Australian Boss: Diamond Ring
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Fiona cast an uncomfortable glance his way before she pinned on that smile she’d worked so hard to hold all night. ‘I don’t think I know the answer to this one, Mum. I’ll have to pass.’
‘You must know.’ Terrence Donner cast a slightly impatient glance his daughter’s way. ‘None of the questions in this game are unanswerable.’
‘For people who enjoy documentaries and non-fiction reading, perhaps.’ Brent’s knee brushed against Fiona’s as he shifted in his chair.
The jolt to his senses shouldn’t have happened. He’d made the choice not to notice Fiona in that way.
So why had he?
You’ve noticed her from the start. You’ve simply been avoiding your awareness of her.
Well, then, he could go on avoiding it. He had to go on avoiding it because she set off behaviours in him that he had worked hard for decades to subdue, and he wasn’t about to reveal those shortcomings to her. He guarded those things.
‘Nope. Sorry, Dad. I truly don’t have an answer to put up at this point.’ Fiona shrugged her shoulders and indicated they should move on to the next player, but her words were slightly breathless.
Brent reacted to that knowledge more than he wanted to.
The game ended. Brent got to his feet. He might not have all his answers, but he knew he’d had enough of this. And so had Fiona. ‘It’s been nice to meet you all, but we have a long trip to get home. I think it’s time we left.’
When they emerged outside the family’s house Brent breathed in the night air and thought of Linc and Alex and how lucky he was to have them. A chosen family, not a blood one. As if that mattered. He wouldn’t trade them. The thoughts helped him regain perspective and that put him in a better place to care for Fiona.
As a colleague and someone he’d begun to admire in that capacity…
He helped Fiona into his truck and talked about this and that as they made their way back towards her home.
If he talked, maybe she would forget the unpleasantness of the evening. And maybe he would forget how much he wanted to draw her into his arms and kiss her to take her mind off the fact that her family didn’t treat her the way they all should. That desire was not businesslike.
Words pushed past his lips anyway. ‘What’s wrong with them? They don’t—’
‘I’m glad you got to meet my family, that they got to meet my boss and hear a little about the work I’m doing.’ Fiona spoke over the top of him. Her words were deliberately upbeat as he turned the truck into an empty parking space in the apartment complex’s courtyard. Upbeat but edged with that same breathless quality as earlier, when their knees had brushed beneath the table.
She went on, ‘I hope that will have made my goals a little more real to them, a little more understandable.’
A little more acceptable? Her family made her feel abnormal when she was a great person in her own right. And that was clearly something that had been going on for a long time. That was Brent’s assessment and it was one that was…a little too close to the bone for comfort.
Brent turned off the truck’s ignition and strode around the front to open her door and help her out. ‘You have a good start in a job that’s in your chosen field. There are plenty of people out there who never manage to say that much. Your family should be proud of the way you’ve pursued and begun to obtain your goals.’
‘Thank you and…maybe they are.’ She spoke in a way that seemed to try to keep the uncertainty out of her tone. And gave a soft smile, no doubt aimed at easing the moment. ‘Well, I promise you I will do my utmost to support you in return when it comes time to go to the Awards dinner.’
‘Your company on the night will be more than enough.’ Brent all but growled the words. ‘I’ll walk you up.’
See her into her apartment safely and then leave. That was what he needed to do, not linger here wanting nebulous things he didn’t want to name but knew would get him into trouble if he went after them. Things that had to do with odd notions, such as comfort and closeness and acceptance.
What was the matter with him tonight? Where were these deep buried thoughts coming from?
When they reached the top of the staircase and made their way to her front door, Fiona put her key in the lock and turned to face him. ‘They didn’t pry too much into your business, I hope. When I was in the kitchen clearing away dishes.’
He pushed his hands into his pockets, frowned and took them out again. ‘They didn’t pry too much.’
She seemed to relax a little at that. ‘Would you like a coffee or something before you drive on? I’ve only got instant—’
‘No. Thanks. But I’ll see you inside.’ He had to know she was safely secured behind these walls. That was only common courtesy.
‘O-okay.’ She pushed the door open and walked inside.
Brent followed, closed it after him and glanced around.
A hand-woven rug brightened the floor. Those splashes of orange and sky-blue and red and green were echoed in throw cushions and the table lamp and an abstract Fiona Donner original on the wall.
She’d made a beautiful home, welcoming and individual and full of her life and vitality and sweetness. Brent wanted to sit on her sofa and just…be there among these things that held meaning for her. As though, if he did that, he’d…belong.
The inexplicable feeling washed through him, so much more than a simple awareness of her, even if that awareness had been causing him enough problems all by itself.
It took him enough by surprise that he hesitated in the centre of her small living room.
He should go.
He wanted to stay.
Since when had his emotions reached for such odd things? He didn’t even do that whole ‘feelings’ arena. Linc and Alex—he loved them, but that was it. His inability to maintain a relationship with his father had taught him what his limits were. The autism—he hadn’t been able to get past that. With Alex and Linc it was different, but they’d all come up together, had faced down their demons together.
With Fiona, Brent wasn’t even prepared to let himself be attracted to her. He wasn’t in the market for a relationship, and Fiona was someone who should be given that if a man was interested in her.
So say goodbye and leave. Do it now before any other temptation comes over you.
‘Well, thanks again.’
‘I should go.’
They spoke at the same time.
Fiona paused and her lashes fluttered over eyes the colour of the sky in the mountains on a warm summer day. Clear, sweet blue.
So lovely. He could appreciate the pure aesthetics of her, couldn’t he? Just appreciate that?
Yes? And where was the distance to go with that kind of remote appreciation?
Brent didn’t know the answer and, because he didn’t, and because he couldn’t quite make his feet take him to the door and through it, he addressed another issue that he did want answers to.
‘Your family made tonight all about themselves.’ Maybe she didn’t want to discuss this, but what if she needed to? What if he needed to talk with her about the way her family had treated her?
His fingers reached out and brushed the back of her hand. She had smooth, soft skin like the petals of a rose. Too late not to touch her now. He’d done it. ‘Your parents could have tried to be a bit accommodating of your tastes in terms of entertainment.’
‘They think I need to fit in, be more like them, but I’m just…not. I tried that. It didn’t work.’ Her soft sigh was a whisper between them. ‘But I love them, and they don’t mean to make me uncomfortable.’ She gestured with her hand to dismiss the topic. ‘Thank you for your company, anyway.’
‘You’re welcome.’ And he had to go.
Brent walked to the door and tugged it open and, with a low, ‘Lock it after me,’ he stepped through. On the other side, he waited until she did as he had asked, and then he walked to his truck and drove away.
What he thought about her family, about all this, didn’t matter in the end. Whatever he now knew of her, whatever empathy he felt for her, he had nothing to offer anyone, and especially not someone like Fiona.
That was what he had to remember.
Chapter Four
BRENT parked his truck and made his way into the club. Fiona had left her flat keys on her work desk, half-hidden away between two separate messy piles of paper. He had discovered this fact as he’d cleared chocolate wrappers from her work area.
Not wrappers from chocolates his graphic designer had eaten from the stash in her bottom desk drawer.
But wrappers from the chocolates he’d eaten his way through while he’d examined her design program. He hadn’t planned to eat the treats. He’d opened the drawer in search of a notepad and, though he’d told himself not to be tempted, somehow his hand had ended up in the drawer and the rest, as he focused all his attention on the nuts and bolts of her program and then on the work she’d done within it, had been, as they said, ‘history’. He’d have to replace the candy stash before she got to work on Monday.
She was on the dance floor. His gaze locked onto her and he quickly forgot his thoughts. Dear God, she looked magnificent. A black skirt that came to just above her knees, high-heeled boots and a scoop-necked cream top that clung to her curves as she moved all combined to make her a highly irresistible package of appeal.
When the number ended, Fiona smiled at her partner and moved off the floor with him. She stood half a head taller than the man. At just about the moment Brent forced himself to acknowledge he felt jealous of that man, they joined a large group of people seated at some tables pulled close together.
The fellow put his arm around one of the women in the group and dropped a kiss on her cheek.
‘Brent.’ Fiona’s exclamation came as he approached the tables. ‘What brings you here—?’
‘You.’ The word was low, husky and far too intimate, reflecting thoughts that poured through him, pushed past his defences.
In her boots with the three-inch heel, she stood almost nose to nose with him. Brent wanted to trace all her dips and curves with his fingertips.
It had to be his autism speaking, a need for a tactile exploration to feed his thought processes the answers they sought.
Sure. You believe that, MacKay.
‘Your flat keys. I found them on your desk after you left.’ That was his reason for finding her here. Only that. ‘You might have spares somewhere, but I didn’t know.’
‘I do have a spare set. In my desk at work. Oh, of all the silly things for me to do!’ Her gaze searched his face. ‘I’m so sorry you had to chase me down. I don’t have my mobile turned on, either. It’s a waste of time in here because I wouldn’t hear it ring. How did you know—?’
‘I heard you mention the name of this place when you were on your mobile phone as you were leaving. There’s no need to apologise. I couldn’t have left you without your keys to get into your home.’
Fiona’s mouth softened. ‘Thank you.’
Just two simple words, and he leaned towards her. Brent straightened and his head tipped to the right. ‘Ah—’
She was returning his glance, was as aware of him in this moment as he was of her, and Brent’s need to protect his privacy fought with his need…for her.
But for what? To explore physical attraction with her? Because that was all he could want, wasn’t it? For him, intimacy—true intimacy that involved opening up and letting someone else in was…out of the question.
And have you asked yourself why that is, MacKay? Why you’re so determined to keep people at arm’s length?
Brent knew the answer. He was different, and his ‘different’ wasn’t something people, generally, would be able to accept. So he kept it to himself. He was happier that way. Comfortable.
Safe?
It wasn’t about that. And he had every right to value his privacy, for whatever reasons he wanted to. And there was nothing else behind the way he felt. Nothing.
Fiona’s gaze searched his eyes.
Brent stared into deep blue irises until he felt the stares of some of her friends on him.
She looked past him and seemed to force a casual smile. ‘Everyone, this is my boss, Brent MacKay.’
A round of introductions followed. It gave Brent a chance to settle his reactions to her.
So why did they continue to simmer beneath the surface of every word, every exchange and glance? Rejecting those reactions should be as easy as deciding they weren’t in his best interests or, in fact, in hers. Brent had already decided that, so why…? ‘I should get going.’
‘Would you like to—?’ She stopped, clamped those soft lips together.
Brent drew her keys from his pocket and, when she held out her hand, dropped them into it.
‘Thank you.’ Her fingers curled over the keys before she snagged her bag from the back of a chair and dropped them into it. ‘Please, let me at least…I don’t know…Can I buy you a drink or something? I feel awful, putting you out this way. We could go to the bar. I see a few spaces over there. Most people are on the dance floor right now, I think.’
The bar stretched across the entirety of the far wall beyond the dance area. It was further from the music than the tables here. Brent’s voice emerged as a low growl of sound. ‘A drink would be…nice.’
He’d led her halfway around the dance floor before he registered that his choice might not have been particularly smart.
When they reached the bar, they ordered drinks and Fiona watched Brent from the corner of her eye in the bar mirror and saw the way they looked together.
A dark head and a fair one. A lean, strong face and a soft womanly one. They looked right to her, side by side this way.
The image reached past her defences, left them in the dust, left her wanting deep silent things she couldn’t want, couldn’t let herself admit.
What did Brent want?
Nothing you can pin hopes on, Fiona. Remember that.
‘I hope chasing me down with my keys hasn’t interfered with other plans of yours.’ She didn’t quite meet his gaze. ‘That is…it’s none of my business of course…I simply didn’t want to take you away from—’
A girlfriend? A lover waiting for him somewhere? The thought stung, yet it wasn’t her business, was it?
‘You might have come here with someone—?’
He spoke almost when she did, and then stopped, and their gazes met and held and the atmosphere between them thickened into silently acknowledged curiosity and a certain comprehension.
‘I don’t…’
‘There’s no one.’ Fiona’s heart began to beat more heavily in her chest.
They both lowered their gazes to their drinks, sipped.
Brent’s face tightened as he looked up at her again. ‘This—’
‘I’ve been thinking about the Doolan project.’ Fiona rushed the words out and took another fortifying sip of her lemon mineral water. If she made it all about work they could forget those moments looking into each other’s eyes in a mirror.
Could forget the warmth and consciousness in their eyes, the desire that when they faced each other in reality, they both worked hard to hide.
A part of her wanted to see it again, even though following that path with him could only lead to hurt for her because he would do what every other man had done.
He would go cold on the idea of her sooner or later. He’d already shown the capacity for that.
So talk about work, Fiona, and ease through these moments and then let him go. ‘I know the couple are at loggerheads with each other in their personal lives, but I thought I might have an idea to keep both of them happy with our project plans.’
‘Go on. I’m interested in any contribution you want to make.’ It was clear he meant this.
And perhaps equally clear that he welcomed the change of topic to a work-related subject as much as she told herself she must take the conversation there.
The little sting of hurt was foolish and incidental, and she did her best to ignore its impact. ‘If we use either of the couple’s suggested overall ideas for the project, one of them is likely to resent the result.’
‘It will be one more thing for them to argue about, and our company might get caught in the middle of that altercation.’ His lashes formed thick crescents against his cheeks as he briefly dipped his gaze.
There was something almost vulnerable in that sight, and that made Fiona vulnerable as she softened towards him.
Maybe they needed to be at loggerheads so she could stop being so conscious of him as a man. Because, whether she wanted to be or not, she was, and, though she felt that same vibe back from him, he was her boss and he seemed determined not to notice her even if he was noticing her.
Oh, she had to stop this analysing!
Brent cast a wry smile her way. ‘So do you think you and I could agree on something that might satisfy both of them?’
Far too easily.
So much for her idea of being at loggerheads for her own salvation. Fiona straightened on the stool. ‘Yes. I think we could do it, for the sake of the project and for the company’s overall good. It’s simply a collaboration of minds, after all.’
‘I couldn’t agree more.’ His nod was pure professionalism. The warmth in his glance was not, but he masked that quickly and she told herself to stop noticing. They sipped their drinks in silence before she spoke again.
‘To answer your question from earlier, I caught a lift here with Stacey but I think she’ll end up at Caleb’s place later.’ The couple had been one of her ‘fix it’ projects and had got back together after not speaking to each other for three months. ‘I’ll head off myself soon. I don’t want a really late night.’
They’d finished their drinks. Somehow they were both on their feet.
‘Thanks again for bringing my keys to me, for taking the time to do that.’
‘Do you need a lift home?’ He asked it in such a level way, yet his gaze was not level. It was thoughtful and cautious, offering and…almost braced for her to say no?
As if Brent MacKay would care whether she rejected or accepted him in anything. He was a self-made, very wealthy, highly eligible and extremely talented man. If anything, he had the whole world at his feet.
Yet that’s not what you see in the backs of his eyes at times when he drops his guard a little. That’s not what you saw in those photos with his brothers.
Well, what Fiona looked for and believed she ‘saw’ in those around her were things she had to guard. Her family’s discomfort with that side of her had proved that. She tried to respond in kind. ‘I left my car at Stacey’s place. I just need to get a taxi that far.’
‘What suburb?’
Fiona told him.
Brent nodded. ‘I’ll drive you.’ Decision made. ‘It’s on the way. It would be silly for you to wait around for a taxi and have the expense of it when there’s no need.’
‘Thank you. I just feel guilty for bringing you out when you must have had far better things to do with your time than chase after a designer who can’t even keep track of her apartment keys.’
‘You’re an artist. It is okay for you to forget things sometimes, you know. Some people would say it was almost obligatory.’ They drew near the tables of her friends and Brent waited while she bade them all a quick goodbye.
Once they were outside he quickly hustled her to his truck and got them on the road. They didn’t speak much at first. In the quiet of the night the truck’s cab felt isolated and enclosed and…intimate.
If only she could be a little less conscious of him, but that didn’t seem to be an option for her at the moment.
As he drove them towards her friend’s home, she turned to him and searched his shadowy face. ‘Were you at work late before you discovered my keys?’
‘Yes. I got…caught up there.’ His slight hesitation seemed to hold perhaps a hint of embarrassment. Or some kind of chagrin?
‘Well, now I’m going to owe you twice as much of an effort when I attend the Awards night with you tomorrow night.’ Fiona gave him directions as they neared Stacey’s home.
He drove the truck into an empty space on the street and killed the engine.
It was a quiet residential street and she’d parked her car underneath a street light.
‘Talk about your work for the company if that chance comes up. That’s all I ask.’ He climbed from the truck, crossed in front and opened her door for her. ‘Let’s see you to your car.’
When they got to her car she had her key ready and she turned to him and thanked him quickly and maybe that would have done it, except her nose bumped the side of his neck as she did that because he moved, and she moved, and she didn’t anticipate his closeness and suddenly all the resistance seemed pointless because all the awareness was there, wasn’t it?
He smelled good. Did she press her nose to his neck for the slightest split second?
Did he tip his head towards hers, encouraging that act?
Two deep breaths, one from him, one from her, and they were apart again, the silence an endless consciousness until his gaze met hers and she saw what had to be rare indecision inside him.
‘I shouldn’t do this. It’s not smart.’ His words were an echo of her thoughts.
And she wanted to know…‘Why do you—’
He shook his head. ‘Maybe it’s those long, tall boots. They’re as good to blame as anything.’ His hand closed around her upper arm. His lashes swept down over glittering green eyes that had gone from indecision to determination in…the blink of green eyes.
And Fiona’s senses stalled and her heart stalled and inside her the war hit a new level of anticipation and concern, of need to engage and need to retreat and she thought, Now. He’s going to kiss me now.
And it was what she’d waited for, hoped for without wanting to admit it to herself. Would it be such a bad thing, even if it might cause complications for them?
But he stood there very still, and his fingers tensed where they held her. And his head twitched once, hard, to the right and the moment was lost.
Brent uttered a harsh, ‘Goodnight,’ and dropped his hand, and left her standing there while he walked away.
Chapter Five
‘IT’S the autism playing out. Having that happen as much as it has lately in front of…other people makes me tense.’ Brent muttered the words to Linc as the two men stepped out of his home the following night and into the communal corridor.
He tugged at the collar of the starched white dress shirt. ‘You know how I feel about being in the public eye with that kind of thing.’
The loss of control of his condition in Fiona’s company—he’d known it was happening from when he’d first met her. Because of that fact alone, he could forget any chance of being intimate with her. Not that he would have tried to pursue that. She worked for him, for starters, and she deserved better than he could give her.
Why was he thinking this way at all, anyway? He didn’t want to examine his motives.
‘Your autism is barely noticeable. Even when it does “play out”, most people wouldn’t figure out the source.’ Linc drew a breath and his gaze searched Brent’s. ‘Are you sure that’s what this is about?’
‘What else would it be?’ Brent spoke quickly, a little too loudly.
A murmur of voices sounded in the foyer below. Voices Brent recognised. His brother Alex.
And Fiona. Alex must have met her on the way in, before she had a chance to hit the buzzer.
He told himself he wasn’t relieved to end the discussion with Linc.
‘Good luck tonight, anyway.’
‘Thanks.’ Brent bade Linc a quiet goodbye and headed down the staircase.
When Alex spotted him, Brent’s youngest brother excused himself from his guest, shared a brief word on the staircase with Brent and disappeared.