ТОП просматриваемых книг сайта:
.
Читать онлайн.
‘I can’t believe I offered to cook,’ Addie groaned, gazing down at her plate.
‘You didn’t.’ Biting into a barbecued rib with guava and tamarind, Malachi raised an eyebrow. ‘You offered to “rustle up something”.’
He was impossible to resist. She tried to frown, but ended up smiling. ‘You tricked me. You said she enjoyed cooking.’
His grey eyes gleamed. ‘And she does. She also happens to be a Cordon Bleu trained cook who enjoys “creating dishes which combine colonial and Caribbean influences”,’ he drawled. ‘Or so it said on her CV.’ Grinning, he leaned across and speared a small, golden parcel. ‘What is this?’
Addie glanced at the menu. ‘It’s coconut and shrimp tempura. It’s delicious.’ She sighed. ‘I think I’ve eaten about forty already.’
He glanced across the table. ‘Only another seventy to go, then.’ He grimaced. ‘I’m afraid Leonda seems to think I don’t eat between visits, so she always cooks enough for a small army.’
Putting her knife and fork together tidily on her plate, Addie gave him a small, careful smile. As if her feelings were as easy to arrange as her cutlery. In her head being alone with Malachi had seemed quite straightforward: there was the sex and then there was everything else. She wasn’t deluded enough to pretend that she wouldn’t enjoy the sex part, but she hadn’t expected the talking, the just being together to be anything other than extremely trying.
Only sitting opposite him now, it was hard to feel like that. Not just because he was stupidly good-looking, but because he was such effortless company. He was bright and well read and, mixing as he did with the rich and the famous, he had an endless supply of amusing and salacious stories.
But, while she might not hate him as much as she would or perhaps should, she needed to make sure their relationship had recognisable boundaries. Sex, by necessity, involved some amount of intimacy—maybe even a certain amount of tenderness. But this—the being together part—required her to be no more than civil. In fact, now might be a good time for her to introduce a more formal, less personal tone to their lunch.
Picking up her water glass, she took a breath and said quickly, ‘Thank you.’
There was a flicker of surprise in his eyes as they met hers. ‘For what?’
‘For bringing me here. It’s lovely. Truly.’ She glanced out across the lagoon. ‘So how did you find this place? I mean, it’s so hidden away.’
He shrugged. ‘It was an accident, really. I was actually looking to buy a yacht.’
She stared at him dazedly. He spoke about buying a yacht as though it was a carton of milk. And what kind of person chose whether to buy an island or a yacht? It was just another reminder of the differences between them.
She shook her head. ‘So what happened?’
His eyes gleamed. ‘I went for a swim.’
She stared at him, confused. Surely he couldn’t have swam that far out to sea?
Glancing at her face, Malachi shook his head. ‘Not here. In a hotel. In Vegas.’
Her eyes narrowed. ‘How has that got anything to do with this island?’
He gave her a teasing smile. ‘I was playing poker and Teddy Chalmers—do you remember Teddy?’
Addie nodded. She had met him socially with Malachi. He was a lanky middle-aged Texan real estate billionaire, with a penchant for land and property and a passion for poker.
‘Teddy bet me this island that I couldn’t jump into a pool at the hotel and touch the bottom.’
She frowned. ‘That’s crazy. Anyone could do that.’ Her face stilled with suspicion. ‘So why did he think you couldn’t?’
Malachi grinned. ‘Probably because of the sharks!’
‘Sharks!’ She stared at him in horror. ‘Real sharks? With teeth?’
He laughed. ‘The sharks were real, so I guess their teeth were too.’
Addie gazed at him, open-mouthed.
Smiling, Malachi reached for the wine bottle and refilled his glass. ‘Don’t look so worried, sweetheart. I won.’
‘What if you’d been bitten?’
He gave her an infuriating smile. ‘I’m touched that you care.’
‘I don’t care,’ she said quickly. ‘I just can’t believe you’d risk your life over some stupid bet.’
‘I like to win.’
She glared at him. ‘Winning isn’t everything. And if you’d walked away what would you really have lost?’
He shrugged. ‘My pride! Look, they were small nurse sharks in a tank in a Vegas hotel. Honestly, I didn’t think it was that risky. All I really had to do was focus on winning.’
Then Teddy Chalmers must be more stupid than he appeared, Addie thought slowly. Malachi might be the most charming person she had ever met, but he was also the most driven. Losing was simply not an option for him.
He held her gaze. ‘I don’t make a habit of it,’ he said lightly. ‘But I was twenty-four years old and I’d spent the best part of a year playing poker non-stop.’ He breathed out slowly. ‘And with those guys everything turned into a bet.’
Picking up his wine glass, he swirled the contents slowly around.
‘When I finally came out here, though, it blew me away. Not the beach and the palm trees so much. But the peace—’ His mouth twisted. ‘There’s something so pure about the sound of the waves, and the breeze and the birdsong.’
Something in his tone made her hold her breath. She stared at him, confused. Birdsong? Since when had that mattered to Malachi? Her heart gave a thump as she wondered what else he hadn’t told her. But could she blame him? She’d hardly been open or honest with him, choosing to share only a carefully edited selection of details about her accident and home life.
Staring past him, she realised that they had never really known one another at all. That they had never trusted one another enough to do so. But why be so secretive now? It wasn’t as if it mattered any more.
She glanced back at his face. ‘I’m not usually a big fan of peace and quiet,’ she said hesitantly. ‘But this is the good kind.’
‘The good kind? What’s the bad kind?’ he prompted, his gaze fixed on her face, searching, curious.
She gave him a small, tight smile. It was so tempting to believe that he was genuinely interested. Had she not known him as well as she did, she might even have hoped that he felt more than just a physical attraction. That he cared about her. But she knew that for Malachi a confidence shared was just a weakness to exploit. Only given their situation, what was there left for him to exploit?
She shrugged. ‘I guess when I say “bad” I mean boring.’ Pausing, she frowned, her sudden impulse to be open faltering in the face of his dark, dispassionate gaze. ‘Which is what I’m being now, so—’
For a moment he stared at her in silence, and then slowly he reached out and pushed a strand of hair behind her ear. ‘You might be a lot of things, sweetheart. Some of them are exceedingly challenging.’ He smiled slowly. ‘But I can safely say you have never once bored me.’
Her heart twitched, caught his smile like a fish on a hook. ‘It’s early yet,’ she said lightly.
He grinned. ‘Come on, I’m intrigued.’
She burst out laughing. ‘Fine. But it’s really not that exciting.’ She hesitated. Except that it felt stupidly exciting to be talking to him about herself. To feel his eyes on her face, not as part