spend two hours replaying the last ten minutes.
She undid the bow at her nape, pausing to massage the tense muscles underneath when she heard her BlackBerry signal that she’d received a text. In her haste to grab the phone, she jammed her bare foot into the corner of the dresser and nearly broke her little toe. All for nothing. Disappointed, she read the text. It was from Lindsey—she didn’t know if she’d be coming back to the room tonight. Good for her.
Mia muttered a mild oath and limped to the bed. What a waste. She had the room to herself, and David, the coward, had slunk away. That was the last time she’d let him off the hook. He’d already shown his hand by flying all the way to Hawaii. Tomorrow he’d better plan on doing more than sightsee.
DAVID ARRIVED IN the lobby fifteen minutes early and made arrangements for the car to be brought around before Mia showed up. He’d blown it last night, and didn’t want to waste another minute of the six days he had left here.
No, he hadn’t really squandered last night. He could easily have gotten her into bed. They both wanted it. They both knew it. Especially after that kiss. Which he also didn’t regret, but couldn’t think about now or risk embarrassing himself in front of a lobby full of Japanese tourists. He watched them, dressed in their aloha shirts and muumuus, cameras hanging from around their necks, chatting with their guide near the koi pond filled with orange and gold carp.
He envied their carefree excitement, their sole purpose as vacationers to enjoy the sparkling blue ocean, the balmy March air that came off the water. Ordinarily he never would have considered traveling this far for a vacation, or for that matter, staying away from the office for longer than three or four days unless it was work-related. But then, this wasn’t actually a vacation.
It could have been, and God knew he wanted this time alone with Mia where they could forget about work and family obligations and get to know each other on a personal level. But hooking up with her wasn’t that simple. Not now, not since his father had asked him to convince her to return to the firm.
He had to make her understand that he wanted to be with her, that he wasn’t here just to lure her back. He could have talked to her in New York, offered her a nice bonus and promotion that she would’ve had to think twice about turning down. But he needed this break because by the time they returned, he wanted her to be clear on what she wanted, him or the firm.
Only problem was, it was a fine line. Once he extended the firm’s offer, she’d have to trust that his motives were pure.
“David?”
He snapped out of his preoccupation. She stood right in front of him, and he hadn’t even seen her walk up. “Mia.”
“Bet you were thinking about work.”
“Oddly, no.”
She grinned. “Right.”
He frowned at his watch. “I haven’t even called the office, and it’s what, one-thirty there.”
“Go ahead. I’ll wait.”
“Nope. If they have a problem they can call me,” he said, ignoring her skeptical expression and appreciating her brief white shorts and the long expanse of legs even more. “The car is parked right over here.” He gestured at the red convertible, uncomfortably aware of how much he wanted to kiss her.
“Sweet.” She took her sunglasses out of her bag and slipped them on as they walked toward the BMW. “Do you know where we’re going?”
“I have a list of places.”
“That’s not an answer.”
Unable to help himself, he touched the small of her back with a guiding hand, even though it was completely unnecessary. “I’ll let you know when we get there.”
She flashed him a smile, her teeth white, her lips a pale glossy pink. “I don’t know how to navigate, so if you’re counting on me…”
“The car has a GPS system.”
“Ah.” She lifted the hair off the back of her neck. “It’s warmer than I thought.”
Tempted to plant a kiss at her nape, he had to look away. “Only in the direct sun. We can put the top up if you want.”
“No, I want to feel the wind in my face and in my hair. It’s Hawaii. I’m on vacation. I want it all,” she said, giving him a look that made his cock twitch. “It might be a rumor, but I heard that what happens in Waikiki, stays in Waikiki.”
“Right,” he muttered, uncomfortably aware that he suddenly felt awkward. He never had trouble with women. No, it wasn’t even that. He had a plan. Sex wasn’t supposed to come first, but if she kept up the sly smiles and sultry looks, it was going to be murder keeping his head.
The valet who’d brought the car around trotted up and opened Mia’s door before David could. “Need directions, sir?”
David shouldn’t have been annoyed. The man was only doing his job, but David had missed out on watching her swing her long bare legs into the car. “No thanks,” he said, slipping the man a ten before climbing in behind the wheel.
“I could get used to this.” Mia adjusted her leather seat so that she partially reclined, and then tugged at the hem of her shorts.
He turned away and fiddled with the navigation system. “It drives well. I picked it up at the airport instead of taking a cab.”
“I’ll take your word for it. I have my license, but I’ve only driven twice since college.”
He wasn’t completely surprised. In Manhattan, he mostly took cabs himself. “What about weekends? Don’t you like getting out of the city?”
Her eyebrows arched over her sunglasses, a cynical smile curving her lips. “Weekends? Is there such a thing at Pearson and Stern?”
“Point taken.” He took out his sunglasses and slid them on before pulling out of the lot. “Is that why you left?”
“I never minded the work.”
He cursed himself for bringing it up. Not so much because she sounded defensive, but the subject only reminded him of his unwanted errand. Luckily traffic was heavy and required all of his attention. So did the GPS. He already knew from studying the map earlier that Hawaiian street names were difficult to differentiate. Too many vowels.
She apparently got the message that he was focusing on driving, but as soon as they stopped at a red light, she asked, “The day I resigned…why didn’t you ask why I was leaving?”
“I was too shocked.”
“You had two and a half weeks.”
David sighed. “I don’t know why. Denial, maybe.”
She didn’t respond, but tied her hair back into a ponytail with something she’d found in her purse. “The light’s green.”
“Thanks.” He started to proceed, but two pedestrians darted into the crosswalk, and he jammed on the brakes.
Mia gasped softly, her hand shooting out to brace herself. “And they say New York is bad.”
“No kidding.” He waited until it was clear, and then accelerated. “I keep forgetting you’ve been here before. I should’ve asked if there’s someplace in particular you wanted to go.”
“Uh, I didn’t get too far out of Waikiki. Or off the beach, for that matter. I had the worst sunburn.”
“I did the same thing freshman year, and I knew better. When I was a kid we spent a lot of summers in Aruba and St. Thomas.”
“Yeah, I know what you mean. That Caribbean sun is killer.”
“Where did you summer?” he asked conversationally, then heard an odd strangling noise coming from her. He glanced away from the road long enough to see her burst out laughing.
“The