Blame It on the Bikini(15)

He flicked on the interior light so he could see her properly. ‘You wouldn’t be lowering your standards for me, would you?’

The colour ran under her skin but she kept on her smile as she shook her head. ‘I’d never do that. I still expect the best.’

Brad grinned despite his disappointment. She’d have got the best. Her automatic, instant refusals of anything he offered? They pricked his pride. He wished she’d come to him, wished she’d be as unable to resist their chemistry as much as he seemed unable to.

‘I really don’t know how to thank you.’ She clutched the door handle, her eyes wide and filled with something he really wished was desire.

‘I can think of a couple of ways.’ He couldn’t help one last little tease.

‘You’ve a one-track mind, haven’t you?’ she teased right back, but she looked away from him, drawing a veil over that spark.

The devil in him urged to press her for a date, but he already knew her answer. She was either working or studying, every waking minute. So he let her go and drove home in the darkness. But once there he remained wide-awake and restless and hot. Nothing was going to happen between them, but that hadn’t diminished the ache and the hunger. Lust. He’d get over it. But as he sat in front of his computer, the sky lightened and he got to wondering whether she’d finished her assignment. Whether she was working her shift. Whether she was okay. And then he realised he wasn’t going to be able to rest until he knew for sure that she was.

Mya knew that if she could survive tonight, she could survive anything. She showered to refresh her system but it was a bad idea. The warm water made muscles melt and her mind wander into dangerous territory. She flicked the jets to cold. Then she dragged herself to her desk and pulled out the piles of paper and opened her ancient laptop. She had four hours. She didn’t have time to lust after anyone.

Finally she got in the zone. She read—fortunately she was fast at it—assimilated, analysed and wrote, fingers thumping the keyboard. Her phone alarm beeped at seven forty-five just as she was finalising the formatting. She packed up and sprinted to the café. There was Internet access there. She grabbed a coffee and hit Send on the email. Her assignment was safely en route to her lecturer’s inbox. She straightened and stretched out the kinks in her back from hunching over her keyboard. Exhaustion hit her like a freight train. Only now she had to put on an apron and start making everyone else’s coffees.

Two hours later she switched her phone to mute and put it in the cubby so she’d no longer be bothered by the zillion messages she was receiving. Brad had sent the invites to everyone about the same time she’d sent the assignment to her lecturer. She’d never expected he’d follow through so quickly or with such impact. She should have known better. Brad Davenport was all about impact.

She’d been impressed by the slick black-and-white mysterious message that had spread over the screen of her phone when she’d clicked on it. Yeah, she’d been fielding texts and calls all morning with people wanting the inside deal on what the plans were for the party—all excitement and conjecture. Because the Davenports were the ultimate in cool. Stylish, unique and rolling in it, and anyone who was anyone, or who wanted to be someone, wanted this invite. She’d answered honestly that she hadn’t a clue what was planned but that they’d better be smart enough to keep it secret from Lauren. Mya had threatened them with a prolonged and agonising social-death sentence should anyone spoil the surprise.

Her shift crawled to its end. She was almost in tears with relief and at the same time ready to drag herself across town. She’d doze in the bus on the way. The last person she expected to see just outside the café door was Brad.

‘What are you doing here?’ Was she so tired she was hallucinating?

‘I thought I’d give you a lift home. You must be exhausted.’

Not a hallucination, he was real. Looking so strong and smiling, and she wished she didn’t have any stupid scruples.

‘I’m okay.’ She was so tired, it was harder to control her reaction to his proximity and the urges he inspired.

‘You got it done?’

She nodded, glad he’d reminded her of her work. ‘Thanks for coming in but I’m not going home. I’m having lunch with my parents.’ She was due there this minute.

‘I’ll give you a ride.’

‘No, it’s fine,’ she hurriedly refused. ‘I take the bus.’

He looked at her. ‘I can give you a ride.’

‘Shouldn’t you be working?’ She really didn’t want him taking her there.

‘I’m due a lunch break too.’

‘But—’

‘Can you stop saying no to me in everything?’ he asked. ‘I’m offering as a friend, Mya. Nothing more.’

She opened her mouth and then shut it again as she registered the ragged thread of frustration in his voice. He must be tired too—that invitation would have taken some time on the computer. Had he not slept a wink either?

‘You don’t have to do this,’ she said softly ten minutes later as they headed towards the motorway that would take them right across town and to the outskirts.

‘Don’t worry, I won’t embarrass you.’ He reached over and gave her knee a teasing squeeze. ‘I won’t tell them you like sending people racy pictures of yourself.’

She managed a light laugh but her discomfort mushroomed as she realised he was going to see the worst.

‘Are you embarrassed?’ he asked quietly. ‘You don’t want me to see your home?’

‘No,’ she argued instantly. ‘But you wouldn’t be the first person to look down your nose at my neighbourhood. We come from totally different worlds, so don’t act like you’re all understanding and down with it. You can’t ever relate.’

‘Your shoulders aren’t broad enough for a chip this big.’

‘Oh, it’s a chip, is it? It’s just me being oversensitive?’ She twisted in her seat to face him. ‘What would you know? Have you ever faced the judgments and expectations from each side of the economic divide? Girls from the wrong side of the tracks like me are only good for a fling.’ Never marriage material. That was how James had treated her. At first he hadn’t known. He’d been attracted to her academic success, but when he’d found out about her background, he’d run a mile. ‘All you ‘ve ever wanted from women like me is sex.’

‘All I’ve ever wanted from any woman is sex,’ he pointed out lazily. ‘It has nothing to do with your family background.’

About to launch into more of a rant, she stopped and mentally replayed what he’d said. And then she laughed.

‘I mean really—’ he winked ‘—you don’t think you’re taking this too seriously? We’re in the twenty-first century, not feudal England.’

She shook her head. ‘Twenty-first century or not, the class system operates. There’s an underclass you know nothing about.’

‘Don’t patronise me,’ he said. ‘I’m not ignorant. I’m aware of the unemployment figures and I’ve dealt with worse in my work. You’ve got no idea of the dysfunction I see. I can tell you it crosses all socioeconomic boundaries. Sometimes the worst are the ones who have the most.’

‘Yeah, but you don’t know the stress financial problems can bring.’

‘That’s true. I don’t have personal experience of that. But I’m not totally without empathy.’

‘And salary doesn’t necessarily equate with effort,’ she grumped. Her mother worked so hard and still earned a pittance. That was why she’d insisted Mya study so hard at school, so she’d end up with a job that actually paid well. And Mya wanted to work to help her parents.

‘Mya.’ He silenced her. ‘I know this might amaze you, but I’m not that stupid or that insensitive.’

She put her head in her hands. Of course he wasn’t. ‘Sorry.’

She heard his chuckle and let his hand rub her shoulder gently—too briefly.

‘I’ll let you away with it because I know how tired you are,’ he said.

But her discomfort grew as they neared. He’d been right—she didn’t want him seeing it. She was embarrassed. Embarrassed she hadn’t done something sooner to get her parents out of there. She should have done so much more already. ‘You can just drop me, okay?’

‘Sure,’ he answered calmly. ‘They must be impressed with how hard you’re working at the moment.’

Mya chewed her lower lip. ‘They don’t know.’

‘Don’t know what?’

‘Don’t know anything.’

‘That you work at the bar, the café or that you’re not at uni full-time?’

She shook her head. ‘They don’t know I lost the scholarships. They don’t know I’m at summer school. They can’t know. Can’t ever.’ She felt tears sting. Stupid tears—only because she was tired.