He's My Husband! - Lindsay Armstrong [26]
Brett came back almost immediately, with two balloon glasses. ‘Brandy,’ he said. ‘You look as if you could do with it.’
She took the glass, stared at its amber contents, then took a solid sip, which caused her to choke as it went down fierily and made her eyes water, but also put some starch back into her soul. She took a smaller sip, then put the glass down beside her—and realised she’d lost one shoe in her undignified struggle and that one of her bra straps had slipped down.
She kicked the remaining shoe off, fished for the errant strap and restored it out of sight, then combed her fingers through her hair. ‘Talking of games,’ she said then, that was a particularly nasty one to play, Brett.’
He raised a wry eyebrow. ‘I never had any intention of taking you to bed, Nicola. You were the one who immediately assumed that was the case.’
‘Then...why...?’ She stared at him confusedly.
‘All I was ever going to do was this—’ he inclined his head towards the counter ‘—so that we could talk this out rather than have you scuttling off to bed all mortified and—whatever. By the same token, many men—’ a grim little glint beamed her way ‘—would not have been so obliging, Nicola.’
‘I know that, but you’re not “many men”,’ she protested, and immediately bit her lip and eyed him warily.
But he only smiled slightly—a cool twisting of his lips. ‘Then let’s move on. Would you care to explain why you were so determined to have me kiss you, against my better judgement?’
Nicola flinched, and put a hand to her mouth involuntarily. ‘If that was against your better judgement I’d hate to see what you could do in accord with it—uh...’ She saw the fleeting look of amusement in his eyes, but it was gone in an instant and her shoulders slumped. ‘I-you may not believe me—but tonight I was made to feel...’
She stopped, then said with more spirit, ‘You were there, Brett! “What a delightful hobby, Nicola!’” she mimicked. ‘And—“I just wish I had time for something like this. ” She...’ She paused, and frowned. ‘I’m not getting through to you, am I?’
He shrugged. ‘It seems an excessive length to go to because you’d been made to feel somewhat inadequate, and she probably had no idea she was being patronising. But what about this desire to brush up certain skills that you mentioned?’ he said with irony.
Nicola breathed frustratedly. He was leaning back with his broad shoulders propped against the door-frame, his arms folded across his chest, and there was absolutely no evidence that anything momentous had happened to him. She hadn’t even left any lipstick on him, because it had all worn off earlier.
‘It was one of those foolish things you say in the heat of the moment.’ She said it quietly, but her gaze was level, even a touch severe.
He grimaced, but said, ‘So it wasn’t a prelude to getting to know Richard Holloway better?’
‘When—if I ever decide to get to know him in that way, it’ll be entirely between him and me, Brett. So don’t say another word about Richard Holloway!’
‘Bravo,’ he murmured, but with a trace of unmistakable satire. And he added wryly, at her scorching look, ‘You’re pretty free with your comments on what you perceive my choices in that line might be, but I shall desist.’
She compressed her lips and slid off the counter abruptly. ‘I am going to bed now, and I should warn you that any attempt to trick me or lecture me on the error of my ways is liable to make me bite and scratch and kick! If you think you’re as pure as the driven snow—’
She stopped as he detained her with a hand on her wrist, and her blue eyes blazed, but he said, ‘I’m not going to do any of those things—and neither are you.’ He waited, and watched all the expressions chase through her eyes, but did not release her. It was like being up against an iron will she had no answer for.
She swallowed. ‘So?’
‘So? As a matter of fact, I apologise—for not being as pure as the driven snow—but what you don’t seem to realise