Sophie parked her SUV in a space half a block short of Alfresco, so that if Francesca was meeting Ben she would be able to see her approaching from the opposite direction. As she turned the ignition off, a muscular four-wheel-drive Jeep cruised slowly past. She caught a glimpse of tanned cheekbones and a tough jaw and froze. It was Ben, looking remote behind a pair of dark glasses.
Her mood plummeted. If Ben was here, then Francesca had to be meeting him.
She considered ducking down but decided against it. She was pretty sure Ben didn’t know what her vehicle looked like. Plus, she was wearing the ball cap, so it wasn’t likely he would recognize her anyway. When she caught the movement of his head, as if he was checking out something in the rearview mirror, she stiffened, then common sense kicked in. He was looking to park, so of course he would check for traffic behind him.
Nevertheless, she slunk down a little lower in her seat and watched until his Jeep pulled over, just a few spaces ahead. Seconds later, without looking in her direction, he strolled into the restaurant. Letting out a relieved breath that he hadn’t seen her after all, she checked her watch. Now that the air-conditioning was off, the SUV was heating up. She noticed a heavy buildup of dark clouds, which accounted for the increased humidity.
As the minutes ticked by and she didn’t spot anyone remotely resembling Francesca walking into Alfresco, she pondered what to do. Maybe it was a huge coincidence that Ben was here, but how likely was that? She had to conclude that Francesca had arrived early and was already waiting inside for him.
That conclusion should have been enough, except that a stubborn part of her wanted absolute proof; she needed to see them together. Grabbing her handbag, she stepped out into the breathless heat, locked the SUV and started toward the restaurant.
As she walked along the sidewalk, the sun was blotted out by a large purple cloud, and thunder sounded in the distance. But the threat of a cooling downpour didn’t seem to make any difference to the air, which was hot and compressed and humid, opening every pore.
She reached the restaurant and took out her phone, pretending to be absorbed by the screen as she surreptitiously checked out the diners visible in Alfresco’s windows. Frustratingly, Ben and Francesca were not there, which meant they were seated farther back, possibly even in the shady little courtyard out back.
Perspiration coated her skin and trickled down her spine as she tried to decide what to do next. She undid a button of her shirt and flapped the damp material in an effort to create a cooling draft. She longed to rip the cap off and throw it away. But now that the initial surge of hurt and anger had passed, her usual clarity was returning. She had come this far; she wasn’t going home without proof. She needed to see Ben and Francesca together.
Large droplets of rain made the decision for her. She was going in. If Ben and Francesca saw her then, that was a risk she had to take. As she neared the front door of the restaurant, an unexpected solution presented itself. A large group of young people who were seated outside, alarmed by the impending downpour, now wanted to be reseated inside. She let them dash into Alfresco ahead of her, then stepped into the foyer directly behind them. To any casual onlooker, she hoped it would appear that she was with them.
She had kept her sunglasses on, which made things a little dim, but even so she saw the back of Francesca’s head almost immediately. She was alone. A cautious wave of relief went through Sophie. Francesca had her laptop out, which meant she was probably working on a design project, something she sometimes did in cafés. Although that didn’t mean she wasn’t also meeting Ben.
A waitress was in the process of showing the chattering group ahead of her to tables when she saw Ben step in from the rear door, which led to the courtyard, and slide into the seat opposite Francesca. He had a cell in his hand, which meant he had probably just stepped outside for a few minutes to take a private call. As he sat, his head came up and his gaze locked unerringly with Sophie’s.
For a split second she froze like a deer in the headlights, then a whole raft of feelings hit: confusion, humiliation, hurt. When she had seen Ben with the anonymous blonde at Nick’s launch party, she had been coolly, quietly furious. But this was different: Francesca was her sister. Ben had crossed an unforgivable line.
Pulse pounding, she turned on her heel and walked outside. Still on automatic pilot, she threaded her way through the now vacated outdoor tables. Cool air laced with droplets of rain hit her as she headed for her car. She dragged off her sunglasses and dropped them in her bag. She was within sight of her SUV when thunder detonated overhead. Glad that she had thought to pack a small umbrella, she retrieved it from her handbag and flipped it open. Seconds later, torrential rain crashed down.
Ben’s gleaming black Jeep loomed out of the blanket of rain. She deliberately gave it a wide berth. Some preternatural instinct made her glance over her shoulder. She glimpsed the unmistakable figure of Ben as he stepped out of the restaurant.
Her heart slammed against her chest and she quickened her pace. She vetoed the thought that he was coming after her. He was probably just heading to his Jeep. After all, he had only glimpsed her in a darkened foyer, and she had been in disguise and wearing sunglasses. How could he possibly have known it was her?
And why should she be worried if he had recognized her? She wasn’t the one who was sneaking around. All she had wanted to do was confirm whether or not her twin was meeting with her ex-lover. She had done nothing wrong.
Annoyed with her panicked overreaction, Sophie forced herself to relax and slowed her pace to a sedate stroll. Ben might have a lot of sterling attributes, but the last she’d heard he did not have supernatural powers.
Ben called her name.
Adrenaline pumped. Sucking in a deep breath, Sophie kept her nerve. If she didn’t respond, but kept walking as if the name Sophie meant nothing to her, maybe Ben would think he was wrong and give up.
Her SUV loomed through the steady rain. Fingers shaking annoyingly, she found the keys to the SUV and deactivated the lock.
A distant clap of thunder signaled that the short, violent squall was moving away. The heavy rain ceased as suddenly as if someone had turned off a tap.
With controlled haste, she put the umbrella down. Another step and her fingers closed around the handle of the driver’s side door, but her heady moment of triumph that she had avoided Ben was cut short by his deep voice. “Damn, it is you.”
She yanked open the driver-side door of the SUV, but before she could climb behind the wheel, a hand curled briefly around her wrist, almost stopping her heart.
She spun, outraged that Ben had touched her, even if he had released her almost immediately. She glared at him, noting with grim satisfaction that while she was relatively dry, he was soaked, his black T-shirt plastered to his shoulders and chest and water dripping from his hair. But soaked to the skin, he somehow managed to look larger and edgier than usual.
“Did I give you permission to follow me, or touch me?” She rubbed her wrist to underscore the severity of the touching transgression. “The short answer to both questions is no.”
Ben’s gaze was cool and disconcertingly direct. “What are you doing here? Now?”
She shook out her umbrella and tossed it on the back seat. “Not that it’s any of your business, but I, too, have an arrangement to meet Francesca.”
Gratifyingly, a faint hint of color burned on his cheekbones. “I thought that was at six.”
She extracted her phone from her bag and placed the bag on the passenger-side seat. “So, I’m early.”
“Way early. You were already parked when I arrived—”
She spun and glared at Ben. “Meaning what? That I’m spying on you? What makes you think I would even want to spy—”
He lifted the cap off her head. “The way you’re dressed, for a start.”
Embarrassed heat burned through her as she snatched the damp cap from his fingers and tossed it onto the back seat along with the umbrella. So much for going undercover. “Last I heard you aren’t a member of the fashion police.”
She should leave. The problem was, arguing with Ben was addictive and oddly satisfying. Until that moment she hadn’t realized how furious she was with him.
She met his gaze squarely. “And what would you know about how I dress, or actually, anything about me at all? We’ve dated twice. In actual fact, they don’t even count as dates, because you never asked me out. I just happened to be there, and it was just casual sex, which is horrible to think of when you were the first—”
His gaze sharpened. “The first what?”
Her jaw locked, but there was no point trying to cover up what she had almost said, because she could see by his expression that he knew.
Ben felt like he’d just been kicked in the chest.
When he spoke the words rasped out of him. “Are you telling me that, a year ago, before we made love, you were a virgin?”
Sophie’s expression became smoothly blank as suddenly as if a blind had dropped. She glanced at her watch. “Well, this has been fun, but I need to get moving.”
And right there he had his confirmation, because if Sophie hadn’t been a virgin she would have made very sure he understood that fact. Instead, she was trying to fob him off, as if he was an underperforming employee or one of her dates whose services she no longer needed.
With the revelation that Sophie had been a virgin, suddenly, a number of puzzling details fell into place. Sophie’s touch-me-not manner and the formidable reputation she had garnered for preselecting, vetting and controlling her dates. It might also explain how from the time they had first met, it had taken eighteen months of simmering attraction and cool distance before they finally did go to bed.
He was beginning to understand why Sophie had been so angry with him when he had walked away a year ago. At the time he had thought she had set out to seduce him because he had just inherited a fortune, but that was the kind of move a more experienced woman undertook. Understanding that she had been a virgin put a whole new slant on what had happened.
He considered that she could have intended to use her virginity to ensnare him, but he instantly discarded the thought for the plain fact that she hadn’t ever told him she was a virgin.
Added to that, Sophie had never tried to place pressure on him, and with the financial power wielded by her brothers and their business connections, she could have. Instead, she had done the exact opposite. The instant he had walked away, she had set about publicly and effectively ditching him, to the point that even Nick had commiserated with him. The clincher was that, even when they had slept together the other night, she hadn’t mentioned the fact that she had been a virgin the first time they had made love.
If he hadn’t come after her now, he doubted he would ever have found out. Sophie would have closed up and cut him out of her life, the way she had before.
But now he did know, and the knowledge changed everything.
He was beginning to understand that, unlike a lot of the women he had dated over the years, what you saw with Sophie was only the tip of the iceberg. He was also beginning to understand that the more she felt, the more closed off she became. Getting to know Sophie Messena was like peeling an onion, and the layers were fascinating and frustrating. In a curious way, it made sense of his obsession, because if Sophie had been easy to figure out, he would have walked away without a backward glance.
The ring tone of a phone cut through the sound of traffic and the distant rumble of thunder. Giving him a cool glance, Sophie dug her phone out of her bag and half turned away to take the call.
Ben caught the name John and every muscle in his body tightened. It had to be John Atraeus, and Sophie’s lowered tones, her attempts to keep the call private, confirmed it. She repeated a date and a time, which were instantly recognizable to Ben because he had received a courtesy invitation for the opening of Atraeus’s new mall complex in Manhattan on that date. If he didn’t miss his guess, Sophie had just agreed to go as Atraeus’s date.
Over his dead body.
The fierce surge of possessiveness that accompanied the thought was clarifying.
He had spent the past few days, the past year, attempting to dismiss what he felt for Sophie. She was too high-maintenance, too problematic and, with her wealth and connections, she reminded him of his ex-fiancée. Nothing about Sophie’s cool elegance or sharp business focus had suggested that she was even remotely capable of fulfilling his own need for a relationship based on emotional warmth and family values. Now, in the space of a split second, everything had changed.
“That was Atraeus.”
Sophie’s fiery gaze clashed with his. “It was John. Not that it’s any of your bus—”
“Atraeus is all wrong for you. You’d be bored within a month.”
She shoved the phone back into her bag. “What you know about me would fit on the back of a postage stamp. Just because I made a mistake and slept with you doesn’t mean you can have an opinion, or interfere in my love life.”
Ben crossed his arms over his chest. “I talked to Atraeus a couple of hours ago, when he forgot to join a conference call we’d arranged. He told me about the car accident and the amnesia.”
Sophie leveled him with a chilly gaze. “And your point would be?”
“You didn’t sleep with him. Just like you didn’t sleep with that other guy.”
“Which other guy would that be? In the last year I’ve dated quite a few very attractive men. I’m pretty sure the number stands at around twelve, not including John.”
“That’s a lot of one-night stands.”
Sophie’s brows jerked together. “I don’t do one-night stands.”
And with that statement, a vital piece of information clicked into place. “But you did with me,” he said softly.
Sophie seemed to freeze in place. “Sleeping with you was a mistake. Both times.”
But she had slept with him, when he was suddenly certain that she had not slept with anyone else, yet.
Atraeus had been a smoke screen so far, just as the guy she had dated a few days after their first night together had been a year ago.
After talking with Atraeus, he had done some checking online. It hadn’t taken long to discover that most of the men Sophie dated had only lasted the one date. The overwhelming picture was of Sophie organizing her social life by picking safe, controllable men for various occasions. Probably by interview, he thought.
The knowledge that Sophie had only ever been his settled in.
Just minutes ago he had been caught in the grip of obsessive desire. That hadn’t changed. What had changed was the raw surge of possessiveness that was now part of that desire.
And the knowledge that if he didn’t claim Sophie, John Atraeus—with his reputation for running through beautiful women—would.
In that moment something shifted and settled inside him. Yesterday, all he had wanted to do was purge himself of his obsession with a woman he thought was driven by cold practicality and his bottom line. But in the space of a few minutes everything had changed. Sophie Messena was complex, intriguing and unexpectedly vulnerable, and he wanted her back in his arms and in his bed.
And Sophie Messena wanted him. Nothing else explained the fact that she had slept with him, twice.
But getting seriously involved with Sophie Messena could have only one outcome: marriage.
He had been on the verge of canceling his date with Francesca tomorrow, but he decided to stay with the program for two very good reasons. If he took Sophie with him tomorrow and Buffy made a play for him, Sophie would go nuts, and the last thing he needed was a scene. Added to that, he needed some time to figure out how this was all going to happen, because getting involved with Sophie Messena would send ripples through every avenue of his life, personal and business. That left him still needing a date to neutralize the pressure Holt was applying for Ben to cement their business relationship by marrying his daughter. At this point, the way he saw it, he couldn’t afford to cancel the date with Francesca.
A last remnant of the storm whipped hair across Sophie’s face. She hooked a glossy strand behind one ear and shot him a defiant gaze. “Shouldn’t you be getting back to Francesca?”
The satiny tumble of dark hair around her shoulders, when normally Sophie’s hair was pinned smoothly back, spun Ben back to the last time they had made love. It made him abruptly aware of the mistakes he had made with Sophie and the need to soften his approach. With Atraeus in the wings, he also had to think about staking some kind of claim. It was a complete about-face, but finding out that Sophie had been a virgin, and that she had only ever belonged to him, had changed the rules.
His gaze locked with hers. “Did you get my roses?”
She looked briefly confused. “What roses?”
“The ones I sent after Nick’s party.”
She frowned, tilting her head slightly to one side as if she was having trouble remembering. “I seem to remember some flowers arriving. Were they from you? I couldn’t tell.”
Ben guessed he deserved that since he hadn’t enclosed a note, but that didn’t change the fact that, suddenly, he was ticked. “Were you expecting flowers from someone else? Atraeus, for example?”
“If Atraeus—John—sent me flowers that would be none of your business.”
Ben’s jaw locked. “Atraeus won’t be sending you flowers.”
And the gloves were off. Her eyes shot dark fire as she stepped closer and jabbed a finger at his chest. “I don’t see why it should matter to you one way or the other.”
Sophie was so close he could feel the heat from her skin, smell the delicate, exotic scent of her perfume, see the dark shadows beneath her eyes as if she hadn’t slept. Join the club, he thought, and his control shredded.
Catching her hand in his, he spread it against his chest.
“This is why.”
He took a half step forward, and a split second later, his mouth came down on hers.