"So I"ve kept you from your family."
She shrugged. "It doesn"t matter. I"ll go next weekend."
"Go tomorrow," he said. "Remember, you have the next two days off in lieu for this weekend."
She looked straight at him, her blue eyes just a little too bright for his liking. "So now what? We go back to a formal office relationship?"
"Yes. No." Oh, h.e.l.l. Whatever he said, whatever he did, he was going to hurt her. He really shouldn"t have been so self-indulgent. Why hadn"t he kept her at a proper distance, the way he"d meant to? He dragged a hand through his hair. "Sara, I don"t do happy-ever-after. And I don"t want to do the wrong thing by you."
"But?"
"But right now I don"t want it to end," he admitted. "And I"m never indecisive like this. I always know what I"m doing." He sighed. "This has thrown me. I didn"t expect to..." His voice faded. Of course he hadn"t fallen in love with Sara Fleet. Even if he believed in love-which he didn"t-he knew it didn"t happen that fast. It couldn"t possibly happen that fast.
"So what do you suggest?" she asked softly.
"As we said yesterday. Take it day by day. See how it goes. No pressure. No promises." He spread his hands. "I"m sorry, Sara. I can"t offer you more. I just..."
"You"ve been focused on your business. And you don"t want any distractions."
He was relieved that she understood. "I know it sounds selfish."
"Sounds?" She arched an eyebrow.
"Is, then. But it"s all I can offer you right now."
"I wasn"t looking for a rel..." Her voice faded.
He took her hand. Kissed her palm. Folded her fingers round it. "He hurt you that much?"
"Who?"
"The guy who"s made you wary of relationships."
"What makes you think there"s a guy?"
He noticed that she didn"t actually deny it-just answered a question with a question. "Because you," he said simply, "aren"t the closed-off sort." Those photographs, all smiles and hugs, had told him exactly what sort of woman Sara was. Warm and sweet-and way too good for him. "So someone must have hurt you to make you back away. And I"d guess that it was the person you told me "wasn"t so nice"."
"I don"t repeat my mistakes."
"And you think I"ll be a repeat mistake?" he asked.
She swallowed. "You"re a workaholic. Like Hugh was."
"No. I"m a workaholic, I admit, but I"m not Hugh," he corrected. "I"m me. I don"t claim to be perfect, but I won"t hurt you intentionally."
"Hmm."
He sighed. "Just remember that I"m a man, not a mind-reader. If you"re not happy about something, I need you to tell me. Be straight with me. Remember, I"m used to being on my own."
She coughed. "More like, you"re used to being with a string of women."
"I"ve never dated more than one woman at a time," he said. "That"s dishonourable. Not my style."
She said nothing. So was that what had happened? Her ex had two-timed her? But even if he asked her straight, he had a feeling she wouldn"t tell him. The guy must have hurt her really badly-and he was surprised to feel himself tensing up. Wanting to flatten him. Ridiculous. Especially when he knew that violence solved nothing.
He stroked her face with the backs of his fingers. "If it"s easier for you, we could play it safe and go back to being business a.s.sociates."
"But?"
Clearly she"d picked up his line of thought. "But I"d always wonder if I should"ve been a bit braver and taken the risk. And I think you would, too."
She looked serious. "So you think it"s worth a try?"
"Only one way to find out. Live a little," he said softly.
He was about to kiss her goodbye-chastely-and leave, when he heard the sound of a key in the door. A couple of seconds later, the kitchen door opened and a man strode in-clearly Justin, because Luke recognised him from one of the photographs.
"h.e.l.lo, Shrimp! Sorry I was out when you got back." Justin greeted his sister warmly with a hug, a kiss and a ruffle of her hair.
"I"ll forgive you. You restocked on ice cream for me." She beamed at him.
"Well, I have to keep my little sister happy."
"Absolutely, if you want me to cook for you. Justin, this is Luke. Luke, this is my ancient, elderly brother."
"Nice to meet you, Luke." Justin"s handshake was firm, dry and professional, and Luke found himself relaxing slightly. "I hope Shrimp here remembered her manners and offered you some apple cake rather than scoffing the lot herself."
"She did."
"Good. So, how was Scarborough?"
"Crossed off my list. I would"ve seen it as a challenge but-" Luke looked over at Sara "-luckily I had someone with me with some common sense."
"No doubt you paid for it in whippy ice creams," Justin said with a grin. "I"m surprised she hasn"t managed to persuade Dad to open a dairy."
"It"s a brilliant idea. It"d complement the apples. Ice cream and apple cake are the perfect partners. And we could do apple sorbet," Sara said. "Expand that to elderflower, from the trees at the edge of the orchard. And maybe-"
"Enough, enough!" Justin held up his hands in surrender, laughing.
Luke found himself liking the man: he had the same warmth and sense of fun as Sara. And he ended up staying much longer than he"d expected to. When he left and Justin shook his hand and said, "Good to meet you", Luke was able to echo the sentiment and mean it.
Though he also shook hands with Sara, rather than kissing her. He wasn"t quite ready to go public on a relationship where neither of them was completely sure where they were going. "See you Wednesday," he said.
She smiled back. "See you Wednesday," she echoed.
CHAPTER TEN.
THE next morning, Sara woke at her usual time. And although she tried turning over and going back to sleep-knowing that she was officially on a day off-she couldn"t settle.
Eventually, she gave up and looked at the clock. Seven o"clock. It was pointless just lying there. She might as well get up, have breakfast...and go into the Docklands office.
When she walked in at nine o"clock sharp, Luke glanced up from his desk and stared at her, looking surprised. "h.e.l.lo. I thought you were on a day off?"
"I changed my mind," she said simply.
"What about your theory about the twenty per cent productivity drop?" he asked.
She shrugged. "You"ll have to live with it."
He smiled. "Then sit down. I"ll make us some coffee."
"I"ve been thinking," she said when he returned with the coffee. "We need to set some ground rules."
"Sounds like you"ve already worked some out."
"I have."
"And?"
"One-and this is not negotiable-you don"t sleep with anyone else while you"re with me."
"Fine. And it goes both ways," he added.
"Agreed. Two, we"re taking this day by day."
"Agreed."
"Three..." She"d been thinking about this one. A lot. It was where things had started to go wrong with Hugh. "You spend time with me. You don"t work ridiculous hours."
"I don"t work ridic-" He stopped, mid-protest. "OK. I"ll compromise-I won"t work quite as late as I have in the past." He could always catch up early in the morning. "But I should warn you I have some standing dates. Including Monday nights."
"Dates?"
"Yup. You know. Things that involve me getting hot and sweaty. With lots and lots of physical action."
Her eyes narrowed. "Indeed."
He leaned back against his chair. "But if you want to be responsible for Karim not having his weekly game of squash with me on Monday nights and getting really unfit and flabby, sure, I"ll cancel."
The rat. He"d strung her along. Teased her. And she"d been gullible enough to fall for it. "Squash."
He spread his hands. "I told you I play squash a couple of times a week. Monday"s with Karim and Thursday"s a league match. And kick-boxing"s on Tuesday and sometimes Wednesday." He paused. "You can come and watch, if you want."
He didn"t sound too enthused about the idea, though. She could guess why. "It"ll cramp your style."
"No. It"ll just be incredibly boring for you."
That wasn"t the real issue, she was sure. "You don"t want anyone to know about me, do you?"
"Sara, any man would be happy to boast that he was dating you."
The word hung in the air-she said it for him. "But...?"
He sighed. "If you come to the squash court, Karim will take one look at you, leap to conclusions and get Lily to nag me stupid. I"ll never get another minute"s peace. And, right now, this is very new-for both of us. So I want to keep things just between us until we"re sure of where it"s going."
She couldn"t argue with that.
"But I could meet you afterwards. I know an excellent Chinese restaurant not far from the squash courts, if you don"t mind eating a bit late. They make the best dim sum ever."
He was trying to compromise, she could tell. And it wasn"t as if she wanted to spend every single evening with him. "I still want to see my friends, too."
"Good. Because cutting yourself off from your social network to spend all your time with one person is incredibly unhealthy."
Did that mean he still intended to go to all those flash parties? And, most probably, on his own?
It must have been obvious what she was thinking, because he smiled. "Hey, I"m bored with the party circuit. I"d offer to take you, but I can a.s.sure you that you"d be bored to tears within minutes. And, anyway, men aren"t like women. They don"t need bonding sessions."
"No? What about football and beer?"
"I"m not into spectator sport," he reminded her. "Sure, I have the occasional beer with Karim after squash, but men don"t sit around dissecting emotional stuff the way women do."
"That"s a bit sweeping."
"Largely true, though." He wrinkled his nose. "Anyway, there"s another reason why you have to keep up with your female friends-because there"s no way you"re dragging me off to see some tedious chick-flick."
"You never know, you might enjoy it."
He shook his head. "I might enjoy sitting in the back row with you and kissing you stupid...but then again, I"d rather kiss you in private, so I can take things to their proper conclusion."
"Proper?" she teased.
He laughed. "OK, so what I have in mind is improper. But possibly not at this time of the morning, when I have meetings to go to and work to do."
"How long have you been here?" she asked.
"Not long."
"Crack of dawn?"
"No. I had a workout first," he admitted.
"In one of your gyms?" At his nod, she sighed. "And I bet you managed to get a meeting in there, too."