sighed. “You always knew how to make me smile, Matthew Cooper.”
His mouth grazed her bottom lip before he reached for her coffee cup and began to fill it. “I’m planning on doing much more than that.”
Oh, wow. She didn’t care that her answering grin was full of girlish giddiness, nor that anticipation made her hand tremble as she took her cup.
“Really.” She took a sip, eyeing him over the rim.
“You told me you hated playing games, remember?” He met her firm look with one of his own. “I’m just being honest.”
Yes, he was. She looked away, unable to hold his gaze any longer. Here’s your chance. Ask him now. She replaced her cup and reached for a tiny smoked salmon sandwich. “So how long were you married?”
He paused, a sliver of bread roll halfway to his mouth. “Does it matter? It’s over.”
“It doesn’t.” She shrugged. “I’m just curious.”
“Her name was Katrina,” he finally said, then popped the food into his mouth and slowly chewed. “We were married for three years. You?”
“Oh, no. Not me.” A memory flashed by, but she swallowed the bitter ashes with a neutral expression as she selected another morsel from the platter. “And you left Saint Cat’s.” She nibbled on the finger sandwich. Chicken and pesto—delicious.
“To start my own company.”
But why? The question hovered on her tongue but she swallowed it back. Did she really need to know?
She took a sip of coffee, studiously avoiding his gaze as she finished the chicken and pesto, then picked a mini chocolate croissant. She bit into it and gave a small murmur as the buttery pastry crumbled in her mouth.
“Good?”
“Oh, yeah.”
“I thought you’d like it.”
“Oh, you did?” She licked her bottom lip, picking up a stray crumb. And just as she expected, Matt’s gaze honed right on in, watching her as she slowly licked one finger, then her thumb.
Her breath staggered on the intake. There was nothing to stop her from leaning over the table and suggesting she was hungry for something more than food. Hell, this cabana was just as good as a private room—they could get naked right here, right now, and no one would suspect a thing.
Yet something made her hesitate. This was Matt. The guy she’d shared a bed with for six whole months. The guy she’d been prepared to let down all her defensive walls for, only to be dumped that same night. The guy who’d been her benchmark, who’d made her vow never to be that vulnerable again.
“Matt...” she began, then paused when he abruptly stood.
He was staring down at her with such intensity that the rest of her words gurgled in her throat. She knew that look. It still made her legs weak even after all these years.
“Come with me.”
When he rounded the table and held out his hand, she was lost.
His fingers wrapped firmly around hers, slowly drawing her to her feet, to him. Her heart hammered as she stared into those dark eyes, that crazy feeling of anticipation simultaneously scaring and exciting her.
Kiss me.
As if she’d spoken aloud his eyes dipped, then his head, and everything fell out of focus. She felt her eyes close, the familiar arousal bubbling up in her belly. Yet when he was barely a breath away, when her senses were full of his delicious scent, her breath ragged and her belly tight, he stopped.
She’d been leaning in, practically begging for him to kiss her. With a small sound of frustration, she opened her eyes and saw him grinning.
Then he turned and pulled her with him.
They left the cabana in silence, her shoes forgotten as they moved swiftly past the pool. AJ barely had time to register the scorching hot tiles beneath her feet before they were inside the cool foyer, Matt leading her to the long bank of elevators. He pressed the button and then looped his arm around her waist, pressing his warm body into her back.
His solid heat made her mind reel. It had been too long since she’d been this intimate with a man. She’d missed having a pair of strong arms hold her, a hot hard body intimately pressed against hers.
When the elevator pinged open, they rushed inside. He swiped his card, then turned to face her when the doors slid smoothly shut.
And she was staring right back at him.
He was tall, well over six feet, and although she was hardly short, her shoulder barely reached his bicep. She caught a glimpse of her reflection in the elevator mirrors—conservative hairstyle, demure dress. Hardly the outfit for a seductress, yet he’d—
He swooped in and kissed her.
It was a hot, determined kiss designed to awaken and arouse, a kiss she recalled stirring her from sleep and into full-blown desire in seconds flat. It was just as good—no, even better than—last night. Her fingers curled around his biceps and the tension in those muscles matched the scorching pressure of his mouth. He took fierce control, forcing her mouth open, and with a squeak of surprise she let him in. Everything throbbed—her skin, her pulse, her groin. His arousal pressed between them, a hard reality against the thin barrier of their clothes.
“Angel,” he breathed. AJ groaned as memories engulfed her. It was the one word he’d always whispered when he brought her to climax again and again.
She barely registered the elevator had come to a stop. Matt suddenly pulled back, spinning her to face the front with a wicked gleam just before the doors slid open.
An elderly woman got on and AJ murmured a polite greeting, her face warm and her blood pounding. Matt was standing behind her, his hands stuck casually in his pant pockets, studying the glowing numbers as they continued their ascent. Yet his thigh nestled firmly against her bottom, heat searing through her thin dress.
She stared at the slowly changing floor numbers until her nerves felt so tight they began to scream.
What on earth do you think you’re doing?
She never dwelled on the past or rehashed it. Moving on was what she did, what she’d always done. She’d come to terms with it all, had matured, grown.
So why was she still thinking about it?
She’d been twenty-three. They’d both gone into their affair with a mutual understanding it was only temporary. Of course his career had come first. Saint Catherine’s up-and-coming neurosurgeon didn’t belong with an addict’s daughter and runaway thief.
When their fellow passenger got off on the tenth floor, AJ took an unsteady breath. I am me. AJ Reynolds. I am not the broken product of those awful people. I have a sister who loves me. I have friends. I am smart. I love animals. I don’t cheat or lie. I’m a good person.
So would a good person manipulate and seduce to get what she wanted?
Matt gently urged her forward, breaking into her thoughts. She glanced up to see they’d reached the top floor just before the doors quietly opened onto the long plush hallway.
Sweat popped out in the small of her back. She could feel the tickle as it slowly slid down, down, until her dress eventually absorbed it.
“AJ?”
She squeezed her eyes shut as his hand cupped her hip, the familiar firmness creating alternate bursts of doubt and desire in her belly.
You can do this.
The corridor was way too long, its walls adorned with exclusive hand-drawn Versace designs in gilt frames. Then finally they were at his door, a huge, dark wooden thing emblazoned with a fresco of classic Greek gods and a gold number three. He opened it with his card and she caught her first glimpse of the