tough-guy jaw, a not-very-successful boxer’s nose, and eyes that were both lazy and penetrating at the same time.

“I thought this was a hotel,” she said. It was certainly large enough—a sleekly modern house set back off the street in barely tamed tropical gardens. The house was right across the street from the beach but if its owner didn’t want to walk that far for a swim, there was a good-sized swimming pool at her feet so cool and inviting her feet throbbed just looking at the blue water And beside it, the spa, steaming silently without its jets on. Crane was a financial wunderkind with a lot of fingers in a lot of very lucrative pies.

She’d flown from San Francisco to help him add the USA to his pie collection. She tried to keep her voice pleasant; he was the client, after all, but even she could hear the edge of irritation. “If you’d told me you wanted to meet right away, I’d have come better prepared.”

“You should have let me send a car for you.”

“It’s just as well you didn’t, since the plane was delayed several hours.” A fact that only added to her fatigue.

“I don’t want you to work tonight. You’re staying here as my guest. I thought you’d be more comfortable in my house than in a hotel.”

In a pig’s eye. She wasn’t entirely sure why he wanted her under his roof, but she doubted it was for her comfort. “I see.” She thought his eyes were a smoky gray-green, but it was hard to tell in the steam. What she could certainly see was the cocky grin that revealed I-could-eat-you-all-up even white teeth.

“Come on in. Water’s great.”

She managed a frigid smile. “I didn’t bring my bathing suit.”

The grin intensified. “Neither did I.”

She refused to gasp or blush. She had a pretty good idea he’d be only too pleased if she did either, or, preferably, both. She’d met his type before. “All I want to do is go to bed.” Before he could say a word, she added, “Alone.”

He laughed outright at that. “I’m Cam.”

“Nice to meet you.” Though it would have been a lot nicer in an office when she had her wits about her. She eased an aching foot out of a pump and rubbed it against the back of her calf.

“Sit down and take a load off. Like a beer? I think I’ve got another one in the esky.” He gestured behind him to a small cooler. She sank into a teak lounger with a green and white striped cushion, unable to resist putting her feet up. “I don’t suppose you have a Perrier?”

He scratched his chin, where darkish stubble shadowed a dimple. “Might, I suppose. I’ll ring through to the kitchen.” He started to rise, water sluicing down muscular shoulders and chest.

As he turned to climb out, she caught a glimpse of the white bulge of his backside and realized he hadn’t been joking about being naked. As hot and cold shivers chased themselves up and down her spine, she opened her mouth to say, “No. Please don’t bother. A beer’s fine.” But she caught the glance he shot her over his shoulder. He paused for a second, waiting for her to stop him. She closed her mouth and sank back into the lounger. He wanted to play chicken? Fine. She wouldn’t even look away. In truth, she couldn’t have if she’d tried.

He emerged from that bubbling water like a Greek god out of the steam of creation. Even in her dehydrated condition, she felt her mouth go dry. His body was muscular and solid, tanned to a rugged bronze, his paler butt rounded, but as solid and muscular as the rest of him. She was accustomed to working with men who appeared better in their business suits than out of them. She had a feeling Cameron Crane looked better in the buff.

There was a smallish dark patch up high on one cheek that she took to be a bruise until the curtain of wafting steam parted and she recognized the company logo. A small crane. Anybody who had their company logo tattooed on their butt was either way too arrogant, or a complete workaholic. If he were a subtle sort of man she’d concede a certain ironic humor in the location of the tattoo, but based on five minutes acquaintance, she doubted Cameron Crane kept much subtlety in stock.

Cam watched blondie watching him. She looked, he thought, like one of those American film and telly stars: tense, tight-arsed, and anorexic. He hated for anyone to have the upper hand over him, especially a woman. In this case, he had to admit, Jennifer Talbot did. She was here because she was a brilliant marketer with an intimate knowledge of the California market, and since she’d be a key player in introducing Crane products in the US, she had a lot of clout. Which meant he needed to make absolutely certain he had more.

Luckily, he had a foolproof plan for maintaining control of their relationship.

He’d sleep with her.

He’d already decided to seduce her before she even got on the plane. If she’d gained a few stone, or lost her teeth since her Harvard photo, he still would have bedded her for the sake of his company. But in the flesh she was even nicer than the eight-year-old photo had led him to believe. He’d seduce her all right, for the sake of his company and his own pleasure.

He used the intercom to alert Marg that company was here and asked for a sparkling water. Then he turned back and found blondie still gazing straight at him. Beneath a gaze of icy reserve, he caught the gleam of hot intelligence in her eyes. She didn’t blush or shift her gaze as he gave her his best view and slowly returned to the spa. She didn’t look him up and down like she was going to measure him for a suit, either. He could have been fully dressed for all the reaction he’d caused.

Her gaze locked with his and her eyebrows rose in a challenge. He sank a bit quicker into the swirling water than he’d planned, as something else raised itself. There was nothing he enjoyed more than a challenge. He reckoned seducing this one, with her hot intelligence and cool beauty, was going to be more fun than he’d imagined. Hell, he might even do the world a favor and loosen her up a bit. In any case, the next few weeks promised to be interesting. There were two things Cameron Crane was really good at. One of them was making money.

At least he has hired help, Jen thought, relaxing marginally when a leather-skinned woman who obviously hadn’t heard the word sunscreen appeared with a tray holding a bottle of sparkling water, the bottle covered with condensation, which she hoped meant it had been refrigerated since the accompanying glass held no ice. There was also a can of beer.

“You must be Jennifer.” It came out as Jinnifer, and Jen was momentarily startled to be addressed so casually.

“Yes. I am.”

“I’m Marg. Cam said you’d be arriving today.” She passed Jen the water, thankfully cold, and the glass. “If you need anything, give me a hoy.”

Whatever a hoy was, Jen doubted she’d be giving it to anyone. “Thank you, but I don’t think I’ll be staying—”

“I know.” The woman threw up one hand and nearly knocked the can of beer over. “That’s what I told Cam. She’ll want to stay in a hotel, I told him. Not stuck out here with the likes of you. She doesn’t need the aggro. But he never listens. You might as well know that straightaway. Cam always does exactly as he pleases.”

Jen blinked slowly, feeling not so much jet-lagged as time-warped. If she didn’t know from her dossier that Cameron Crane was single, she might have thought this woman was his wife, even though she was clearly much older. Could she be his mother? Since reticence didn’t seem to be part of this woman’s makeup, she felt safe asking. “Are you a relative of Mr. Crane’s?”

The woman emitted a hoot of laughter that caused an unknown bird to squawk in the dark rustle of leafy green trees Jen couldn’t yet identify.

“Not bloody likely. I only stay because he pays me.”

“If I double your salary, will you keep your mouth shut?” asked the man who paid her salary from his private spa, where he’d sunk back in the water, his arms outstretched and gripping the sides of the Jacuzzi in a casual way that annoyed Jen.

She’d come a long way to do a job. She didn’t appreciate being toyed with. Marg’s laugh came again, but good-natured, as though she and her employer acted like this all the time. She walked around the pool with an unhurried, flat-footed gait and plonked the fresh can down beside Crane, who winked at her and said, “Cheers.”

Rising and turning back to Jen, she asked, “Are you hungry?”

“No. Just thirsty.” Jen sipped from her drink. “And tired.” Beyond tired.

“Did you sleep on the plane?”

“I never sleep on planes.” It was a curse. Other travelers snoozed and snored. She could fly around the world and not manage a doze.

Mostly, she worked. In the eighteen or so hours it had taken her to fly from San Francisco, California, to Sydney, New South Wales, she’d re-read her material on Crane Surf and Boogie Boards and reviewed the report she’d prepared on the already tight California market. Of course, California was just a start.

Mr. Crane, she’d realized as she read up on him, was an ambitious man. He’d made his first million a decade ago, by the time he was twenty-four. He’d had no family leg up in the business world. His father was a sheep farmer and his mother a homemaker. Cameron had left the sheep station at a young age, it seemed, because the next anyone had heard of him, he was making a name for himself as a surfie, as they called them here. He’d won some competitions, started designing and building his own boards, and soon he’d made a small fortune.

He’d parlayed that into a business empire in the next decade of his life, going from self-made man to self-made mogul. She’d been prepared to find this man admirable, driven, aggressive— she knew the type well. But to find herself manipulated into sharing his home, met with nakedness and sultry challenges, was more than she’d bargained for.

If she’d been the client, she’d be hailing herself another taxi in a heartbeat and speeding out of here. But he was the client, and, within reason, it was her job to give him what he wanted. But, if the naked man in the hot tub thought she was part of the package he was paying for, he was going to find he’d mistaken his woman.

As a marketer, she knew all about stereotypes, played with them or against them in advertising campaigns, and used them to help place product in the marketplace. However, because she knew how misleading they could be, she always made a conscious effort not to fall into the trap of judging people by stereotypes. But Cameron Crane was the quintessential Aussie bloke.

Right now, she was just tired enough to snap unwisely at a lucrative client she’d come halfway around the world to work with; antagonizing him because she was dead-tired and he was a chauvinistic, beer-swilling, naked womanizer, was not going to start them off on the path to a harmonious working relationship. Having downed most of the water, she rose from the blissfully comfy lounger and said, “I’ll go to bed now, if you don’t mind. I’ll want to be fresh and ready to work tomorrow morning.”

“It’s still early. A quick dip in here’ll set you right up,” he promised.

She sent him a smile so frigid it should have put a layer of ice over his spa. And his libido. “I doubt it. Good night.”

“Oh, stop it, Cam. You can see the girl’s dead on her feet. Come on then. I’ll show you your room,” Marg said.

Jen took a step and remembered her heavy suitcase. She hadn’t been certain what the weather would be like in Sydney in September—it was their spring, which meant what exactly? The Internet weather guides weren’t much help. It seemed anything could happen in the spring: summer heat or cold, damp days. So she’d packed for both, and her case was heavy.

“Oh.” She turned and gestured vaguely at the beast.

“Don’t worry about your bag. I’ll see to it,” said Crane.

He didn’t jump right out to help, though, did he? He must know her night things were in there, but he shook his beer can and clearly hearing it slosh in his ear, settled back and sipped.

“Don’t trouble yourself,” she snapped.

His eyes gleamed wickedly through the steam. “I won’t. I’ll have Roger do it. He’s my gardener and odd-job man.”

Too irritated to speak, and too fuzzy-headed to think of anything annihilating enough anyway, she picked up her briefcase and followed Marg, who said as soon as they entered the house, “Don’t bother yourself about Cam. He acts like an arse, but it’s only an act.”

“Well, he’s damn good at it.”

A low chuckle shook the older woman. “I think the next couple of weeks are going to be beaut.”

She was more than a little surprised when a soft knock a few minutes later had her opening her bedroom door to find not the odd-job man Roger but big-shot Cameron Crane himself, hefting her suitcase as though it weighed nothing. And he wasn’t naked, thank God.

“This is a surprise,” she said, stepping back so he could bring the suitcase into her bedroom.

“Marg said I was being an arse,” he told her, his hazel eyes twinkling at her in a way that suggested there was more to him than she’d suspected.

“Marg is a very intelligent woman.”

He laughed, big and easy. Now that he was closer and there was no mist between them she noticed the way his eyes crinkled when he was amused, and she imagined him squinting into the sun, gazing over red-soiled land. Sure he was a Sydney-dwelling surfer, but it was the Outback that had bred him.

“Let’s start over, shall we?” He stuck out his hand. “I’m Cameron Crane. Call me Cam.”

She took his hand and shook it. His palm was warm and firm and tough-skinned. She let him hold on a moment too long and told herself she was amused by him, and not feeling the tug of attraction.

“Jennifer Talbot. So,” she said, pulling back. “Arrogant didn’t work, now you’ve moved to charming?”

Once more his big chest rumbled with laughter. “Glad you noticed.” He glanced around the guest room as though checking up. “Got everything you need?”

“Yes, thanks.” It wasn’t a room, it was a guest suite and nicer than most hotels she’d stayed in. This had to be the strangest introduction she’d ever had to a client. She’d seen him naked and they’d been alone together in her bedroom within the first hour of meeting. Tomorrow, when she’d had some sleep, she was going to get them on a professional footing. Tomorrow.

As she stifled a yawn, Cameron Crane walked to the door. “Sleep well,” he said, and he was gone.

While she dragged out her night things, she couldn’t help wondering about him. He’d struck her as an arrogant beer-swilling jerk on their first meeting, but when he’d brought the suitcase he’d exuded warmth, almost teddy-bearish in this rather hairy man. Contrasts like that intrigued her, and she didn’t want to be intrigued by Cameron Crane—just paid well. Thinking the next few weeks were going to be quite the challenge, she fell into bed and wondered if cool, crisp sheets had ever felt so good.

Jen awoke with a start, momentarily disoriented. She blinked a few times in the darkness, feeling tired, wide-awake, and starving hungry all at once. As memory returned about where she was and why, she scowled and rolled over, searching out the clock by her bedside. Three in the morning. The green fluorescent dots broadcast the time as though it were good news. She groaned, rolled over, and squeezed her eyes shut, but who could sleep with the racket coming from her stomach? It was hopeless.

She flipped on the bedside light, illuminating walls of a pale Wedgwood blue, a couple of paintings on the wall—one of tropical flowers and one of a sailboat floating over blue-green water— typical guest-room fare except that when she’d examined them last night she’d discovered they were originals. Good ones, too, although she’d never heard of the artists. Australian probably.

The blue and green batik bedspread and the rattan furniture in the room continued the tropical theme. She got out of bed and wished she were in a hotel where there was room service and she could raid the mini bar. In a private home she was going to have to put up and shut up until it was morning.

Since she was wide awake, she pulled out her laptop. Might as well do something useful, she decided. But in the next heartbeat, stomach pangs attacked her again. She wondered why she should be polite about being a guest in Cameron Crane’s home when she was an unwilling guest. Her stomach rumbled again. She was so hungry she was starting to feel nauseous. She snapped the laptop closed. If there was food on these premises, she was going to find it.

She shrugged into her robe and the terry slippers she never traveled without and pushed her hair out of her face. Quietly, she eased open the door and stepped into the hall. The house slept soundly, so she padded down the stairs then through a hallway that led to the back of the house where the kitchen must be. She found it without trouble. There were dim nightlights in all the hallways, which struck her as useful for the jet-lagged, but odd otherwise.

The kitchen matched the dimensions of the rest of the house and was predictably huge: restaurant-sized, sleek, and industrial. She flipped on the light and was nearly blinded by the gleam of stainless steel appliances and black counters. It looked like he’d taken his decorating palate from a carving knife. Everything was sharp and cold.

She shivered as she made her way to the refrigerator, where she found orange juice and yogurt. A little more snooping in the cupboards uncovered muesli, which looked like plain old granola to her. She was happily chowing down until the thing she dreaded most—and at three in the morning wouldn’t have believed possible—happened.

“You’re up early,” said the twangy voice with its subtle teasing note she’d hoped to avoid until the sun rose.

“Jet lag,” she said, not bothering to turn around. She sipped her orange juice, wondering if she could pretend to being already full and dash back to her room—except she wasn’t full. She was still hungry.

Cameron Crane padded past her and leaned against a counter, pausing to look her up and down. God, did the man have a single good manner? She wore a robe, but Crane had a way of gazing at her that reminded her she wore no underwear. She was two not very sturdy garments shy of naked. At least her host was still fully dressed in jeans and a T-shirt, though his feet were bare.

“I hope I didn’t wake you?” she asked politely.

“No. I was working in my study.”

Her eyebrows rose. “In the middle of the night?”

He shrugged. “I don’t need much sleep.” He glanced at her shrewdly. “I’d say you’re done sleeping for the night, darl. Come on back when you’ve finished your brekkie. I’ve got some reading material for you.”

“I’m sure I’ll go straight back to sleep,” she lied, thinking endless games of solitaire on her laptop were preferable to a meeting with Crane’s CEO in the wee hours.

“Take it up with you anyway. It’ll bore you to sleep.”

What could she say? “All right.”

He walked to the sink with an easy grace that forced her to remember how he’d looked with nothing covering him but a little steam and a few bubbles. He grabbed a glass of water. “I’ll leave you to it, then. My study’s back there.” He pointed through a doorway at the opposite end of the kitchen, and then he was gone.

She finished her food but, as Crane had smugly prophesied, she wasn’t remotely sleepy. She’d deliberately set her watch to Sydney time, but that didn’t prevent her from calculating that it was only nine in the morning yesterday in San Francisco. After tidying up and putting everything away, she ran back upstairs. Cameron Crane might be able to dictate her actions, but no way in hell was she going into his study to talk business in her nightgown.

Besides, her calculations reminded her that her fiancé, Mark Forsythe, would be wide-awake and dying to hear that she’d arrived safely. He was such a sweetheart—steady, reliable, good-hearted, and he worried about her.

She called and Mark answered on the first ring, as though he’d been sitting by the phone waiting. Sure enough, his first words were, “I’m so glad you called. I was wondering if you made it okay. How was the flight?”

“Long and boring.”

“Don’t forget to drink lots of water. Jet lag can be a killer.”

“I know. It’s three in the morning and I just ate breakfast.”

He chuckled. “Give me your hotel and room number before I forget.”

She hesitated. She loved Mark and sometime in the next year or so was going to marry him, but he could be a little old-fashioned. He’d blow a gasket if he knew where she was currently staying. She hadn’t finished blowing her own gasket so she didn’t need any extra aggravation.