He smiled and kissed the tip of her nose. ‘Powerful emotion often has its other side.’
‘You mean being so angry with you made me—I don’t know—vulnerable to that?’
‘Perhaps.’
‘How about you?’
‘I—’ he paused ‘—have wanted to do it before. Why don’t you finish what you were saying?’
She shook her head. ‘I’ve lost the thread—’
‘No, you haven’t,’ he contradicted. ‘You were all set to be extremely passionate about the ‘‘singular difference’’ between the facts and what I was implying.’
He was so close she could see the fine laugh lines beside his mouth, a little nick in one of his eyebrows, she could smell soap on his skin and there was a patch of stubble on his jaw his razor had missed.
It came to her with a punch that she’d never looked so closely at a man before, never been interested enough to wonder, for example, how he’d cut his eyebrow and what it would be like to wake up in his arms…
‘I…’ She tried to collect her thoughts. ‘You seemed to be completely confident I’m one of those predatory girls who won’t rest until she gets her man, plus—’ she looked at him challengingly ‘—the hoary old spoilt-little-rich-bitch-who-has-to-get-her-own-way bit. That couldn’t be further from the way it really is.’
‘Which is?’ He arched the split eyebrow at her.
‘It’s never happened to me before,’ she said slowly. ‘I’ve always had to fend men off. I’ve never before been… really, really interested. Oh, there’ve been a few flirtations and I’ve had some nice friends—Tim is one of them—but you could truthfully say I’m a bit of a novice who’s been quite happy…’ she sighed and shrugged ‘… doing my own thing, I guess.’
‘Go on.’
‘For some…’ she paused ‘… mysterious reason that changed overnight when I was locked in the shed with you. Suddenly I was interested and no one,’ she said with emphasis, ‘seems to be able to give me one good reason why I shouldn’t be, not even you, although you dropped me like a hot potato.’
‘Maggie—’
‘Look.’ She laid her hand on his arm. ‘Perhaps you are right about me. Perhaps I don’t take no for an answer easily, but it’s pretty important for me at least to be able to assess what this change means to me.’
He put his finger under her chin and tipped her face up to his.
‘In other words…’ she smiled fleetingly ‘… give me one good reason to say to myself, Maggie Trent, you came of age over the wrong man because there’s absolutely nothing you can offer him—or there’s someone else in his life—and I will go away.’
He stared into her eyes, fingered her chin lightly, then laid his head back with a sigh. ‘Your father and I will never see eye to eye—’
‘Forget about my father. It so happens I have the same problem with him. And I have taken quite some pains, believe me, to live my life the way I want to rather than the way he wants me to. Yes,’ she added intensely, ‘it may still be a pretty privileged life compared—perhaps—to how you grew up, if that’s what you hold against me!’
He smiled slightly. ‘No. There’s not a lot I have against you, personally.’
‘And there’s no one else?’ she asked seriously.
He watched her for a long moment, then shook his head.
‘Well, then.’ She gestured. ‘Would it be such a bad idea if we got to know each other better?’
‘Taking into consideration the fact that I have wanted to kiss you and you don’t seem to mind being kissed by me?’ he queried.
A glint of laughter shone in her eyes. ‘I wasn’t going to say that, although I suppose it is fairly pertinent, but there’s a lot more to getting to know someone, isn’t there?’
If I had any sense, Jack McKinnon mused as he studied the lovely crumpled length of her across his lap, I would end this now, for once and for all.
On the other hand, I did walk away from her and she was the one who wouldn’t accept it. Does that absolve me? Not in her father’s eyes, I have no doubt. Whichever way I travel with her, to the altar or simply an affair, David Trent is going to hate like hell me knowing his daughter in a biblical sense. But will it be revenge? Only if she falls in love and I don’t…