A Fare To Remember_ Just Whistle_Driven - Vicki Lewis Thompson [88]
A curse slipped from his lips and he shook his head. This had to stop right now. If he hoped for anything to happen between them, it couldn’t begin this way. Alec drew a deep breath. He’d known her a day, less than twenty-four hours, and already he was planning their future together.
“What is going on in your head?” he said, raking his hands through his hair. If he didn’t know any better, he’d suspect she’d used one of those crazy Gypsy spells or curses and rendered him completely defenseless to her beauty.
Hell, maybe she knew exactly who he was. After all, she was psychic. And that fortune she’d told in the shop hit pretty close to home. This could all be a plan for revenge, cooked up between her and her grandmother. She’d lure him into bed, make him all hot and crazy, and dump cold water on him.
He stared at his reflection for a moment longer, then opened the medicine cabinet and grabbed the aspirin. “You’re not bewitched,” he muttered. “You’re temporarily insane.” On the way back to the kitchen, Alec stopped and grabbed a T-shirt from his bedroom. He found Sabina waiting where he’d left her.
“Aspirin,” he said, popping the cap off the top of the bottle. He shook two into her palm, then refilled her empty water glass.
Sabina watched him with a curious gaze before she tossed the aspirin into her mouth. Tilting her head back, she took a sip of the water, then smiled. “There,” she said.
Alec could see that she waiting for him to step closer and kiss her. His eyes were fixed on her lips, still damp from the water and slightly parted. She clenched and unclenched her fingers, but Alec stayed glued to his spot. “I should take you home. We’ll do this some other time.”
“I’m fine,” Sabina insisted, sending him a sultry smile. “My headache is gone.”
“You still look a little pale. You really should go home and rest. I’ll go get my car.”
She opened her mouth, as if to protest, but thought better of it. A tiny frown worried her brow. “You’re probably right. I still do feel a bit dizzy.” She quickly stood up and grabbed her purse. “You don’t have to drive me. I can get a cab.”
“Don’t be silly,” Alec said. “I’m parked just a few blocks from here. It will only take me a minute to go get my car.”
Sabina shook her head. “I’m perfectly capable of getting myself home.”
Alec sensed the anger in her voice and decided to let the argument go. “All right.” He grabbed her hand before she had a chance to leave and gave it a squeeze. “I’ll call you.”
“Fine,” she said.
With that, she turned and walked out. At the last minute, Alec decided to stop her, but then he heard the front door slam and he thought better of it. If she stayed any longer, he’d forget that he was a nice guy deep inside. He’d forget that there was a reason he couldn’t spend the rest of his evening kissing her and undressing her and making love to her.
He strolled into the foyer and watched through the beveled glass of the door as she descended the front steps. If he looked at the situation objectively, she was just a woman. A beautiful woman, but a woman all the same. Hell, Manhattan was full of them—models, actresses, socialites, heiresses. Up until now, he’d had his choice.
But suddenly he didn’t want his choice. Only one woman interested him and that was Sabina Amanar. Maybe that was the Gypsy curse, to want something that you knew you could never have.
Alec wandered back to the kitchen. His briefcase sat on the counter where he’d dropped it that afternoon. He opened it and pulled out the Lupescu file, then spread the papers out on the granite-covered island.
Acquisition of the Lupescu property had been a crusade of sorts for his father. Simon Harnett didn’t like to lose. For him, business was like war. There were those who agreed with him, his troops, as he liked to call them. And then there were those who opposed him…the enemy.