She was driving him crazy. Once or twice as she sashayed past he considered yanking her off her feet, into his lap, and repeating the experiment.
Their no-sex agreement had to be the most idiotic thing he’d ever done. Hell, she was going to wear his ring. That would brand her his for the world to see. Yet he wouldn’t be allowed to touch. Sooner or later something was going to have to give—and it would be Victoria. He was quite confident that he would achieve that. She would come around. He’d see to it because he sure as hell had no intention of sticking to their stupid pact.
In the meantime, he made up for it by looking. Surreptitiously, carefully and at every opportunity he got.
It was torture.
Several times each day he would call Victoria at work—ostensibly to talk about Dylan. But he found himself looking forward to those segments of time when her husky voice came over the line, especially when he managed to get her to laugh.
Lust had turned him into something pathetic.
It was a sign of how entangled he’d become with his new life that, when Iris came into his spacious corner office with his coffee and announced that she’d heard Dana and Paul were getting married, Connor felt one brief flare of resentment and then … nothing.
The lack of turmoil and emotion was liberating. He stood staring at Iris until she said, “Connor, are you okay?”
He gave his assistant an unabashed grin. “I’m better than okay—I’m great.”
She snorted. “Because Dana and Paul are getting married?”
“Yep.” His grin widened. “Makes me feel much better than I thought.”
A wave of relief crashed over him that there was no need for anger, or to exact further revenge. That phase of his life was over.
What he had now was so much better.
Iris straightened the papers on his desk into a neat pile. “There’s a rumor that Dana’s pregnant.”
Even that didn’t disturb him. He grinned at her over the top of the coffee mug. “I should’ve anticipated that. Poor Paul.”
“You had a lucky escape.”
“I certainly did.” Setting the mug down on a wooden coaster, he tipped his head sideways and studied Iris as she slit his correspondence with a letter opener. “You never indicated you didn’t like Dana.”
“Wasn’t my place—you seemed happy enough with her.”
His gaze paused on her pursed mouth. “You’re not the only one. Michael never liked her, either, nor did Brett.” His brother had been open in his reservations about Dana after their first meeting. Of course, Dana hadn’t cared for Brett either—she’d been relieved that he lived in London.
There was a scrape as Iris shredded the empty envelopes. “Dana was always good at her job, and she knew who to impress. But she’d clamber over anyone in her way to get what she wanted.” Iris turned back to face him.
Leaning back in his executive chair, Connor folded his arms behind his head. “It wasn’t easy for her. People are always harder on women who are successful in business.” He thought of Victoria. “Even me.” He couldn’t help wondering what Iris would make of Victoria.
“It had nothing to do with Dana’s successes, just the way she went about achieving them.” Disapproval came off Iris in waves. “And you shouldn’t be defending her.” With that, she bustled out of his office, pausing at the doorway to say, “Don’t forget you have a meeting at noon.”
Connor nodded, then swiveled his chair to look out the window at the knot of gum trees that flourished beside a pond. A pair of ungainly blue-and-black pukekos minced on orange webbed feet along the bank of the pond, picking for food.
His motherly assistant thought Dana had used him as a way to get what she’d wanted, but to be honest, he’d used Dana, too. He was starting to realize that what he liked about Dana was that she didn’t affect him—he could stay heart whole and devoted to work. He didn’t think about her all day long. He hadn’t felt the same compulsion to talk to her as he did with Victoria. Dana hadn’t been a constant distraction from his work. Sure, she’d been a very decorative diversion, and of course he’d gotten a kick out the covetous looks other men had given her. And she could be as feral as a sex-starved mink in bed.
Yet her infidelity still left a bitter taste.
But Michael had hit the nail on the head. It had been his pride—rather than his heart—that had been bleeding when she’d walked out.
He’d never thought he’d land himself in a similar position.
Yet Victoria was even sexier to him, and her beauty was more subtle but no less captivating … and he had a suspicion that Victoria could make him never want to go to work again.
And she was even smarter than Dana.
Just look how she’d gotten him to agree to a marriage without sex—only minutes after kissing him stupid. She’d reduced him to a quivering lump.
Masterly.
And he’d been the fool who’d agreed to it! Even though he was certain he’d be able to convince her otherwise. Given time.
As the pukekos disappeared into the reeds on the waterline, an inner voice whispered, Dana would never have done that. She’d have used sex as another weapon in her arsenal.
But then he couldn’t remember ever wanting, yearning, going mad with desire for Dana in quite the same way.…
Out of respect for Suzy and Michael it was decided the wedding would be a small one with no frills and flounces—and definitely no fairy-tale white dress.
The following night after they’d put Dylan to bed Connor came to the small sitting room upstairs that Victoria had claimed as her own, where he hadn’t invaded until now. He paused at the threshold, and she watched him survey the changes she’d made to the elegant cream-and-dull-gold décor. The addition of a wall hanging in muted colors that she’d brought from her town house. A large fern she’d called Audrey, which was draping enthusiastic fronds over the back of the couch where she sat holding a wineglass.
“I don’t want to disturb you,” he said at last.
Didn’t the man know by now that he always disturbed her? Even wearing only a T-shirt and black jeans he managed to make her pulse pick up.
Of course she’d never admit it.
“Would you like a glass of burgundy?” she asked, setting her glass down and reaching for a clean one from the butler’s tray on the side of the couch. “A client gave it to me—and it’s rather good.” Relaxing, too—which she needed now that the realization she and Connor were actually getting married was starting to sink in.
Connor looked taken aback for a moment, then nodded. “Just half a glass. I’m not staying long.”
Once she’d poured, he moved farther into the room. Taking the glass from her, he raised it to his nose before sniffing and saying, “Mmm … nice.” Then he glanced down at her. “I came to ask for a list of friends and family you’re inviting to the wedding. Iris—my PA—will send out invitations if you give me details. She’s a whiz.”
“No.”
That caused his eyebrows to leap to his hairline. “Aren’t you a little busy to be doing it yourself?”
“There isn’t anyone I want to invite.” Victoria took a sip of her wine. “Have a taste, it’s very smooth.”
Settling himself against the antique writing desk across from her, he sipped. “Very smooth. No friends at all?”
She shook her head slowly, supremely conscious of the weight of his stare.
With the exception of Suzy, she’d lost contact with most of her friends over the past ten years, too busy with work. Occasionally she’d gone out with Suzy and her teacher friends to a movie, or to dinner with a group from Archer, Cameron & Edge. But she wasn’t close to any of them.
“What about family?” He shifted, crossing one ankle over the other where he leaned, the rustle of denim loud in the intimacy of the sitting room. “My brother’s coming.”
“I don’t have brothers or sisters.” Victoria dropped her gaze away. “My mom’s dead, and I haven’t spoken to my father in years.”
“Then this might be the time to invite him and mend some fences. Both my parents are dead—at least you still have a father who could be there for you.”
She played with the stem of her glass. Connor couldn’t know what he was asking of her. “I thought the purpose of the day was to get married and provide a family for Dylan.”
“Nothing wrong with using the opportunity for reconciliation, Victoria.”
Connor’s arrogant assumption that inviting her tumbleweed father to her wedding would make amends for decades of irresponsibility and selfish neglect rubbed her the wrong way. “So I take it you’ll be inviting Dana and Paul?”
There was a horrible pause. Then he said, “Okay, maybe we should just focus on the wedding.”
“Good idea.” In an effort to restore the peace she said brightly, “I didn’t know you had a brother.”
He drained his glass and set it down on the desk behind him. “Brett’s been living it up in London for the past few years.”
“And he’s coming all the way out to New Zealand?”
Straightening, Connor gave her a grim smile. “It’s my wedding—probably the only one he’ll ever see me celebrate. Of course he’s coming.”
Less than a week after Connor had asked Victoria to marry him, the wedding took place.
In sharp contrast to Suzy and Michael’s wedding, it was a small affair with no bouquets, flower girls or white lacy bridal dress in sight. In fact, Victoria decided that celebrate was a far too strong word for the civil ceremony that they rushed through in an anonymous Queen Street government building.
Afterward, accompanied by Connor’s brother and Anne—who’d come to take care of Dylan but ended up acting as a witness—they went to a lovely restaurant set in the rolling, parklike gardens of Auckland’s domain. Sitting at a table on a verandah that overlooked a series of lakes shaded by budding willows and frequented by swans, Victoria’s gaze settled on Dylan perched in the high chair beside Anne, and she finally relaxed.
Married.
Her place in Dylan’s life was secure now.
“Congratulations!” Connor’s brother waved a glass of champagne. “Welcome to our family.”
Victoria smiled and raised her glass. Brett’s personality had come as a surprise. Younger than Connor, he had a boyish flirtatiousness that made her laugh.
“Connor needs to be married,” he told her while Connor discussed their meal with the restaurant owner. “Even though I would rather you’d had a very unequivocal, big, splashy wedding instead of this hole-in-the-corner affair.”
“Needs to be married?” Victoria raised one brow skeptically and carefully ignored the rest of his explosive statement.
“Oh, yes. He likes domesticity.”
“Connor?”
She glanced at the man whose commanding presence had conjured up the owner and a trio of waiters in minutes. His baby brother was mistaken—Connor was as domesticated as a Bengal tiger.
Brett nodded emphatically. “Oh, yes. He’s suffering from empty nest syndrome.”
She must have looked blank, because Brett elaborated. “Since I left home.” His eyes widened. “He never told you that he raised me?”
“No.”
Victoria started to feel ridiculous. She knew nothing about the man she was marrying—except that he’d been dumped by his girlfriend and betrayed by his partner two years ago, and had built a multimillion dollar corporation out of the ruins of those relationships. She’d been crazy to think that was enough. “Until last week I didn’t even know he had a brother.”
“What mischief are you whispering to my bride?”
The owner had departed, wearing a very satisfied smile. But Connor’s eyes narrowed alarmingly as he focused on Victoria and his brother.
“No mischief … yet. I’m still trying to impress her with how upstanding we are. I’ll get to the skeletons in the closet later.”
Connor’s eyes crinkled into a smile. “Those are all yours, brother.”
After that lunch became a noisy, happy affair—where even Dylan contributed much gurgling. The food was sublime and the pale-golden sunshine gave the occasion luster. After listening to the brothers bantering, Victoria met Anne’s eyes and both women collapsed in paroxysms of laughter.
Dylan finally decided he’d had enough sitting.
“I’ll show him the swans,” Anne said, rising to free the baby from the high chair. “And it’s probably time for a change, too.”
“I’ll get a travel rug from the car—” Connor was on his feet “—for you to lay him on.”
“You may have noticed that Connor doesn’t talk much about himself,” Brett said to Victoria once Connor had disappeared around the corner of the building.
Now, that was an understatement. She flashed Brett a wry glance.
“Our parents are dead—did you know that?”
She nodded. “He mentioned it, but he didn’t give any details.” And she hadn’t asked because the last thing she’d wanted was Connor asking questions about her estrangement from her father.
“A train crash.” Brett paused. “That’s why he was so upset about Michael. Brought back old memories.”
She hadn’t even known; Connor had hidden the old, festering wound so well under that icy exterior.
Brett leaned closer. “Has he told you about Dana?”
“His ex?”
“The viper.”
A giggle escaped despite Victoria’s attempts to look disapproving. “Brett!”
“She kicked him out of his own home, but in a way it was a relief when I heard. I was scared shitless Connor would marry her—she was angling for it.”