Powerful and Proud: Beneath the Veil of Paradise / In the Heat of the Spotlight / His Brand of Passion

You seem sad.

‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’ As far as come-backs went, it sucked. And her voice sounded horribly brittle. But Millie didn’t have anything better. Averting her eyes, she slipped out her smart phone and punched in a few numbers. Chase watched her without speaking, yet she felt something from him. Something dark, knowing and totally unexpected.

‘What’s your name?’ he finally asked and, knowing she was being rude, she didn’t look up from her phone.

‘Millie Lang.’ No work emails. Damn.

‘What’s that short for? Millicent? Mildred?’

She finally glanced up, saw him still studying her. ‘Camilla.’

‘Camilla,’ he repeated, savouring the syllables, drawing them out with a sensual consideration that didn’t seem forced or fake. ‘I like it.’ He gestured to her phone. ‘So what’s going on in the real world, Camilla? Your stock portfolio sound? Work managing without you?’

She flushed and put her phone away. She’d just been about to check NASDAQ. For the fifth time today. ‘Everything ship-shape. And please don’t call me Camilla.’

‘You prefer Millie?’

‘Clearly.’

He laughed. ‘This is going to be a fun evening, I can tell.’

Her flush intensified, swept down her body. What a mistake this was—a stupid, stupid mistake. Had she actually thought she could do this—have dinner, have fun, flirt? All ridiculous.

‘Maybe I should just go.’ She half-rose from her chair, but Chase stopped her with one hand on her wrist. The touch of his fingers, long, lean and cool against that tender skin, felt like a bomb going off inside her body. Not just the usual tingle of attraction, the shower of sparks that was your body’s basic reaction to a good-looking guy. No, a bomb. She jerked her hand away, heard her breath come out in a rush. ‘Don’t—’

‘Whoa.’ He held his hands up in front of him. ‘Sorry, my mistake.’ But he didn’t look sorry. He looked like he knew exactly what she’d just experienced. ‘I meant what I said, Millie. It’s going to be a fun evening. I like a challenge.’

‘Oh, please.’ His stupid comment made her feel safe. She wanted this Chase to be exactly what she’d thought he was: attractive, arrogant and utterly unthreatening.

Chase grinned. ‘I knew you’d expect me to say that.’ And, just like that, she was back to wondering. Millie snatched up a menu.

‘Shall we order?’

‘Drinks first.’

‘I’ll have a glass of Chardonnay with ice, please.’

‘That sounds about right,’ he murmured and rose from the table. Millie watched him walk to the bar, her gaze glued to his easy, long-limbed stride. Yes, she was staring at his butt. He looked good in board shorts.

By sheer force of will she dragged her gaze away from him and stared down at her phone. Why couldn’t she have one work crisis? She’d had a dozen a day when she was in the office. Of course she knew why; she just didn’t like it. Jack had insisted she take a week’s holiday with no interruptions or furtive tele-commuting. She hadn’t taken any in two years, and new company policy—supposedly for the health of its employees—demanded that you use at least half of your paid leave in one year.

What a ridiculous policy.

She wanted to work. She’d been working twelve-, fourteen- and sometimes even sixteen-hour days for two years and screeching to a halt to come here was making her very, very twitchy.

‘Here you go.’ Chase had returned to the table and placed a glass of wine in front of her. Millie eyed his own drink warily; it looked like soda.

‘What are you drinking?’

‘Some kind of cola.’ He shrugged. ‘It’s cold, at least.’

‘Do you have a drinking problem?’ she asked abruptly and he laughed.

‘Good idea, let’s skip right to the important stuff. No, I don’t. I’m just not drinking right now.’ He took a sip of his soda, eyeing her thoughtfully. Millie held his gaze. All right, asking that had been a bit abrupt and even weird, but she’d forgotten how to do chit-chat.

‘So, Millie, where are you from?’

‘New York City.’

‘I suppose I should have guessed that.’

‘Oh, really?’ She bristled. Again. ‘You seem to think you have me figured out.’

‘No, but I tend to be observant. And you definitely have that hard city gloss.’

‘Where are you from, then?’

He gave her one of his toe-curling smiles. His eyes, Millie thought distantly, were so warm. She wanted to curl up in them, which was a nonsensical thought. ‘I’m from New York too.’

‘I suppose I could have guessed that.’

He laughed, a low, rich chuckle. ‘How?’

‘You’ve got that over-privileged, city-boy veneer,’ she responded sweetly, to which he winced with theatrical exaggeration.

‘Ouch.’

‘At least now we understand each other.’

‘Do we?’ he asked softly and Millie focused on her drink. Sip. Stare at the ice cubes bobbing in the liquid. Don’t look at him. ‘Why are you so prickly?’

‘I’m not.’ It was a knee-jerk response. She was being prickly. She hadn’t engaged with a man in any sense in far too long and she didn’t know how to start now. Why had she agreed to this? She took another sip of wine, let the bubbles crisp on her tongue. ‘Sorry,’ she said after a moment. ‘I’m not usually quite this bitchy.’

‘I bring out the best in you?’

‘I suppose you do.’ She met his gaze, meaning to smile with self-deprecating wryness, but somehow her lips froze in something more like a grimace. He was gazing at her with a sudden intentness that made her breath dry and her heart start to pound. She wanted him to be light, wry, shallow. He wasn’t being any of those things right now. And, even when he had been, she had a horrible feeling he’d simply done it by choice.

‘So why are you on St Julian’s?’ he asked.

‘Holiday, of course.’

‘You don’t seem like the type to holiday willingly.’

Which was all too true, but she didn’t like him knowing it, or knowing anything. ‘Oh?’ she asked, glad to hear she was hitting that self-deprecating note she’d tried for earlier. ‘And you know me so well?’

He leaned forward, suddenly predatory. ‘I think I do.’

Her heart still pounding, Millie leaned back as if she actually felt relaxed and arched an eyebrow. ‘How is that?’