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His frown formed a bridge between his eyes. ‘But in spite of it all you still loved her?’
She gave him a crooked smile. ‘Yeah, well, that’s what kids do, isn’t it? Their survival depends on it—loving their caregivers. Not that she was great at caregiving or anything. But, yes, I loved her.’
‘Is that why you don’t want kids?’ he said after a moment. ‘Are you worried you won’t do a good job of mothering your own kids?’
Kat picked up her glass for something to do with her hands. ‘I guess on some level... But I really want to achieve what I set out to achieve first. If I get tied down with kids and marriage, I’ll never reach my goal.’
‘What if fame isn’t everything you think it will be?’
‘It’s not just the fame,’ Kat said. ‘I’ve wanted to act for as long as I can remember. I know I won’t be satisfied until I exhaust every opportunity to make it onstage. It’s not like I want to prove it to anyone else. I need to prove it to myself.’
‘It’s a tough life, working for weeks and then nothing for months,’ Flynn said. ‘There are good years and bad years. Plays fold without notice or run for season after season until you’re bored out of your brain for the want of something fresh and more challenging. Then there are the great reviews and the awful ones. You have to have a tough skin.’
She met his dark gaze across the table. ‘And you don’t think I have one?’
‘Underneath that tough exterior is a girl with a soft heart. I see it. Cricket sees it. Miranda and Jaz saw it. Probably Elisabetta saw it, which is why you’re feeling so threatened by her.’
Kat had always prided herself on the impenetrable armour she wore around her heart. But in his presence she could feel it falling away, piece by piece, like a glacier fracturing. He seemed to understand her in a way no one had ever done before. It was hard to keep her defences up when he was so strong and supportive, so intuitive and accepting of her. ‘Do you think I should meet Julius and Jake?’
‘They wouldn’t want you to do anything you’re not comfortable with. But they’re on your team, Kat. We all are.’
‘Apart from Elisabetta,’ she said with a downturn of her mouth.
He reached across the table and covered her hand with his. ‘Let your talent do the talking. You have no reason to doubt yourself.’
Kat stroked her fingers over the flesh of his thumb, feeling a rush of lava-hot heat go from his body to hers. His eyes held hers in a lock that said all that needed to be said. The message was erotic, exciting, thrilling. Urgent. The need that pulsed between them made her inner core vibrate with a longing no amount of celibacy pacts could withstand.
Resisting him any longer was pointless. They had been moving towards this moment from the first time they’d locked gazes. She wanted him and couldn’t bear prolonging the agony. She could no longer find any reason not to explore the chemistry between them. So what if he wasn’t the settling down type? She wasn’t ready for the white picket fence and cottage flowers either. All she wanted was to feel his arms around her, to feel alive in the way a man can make a woman feel when they both like and respect each other. She couldn’t think of a man she liked and respected more than Flynn.
Maybe that was what she had been doing all wrong with dating up to this point. She had dated men who weren’t her equal intellectually, not strong enough to stand up to her and for her. They had only been interested in her body, not her mind, her emotions, her ambitions, her drives and aspirations.
‘If we were to get involved...hypothetically speaking...’ Kat chanced a quick glance at him. ‘What would you want out of it?’
His thumb found the nerve-rich centre of her palm and began stroking a mesmerising caress across the sensitive flesh. ‘You mean apart from sex?’
Kat’s belly quivered at his touch, at his words, at his smouldering-coals look. ‘I mean...would we be having a fling or be in a...a relationship?’
‘You said “relationship” like it was a prison sentence.’
‘Yes, well, some of mine have been a bit like that.’
His stroking continued, stoking a fire within her body she could feel deep and throbbing in her core. ‘What about your celibacy pact?’
‘I’ve proven my point to my friend. Besides, I think she’s going to break it herself this weekend. She’s going to be within arm’s reach of her ex. Always a dangerous prospect for her.’
‘Whose idea was the pact?’
‘Mine mostly,’ Kat said. ‘I just got tired of getting involved with men who were shallow and not interested in me as a person. Or ones who told blatant lies.’
‘Well, if it’s any comfort, I’m not married, haven’t been and was only engaged for forty-eight hours eleven years ago,’ Flynn said. ‘Every other relationship—and I use that term loosely—has been temporary.’
Kat stroked her fingertip over the blunt end of his thumb, watching as his dark ink-like pupils flared with molten heat. Even the candle on the table flickered, as if it was tired of competing with the flame of attraction glowing between them. ‘So...if we get involved what will we call it?’
His mouth slanted in that spine-tingling manner. ‘How about a flingsationship?’
She gave him an answering smile. ‘I’ve never heard of one of those. What does it involve?’
He winked at her. ‘Let’s go back to my place and I’ll show you.’
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