pushing up from the table in her agitation, gesturing a helpless apology. ‘You’ve made it clear and I…I know this must be frustrating to you, but…I need time to feel sure I’m doing the right thing for me, too. I’m sorry…’
‘It’s okay,’ he quickly assured her, rising from the table and holding out his hands in an open gesture of giving. ‘I didn’t mean to make you feel pressured. I guess my own decision is so clear-cut to me…’ He grimaced an apology. ‘I’m not about to force you into marriage, Sunny. It has to be your choice, too, and if you’re not ready to make it…’
‘I’m not. Not yet,’ she quickly added, acutely aware she didn’t want to shut the door on his proposal, however many doubts were clouding it for her.
‘Then we’ll make other plans for today,’ he offered, smiling to soothe her agitation. ‘Simply spend time together. Are you happy to go along with that?’
She nodded, her chest feeling too constricted to find breath for more words. He was the most stunningly attractive man she’d ever met and one side of her was clamouring it was madness not to accept him on face value alone. Only the painful thud in her heart argued that want wasn’t love, and she craved real love from the man she married—the kind of love that lasted a lifetime.
‘Have you seen the Grand Canyon?’
‘No,’ she whispered shakily.
‘Would you enjoy a ground/air combination tour—a helicopter flight, as well as travelling around the rim by road, hiking where you want to?’
Sunny scooped in a quick breath. ‘Yes. I’d like that very much.’ Outside distraction…more time…
‘Shall I book it for an hour’s time? Can you be ready to go that soon?’
She nodded, grateful to seize on quick action. ‘It won’t take me long to get dressed. I’ll start now.’
Eager to be on the move, she was already heading for the staircase when he paused her with the words…
‘One last thing, Sunny…’
‘Yes?’
He had stepped over to the telephone table and had picked up the receiver to make the booking. His head was cocked quizzically and she was anticipating a further question about the trip they had agreed upon.
‘You said…married for love. What, in your mind, is love?’
Her mind went completely blank, then tripped into a welter of needs that Derek’s defection had wounded, very badly. Out of the miserable emptiness of bitter disillusionment came the one thing love had most represented to her, and precisely what Derek had torn away.
‘Emotional security,’ she said, with all the passion of having been stripped of it.
‘I see,’ he murmured, as though weighing her answer against what he could balance it with.
‘What is love to you, Bryce?’ she shot at him, wanting him to feel some of the vulnerability he had stirred with his question, though she couldn’t really imagine him feeling insecure about anything.
He seemed to consider his answer carefully before giving it, perhaps gearing it to her own. She didn’t want that. She intinctively shied from thinking he would pursue his purpose relentlessly, calculating every word, every move.
‘I think it’s something that grows,’ he said slowly, his eyes holding hers with hypnotic intensity. ‘It begins with strong mutual attraction, and is fed by the caring each person demonstrates towards the other. It’s a commitment to caring, and without that commitment it dies a quick death.’
Derek, she thought, not caring enough for her.
While Bryce…how much did he care? His answer sounded genuine, a deeply held personal belief, not a reply designed to win her over.
His mouth quirked into an appealing little smile. ‘A fair assessment?’
‘Fair enough,’ she agreed. ‘I’ll think about it.’
He nodded and turned away to make telephone contact for the tour booking.
He cared a lot about his father, Sunny thought, and as she continued on upstairs, she decided he would care a lot about any child he fathered, too.
But how much for her?
Would love grow between them?
Could she take that gamble?
BRYCE clamped down on his impatience. Rushing Sunny was not going to work. Marsden had obviously caused too much emotional damage for her to trust easily. Yet he was quite certain her instincts sided with him. She would never have responded as she had without feeling the same deep attraction he felt.
Or was it rebound stuff—an overwhelming need to be desired?
That was one need he could certainly answer. Desire was simmering through him right now as they waited for the arrival of the elevator to take them down to the limousine which would transport them to the helicopter base. The stretch jeans and T-shirt Sunny had pulled on showed every delectable line and curve of her. She’d crammed one of the conference caps over her rioting curls, and it, too, seemed provocative on her, like a perky invitation to whip it off and free her hair.
Free everything!
The elevator doors slid open. Sunny glanced nervously at him as she stepped into the empty compartment. Bryce’s chest tightened as he followed and hit the control panel for the ground floor. What good was restraint? Pouncing on her the last time they had been in this elevator together had propelled them into an intimacy that was working for him. Why should he hold back now?
The doors closed.
Driven once more by the urge to claim her as his, Bryce reached out and wrapped her in his embrace. Her lovely amber eyes lit with alarm. ‘No pressure,’ he gruffly promised, lifting a hand to gently stroke the tension from her face. ‘I just have a need to feel you with me.’
The amber softened into a golden glow as he bent his head to kiss her and there was no hint of resistance when his mouth touched hers. The hands that had rested warily on his shoulders, slid quickly to link around his neck, an eager signal of her desire to feel him with her, too.
It was more than enough to push Bryce into seeking all she would give him and her active response as he deepened the kiss instantly ignited a passionate drive to break the emotional barriers in her mind, to draw all her feelings towards him with such dominant force, nothing else existed for her but the two of them together.
He pressed her closer, exulting in the long, feminine legs clinging to his, the soft fullness of her breasts spreading across the hard muscle of his chest, the whole delicious pliancy of her body as it seemed to crave every contact with his. He was so strongly aroused, so exhilarated by the fervour of her response, he wasn’t aware of the elevator having come to a halt at ground level.
The whirr of the doors opening did belatedly register in his consciousness, but by the time he’d lifted his mouth from Sunny’s, the doors were closing again, which was fine by him. He didn’t want to stop what he was doing. They could ride straight back up to his suite and…
‘Bryce…’ An urgent gasp.
‘Mmm?’
‘We’re down!’
He sighed, swiftly deciding he had regained some ground with her and playing for more might be a bad idea. He swung aside, reached out and pressed the Open Doors button just as the elevator was being sealed shut again.
Her hands dropped from his neck as she turned to face the exit, but she made no move to distance herself from the arm he’d left around her waist. They stepped out to the lobby together, which was a far