To hurt Lynette.
The thought tore at Kia’s insides. She’d never deliberately hurt someone in her life and didn’t appreciate being a part of this now. She’d tell Phillip on the way home and make him promise to set things right after this once and for all.
It was as well the DJ announced he would take a break while they served the meal, and everything became a flurry of people returning to their tables.
All at once she realized Brant was watching her with narrowed intensity. Every instinct inside her told her not to let him figure out the truth just yet. He was the senior partner—the boss—and he would take no hostages.
She felt uneasy as Brant continued to watch them while they worked their way through each course. By the time dessert was served she felt as though her relationship with her new fiancé had been scrutinized.
Suddenly Phillip pushed his wheelchair back from the table and gave a weak smile to the other guests.
“You’ll have to excuse me, but I think I’ll call it a night. My leg is really starting to give me hell.” He looked at Kia apologetically. “Darling, you stay and enjoy yourself.”
She’d been concentrating so hard on Brant that his announcement took her completely by surprise.
Come to think of it, Phillip hadn’t eaten much and he’d been very quiet throughout the meal.
Probably from guilt, she decided, anger building at him even thinking about leaving her here and throwing her to the wolves. Or should that be wolf?
As in, Brant Matthews.
“I’ll come with you,” she said, reaching for her purse, determined to get away from all prying eyes.
He gave her a tired smile that was offset by the wary gleam in his eyes. “There’s no need, darling. I’ll be going straight to bed.”
Kia wasn’t about to let Phillip get away with this. They needed to talk. Tonight.
She pushed her chair back farther. “Still, I think I’ll go home, too.”
Phillip put up a hand. “Please stay, darling. I don’t want to spoil your fun.”
What fun? She didn’t call Brant’s company fun, not with him watching her, waiting. And if Phillip called her “darling” one more time, she was going to scream. She was no man’s “darling,” not when her father liked to call her his “darling girl.”
She turned back to Phillip, ready to insist on going with him. Only the look in his eyes stopped her dead.
Seeing Lynette again had upset him.
Compassion stirred within her, diminishing her anger to a degree. “Okay, Phillip. I understand. You just get plenty of rest so that we can go to the art exhibition tomorrow.” Her eyes said she intended talking to him then about all this.
His eyes darted away uneasily. “I’ll call you in the morning.”
“I’ll make sure she gets home safely,” Brant said out of the blue.
Kia’s heart lurched. She couldn’t imagine being in the confines of a car with Brant. Why, even the ballroom wasn’t enough to stop his silent seduction.
“No, that’s okay,” she said quickly. “I’ll take a taxi.”
“Not in that, you won’t,” Brant said arrogantly, giving her br**sts a raking glance in the clinging silver dress. “There was a woman attacked just last week after she left one of the hotels by herself.”
“Yes, and they caught the guy, remember?” she pointed out, resisting the urge to tug at her bodice and cover her cl**vage. “It was an old boyfriend.” She turned to Phillip. “I’ll be fine.”
But Phillip was frowning. “No, Brant’s right. You’re too attractive to be out on your own late at night.”
Okay, this was getting crazy.
“Phillip, don’t be ridiculous. I’m a grown woman. I know how to take care of myself.”
Phillip opened his mouth, but it was Brant who spoke. “I don’t think it’s ridiculous that your…” He paused. “…fiancé is concerned for your safety.”
She grimaced inwardly. What could she say to that? “Fine. You can drive me home then.”
God help her.
Satisfied with that, Phillip fobbed off someone’s suggestion that they announce the engagement over the microphone before he left. She shuddered at the suggestion, knowing it would be public knowledge soon enough. Oh, heavens, and wasn’t that idiotic journalist who’d written the comment about her getting her hooks into Phillip going to just love all this?
Thankfully Phillip’s male nurse, Rick, was in the hotel and was ready and waiting by the time Kia pushed the wheelchair through the ballroom doors. She tried to speak to Phillip, but all she got was a quick apology and a promise to talk later.
Then Rick wheeled him away. Suddenly the hardest thing to do was turn around and walk back into that room. Brant would be there with his arrogance and his hostility, and if he said so much as one word out of place, she would pour his drink over his head.
She smiled to herself. As a matter of fact, she hoped he did, she mused as she pushed open the doors and immediately felt those hard eyes eating her up from across the room. They scorched her with a look that bordered on physical intensity.
Unable to stop herself, she glanced at Brant. Through the sea of people and smoke-filled air, her knees weakened as sexual heat enveloped her, even as he pretended to be listening to something Simon said to him.
And it was a pretence. Every feminine instinct told her that he’d like nothing more than to sweep her into his arms and lose himself in her body. Her body. She had to remember that’s all he wanted.
“Hey, babe. Wanna dance?”
Startled, she turned and looked into the face of Danny Tripp, the teenage son of one of the executives who worked a few days a week in the accounts department, and who turned beetroot-red whenever she came into the room. She’d never been able to get him to say more than two words at a time.
But not tonight, it seemed. Tonight tall, young, clean-cut Danny Tripp, fortified by alcohol, had a silly grin on his face and was game for anything, especially with a group of his mates egging him on.
Great. Now she had two men lusting after her. Well, one was really only a boy in a man’s body. And the other? Yes, Brant Matthews was all man. And more. Much more.
She glanced across the room and saw the alert look in his eyes that told her he sensed another male moving in on his territory. His territory. How ridiculous to think that way. Yet she couldn’t shake the feeling.
Dragging her gaze away, she gave Danny a friendly smile so that he wouldn’t feel embarrassed in front of his friends. “I’d love to dance with you, Danny.”
“You would?” For a moment he appeared stunned. Then he grabbed her hand and dragged her out onto the dance floor.
She stumbled into his arms when he spun around to face her, and before she knew it, he’d slid his hands onto her hips, pulled her close to his lanky body and buried his face in her hair. There was none of the finesse Brant had exhibited earlier when he’d taken her in his arms. This was pure adolescent male, hungry for sex, and all the better with a woman he fancied.
Slightly alarmed—and hearing his pals’ whistles over the slow music—she put her hands against his chest and forced some distance between them. “Danny, I—”
“Don’t talk, babe.” He went to pull her back into position.
She held firm against him. “Dan-ny…” The tone of her voice must have gotten through to him, because the hold on her h*ps slackened. She breathed a sigh of relief and looked up at him, pleased to see some of the alcoholic glaze disappear from his eyes.
He gave her a self-conscious grin. “Sorry, Kia. I guess you went to my head.”
She relaxed with a smile, finding his boyishness easier to handle. “I think the drink had more to do with it than me.”
He shrugged wryly. “Yeah, well, I’m not used to drinking rum.”
Kia suspected he wasn’t used to drinking at all. “I once got drunk on brandy and was sick for a full week.”
“You got drunk? No foolin’?”
“I was young once, too, you know,” she joked, even while her heart cramped with pain at the reason she
’d been drinking. It had been the day her father had married his second wife. He hadn’t wanted his
“plain-looking” daughter at the wedding—or that’s what he’d been telling her mother when Kia had accidentally picked up the telephone to make a call.
She’d been crushed by his rejection, though at fifteen she should have been used to his insensitivity.
Afterward she’d feigned ignorance when her mother had gently explained about her father’s remarriage.
She had then gone out and gotten rotten drunk at a friend’s party, learning the hard way that drinking didn’t solve a thing.
“I hope you won’t spread that around?” she said now, pushing aside her painful memories to smile up at Danny.
“Er…” His eyes darted to his friends at the table behind them, then back to her. “Sorry. What did you say?”
Someone yelled out, “Yea, Danny,” but she pretended not to notice. They were only having fun. “I said I hope you won’t tell anyone that I once got drunk. I have a reputation to uphold,” she teased.
His gaze went beyond her again, seemed to hesitate. Then, taking a deep breath, he pulled her up close once more. “I won’t say anything,” he said as if whispering sweet nothings in her ear. “I promise, babe.”
He was obviously more concerned with his own reputation than hers, so it was silly to feel a flutter of apprehension just because he wanted to show off for his friends. He was really just a kid who’d had too much to drink.
Should she wait until the music stopped, then go back to her table? Or go now? The room was full of people. Surely nothing would happen to her in the middle of the dance floor….
She jumped when he began to nuzzle her neck. Okay, no way could she let this go any further. “Danny, I—”
“Let the lady go,” a deep male voice said beside them, startling them both, the warning in Brant’s voice clearly evident.
Danny shoved himself away from Kia, a slightly belligerent look on his face until he caught sight of who’d spoken. His cheeks began to turn red as he looked at Brant’s thunderous expression. “I’m sorry, Mr.
Matthews,” he said quickly. “I wasn’t doing anything wrong.”
“I know exactly what you were doing, Daniel.” Brant jerked his head at the table behind them. “I suggest you go back to your table before I decide to tell Mr. Reid what you were trying to do with his PA.”
Danny looked horrified. “I was just fooling around, Mr. Matthews—promise,” he said, then scurried away, obviously terrified he would lose his job.
Kia couldn’t help but feel sorry for the young man. Brant could be a formidable figure when he chose to be, though why he chose to throw his weight around now was anybody’s guess.
She winced inwardly. That wasn’t quite true. She knew exactly why he wanted Danny away from her.
But before she could think further, Brant swept her into his arms and began to lead her around the dance floor. His touch was impersonal enough, so why did she feel acutely aware of him and his sexual power over her?
Angry with herself for her reaction, she shot him a look that would make a lesser man stumble. “You didn’t need to frighten him like that.”
“Yes, I did.”
And she saw that deep down he did. It fit his dangerous persona. The predator who never gave up his prey without a fight. All very subliminal, yet it was there, hidden beneath his civilized exterior. God, was she the only one who saw it? Who felt it? She must be.
She swallowed a lump of apprehension. “You had no right to interfere.”
His grip tightened. “I had every right. Philip would expect me to protect his…fiancée.”
She ignored another insulting pause. “Danny’s just a boy. He was having some fun, that’s all.”
A cynical smile immediately twisted his lips. “He’s a young man who was almost having his way with you right there on the floor.” He shrugged. “But, hey, if that’s how you get your kicks, then maybe—”
“Shut up, Brant.”
For a moment it was hard to tell who was the more surprised, but then a satisfied light came into his blue eyes. “Hurrah! She said my name.”
Kia found herself exchanging a subtle look of amusement with him. Okay, so he’d won that small victory.
She could allow him that, seeing he really had saved her from a possibly unpleasant situation.
“If it’ll make you feel any better, I’ll talk to Danny on Monday,” he said. “For now, it’ll do him good to stew over the weekend. He needs to learn a lesson about not making a move on the boss’s woman.”
Which boss? she wanted to ask, a tingle running down her spine at the thought of being Brant’s woman.
She grimaced. One of Brant’s women. “Thank you.”
There was a moment’s pause, then, “So congratulations are in order,” he said in a harsh voice that suddenly matched his eyes.
Unable to bring herself to say yes, she merely nodded.
“I’m surprised,” he continued. “Most women couldn’t have kept it a secret.”
“I’m not most women.”
“True.” But it didn’t sound like a compliment. His burning gaze slid down the column of her throat, to the necklace, and rested there for a moment. “Diamonds look good on you,” he said almost as if he disliked her for it. “Another expensive gift from Phillip?”
“Another?”
“As well as the Porsche.”
Good grief. Did he think Phillip had bought the car for her? She felt her cheeks redden. “Phillip did not give me the Porsche.”
His eyes flickered with surprise. “But he gave you the necklace, right?” His expression darkened, grew stormy. “He’s generous to a fault.”