The Boat Builder's Bed (6 page)

Rafe registered Sophie trying to lever herself away. God, she had more will-power than he did! He was uncertain quite how he’d got his hands on her again, but he knew he wanted more than a quick fumble in the echoing shell of his half-finished house.
 

Paddling her pert curvy butt was some consolation, but not enough...not enough. He needed to take his time somewhere private and warm, wanted to explore and delight her and lose himself in her rose-scented softness.

He hoped she was only trying to fight him off because of the damn work. Okay, he needed to tread carefully, but he’d taken a direct hit when he least expected it and no way would he give her up now.

His hands slid up to cup her face, and he tilted it so their eyes meshed.
 

“Stop panicking. And don’t start thinking the work’s tied to anything personal. It’s yours regardless.”

He felt her relax a little and then saw her earrings dangling against his hands. He’d noticed them earlier—small cubes of blue stone edged with silver. He pushed a cautious forefinger behind one of her ears. The silver wire hook slid through the piercing and an earring slipped forward into his waiting hand as she pulled away from him.
 

He smiled to himself as he dropped the jewel into his trouser pocket.
 

A reason to see her again.
 

The door on the lower floor slammed at last. Once the builders had thudded back up to the middle level he walked her to the stairs and snapped the radio on again. Chris had it tuned to an old classic hits station. Billy Joel pounded out “Uptown Girl’. The big saw re-started its raucous screaming.

“Master suite,” Rafe said, glancing in the direction of the noise. “We can see that later.”

“So where are we going now? Should I take notes?”
 

He shook his head as he led her down to the lowest level of the sprawling house and closed the door.

“Not yet. Treat this visit as a quick recce and come back properly once you have more time.”

She put a couple of quick steps between them and he let her go with reluctance, knowing his need to be close to her would only grow. He wouldn’t be giving up without a fight, that was for sure.

“Ground floor.” He felt super-aware of his thudding heartbeat, his faster breathing. He hadn’t reckoned on being anywhere near this attracted to her. Strange reaction considering they’d met over his shattered headlight!
 

Far too warm, he pulled off his jacket, tossed it onto a chair, and reached out for hers as well when he saw the flush on her cheeks. “Guest accommodation. Currently the site office and lunch room.”

He watched as her big grey eyes inspected the spacious area. One corner had been set up as a compact kitchen with a well-used electric kettle and microwave oven on the counter. Battered plastic chairs and a rough table sat alongside it, and plans covered the wall above a paper-strewn desk. But the rest was much more luxuriously appointed, and he saw her registering this.
 

“Some site office?” she queried. “Leather sofa...big-screen TV?”

“Night-watchman’s perks.”

Her eyes widened. “You have an actual night-watchman?”

“You’re looking at him.”

“You?”

“When I’m in Wellington. It works well. It’s the best site office in town. Better than the shipping container up the top ever was. I got the guys to fit out this floor first. Painted everything white for starters so you’ve got a blank canvas.” He turned, surveying his domain. “This’ll be the guest suite when the rest of the house is finished. Right now it’s mine.” He grabbed her hand and led her across to a doorway. “My temporary home office.”

Sophie glanced in at his state-of-the-art equipment.

“And this way to my bedroom,” he continued, grinning broadly as he opened another door.
 

He really does live here
.
 

She stared open-mouthed at his king-size bed with its crisp navy and white striped cover. At the sleek Scandinavian Ash chests of drawers. And at the industrial shelving along one wall which held books, squash racquets, a crash helmet, beautiful model boats and scuba gear.

She heard herself make a strange strangled noise as he pulled her further into his room.

“No, Rafe.”

She tugged her hand out of his.

He had a killer smile, she had to concede. Cocky and confident, but not threatening. She was torn between trying to wipe it off his face and doing a little flirting right back at him. Commonsense won out.

“I don’t socialize with clients.”

“Maybe I don’t have socializing in mind?”

Above them the saw screamed and Billy Joel played on.

“Well to speak plainly, I don’t sleep with men I work for.”
 

His expression changed slightly. She wondered if she’d been too direct.

“You don’t work
for
me. With me, maybe, but that’s a big difference. No pressure. Nothing to get in the way.”

She somehow held his dark-eyed gaze, astounded to find she was burning to feel his hands and lips all over her; desperate to welcome him deep, deep inside where she ached and itched and felt full of slippery heat.
 

“You’re lovely, but I just don’t do things like that,” she said as primly as possible.
 

Rafe breathed out in a rush. Nothing—
nothing—
felt better than being genuinely wanted. That Sophie wanted him he had no doubt. All the signs were there, even though she was trying to hold on to her defenses. Her dark pupils almost filled her grey irises...her lips were softly parted...her nipples had peaked into hard nubs against the silky fabric of her camisole.
 

What had started as idle attraction on his part had turned uncomfortably intense.
 

If only he hadn’t stopped to help with her damned sign-board! He needed a partner with domestic talents and a deep maternal streak, not another ambitious, strong-minded, career-focused woman.
 

But hell, she was sweet.

Sophie cast him a cautious glance.

What am I doing?
Breaking the most important rule I ever set for myself. I swore never to mix business with pleasure again.

 
“What are we really here for?” she asked. “What had you planned?”

Rafe suddenly looked the soul of innocence.
“A walk around the house for a preliminary inspection...and to grab some screws for your sign-board.”

“Not anything more, because...”
 
She broke off in confusion. Maybe she’d got things totally wrong? Perhaps she’d mistaken his motives?
 

“Not yet, anyway. Although I did think of asking you out to dinner and trying my luck.”

“When?” she demanded, trying to ignore the leap in her heart.
 

“When you said I wouldn’t be getting anything, and then turned on that sexy blush and went all apologetic to me in your studio.”

“I did not!”

“You absolutely did. Said you ‘weren’t thinking of that’, and suddenly I was thinking of ‘that’ quite a lot.” A smile curled the edges of his mouth. “And when we got here you mentioned French wall-coverings and my hopeful brain made the leap to French knickers and French champagne...”

Sophie gave an unladylike snort.

“How about I buy you a dozen bottles of nice fizz for the studio launch,” he continued. “And we’ll go out for a meal afterwards. Somewhere on the waterfront?”

He’s making it sound so easy, but I can’t. I
can’t.

“I need to be home around six-thirty for an important phone-call.” She wasn’t quite able to look him in the eye as she said that.

He quirked an eyebrow. “Later then? I can wait.”

Sophie felt he wouldn’t want to wait if he knew she was phoning her four-year-old daughter—the daughter she’d had to give into her mother’s care. He’d said twice that children should be with their parents.
 

She sighed and stood deep in thought for a few moments. Although it was agonizing, she needed to try and stop things right now. Make this a once-only moment of madness and somehow salvage a businesslike relationship from the tempting situation she found herself in.

“Rafe,” she began.

“Hmmm?”
 

She took a deep breath and huffed out a sigh, glad he seemed to be treating this as a game and not taking offence at her comments.

“I seriously think,” she began again, “that’s not a good idea. This is a business arrangement.”

“Feels pretty businesslike to me, too.” His smile was now wide and warm, and Sophie feared her resolve might melt all too soon under its powerful wattage.
 

“Stop it. Concentrate. This is a huge deal for me. Your house has been talked about in the design community for months. And that means architects and other decorators and suppliers will all be watching like hawks. I want to do a fantastic job for you. I
will
do a fantastic job for you. But the last thing I need is people saying I got the work because they think we’re sleeping together.”

Rafe raised a skeptical eyebrow. “They can think what they like but they can’t prove anything.”

“Well, we’re not.”

“Of course we’re not.”
 

Is that a sneaky little grin he’s trying to suppress?

“So being seen out at dinner is a terrible idea.”

“It’s only dinner.”

“Yes, but...”

“No buts. We can keep it to ourselves while we get to know each other. No-one knows you’re here.”

“Your builders know.”

“They know you’re on the premises. Discussing the house. They wouldn’t know if you were in my bed.”

 
“Well I won’t be,” she somehow managed. “And anyway—”

“So that takes care of that worry.”

“Yes, but
lunch.
” She threw him an imploring glance. “Rafe, what are people going to think if we turn up to lunch together?”

“That I’m mentoring you, as I’ve mentored other new business-people in the last couple of years.”

That took the wind out of her sails a little.

“You’d better keep your hands off me, then,” she said, taking half a step away. But only half a step, because he somehow gave her the courage to stay close when she knew she should be running full-tilt in the opposite direction.

“I can manage that in public, Ms Calhoun. But in private?”

And although he hadn’t gone into details she could supply those details all too readily for herself. Her whole body sparked. She’d never had a man speak so directly so soon, and she knew it wasn’t a one-sided attraction. Oh hell...

 
“No,” she objected, giving him a light punch high on his arm, and leaving her hand there because...well she didn’t know quite why, but he felt warm and alive and lovely.

“
No
, Sophie?”

“No.” There was a short silence. “No,” she murmured again. The waves crashed on the rocks far below.
 

“No, we mustn’t,” she decided, finding determination from somewhere. “It’s a really bad idea. No.”
 

She sighed.
 

“I’m glad we got that settled,” Rafe chuckled, as though there was nothing set in concrete.

Sophie’s fingers stroked idly down from where she’d punched him, pinching gently, smoothing over the long muscles under his shirt.

“Fancy me, do you?”
 

“As if,” she retorted, grabbing her hand away with a guilty glare. “But you don’t have a businessman’s body, that’s for sure.”
 

He smiled at that.
 

“I was a carpenter, like my
Koro—
my adopted grandfather. From a little forestry settlement up north that I bet you’ve never heard of. I’ve always worked hard physically. Played rugby for the locals. Typical Kiwi boy.”

“Typical half-Italian, part-Cherokee Kiwi boy,” she teased. “I bet there’s not another one like you anywhere.”

“There are two. Same bloodlines, but you’d never know it to look at them.”

“Your brothers?”
 

“My much-more-acceptable, paler-skinned brothers,” he said, sleepy eyes suddenly spitting sparks.

She scanned his face, searching for further clues, but he let nothing else slip.

Rafe sighed as they climbed the stairs again to the living area. How could his brothers intrude, even here?
 

He had nothing left to prove to his parents. Nothing to prove to his brothers, either. But still they invaded his consciousness, taunting him with their fertile wives, their fast-arriving families. For all his money and outward success Rafe had not won that particular race. Wasn’t even in the running yet.
 

The fierce craving burned whenever he thought of the children he’d expected to father by now. The dancing-eyed daughter. Long-limbed sons to carry his name forward. They’d never lack for parental love as he had.
 

Nanny and Koro had been wonderful to him but they weren’t his mother and father. Somewhere buried deep within him was the urge to show Luca and Huia exactly how parents should treat their children.
 

He drew a long brooding breath and imagined the ice that must rim Luca’s heart. Okay, every father hoped his son would be a replica of himself. Rafe understood that. And he looked so unlike Luca Severino he could almost forgive the indifference.

But as for his mother... What woman willingly gave away her first-born child? The dark thoughts swirled around his brain as he looked across at Sophie silhouetted against the sunny deck. Another career-woman like Faye? Should he cut his losses and make it all business from now on?

No. There was something about her. He’d keep her close for the decorating and see where it led.

CHAPTER FIVE

“I wish you success, Sophie,” Councilor Duncan said, inclining his wine-glass towards her. “In these uncertain times it takes a lot of determination and a little bit of extra luck to make a new business succeed.”