indelible part. For all the changes I’ve made to my life, I can’t change my birth.
‘That’s exactly what we can change!’ There was vehemence in his reply, and he took another slug of bourbon. Memories were pressing in on him suddenly—bad memories. His hapless mother, abandoned by the man who’d fathered her son, abandoned by all of the other men who’d taken up with her—or worse. His memory darkened. Like the brute who had inflicted beatings on her until the day had come when Nic had reached his teenage years and had been strong enough to protect her from thugs like that....
I had to change my life! I had to do it for myself—by myself. There was no one to help me. And I did change it.
She was looking at him, a slightly curious look in her eyes at the vehemence of his expression, her beautiful grey eyes clear in her fine-boned face.
She gave a slow nod. ‘Then perhaps,’ she said, in an equally slow voice, ‘we have to bear in mind that old prayer, don’t we? The one that asks that we be granted the courage to change what we can, but the patience to accept what we can’t, and the wisdom to know the difference.’
Nic thought about it. Then, ‘Nope,’ he said decisively. ‘I want to change everything I don’t like.’
She gave a laugh—a deliberately light one. ‘Well, you wouldn’t make a scientist, that’s for sure,’ she said.
He gave an echoing laugh, realising with a sense of shock that he had spoken more about his deepest feelings to this woman than he had ever done to anyone. It struck him that to have touched on matters that ran so very deep within him with a woman he hadn’t known existed twenty minutes earlier was....
Significant?
I don’t have conversations like this with women—never. So why this one?
It had to be because of her being a scientist—that had to be it. It was just that, nothing more.
She’s a fantastically beautiful woman—and I want to know her more. But there have been a lot of beautiful women in my life, when I’ve had time for them. She’s just one more.
She was different, yes, because of her being an incredibly talented astrophysicist when the women he was usually interested in were party girls, prioritising good times and carefree enjoyment, which allowed him time out from his obsession with building his personal empire. Females who didn’t ask for commitment. For more than he could give them.
But thinking about the assorted women who’d been and gone in his life was not what he was here to do. He was here to make the most of this one.
He flexed his shoulders, feeling himself relax again, his eyes focussed on drinking in her extraordinary entrancing beauty.
She had finished her drink, and so had he. With every instinct in his body, long honed by experience, he knew it was time to call time on the evening. He’d set the wheels in motion, but tonight was not going to get them further to the destination he wanted for them both. She was not, he knew, the kind of woman who could be rushed. He’d followed through on the impulse that had brought him across the casino floor to her, and for now that was enough.
He signalled the barman, signed the chit as presented, making sure his scrawling ‘Falcone’ was visible only to his employee, and got to his feet with a smile.
Fran did likewise. Her emotions were strange—new to her—but she smiled politely. ‘Thank you for the drink,’ she said.
The long dark lashes swept over the blue, blue eyes. ‘My pleasure,’ came the laconic reply. ‘And thank you for the science tutorial,’ he added, the smile warm in his gaze.
‘You’re welcome,’ Fran replied, her smile just as warm, but briefer, more circumspect.
She headed towards the bank of elevators across the lobby, conscious of his gaze upon her. Was she regretting the fact that he was calling time on their encounter? Surely not? Surely anything more was out of the question?
And yet even as with her head she knew it must be, with quite a different part of her body she knew—from the heady buzz in her bloodstream and the quickened heart rate—that she was regretful that she must retire to her solitary bedroom.
That sense of restlessness she’d felt earlier filled her again. Cesare had been a long time ago—over a year ago now—and anyway, theirs had never been a physical relationship. That, she knew, would have waited until well into their engagement, or even their actual wedding night, for Cesare was a traditionally-minded Italian male.
Not many would have understood their relationship—understood that, having known each other all their lives, it had made perfect sense for them to marry one day. In the meantime, they had both been single agents, and she was well aware that Cesare—an extremely attractive male, blessed with a high social position and great wealth to boot—had indulged in many a romantic liaison.
He had accepted that such tolerance was two-way, and until they had become formally engaged she had been as free as he to indulge in affairs. She’d had only two what might be called ‘full affairs’ in her life—one with another undergrad at Cambridge, a very boy-girl romance, and one brief liaison with a visiting academic while on her PhD course on the East Coast—and that had amply sufficed.
Her dating had nearly always been with fellow academics, and usually based around concerts, films or theatre outings. Searing passion had not played a role, and its absence had not troubled her. One day, after all, she would be marrying Cesare...
Except that now she wouldn’t, after all.
She was footloose and fancy-free. If she chose to be. Free to move on from Cesare, to seek romance—free to take a break, if she wanted, from the demands of academia.
Free to be chatted up by a muscled hunk with the bluest eyes she’d ever seen in a man, let alone one of Italian origin. A man whose smile was lazy, his speech laconic, and whose expression and long-lashed deep blue eyes were telling her just how very much he appreciated her.
She jabbed at the elevator button, her feeling of restlessness increasing as she stepped inside, feeling it swoop her the couple of floors upwards in this low-rise hotel that blended so gracefully into the desert landscape.
Inside her room, she glanced at the folder with her notes, but did not open it. Instead she stripped off for bed, taking off her make-up, brushing out her hair. Wondering why her heart rate still was not back to normal.
Her dreams, when they came, were full—and unsettling.
THE CONFERENCE WAS wrapping up, with the panel of plenary speakers paying courteous tribute to each other.
Fran flexed her tired fingers, having taken copious notes throughout. Her thoughts were uncertain. She was scheduled to fly back to the West Coast with her colleagues that afternoon, but was conscious that she was reluctant to do so. She’d meant what she’d said about wanting to take advantage of the hotel’s amenities, and why shouldn’t she? She hadn’t taken any holiday time for a year—she was overdue for a break. So why not here and now?
And whether that hunky security guy chatting her up last night had anything to do with her decision, she would not consider. He’d been a catalyst for it, that was all.
The sense of restlessness that had started to well up in her again subsided, her decision made. She said as much to her colleagues, telling them that she would be staying on for a few days at the hotel.
Grinning, they informed her they were off to hit Vegas and see if their luck at the tables was holding out. Fran wished them well and waved them off. Las Vegas was one place she did not want to go to.
No, if she went anywhere it would be to see something of the western desert—maybe even, she pondered,