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CHAPTER THREE
ZACK was in a fouler mood than he’d been when the double doors of the hotel’s wedding hall had opened to reveal, not his bride, but a very panicked wedding coordinator who was hissing into her headset.
He leaned back in his seat on his private plane and stared at the amber liquid in the tumbler on his tray. Turbulence was bouncing the alcohol around, sending the strong aroma into the air. He wasn’t tempted to take a drink. He didn’t drink, it was just that his flight attendant had heard about the disaster and assumed he might be in need.
He looked across the wide aisle at Clara, who was, sitting on a leather love seat in the living-room-style plane cabin, staring fixedly at her touch-screen phone.
“Good book?” he asked.
Her head snapped up. “How did you know I was reading?”
“Because you always read.”
“Books make better company than surly bosses.”
“Do they make better company than bitchy employees? If so, perhaps I should read more.”
She looked at him, her expression bland. “I wouldn’t know.”
“No. You wouldn’t. Look, I gave you what you asked for.”
“After a big ugly fight.”
“Because I don’t want to lose you.”
A strange expression flashed in her brown eyes. “Right.”
“You’ve been here since the very early days of Roasted, and you’ve been key to the success of the company, of course I don’t want to lose you.”
She looked back down at her phone. “Well, I can’t live my entire life to make you happy.”
He frowned. “That’s not how it’s been, is it?”
“No,” she said, her tone grudging. She put her phone down and stretched her legs out in front of her and her arms straight over her head, back arching, thrusting her breasts forward. His body hardened, his blood rushing through his veins hotter and faster.
That was a direct result of the fact that he was supposed to break his long bout with celibacy tonight, on this very plane, and it wasn’t happening now. Still, his body hadn’t caught up with his mind yet. Damned inconvenient considering he was now fixating on his friend’s breasts. Breasts that he was not supposed to fixate on. Basically two of the only breasts on earth that were off-limits to him.
More inconvenient, considering they were about to spend the week in Chiang Mai in a very secluded and gorgeous honeymoon villa. Even more when you considered that she was leaving the company soon after.
Well, that wasn’t happening. He would make sure of that. He would offer her whatever he had to offer to get her to stay, and until then he would simply nod whenever she brought it up.
He wasn’t sure how he would convince her, only that he would. He’d successfully stolen her away from her bakery job back when he’d only had a handful of coffee shops to his name. He had no doubt he could do an even better job of keeping her now that he had so many resources at his disposal. He could give her whatever she wanted, more freedom, more time off. And she was his friend. She wouldn’t leave him.
She was just mad about the whole fake fiancée thing. But she would get over it. She always did. It wasn’t the first time he’d made her mad. Likely it wouldn’t be the last. But that was just how it was. She wouldn’t really leave him.
He was a master negotiator. And he didn’t lose. He was good at keeping control, of his life and of his business.
“The property we’re staying on is supposed to be amazing. It borders a Chiang Mai, and there’s a spa right on site. It’s more of a resort than anything else, but you have to be invited to stay there by the owner. Very exclusive.” He got nothing but silence in response.
“They have unicorns, I hear,” he continued, “with golden hooves. You’ll love it.”
He heard her try to stifle a very reluctant snicker.
He leaned in and looked at her face, at the faint shadows marring the pale skin beneath her eyes. “Are you tired?” he asked.
She leaned back in the chair. “You have no idea.”
“There’s a bedroom.” His blood jumped in his veins again, like the kick-start on a motorcycle. “You could lay down for a while if you want.”
“How long have we got?”
“Ten more hours.”
“Oh, yeah, I need sleep.” She stood up and did another little stretch move that accentuated her breasts.
Clara needed more than sleep. She needed to get out of the tiny, enclosed space with Zack and all of his hot, male pheromones that were wreaking havoc on her good sense. If she had any at all to wreak havoc on. Well, she did have some. She’d used it to ask for her out.
For a little bit of a chance to move on and forward with her life. Because Zack hadn’t married Hannah today, which was fine and good, but he would marry someone. He’d decided to, and when Zack put his mind to something, he did it. That meant it would happen, sometime in the very near future, she imagined, now that she knew love wasn’t necessarily on the docket. Heck, if he smiled just right at the flight attendant they would probably be engaged by the time they landed in Thailand. And then she could sleep in the guest room in the villa.
She snorted.
“What?” he asked.
“Nothing.”
“The scariest word known to man when issued from the lips of a woman.”
Her lip curled voluntarily at his statement. “Sexist.”
“I prefer realist, but you’re free to call it as you see it.”
“So tell me this, Zack.”
“What?” he asked, one dark eyebrow arched.
“I assume you’ll attempt marriage again.”
“If I find the right woman.”
“And by that, you don’t mean the woman you love?”
Something in Zack’s posture changed, subtle but obvious to her, his shoulders straightening, his muscles tensing beneath his expertly tailored shirt. His eyes changed, too. There was something dark there, haunted, something she’d never seen before, not this clearly. She’d felt it before, an intensity lurking beneath his cool exterior, but she’d never seen it so plainly.
It was almost frightening in its intensity, transforming a man she’d seen every day for seven years into a cold stranger.
“I don’t do love, Clara. Ever.” He turned his focus to the newspaper that was folded on his lap. “Good night.”
Clara turned toward the bedroom, exhaustion burrowing beneath her skin, down into her bones. Yesterday, everything had been the way it had always been. It had sucked; it had been heading in a direction she hadn’t liked, but for the most part, it had been the same.
Today everything felt different. Most of it was her fault. And even though she wouldn’t change it, she hated it.
“We just landed.”
Clara sat up and pushed the wild mass of auburn curls out of her eyes. She blinked a few times and Zack’s face came into focus. For a moment, she didn’t do anything. She didn’t move, she didn’t breathe, she just concentrated on his face being the first thing she saw.
She’d never woken up next to a man before. And, yeah, this wasn’t really waking up next to a man in the traditional sense. And he was more leaning over than next to her. But it was a really nice thought, and it was a very nice sight first thing in the morning. If it was even morning. She had no idea.
“What time is it?” she asked.
“It’s 10:00 p.m. local time.”
She flopped backward. “Oh, no. Why did you let me sleep?”
“I tried to wake you.”
“No, you didn’t.”
“I did, you were out.”
She felt a strange sort of disappointment curling in her stomach. She wished, well, part of her did, that he had woken her up. She swallowed hard. Her throat felt like it was lined with cotton. It was far too easy to think of a lot of very interesting ways he might have woken her up.
No. Bad.
“I’m going to be a wreck.”
“Sorry.”
“I take it you didn’t sleep?” She looked down and realized she was still wearing her jeans.
“No. But then, I don’t sleep all that much.”
That didn’t surprise her. She’d never really quizzed him on his sleeping habits, but honestly, he just didn’t seem like the kind of man who could sleep at all. He had too much energy and drive to stop even for a moment. Whenever she’d thought of him in bed … well, it hadn’t been images of him sleeping plaguing her.
“We’re at the airport?” she asked, peering out one of the windows, confused by how dark it was outside.
“Don’t know if I’d say airport so much as landing strip. We’re on Mr. Amudee’s property. It backs the city, but there’s a lot of forest in between his land and civilization.”
“Oh.”
“There’s a car waiting for us, and your luggage, such as it was, is already loaded in it.”
She stood and her breasts nearly brushed his chest. She’d misjudged the distance. Her breath caught in her throat and nearly choked her.
Zack didn’t seem affected at all. He just smiled at her, one of his wicked smiles, all of the ghosts she’d glimpsed in his gray eyes before she’d gone to sleep were banished now, leaving behind nothing but the glint that was so familiar to her.
“I didn’t have—” she had to take in another breath because being so close to him had kind of sucked the other one out of her “—that much time to pack. Otherwise I could have had just as many bags as your high-maintenance ladies.”
“You aren’t like the women I date. You aren’t high maintenance. I like that about you.” He turned and headed out the bedroom and she followed him, her chest suddenly feeling tight.
What he meant was, she wasn’t beautiful. Not like the women he dated. The women who were all high-fashion planes and angles. And cheekbones.
Her mother was like that. Her sister, too. Tall and leggy with hip bones that were more prominent than their breasts. And that was the look that walked runways. The look that was fashionable, especially in southern California.
And she just didn’t have the look. She had curves. An abundance of them. If any of the chi-chi boutiques had bras with her cup size, they were very often too small around, meant for women who’d gone under the knife to give them what nature had bestowed upon her so liberally. And her stomach was a little bit round, not concave or rippling. She wasn’t sure if she’d ever seen her ribs.
Standing next to the women in her family just made her feel … inadequate. And wide. And short. She’d tried to subsist on cabbage and water like her mother and sister, but frankly, she’d felt like garbage and had decided a long time ago that feeling healthy beat being fifteen pounds lighter.
Of course, that decision didn’t erase a lifetime of insecurity. And that insecurity wasn’t all down to weight, either.
“Great. Glad to be so … easy.”
The door to the plane was standing open, and a staircase had been lowered to the tarmac. Zack stood and waited for her to go in front of him. She passed him without looking, trying not to show the knockout effect the slight scent of his cologne had on her as she moved by him.
“I wouldn’t call you easy,” he said.
She stopped, third stair from the top, and whipped around to look at him. “That’s not what I meant.”
“Not what I meant, either,” he said, his expression overly innocent.
“Yeah. Right. Are you determined to drive me absolutely insane for this whole trip?” She continued down the steps and hopped onto the tarmac, the night air balmy and thick with mist, blowing across her cheeks and leaving its moist handprint behind.
“We are supposed to be a couple.”
“Fair enough.”
She was reluctant to get into the glossy black town car that was parked right by the plane. Because she’d only just gotten Zack-free air, and she didn’t really relish the thought of getting right back into a tight, enclosed space with him.
She needed to be able to breathe. To think. And she couldn’t do it when he was around.
That realization alone reinforced her crazy, spur-of-the-moment decision to move on with her life, and away from Roasted.
The idea made her slightly sick and more than a little bit sad. Roasted had been her life since Zack had hired her on. The day-to-day of it, the constant push to invent more and more goodies, to push the flavor profiles, to push her creativity … there would never be anything else like it.
But she needed to stand on her own feet. To move on with life. She’d gone from her parents to Zack, and while she didn’t feel familial about Zack in any way, he represented comfort and safety. And other stuff that wasn’t comforting or safe. But being with him, like she was, wasn’t pushing her to move forward.
So she was pushing herself. It was uncomfortable, but that was the way it worked. She hoped it would work.
He opened the door to the town car for her and she slid inside, and he came in just behind her. “So, do you and your boyfriends have fights?”
He must know she never had boyfriends. The odd disastrous date that never went past the front door. Emphasis on the odd, since half the men picked her up while she happened to be in the flagship store. And, in her experience, men who picked you up at ten in the morning in coffeehouses were a bit strange.
“How many long-term relationships have I had, Zack?”
“Well, Pete was around a lot until he moved for work.”
“Pete? He was a friend from high school. And I was not his type, if you catch my drift.”
“You weren’t blonde?”
“Or male.”
“Oh.”
“Point being, I haven’t done a lot of long-term.” Any, but whatever. “And if I’m ever going to … move on, go into that phase of life then I need to be less consumed with work.”
A muscled in his jaw ticked. “But you won’t make this kind of money running your own bakery.”
“I know. But I have a decent amount of money. How much do I need? How much do you need?”
There was a pause. Zack’s hand curled into a fist on the leather seat, then relaxed. “More. Just … a bit more.”
“And then you’re never done.”
“But if not for that then what am I working for?”
She swallowed. “A good question. Good and scary. Though I suppose adding a wife will add … something. When you find a new prospect, that is. Did Hannah have an equally efficient and driven sister, by chance?”
“Not that I’m aware of.”
She snapped her fingers. “Darn.”
“Don’t lose sleep over it.”
“I won’t be sleeping tonight, anyway. Because you didn’t wake me up on the plane.” She couldn’t resist the jab.
“Because you sleep like a rock and snore like a walrus.”
“Might be why my relationships aren’t long-term,” she said drily. Not that any man had ever heard her snore but she was so not admitting to that.
“I doubt that.”
“Do you?”
His eyes locked with hers and something changed in the air. It seemed to crackle. Like a spark on dry leaves. It was strange. It was breathtaking, and electrifying, and she never wanted it to end.
“Why?” she asked, pressing. Desperate to hear more. A little bit afraid of hearing more, too.
“Because a little bit of snoring wouldn’t deter a man who’d had the pleasure of sharing your bed.”
She sucked in a sharp breath and looked out the window, and into the inky-black jungle. She felt dizzy. She felt … hot.
“Well, thanks,” she said.
He chuckled, low and rich like the best chocolate ganache. Just as bad for her to indulge in as the naughty treat, too. “You seem uncomfortable with the compliment.”
“You and I don’t talk about things like that.”
“Only because it hadn’t come up.”
“Do you snore?” she asked.
“Not that I’m aware of.”
“Then your lack of long-term relationships doesn’t really make sense at all.”
He arched one dark brow. “Was that a compliment?”
“More a commentary on the transient nature of your love life.”
“I’m wounded.”
She winced. “Well, maybe in light of all that happened today it wasn’t the best thing to say.”
“You’ve never pulled punches before, don’t start now.”
“I don’t know any other way to be.”
“Now that may account for your own short-term relationships.”
She whipped around to face him and her heart stalled. He was looking at her like she was a particularly interesting treat. One he might like to taste.
The car stopped and she nearly breathed a prayer of thanks out loud. She needed distance. She needed it desperately.
“Well,” Zack said, opening the door. “Time to go and have a look at our honeymoon suite.”
CHAPTER FOUR
THE honeymoon villa was the epitome of romance. The anterior wall of the courtyard was surrounded by dense, green trees, clinging vines and flowers covering most of the stone wall, adding color, a sense that nature ruled here, not man. There was a keypad on the gate and Zack entered a code in; a reminder that the man very much had his fingerprints all over the property.
“Nice,” she said, as the gates swung open and revealed an open courtyard area. The villa itself was white and clean. Intricate spires, carved from wood and capped in gold, adorned the roof of the house, rising up to meet the thick canopy of teak trees.
“Mr. Amudee had planned on giving Hannah and I a few days of wedded bliss prior to meeting with me, so he made sure I had the code, and that everything in the home would be stocked and ready.”
Clara tried not to think about Zack and Hannah, using the love nest for its intended purpose. More than that, she tried not to think of her and Zack using it for its intended purpose.
She really did try. There was no point in allowing those fantasies. Those fantasies had led to nothing more than dateless Friday nights and lack of sleep.
“Well, that was … thoughtful of him.”
“It was. I believe he has some activities planned for us, too.”
Oh, great. She was going to be trapped in happy-couple-honeymoon-activity hell.
She followed Zack through the vast courtyard and to the wide, ornately carved double doors at the front of the villa. She touched one of the flower blossoms etched into the hard surface. “These are gorgeous. I wonder if I could mimic the design with frosting.”
“I will happily be a part of that experiment.” He pushed open the doors and stood, waiting for her to go in before him.
“You do seem to hang around a lot more when I’m practicing my baking skills.”
“I don’t know how.”
“I could teach you,” she said. “Maybe sometimes after I can teach you how to use a food processor.”
“I think I’ll pass. Anyway, I’m a bachelor. Have pity on me. I wasn’t supposed to be a bachelor after today, but I am, and now I still need my best friend to cook for me.”
“And probably do your laundry.”
“I wouldn’t mind.”
Basically he wanted her to be his wife with none of the perks. She nearly said so, but that would sound too much like she wanted the perks, and even if a part of her did, she’d rather parade naked through the Castro District than confess it.
“I’m not doing your laundry.”
Zack closed the door behind them and a shock of awareness hit her, low and strong in her stomach. She felt so very alone with Zack all of a sudden that she could hardly breathe. And it wasn’t as though she’d never been alone with him. She had been. Hundreds of times. Late nights in the office, at her apartment cooking, at his luxury penthouse watching a movie.
But this wasn’t San Francisco. It wasn’t their offices; it wasn’t one of their apartments. It felt like another world entirely and that was … dangerous.
She looked up at the tall, peaked ceilings, at the intricately carved vines and flowers that cascaded from wooden rafters. Swaths of fabric were the only dividers between rooms, gauzy and sexy, providing the illusion of privacy without actually giving any at all.
And in the middle of it all was Zack. He filled the space, not just with his breadth and height, but with his presence. With the unique scent that was so utterly Zack mingling with the heavy perfume of plumeria. Familiar and exotic all at once.
This was like one of her late-night fantasies. Like a scene she’d only ever allowed herself to indulge in when she was shrouded in the darkness of her room. And now, those fantasies were coming back to bite her.
Because they were mingling with reality. This was real. And in reality, Zack didn’t want her like she wanted him. But in her fantasies he did. There, he touched her like a lover, his eyes locked with hers, his lips.
She needed her head checked.
“I have a housekeeper, anyway. I was teasing,” he said.
“I know.” She hoped she didn’t look as flushed as she felt.
“I don’t think you did. I think you were about to bite my head off.” He looked … amused. Damn him.
“Is there food?”
His lips curved into a half smile. “I can check.”
He wandered out of the main living area, in search of the kitchen, she imagined, and she took the opportunity to breathe in air that didn’t smell of Zack. Air that didn’t make her stomach twist.
She walked the opposite direction of Zack, through one of the fabric-covered doorways and stopped. It was the bedroom. The bed was up on a raised platform, a duvet in deep red spread over it. Cream colored fabric with delicate gold vines woven throughout hung from the ceiling, shielding the bed. It was obvious that it wasn’t a bed made for one, or for sleeping.
She swallowed heavily, her eyes glued to the center of the room.
She heard footsteps behind her and turned. “I found food.”
“Good,” she said, trying to ignore the fast-paced beating of her heart. Zack and the bed in one room was enough to make her feel like her head might explode. “There is. I mean, this isn’t the only bedroom is it?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Oh,” she said.
“I set dinner out on the balcony, if you want to join me.”
“Don’t you want to go to bed?” she asked, then immediately regretted the way the words had come out. Heat flooded her face, and she was certain there was a very blatant blush staining her cheeks. “I mean … well, you know what I mean. That wasn’t. I meant you. By yourself. Because I slept and I know you didn’t.”
“At least let me buy you dinner first, Clara,” he said, his mouth curved in amusement, his eyes glittering with the same heat she’d noticed earlier. It made her uncomfortable. And jittery. And a little bit excited.
She laughed, a kind of nervous, fake sound. “Of course.”
Zack ignored the jolt of arousal that shot through his veins. For a moment at least, he and Clara had both been thinking the same thing. And it had involved that bed. That bed that was far too tempting, even for a man who prided himself on having absolute control at all times.
Things with Clara had always been easy. No, he’d never been blind to her beauty, but their relationship had never been marked by moments of heavy sexual tension. Not until today.
And knowing that, even for a moment, she’d shared in the temptation, well, that made it all worse. Or better. No, definitely worse, because in his life, he valued boundaries. Everything and everyone had a place and a purpose. Clara had a place. It was not in his bed.
Or this bed.
It was important that his life stay focused like that. Controlled. That nothing crossed over. He’d been rigid in that, uncompromising, for the past fourteen years.
“This way, beautiful,” he said, clenching his hand into a fist to keep from putting it on Clara’s lower back. He would have done it before. But suddenly it seemed like far too risky of a maneuver.
Clara shot him a look that was pure Clara, his friend, and it made the knot in his chest ease slightly. Though it didn’t do much for the heat coursing through his veins.
He was questioning why he’d thought bringing her was a good idea. And he never questioned his decisions. Not anymore. Because he thought everything through before he acted. Not thinking, letting anything go before reason, was a recipe for disaster.
And bringing Clara had been the logical choice. At least until thirty seconds ago.
He moved in front of her, under the guise of leading her to the deck, but really just so he wouldn’t let himself look at her butt while she walked. Occasionally he allowed himself the indulgence of looking at her curves. Harmless enough. He was human, a man, and she was a beautiful woman. But it seemed less harmless after a moment like that.
“This is really nice,” she said when they were outside.
Her words were true, banal and safe. He’d set the table and turned on the string of lanterns that were hung above the table. A moderate effort, but he had wanted it to be nice. Now it felt strangely intimate.
He couldn’t remember the last time a dinner date had seemed intimate. He couldn’t even remember the last time that word had seemed applicable to something in his life. Very often, sex didn’t even seem all that intimate to him.
Of course, it had been so long since he’d had sex maybe that wasn’t true. That was likely half of his problem now.
Clara wandered to the railing and leaned over the edge, tossing her glossy copper curls over her shoulder and sniffing the air. Or maybe the sex wasn’t the problem. Because being alone with Hannah hadn’t made him feel this way. And there were days when the scent of Clara’s perfume hitting him when she walked past made his stomach tighten.
But he ignored that. He was good at ignoring it.
“What are you doing?”
“It smells amazing out here. Like when you bake bread and the air is heavy with it. Only it’s flowers instead of flour.” She turned to him and smiled, the familiar glitter back in her eyes.
The knot inside him eased even more.
“I would never have thought of it that way.” He pulled her chair out and nodded toward it and she walked over to the table and took her seat.
He sat across from her, ladling reheated Tom Yum Ka into her bowl and then into his. She smiled at him, the slight dimple in her rounded cheeks deepening as she did.
Things seemed to have stabilized, even if her sweet grin did have an impact on his stomach.
“So, tell me more about this deal with Mr. Amudee.”
He put his forearm on the table and leaned forward. “I think we covered most of it. Although, another reason it’s nice to have you here is your palate. I’d like you to taste the different roasts and come up with pairings for them. It would be particularly nice to have in our boutique locations.”
“Pairings!” Her eyes glittered. “I love it.”
“Good coffee or tea really is just as complex as good wine. There are just as many flavor variations.”
“I know, Zack,” she said.
“Of course you do. You appreciate good coffee. It’s one reason we get along so well.”
Clara took another bite of her soup and let the ginger sit on her tongue, enjoying the zip of spice that hurt just enough to take her mind off the weird reaction she was having to Zack. Yes, being attracted to him was nothing new.
But this was different. The attraction she felt at home was like a sleeper agent. It attacked her when she least expected it. In dreams. When she was looking at other men and contemplating accepting a date. It wasn’t usually this shaky, limb-weakening thing that made her feel tongue-tied and exposed in his presence. Maybe it was the feeling of utter seclusion. Or maybe it was because she knew just what that big bed was here for, what he’d been planning on doing with it.
“That and I bake you cupcakes,” she said, swallowing the tart and spicy soup.
“There is that.” Zack looked toward the railing of the deck, off into trees, the look in his eyes distant, cold suddenly. “Tell me about your bakery.”
“The one I hope to have?”
“Yes. And the life you’re going to put with it.”
Her chest constricted. “It will be small. I’ll have regular menu items and daily specials. I’ll have more time to make fancy little treats with a lot of decorations. I’ll have a hand in everything instead of just conceptualizing and farming the instructions out to hordes of employees.”
“And that’s important to you?”
“It’s how we started. Me in the flagship store, you going back and forth between your—What did you have when I met you? Fifteen stores up and down the West Coast? It was fun.”
“Yes, but now we have money.”
She nodded. “We do. And it’s great. You’ve done this incredible thing, Zack. The growth has been … amazing. Way beyond what I imagined.”
“Not beyond what I imagined.”
“No?”
He shook his head. “It was always the plan. Planning is key. It’s when you don’t plan, when you drift, that’s when things are a surprise. Good or bad.”
“You didn’t plan for Hannah to opt out of the wedding.”
“I didn’t plan for you to leave Roasted, either. Sometimes other people come in and mess with your plans,” he said, his dark eyebrows locked together.
“This doesn’t mean I won’t see you anymore,” she said. Though she probably shouldn’t. But the thought of that made her chest feel like there was a hole in it. Still, she’d baked the man’s wedding cake. She was such a pushover, such a hopeless case, it was obscene. It had to end.
She didn’t want it to. But if she didn’t see him at work every day … it would be a start.
“I know you’ll still see me,” he said, his mouth curving. “You’d have withdrawals otherwise.”
If only that weren’t true. “Right. Can’t live without you, Zack.” She felt her throat get tight. Stupid. So stupid. But Zack really did mean the world to her, and she had a very strong suspicion that her statement was nothing but the truth. He had offered her support when no one else in her life had. He still did.
She regretted saying she wanted to leave Roasted. Regretted it with everything in her. But she couldn’t change her mind. The reasoning behind the decision was still sound. And she really would still see him. He just wouldn’t fill up her whole world anymore. She couldn’t let feelings for him, feelings that would never be returned, hold her back for the rest of her life.
Zack’s arm twitched and he reached into his pocket. “Phone vibrated,” he said. He pulled out his smart phone and unlocked the screen, a strange expression on his face. “Hannah texted me.”
