She's So Over Him (Mills & Boon Modern Tempted) Read online

  ‘Don’t, Cale.’

  Cale moved closer and, ignoring her desperate plea, pulled her into his embrace. Strong arms bound her and she found herself breast to chest, her face tucked into the hollow beneath his shoulder, his bent head blowing warm air across her cheek.

  So this was what being held by him again felt like. Maddie had to admit that reality kicked memory’s butt.

  Maddie lifted her head to look into those fabulous eyes. Beneath the sadness and apology she caught a flicker of heat, and suddenly realised the attraction wasn’t one-sided. A muscle ticked in his jaw as his eyes darkened and the flame flickered brighter. Maddie could feel his body change, felt the switch from comfort to awareness. It was in the way his hand flexed on her back and ran down her spine.

  And that was all the warning he gave before lowering his mouth onto hers. The world fell away as she welcomed his manly, exciting taste, his firm lips and clever tongue, his strong hand on her back pulling her closer.

  One of her hands, operating independently from her protesting brain, crept up his hard chest and curled into the thick hair at the back of his neck. The other gripped his hip above the ridge of his belt. Solid, warm, masculine. Oh, she’d missed the feel of hard male flesh, the texture of sun-kissed skin, the demand of strong hands and a firm mouth urging her to take more, to own the moment.

  ‘I’m so, so sorry.’

  He murmured the words against her neck and she heard the sincerity in them. It was the mental equivalent of a tidal wave dousing her back to reality. Whoah! She was not eighteen any more, at the mercy of her hormones and emotions. He didn’t get to step back into her life and pick up where they’d left off. She wouldn’t let that happen again.

  She hadn’t raised herself to be a fool.

  Stepping back abruptly, she sent him a cool look. ‘Okay, so that’s something that hasn’t changed. You always were a dynamite kisser.’

  ‘Um—thanks. Want to do it again?’

  Maddie rolled her eyes. ‘I’ll survive.’ Maddie held up her hand as he stepped forward. ‘No, stay where you are, Slick.’

  Cale reached out to touch her and abruptly pulled his hand back. Good call, Maddie thought, or else I might just end up with splinters in my butt.

  Maddie shook her curls. ‘We’re not doing this, Cale. It’s been a long time, and too much has happened for us to go back there.’

  ‘I am sorry,’ Cale said, and she could see the frustration on his face. Did he really expect that a couple of apologies would make it all better? That he could snap his fingers and have her in his arms and his bed again?

  Not going to happen.

  Maddie lifted her eyebrows. ‘Sorry for what? Letting me down? Disappointing me? Kissing me?’

  ‘One and two. Kissing you, it turns out, is still an absolute pleasure.’ Cale raked his hand through his hair. ‘So, where to now?’

  What? Was he insane?

  Maddie summoned up her frostiest voice. ‘Nowhere! Cale, this is it. You carry on your merry way and I do the same.’

  Cale snorted. ‘You’re not that naïve, Maddie.’

  Maddie forced herself to step forward, to give him a patronising pat on the cheek. ‘I was never naïve, and you don’t know anything about me any more.’

  ‘I know that something shifted in my world when I saw you behind that bar tonight.’

  Maddie felt her heart stutter. She didn’t like her heart stuttering—wasn’t used to it behaving badly.

  ‘And I don’t generally kiss a woman like that and let her walk away.’

  Ooh, there was that legendary Grant arrogance again. Her eyes and her voice cooled. ‘There’s always a first time for everything. Goodbye, Cale.’

  ‘This isn’t finished, Madison.’

  Maddie thought that silence was the best response to his statement, because in truth she had no idea how to reply to the words that terrified and annoyed her in equal measure.

  Maddie treasured Sunday—her favourite day of the week. Most Sundays she’d pull on a bikini and a wetsuit, grab her surfboard, then head for the west coast and the big rolling waves that made the area north of Cape Town a surfers’ paradise.

  Mid-morning, loose-limbed and hungry after skimming the waves, would find her at her favourite coffee shop in Scarborough, devouring the papers and scoffing poached eggs and hollandaise sauce, followed by croissants and strawberry jam.

  And coffee—rich, aromatic, compelling. Just like the man walking across the packed room towards her table. This was more like the Cale she remembered: faded navy T-shirt, red board shorts and flip-flops.

  She tipped her head and watched him as he stopped for a moment to talk to a fit-looking couple in the far corner. Dr Caleb Grant: consulting sports psychologist and life coach to several national teams, top sportsmen and women, sports writer, TV commentator and triathlon stroke adventure racer.

  Unfortunately, due to that strong face and hot body, and the fact that he was rich and relentlessly single, he was also a favourite amongst the gossip columnists. One of, if not the most eligible bachelor in the city.

  Good for him—but she wouldn’t let it affect her; she made it a personal policy never to make the same mistake twice.

  Cale took the seat opposite her, took a sip of the coffee from her cup and snagged a piece of croissant with the familiarity of a current lover and not a blast from her past.

  ‘Order your own.’ Maddie slapped his fingers as they headed towards her plate again.

  Cale, for once, listened and ordered an espresso and two croissants.

  Maddie folded her paper and tucked it into her bag. Folding her arms, she tapped her foot. Squinting at him, she reacquainted herself with the object of her fantasies of the last week… and the last ten years. In daylight, she noticed the little things now: a couple of laughter lines, some strands of grey mingled with the streaky blond hair at his temples, and the high-tech watch on his wrist that could be the price of a new car. Well, not an entire car—maybe just a set of tyres. The sunglasses were top of the range too. Striking and successful, he’d become all the S’s she’d known he would.

  Back then he’d had sardonic, sporty and sexy nailed. She could add super-successful and sophisticated to the list.

  ‘How did you find me?’

  ‘Easy. I went to your flat and your neighbour… Jim?… he told me that you spend most Sunday mornings here.’

  ‘You could’ve called.’

  ‘You neglected to give me your number.’ Cale whipped his BlackBerry out of his back pocket and looked at her enquiringly.

  Maddie sighed, recited her number and handed over her mobile so that he could scan the barcode for her BlackBerry BBM. She’d never in a million years thought that she’d see Cale’s number in her phone again.

  ‘I can’t believe I’m letting you put your number in my phone.’

  ‘Was I that bad?’

  ‘Terrible. Have you improved?’ Maddie asked archly, openly curious.

  ‘Probably not as much as you’d hoped.’ Cale sat back as the waiter placed his coffee and croissants in front of him. ‘What about you? How long did you pine for me before you twisted the next guy up into a pretzel?’

  ‘About two seconds. Nearly as long as you spent missing me.’

  ‘Yeah, I really wish it had happened that way,’ Cale said, his eyes on his plate.

  Maddie had opened her mouth to pursue the subject when her attention was distracted by the gaggle of young women who had entered the restaurant behind Cale, all wearing tops and shorts about three sizes too small for them. Maddie sourly wondered why they didn’t just go out in their underwear. They weren’t covering up much more.

  Oh, man, she sounded just like a jealous old woman. Deciding it was a good time to take a bathroom break, she quickly excused herself. When she returned, she found one of the gaggle leaning over Cale’s shoulder as she watched him scrawl his signature on a paper napkin.

  Please, shoot me now, she thought as she ambled back to her seat.

>   She sat down and waited till the girl had gone, then whispered, ‘That’s nice, dear, now run along and do your homework.’

  Cale choked back his laughter.

  ‘Does that happen often?’ she asked Cale, horrified.

  He shrugged. ‘Now and again.’

  ‘It would drive me nuts.’

  ‘You kind of get used to it. The trick is to remember that they don’t know you. They know the TV you. They don’t know that you hate going to sleep, or that you snore, or that you are allergic to peanuts.’ Cale took a sip of his espresso and lifted a broad shoulder in a shrug. ‘It keeps your head from getting too big.’

  ‘It’s already big,’ Maddie teased, mostly because he expected her to. She played with her teaspoon and decided to risk a personal question. ‘Why do you hate going to sleep?’

  Cale bit the inside of his lip while he obviously debated what to say. Maddie was surprised when he gave her a real answer instead of responding frivolously.

  ‘The spooks come and get me.’

  ‘What?’

  Cale sighed. ‘I normally delay going to bed until the early hours of the morning and then I can’t sleep anyway. The mind loves three a.m. The nastiest hour of the day.’ Cale toyed with a piece of croissant and smiled thinly. ‘Just because I’m a psychologist doesn’t mean that I don’t have my own demons to fight, Mad.’

  Judging by the weariness that flashed in his eyes, she suspected that his demons were winning.

  ‘I can understand that,’ she replied, intrigued by this new side of Cale.

  She sighed when she saw another member of the group stand up and head towards them, a small book in her hand. By the constant looks they sent Cale, and the animated discussion that followed, Maddie supposed that there was a bit of a dare raging to see who grabbed his attention. The fact that he was at least fifteen years older than they were didn’t seem to faze them in the least. It was also galling to realise that they didn’t think her much competition.

  This one was a pale redhead with a breathy voice. ‘Sorry to disturb, but would you mind?’ She thrust the book under Cale’s nose.

  Maddie sent her a cool look. ‘Excuse me, we’re trying to have a conversation here.’

  ‘It won’t take a mo,’ Strawberry Cake dismissed her.

  Maddie looked at her super-flat stomach and the small medallion that hung off the ring in her belly button. She blinked and looked again. It couldn’t possibly be…

  The girl drifted away with another signature and Maddie widened her eyes at Cale. ‘Did you see the picture on the medallion hanging off her belly button ring?’

  ‘I was too scared of you to do more than quickly scribble my name,’ Cale retorted.

  ‘Funny man.’ Maddie leaned across the table. ‘It was a very small, very clear picture of a… a sexual position. Very inventive. You’d probably have to be double-jointed to do it…’

  Cale mock turned in his seat. ‘I need to see it… Let me call her back!’

  Maddie pinched the skin on the back of his hand. Then she sighed heavily. ‘My mother would applaud her upfront attitude to sex, but I think it looks tacky.’

  Cale pushed his plate away. ‘Speaking of… how are your parents?’

  Maddie leaned back in her chair and rolled her eyes. ‘Still mad as a box of crickets. My mother is working as a guest lecturer in Women’s Studies at Edinburgh University. She’s still got that waste of oxygen with her—Jeffrey. I think you met him.’

  ‘Mmm.’

  ‘My father is still a Professor of English Literature, drinking cheap red wine out of pottery bowls while listening to Verdi and bonking as many un-dergrads as he can. And, yes, they still think that I am a massive disappointment as a daughter and an outright academic failure.’

  ‘And they still have the ability, when I hear that, to make me want to smack them,’ Cale said grimly. ‘How can they think that? You are so successful.’

  ‘At planning parties? “Darling, any two-bit socialite can do that.”’ Maddie imitated her mother’s crystal-clear diction. ‘“How do I explain to our friends, our colleagues, that our only child obtained a silly degree in Marketing? The shame, the horror!”’ Maddie shuddered theatrically and slumped in her seat. ‘I’m embarrassed to admit that I’m still looking for their love and approval.’

  ‘It’s a natural response. Habits that are formed in our childhood are the most difficult to break,’ Cale told her, idly toying with her fingers.

  Maddie pulled in her breath when his thumb caressed the inside of her wrist.

  Cale glanced at Maddie’s frustrated face, thinking he was glad he’d taken the risk to seek her company today. Her prickly attitude and fast mouth amused him. The vulnerability below her tough, business-girl exterior touched him. To throw in a body still slim, tanned and long-limbed was deeply unfair. Cale watched as she threw confused looks at him. Her amber eyes were dark with bewildered distrust, the colour of bold, old whisky.

  Since leaving her the other night his mind had frequently drifted in her direction, so he’d done what he always did when a subject engaged his curiosity: he’d looked for more information.

  He’d spent the last week reaching out to his extensive network of contacts and found out that she was much respected in her field and solidly stable financially. How could her fruitbat parents not be proud of her? They were, to him, a very clear case of too much education and not enough humanity and common sense.

  Cale moved in his chair, unfamiliar with the strange sensation he felt just being in her presence. He eventually identified it as excitement. Excitement. He rolled the word around his head. He hadn’t felt it in a while.

  The last two years had been a blur of grief, denial and self-recrimination, and he was still looking for himself… for the Cale he was supposed to be without the person who had shared his life before. Oliver had lived life on a knife-edge and Cale had been sent, he was convinced, to keep him from tumbling over. He had been Oliver’s voice of reason, his compass, his navigation system. While Oliver had been brilliant academically, he’d had the impulse control of a two-year-old.

  A two-year-old with the destructive capabilities of a nuclear bomb.

  Don’t think about that, Cale told himself. Don’t think about the chaos he created, the hurt he caused… Besides, being Ol’s voice of reason was what he’d done—except when Oliver had been at his most vulnerable and so sick he’d let him down. Cale swallowed, breathing deeply to keep the flickers of panic to a manageable level.

  A slender hand slapping his jolted him from his thoughts. ‘What?’

  ‘You faded away on me—with your eyes on my chest.’

  The flickers dissolved with one look at her startling eyes. Relieved, he grinned, probably unwisely, at her pinched face. He couldn’t help it. Prickly or not, it was good just to look at her. He was bemused by how fiercely compelling he found her. The wave of attraction he’d felt back then had morphed into a tsunami of lust. No woman—not even his ex-model ex-girlfriend, Gigi—had roused such thoughts. Candles. Silk sheets. A huge bed with her naked in it.

  It had obviously been too long. It wasn’t because he was remembering how addicted he’d been to Maddie, how much he’d craved her. He was over her; he’d been over her the minute he’d realised that she’d disappeared for good a decade ago.

  She was a very good-looking woman and he was just a man. You didn’t need to be a rocket scientist…

  Maddie was staring at his mouth. Damn, he wished she wouldn’t. It gave him ideas, and he needed those ideas like he needed an aneurysm. Naturally even the thought of kissing her had his blood rushing south. Superb, he thought sarcastically, how old was he? Thirty-five or fifteen?

  He really had to get himself some action… this was ridiculous.

  ‘Excuse me?’

  Oh, hell. Not another one. He sighed and turned his attention from Maddie’s visibly annoyed face to the blonde bunny looking down at him, with a far too adult promise in those admittedly startling blue eyes.
>
  Maddie’s breath hissed as she swiftly leaned across the table and picked up his plate and coffee cup and handed it to the girl. Not knowing what else to do, the blonde took the crockery and lifted it, puzzled.

  ‘Thanks. Take this, too.’ Maddie put some bunched-up used serviettes on the plate and waved her away. The blonde, caught off-guard, turned on her heel and dumped the dirty crockery on an empty table.

  Maddie ignored Cale’s wide grin, leaned back in her chair and hooked her arm over the back. ‘How is your family? Still boringly normal?’

  ‘’Fraid so. All of us—parents, Megs, the twins—’

  ‘Whoah! Back up. You have kids?’

  Cale grinned at Maddie’s shocked face. ‘No, you idiot. They are Ollie’s kids.’

  More shock. ‘Oliver had twins? He got married?’

  Cale nodded. ‘Briefly. The twins were a result of a brief fling and he thought he’d try to do the right thing. He lasted about three months. He tried to settled down with them… but you know Oliver.’

  He didn’t need to spell it out. Oliver had had the attention span of a gnat.

  ‘Did he see the twins? Spend time with them?’

  ‘He was a great father.’

  What else could he say? Certainly not the truth—that he’d been a great father when he’d remembered them and when he didn’t have something better to do. Not so great on the realities of fatherhood, like paying maintenance and attending PTA meetings.

  To Oliver, the mundane tasks of life had had to be avoided at all costs. And when they couldn’t be avoided, normally his twin had stepped in to sort them out.

  Maddie cocked her head. ‘Good for him.’

  Her dry tone told him that he hadn’t completely convinced her. But that wasn’t his problem. He never openly criticised Oliver. Ever. His mixed-up contradictory feelings about his brother were his and his alone.

  ‘Anyway, to get back to the subject, my parents are fine, thank you. We all had supper together a couple of nights ago.’ Cale rested his cheek on his fist. ‘They’re talking about doing something in memory of Oliver. It’s two years in August.’