Bombshell (Hollywood A-List #1)(43)

Oh God, I was falling for this. In half a hot second, my defenses dropped with a clang and I let myself get hurled into deep space by that kiss, spinning and twisting, reality and fantasy joined into a single burning body.

Cara.

You’re not supposed to do this.

A single, small voice threaded through my consciousness.

Then regret.

Then anger.

At him. At myself. At my body. I had to push him away violently or the push was going to turn into a caress. He took a step back and I caught my breath.

“Jesus Christ, Sinclair, what do you think you’re doing?” I didn’t feel bad about pushing him because the anger was still in my veins. I had to stop myself from pushing him again. I didn’t think I’d be able to walk away. “Do you think I want to end up on the cover of some magazine? You think I want to get dirty looks up and down Sunset?”

This guy could ruin me. He had all the tools to do it. He was gorgeous and laid-back. He listened when I spoke and had a daughter who was just about perfect.

But I’d be on the cover of tabloids. I’d become an ugly stereotype. I’d get ditched with nothing but a bad reputation to show for it. I’d cry. I hated crying. Children cried and I soothed them by not getting all weepy myself.

There he stood, with the pool party behind him. A movie star. The most eligible bachelor in Hollywood and to me, he was an overwhelmed father with no clue how to manage his daily tasks, but formidably lit by stars. An awe-inspiring display of power and presence with a magnetism that led right to him.

Hollywood stars weren’t stars just because of their light. They had a gravity generating mass and unbearable heat. Something coded in their genes, like hair color or height. I’d seen it before from the diplomats I met when I was a kid to the moms and dads I worked for in Los Angeles, and having identified it, I resisted it. Easy.

He was different. His heat seemed made for me.

It wasn’t.

It was a trick. That kiss, as short and inappropriate as it was, had vibrated every cell. His taste, his scent, the feel of his lips.

I had to pack. Just pack and go. This job was tainted. Everything was tainted now. Head down, I walked to the pool house, my sexless shoes pumping in and out of my vision.

I had to go.

Never see him again.

Maybe once.

Stopping dead in my tracks with my hand on the doorknob, I laughed.

“What’s so funny?” Brad asked from ten feet behind me. He held his shirttail to his lip, exposing a flat, tight washboard stomach and that god damn muscled V-thing at the waist of his low-hanging shorts.

“I’ve lost my mind, that’s all.”

“We have something in common.”

“No. Let’s not do this. Look—”

“Look, I—”

He stopped himself when we said the same thing at the same time . . .

“I’m sorry.”

What was I apologizing for? Being kissed? Being watched in the shower? What the hell was wrong with me?

“You keep having to apologize for inappropriate behavior,” I said, then I opened the door and walked in. He stood just outside, backlit by the front light. It came to me that we were alone. It was dark. He’d just kissed me in a moment of weakness. I could claim weakness too, because I was weak. My knees barely held me, and my body gushed with desire.

“Don’t be done,” he said, his voice stroking under my clothes. Which was all in my mind. The result of a year without a date. But I couldn’t breathe right, and my nipples got hard under my cotton bra.

My feelings were as inappropriate as his actions, and I had no control over either.

“I don’t know what to do,” I said. I was being too honest. I was about to cross into unprofessional.

“Tell me what to do then.”

I don’t know where I got so bold. Something in me was pushing him away because he scared the hell out of me. Or I scared the hell out of me. When he raised his eyebrow as if I’d crossed a line, something in my chest shrunk. I didn’t want him to be displeased, even though I wanted him to make it easy for me and throw me out right there and then.

“Kick everyone out,” I said.

He didn’t hesitate to take his phone out, which was unexpected. The light shined in his face as he tapped and swiped the glass, the light casting shadows from below and lighting his blue eyes to light gray. He put the phone in his pocket, and the light under him snuffed.

“Five seconds.” He didn’t explain further. If he’d been unsure of himself, he wasn’t now. His feet spread apart, arms crossed, chin high, music thumping behind him.

Five. Four. Three. Two. One.

Nothing changed.

“Ten, then.”

Five seconds later (give or take) the music abruptly stopped. A chorus of aws went up, but still, we didn’t move. The pathway lights flicked out. Then the voices and splashing were over. Then the undulations of the turquoise light slowed. Still we said nothing, just regarded each other. I didn’t know what he felt. Couldn’t have guessed at it. He could have any woman he wanted, any time he wanted. The most glamorous, sophisticated women in the world were at his beck and call.

But maybe the things he didn’t remember saying were true. Maybe he did want me.

I took care of children for a living. In order to do my job, I had to wear sensible clothes and speak in a lilting singsong voice. Nothing about me could have been desirable to a man like him.