Too Charming (9 page)

‘I didn’t say I wanted to dance,’ she started to protest but he turned and placed a finger on her lips, silencing her.

‘Sweet Megan, for once in your life, can’t you shut that kissable mouth of yours, turn off that impressively smart brain and just go with your instincts?’ He drew her stiff, unyielding body into his arms. ‘Just let yourself feel,’ he whispered huskily into her ear. ‘Just feel.’

Right on cue, the music slowed to a seductive ballad and Megan felt herself doing exactly what he wanted her to do. She started to feel. It was intoxicating, being held in his arms, her senses swamped by the touch of his strong, hard body and the scent of his sexy aftershave. She hadn’t liked seeing him dance with the busty blonde, hadn’t liked the sharp stab of jealousy she’d felt at the sight of them together. God, what was she doing here?

‘You don’t dance like a cop,’ he remarked after a few minutes, clearly surprised at the sure way she was following his steps.

She arched an eyebrow. ‘Don’t tell me, you were expecting me to dance flat-footed?’

‘Something like that,’ he agreed, trying to hide a grin.

‘You, on the other hand, dance just like a lawyer.’

He raised a questioning eyebrow.

‘Smooth and quick on your feet.’

‘Somehow I don’t think you mean that as a compliment.’

She didn’t dispute it, merely smiled, and it left him feeling oddly out of sorts. Would she always see him as the slick lawyer first, the man a long way after that? No doubt she believed his dancing skills were a product of some fancy private school, rather than a mother who’d loved to dance and had passed that joy on to her only child.

Determined that, for a few moments at least, he would get her to think of him as a man rather than a defence lawyer, he eased Megan even closer towards him. ‘Did I tell you how stunning you look tonight?’ he asked softly in her ear. ‘And how much I want to run my hands over that silk-covered body of yours.’

To
emphasise his point, he smoothed his right hand down her back and on to the curve of her buttocks. Deciding he liked the feel of that, a lot, he moved his left hand down to join it.

‘Where I come from, that’s called groping.’

He laughed, feeling a buzz of satisfaction when she didn’t slap his hands away. Perhaps she didn’t want to create a scene. Or perhaps she was enjoying being held as much as he was enjoying the holding. With that thought in mind, he gently squeezed her, bringing her hips snugly against his. Of course in doing so, it was hard to hide his obvious state of arousal.

‘Jesus, Scott, what the hell?’ She tried to pull away, looking up at him crossly when he wouldn’t let her.

Totally unabashed, he grinned and kissed her gently on the mouth. ‘Don’t tell me you’ve never felt a man’s arousal on the dance floor before.’

‘Of course I have.’ But the red blush that swept across her face told him that the usually unflappable detective was feeling distinctly flustered. ‘But we agreed, friends only.’

‘Hey, you’re the one that instigated that rule, not me,’ he argued. ‘I can’t promise not to be aroused when I’m pressed against an attractive woman. It’s a normal male reaction.’

‘Does it happen with all the women you dance with then?’

‘Fishing for compliments now?’ he retorted, acutely aware of his lack of reaction to the attractive blonde lawyer earlier.

She blushed even more furiously. ‘No.’ Clearly embarrassed, she tried to wriggle out of his grasp, but Scott held on tight.

‘Look, I can’t help it if you turn me on, Megan. You know how attracted I am to you. I’ve made no secret of it.’

‘But I don’t understand,’ she told him, shaking her head, looking almost painfully confused. ‘Why me? When you could have any woman here in the blink of an eye, why bother with me?’

Those words coming from another person would have sounded artful and contrived, but the dark-haired woman looking up at him now was anything but. Her face conveyed genuine confusion.

‘It’s the challenge, isn’t it?’ she continued, eyes flaring with irritation. ‘The thrill of the chase.’

Disappointment crashed through him. ‘Come on, not this again.  I can’t deny there’s some fun in the chase, but believe me, I would have found you just as attractive, and the situation a damn sight less frustrating, if you’d come to your senses and swooned in my arms on day one.’

‘And if I’d done that, you’d now be dancing with someone else tonight.’ Suddenly she broke away from his hold. ‘Take me home.’

Without waiting for the song to end, she turned and strode off the dance floor. Scott watched her slim retreating figure with a mixture of disbelief and frustration. Disbelief that a woman he’d always thought of as confident had allowed her ex to undermine her so much: she now genuinely didn’t realise how gorgeous she was. Frustration because she was so determined to always think the worst of him. It wasn't as if he deliberately set out to sleep with a woman and then dump her, just for the thrill of totting-up another conquest. It was more that in his experience, once the heat had dissipated, the relationship fizzled out.

With a deep sigh he followed after her. He wondered, as they trailed to the car, why couldn’t he set his sights on a different woman?
One less willing to judge him, and far more willing to sleep with him.

‘Sally’s father has really done a number on you,’ he remarked evenly as he finally parked outside her house.

Megan turned to face him, her eyes looking luminous in the moonlight. ‘He broke my heart, Scott. Do you even know what that feels like?’

He thought back to the relationships he’d had. Some had been more fun and had ended with more regret on his part. None of them had touched his heart. ‘No,’ he answered shortly.

Then she laughed, a bitter laugh that masked a great deal of hurt.
‘Of course not. It’s men like you that do the breaking.’ She stepped out of the car and briefly looked back at him. ‘What was the length of your longest relationship, Scott?’

He was aware of an uncomfortable flush crossing his face. ‘I can’t recall,’ he replied stiffly.

‘Okay, let’s talk ballpark. Are we talking weeks, months or years?’

Shifting on his seat, he tried to think of a way out of this conversation. He couldn’t. ‘Weeks. But that’s totally irrelevant.’

‘Is it?’ Carefully she shut the door. ‘Thanks for an interesting evening.’

Watching her disappearing up the driveway Scott
realised, with more than a touch of despair, why he had no interest in any other woman. Even angry with him, she was by far the most sexy, strong-minded and, damn it all,
fascinating
woman he’d ever met.

Chapter Nine

Scott figured he had nothing to lose by asking Megan out again. Either she’d laugh in his face, in which case he’d put the phone down and try again the following day, or she’d
realise he wasn’t going to give up and agree straight away, saving them both a lot of hassle.

‘How about another drink?’ he asked as soon as she answered.

He heard her sigh. It was a sound he was getting quite familiar with. ‘Are you out of your mind? I’d have thought the last non-date we had was bad enough to put even you off.’

He winced at the emphasis on the
even.
So, it looked like she was going to choose the first, laugh-in-his-face, option. Well, he had the stomach for a long chase. ‘As a matter of fact, I enjoyed our evening,’ he asserted. ‘Well, the bit before you walked out on me on the dance floor.’

‘If I recall correctly, you forgot the ground rules.’

No, he hadn’t forgotten them. He just wasn’t prepared to play by them. ‘A drink,’ he repeated. ‘You and me. Just friends.’

There was a gaping silence. He could almost hear her brain ticking over, wondering how to turn him down without giving him the opportunity to accuse her of being scared. ‘This is ridiculous,’ she finally replied. ‘We don’t even like each other all that much.’

‘Hey, I like you. And it will only take one more drink to convince you that actually, even though I’m a lawyer, I’m quite likable, too.’

He couldn’t be certain, but he had a feeling she was reluctantly smiling on the other end of the phone. ‘Okay. One more drink. Absolutely no dancing or touching of any kind.’

‘What if our fingers accidentally meet when I hand you your drink?’

‘Then you might accidentally end up with it running down your shirt.’

He had no doubt that she would do that, too. ‘You strike a tough bargain, detective, but I guess if that’s the best you can offer, I’ll have to take it.’

A satisfied smile spread across his features as he put down the phone. On the face of it a drink-only date, which offered no opportunity for touching, wasn’t a great achievement. But Scott knew there were some things in life that were important to approach slowly. When he put together a case he built it up carefully, starting from the bottom, rather than rushing straight for the jugular. Getting Megan to go out with him required a similar skill. Taking small steps, building a solid foundation. He’d kissed her once and experienced her instinctive response. She’d been like molten lava under his touch. He was quietly confident that at some point he’d get to sample that again. Until then, as long as he was seeing her, she would be thinking of him.

A few days after the ball, and just over a week after their first drink together, Megan found herself once more in the same bar, with the same man. She must be out of her tiny little mind. He pushed, she ran. That was the plan. So how come she was meeting him for another drink? Despite the conversation they’d had, she knew very well that Scott wasn’t taking her friendship rule seriously. He was still hell-bent on getting her into bed. The thought both alarmed and excited her. No matter what she might say out loud, there was no doubt that having a sexy man chase her, look at her with the
smouldering intensity that Scott did, thrust all sensible thoughts out of her head. It was thrilling –scary as hell, but undeniably thrilling. So long as she kept her head and didn’t start to believe she was anything more than a challenge to him, having the occasional drink together could be fun. Couldn’t it?

He placed the ice-cold lagers on
to the table and sat down opposite her once more. Somewhere between the bar and the table he’d taken off his tie and loosened his collar. He’d also run a hand through his dark hair, leaving it slightly dishevelled. It was as if he knew she preferred the more casual look on him. The one that had him looking less like a lawyer.

‘How are things down at the station?’ he asked as he took his first sip. ‘Caught any bad guys recently?’

‘A few. Let any off, recently?’ She’d intended her reply to be a joke, but from the way his eyes immediately shuttered, she could see it hadn’t been taken as one.

‘We never did touch on that particular objection you had against me, did we?’

She held up her hand. ‘I’m sorry. I was trying to make a clever reply, that’s all. A poor attempt at witty banter. Please, forget I said it.’

Above his clear grey eyes, his brows knitted together. ‘No, I don’t think I can. You clearly have something against what I do and, I guess, looking at it from your point of view, I can see why. Equally, as a key player in the justice system, you can surely appreciate that it’s vitally important that
every accused person is entitled to defend themselves in court. What was it that William Blackstone said?
It is better that ten guilty persons escape than that one innocent suffer.’

She acknowledged the truth of his words with a small sigh. ‘I can accept that, but I find it hard to understand how you can defend those you know perfectly well are just plain guilty.’

‘I don’t know they’re guilty. I can assess the evidence against them, see how strong it is, but I don’t know if they’re guilty any more than you do.’

‘Okay, okay, a clever use of words, but you know what I mean. There are some cases where it’s blindingly obvious.’

‘To you, maybe, but when I take on a case I always tell myself that the client is innocent. That way I ensure I do a proper job.’ He cradled his hands around his glass. ‘It’s my job to make sure the jury see both sides to any argument, Megan. My ethical duty to point out any flaws in the prosecution case.’ His face grew sober. Grim almost. ‘People should lose their freedom only if there is really strong evidence to justify it. Not because of the whim of a dirty cop who wants to big up his number of collars.’

‘Now wait a minute.’ For a moment she’d been enjoying debating with him, pitting her wits against his, but now he’d gone too far. ‘Is that what you think motivates us? Numbers?’

‘No,’ he replied quickly. ‘Not all of you. Not even most of you. But some of you?’ He looked her straight in the eye, his eyes like granite. Cool and hard. ‘A very small minority of you, yes.’

There was something in the way he looked at her that told her he wasn’t saying this to upset her. He was saying it because he genuinely believed it. ‘Have you had experience of this?’ she asked quietly.

‘It happens.’ Scott felt the familiar bile rise in his stomach and quickly moved to another topic. ‘What motivates you, Megan? What made you want to become a detective?’

If she was surprised by the change of subject, she didn’t show it. He’d come to
realise that Megan wasn’t often wrong-footed. ‘The desire to do good. To follow in my father’s footsteps.’

‘Yeah, I heard your Dad was a police detective, too. That must’ve been tough, growing up with a father in the force.’

Her eyes flickered. ‘It had its moments. Kids can be cruel sometimes.’

Didn’t he know it? ‘I’m guessing they only dared go so far. The thought of your father appearing on their doorstep must have put the fear of God into them.’

She smiled and his heart seemed to lift a little in his chest. ‘He was pretty scary. Still is, sometimes.’

‘I bet you can twist him around your little finger though, when you want to.’

Her face relaxed and she laughed.  A soft, sexy sound that made more than his heart stir this time.

‘I bet I can.’ Glancing down at her watch she drained the rest of her pint. ‘Well, it’s been,’ she searched for a word, ‘interesting, but I’ve got to go. I have a daughter waiting to hear her bedtime story.’

Nodding he stood up and went to ease back her chair. ‘Why don’t we have a meal next time? I’ll pick you up. What time does Sally go to bed?’

‘Err, around half seven, but—’

‘Good. I’ll come by just before that so I can say hello.’

She blew out a deep breath. ‘Scott, I’ve already told you—’

‘Where is the harm in a meal between friends?’

‘Is that what we really are?’ she asked, moving so she could study him with her cool blue eyes. ‘Friends?’

‘For the time being, yes.’ Taking her elbow he led her through the thronging crowd of after-work drinkers and over to her car. Once there, he positioned his body so that she was between him and the driver’s door. ‘Of course the more you get to know me, ‘ he told her softly, his face inches from hers, ‘the more you’re going to fall for my not inconsiderable charm and outrageous good looks. Then you’ll find you want nothing more than to get into bed with me.’

Before she had a chance to say anything, and her flashing eyes said she had plenty of retorts, he kissed her. It wasn’t for as long as he’d have liked, but when her hands crept into his hair and pulled him even closer to her, he was pretty certain he’d made his point. That was when he drew back.

Opening the car door for her, he waited until she was settled into the driver’s seat before giving her a final peck on the cheek. ‘Until  next time, Megan.’

The barefaced arrogance of the man, Megan repeatedly muttered to herself the next morning, as she attempted to break the back of her mounting paperwork. She still couldn’t get Scott’s parting words out of her head. Nor could she forget the way he’d kissed her. And her inflamed reaction to him. If that was how he kissed a friend, what on earth did he do to a lover? And why was part of her aching to find out?

‘So, how was date number three?’ Ann popped her head around the door. ‘Or was it four? I forget, because I think you claim that the meal at your house shouldn’t be counted as a date.’

‘None of them were dates,’ she muttered darkly. ‘And if you want to hear the details, you need to come in. And close the door behind you.’

Ann’s eyes lit up.
‘Ooh, details that require privacy. Excellent.’

Laughing, Megan
swivelled her chair round so she was facing her friend. ‘The details don’t require any privacy, but I do.’

After pulling the door firmly shut, Ann crossed her arms and gave Megan the look she gave anyone she was about to interrogate. ‘Come on then, spill.’

‘He kissed me again.’

Ann’s eyes widened in shock.
‘Again? Why didn’t I hear about the first time?’

‘Because it was nothing.
It was when he came round to my parent’s house.’

‘You’re telling me the man looks like a God, but can’t kiss?’

Megan fiddled with the pen on her desk. ‘Okay, maybe it was a lot more than nothing.’

Suddenly Ann grinned. ‘I’d say, missy. Your bright red cheeks are rather giving that one away.’

Unconsciously Megan’s hand went up to touch one of her, yes okay, distinctly warm cheeks. ‘All right, I admit, the man can kiss. Really, totally-lose-yourself-in-the-moment, kiss. The first time, we’d just climbed off his bike and he kind of swooped. I forgot I wasn’t meant to like him. Forgot my parents might be watching. Forgot everything.’

There was an explosion of laughter from the other side of the desk. ‘Meg, honey, this has all the ingredients of a raunchy film. The bad-boy lawyer in his black leathers, sitting on his bike, snogging the uptight detective in front of her parents.’

‘I’m not uptight.’

Ann cast an eye up and down Megan’s admittedly sensible work shirt and dark trousers. ‘So says the woman who’s been out with the dashing lawyer four times, kissed him twice and still insists they’re just friends.’

Megan let out a sigh of resignation. ‘I’m being stupid, aren’t I? It feels like I’m trying to push back this giant wave, but in reality it’s going to roll over and suck me up anyway.’

‘Being caught up in a wave doesn’t have to be a scary experience, Meg,’ Ann told her, reaching out to give her arm a quick squeeze. ‘Not if you relax and give in to the thrill of it.’

Perhaps, Megan thought. But once you’d been churned up and spat out by a powerful wave, it was pretty hard to relax at the sight of another one relentlessly surging towards you.