A Groom For The Taking: The Wedding Date

Either way, the sound of the lift opening registered somewhere in the fuzz that was Hannah’s brain at about the same time she felt Bradley’s arms unwinding from around her.

She looked into his eyes, confusion taking hold of her still liquefied system. But she didn’t have time to decipher a thing as a pile of Elyse’s friends spilled out of the lift, laughing, screaming, half way to being drunk.

She scrambled to fix her hair. Her lipstick. Her crumpled clothes. Then saw her discarded shoes were in their stumbling path. She leapt away from Bradley, grabbed the shoes out of their way before somebody impaled themselves on a stiletto.

‘Hannah Banana!’ one of Elyse’s oldest friends called out, grabbing her and trying to pull her in their wake. She managed to extricate herself and tell them to have fun. And then, as suddenly as they’d appeared, there was nothing left of them but their echoing laughter.

The quiet foyer was filled with nothing but the sound of her puffing breaths. Adrenalin poured through her like a flood, till her body shook from the shock. Her body—which was still throbbing from head to toe as it baked in the intensity of Bradley’s kiss.

Bradley.

Shoes gripped in her tight fist, she glanced up to find him watching her. A huge dark shadow of a figure in the pale moonlight. Hands in pockets. Still as a mountain.

The lift ‘binged’ again. This time instinct had her stepping inside. The doors started to close until she reached out and held them at bay.

‘Coming up?’ she asked, shoes swinging against her leg.

A muscle worked in his jaw as he flicked a glance up in the direction of their suite. Then he took a step back. ‘You go. I’m going to track down a nightcap.’

The fact that they had a crazily well-stocked bar in their über-suite seemed to have eluded him. Or perhaps not. Hannah felt a wretched little cramp in her stomach. She wished Elyse’s friends would return, so she could throttle them one by one.

‘Okay,’ she sing-songed, as though she didn’t realise she’d just been wholeheartedly rejected. Then, falling back into ever helpful assistant mode, she said, ‘I’m pretty sure the foyer bar is open all night.’

He nodded. Yet didn’t move.

The cramp in her stomach gave way to hope. Maybe he was being a gentleman, waiting for a sign from her. Though she wasn’t sure she knew a bigger sign than throwing herself into a guy’s arms and wrapping her thighs around him.

The lift ‘binged’ several times, ready to get a move on. She clenched her teeth and jabbed at the ‘open door’ button till it shut the hell up. Didn’t it realise what a delicate moment this was?

Maybe that was the problem. Maybe subtlety didn’t work on mountains. Maybe the guy needed not a sign but a sledgehammer.

‘Bradley, would you like to—?’

‘Get some sleep.’ He cut her off. ‘It’s been a big day.’

Her stomach sank like a stone dropped into the lake behind their hotel. She desperately tried to locate some dormant thread of sophistication somewhere inside her but just ended up babbling. ‘Right. Sleep. What a great idea. Just what I need.’

Clearly to him what had just happened was just a kiss. And a little necking. And, okay, some extremely dextrous fondling. Maybe it was an everyday occurrence for him and it had simply been her turn. Maybe she’d come on too strong and he already regretted it. Maybe. But then again he’d absolutely come on to her first.

As her head began to spin, the only thing Hannah knew was that she should take his advice and get the hell out of there before she said or did something really stupid.

She looked away to jab hard and fast at the number for their floor. ‘Goodnight, Bradley.’

He nodded. ‘I’ll see you in the morning.’

Slowly, slowly the lift door closed. When her own reflection stared back at her and the lift began to rumble she could still see his face clear as day. Dark. Stormy. Stoic.

Somehow, some way, whatever forces had come together to create that moment back there had disappeared as if in a puff of smoke. If only she knew why.

CHAPTER SEVEN (#ulink_0c75d6b4-43e6-5400-8b91-d213b330163e)

BRADLEY cradled the now lukewarm cup of coffee in his palms as he sat in the big, empty foyer bar.

Unfortunately the mind-numbing normality of a late-night coffee hadn’t done a damn thing to numb one bit of him.

He wasn’t a reckless man. Even as he’d lowered his head to kiss Hannah’s soft, pink smiling lips he’d known there would be consequences. He’d weighed them, measured them, and decided that after negotiating such a riotous night with commendable finesse a celebratory kiss was a pretty fine idea.

What he hadn’t expected was for the effortless sensuality she wore so lightly to explode into a raging furnace the second his lips had touched hers. Though that he could handle.

What had him sitting alone in a bar at three in the morning was, ‘If I’d had a clue this would feel this good I’d never have been able to hold back all those months.’

Her words hadn’t stopped ringing inside his head since he’d sat down.

It appeared as though Hannah had feelings for him. Perhaps only nascent ones, but that was still too much. He’d never let himself become involved with any woman who didn’t view relationships with the same lack of gravity he did. Doing so would be nothing short of hypocritical. He knew all too well how it felt to have the world you thought you knew cut out from under you.

So why did the same mouth that back-chatted constantly, barked remonstrations whenever he ran late, and grinned delightedly any time he was pushed outside of his comfort zone have to be an instant gateway to paradise?

Dammit. He pushed the porcelain cup aside in frustration.

‘Another, Mr Knight?’ the barman asked.

‘No thanks, mate,’ he said, his voice ragged. ‘I think I’ve done enough damage for the night.’

‘Very good, sir.’

Bradley hauled his heavy self from the bar stool and walked slowly to the lift. Standing on the very spot where for the sake of that mouth he’d ignored the signs and kissed her anyway.

The lift door opened and he stepped inside. He looked at his feet rather than his reflection in the mirrored doors, not wanting to look himself in the eye as he considered things again.

Hannah liked him. He’d never use that to his advantage. If he did he’d be no better than those who’d hurt him in the pursuit of making their own lives a tad more comfortable.

Even though she kissed like a siren. As if there was a fountain of untapped heat bubbling beneath her small frame. As if she wanted nothing more than for him to be the one to release it.

All he could hope was that by the time he got back to their shared suite Hannah’s room would be dark and quiet. Then he could retire to his own room, strip down, open his bedroom window as wide as it would go and let lashings of bitterly ice-cold air do what will-power and boiling hot coffee could not.

Bradley shut the suite door behind him as quietly as humanly possible. Ears pricked, he couldn’t hear anything beyond the faint swoosh of winter wind gently buffeting the unadorned windows that stretched the entire length of the shared living space.

He shucked off his shoes and lifted a foot to sneak to his room. Then he heard a noise. His whole body clenched and adrenalin kicked his senses into overdrive.

He heard it again. It sounded like the clink of glass on wood. Probably a tree branch scraping against the window. Only one way to be sure.

He padded down the wide steps into the lounge, to find all the lights were off bar a lamp at one end of the modern cream leather fourseater couch. Beneath the lamp a magazine was open and turned face-down. In the far corner of the room embers burned red in the fireplace. It seemed Hannah hadn’t been able to instantly fall into the sleep of the innocent either.

The clink pinged in his ears again and he turned towards the sound. It was coming from the corner of the room in which the spa pool sat, tucked into an alcove with a window overlooking the forest. It was hidden discreetly from view behind a half-wall.

Blood pumping in his ears, Bradley took two more steps. The deep dark blue of a large square dipping pool came slowly into view …

And there she was.