And still he found her somehow alluring.
‘Have you eaten?’ he asked abruptly.
She glanced up at him. ‘What has that got to do with anything?’
Not bothering to answer he stalked across the room and picked up the hotel phone. ‘Coffee, some pastries, bacon, eggs, toast and whatever headache tablets you have in this country.’
‘Why did you order all that?’
‘It’s harder to cry on a full stomach.’
‘Is it?’
Aidan ran a hand through his hair. ‘I don’t know, but it will help your headache.’
She looked startled. ‘How did you know I have a headache?’
One corner of his mouth kicked upwards. ‘The tablets were for me.’
‘Oh.’
His smile grew at her contrite expression and he realised that ordinarily he’d be pissed at having his well-ordered life disrupted like this but for some reason he wasn’t.
‘But you keep rubbing the back of your neck.’ And it was truly distracting him. ‘You just need to relax. This will all blow over before you know it.’
Her mouth twisted as if she didn’t believe him. ‘For you, maybe. For me … last night is just one more notch on my bad-girl belt. And I have no idea what to tell Christos now. He’s already left a couple of filthy messages on my phone this morning and that was before this latest disaster.’
Aidan rubbed the back of his own neck then. He’d meant to help her before, not make it worse for her, and he felt another twinge of guilt about last night. He knew he could have rejected Ellery’s suggestion of putting her up as a stake but he hadn’t. For the first time in his life he’d ignored logic and felt a primal rage that he had been made a fool of. Something that turned out not to have been true.
But if he was honest, that hadn’t been the only thing driving him last night. Once his mind had locked on to her and Ellery as a real couple he’d wanted to rip her away from him. He’d wanted to rip her away and lock her in a room and ask her how she could have been so stupid.
But perhaps she wasn’t the stupid one in this scenario. Perhaps he was.
Aidan wrenched at the collar on his shirt, unused to feeling like he wasn’t in control of a situation.
‘If you think about this logically,’ he began, deciding it was time he did that very thing. ‘What happened downstairs actually plays to your advantage.’
She sniffed. ‘I don’t see how.’
‘That’s because you’re being emotional. Think about it. I know of Christos Giatrakos. If he thinks that we’re actually involved he’ll be more relieved than not. You can tell him this whole thing was misinterpreted, we’re a couple and no harm done.’
She chewed on the inside of her lip and Aidan forced his eyes to meet hers. Only, she had on those damned plastic sunglasses.
‘Take them off.’
She paused and her throat bobbed as she swallowed. ‘Take what off?’
Your clothes. Take off your clothes so I can see you again. Touch you. So that I can lay you out flat and taste every inch of you.
Aidan stilled as images of Cara in his arms downloaded inside his head like an X-rated movie. Man, but he had to get out more.
‘Your glasses.’ His voice sounded like it had rolled across sandpaper. ‘I can’t talk to you with those damned glasses on.’
Cara felt her body shudder at the rough timbre of his voice and she wondered if he hadn’t read her mind. If he hadn’t known that all she could think about with him pacing in front of her was how lethally attractive he was. Tall, masculine and so powerfully self-assured. He had swept her up in his arms before like a white knight and her girlhood fantasies about being saved like some princess in a fairytale had been reborn.
Stupid, worthless fairytales. They had clearly been written by people with wild imaginations and no life to speak of. A bit like herself right now …
‘I need them on.’
Aidan stopped in front of her. ‘Why?’
‘My eyes are sore.’
Before she could stop him he had reached forward and slid them off her face. Cara quickly ducked her head but he gripped her chin. She shivered and closed her red eyes, trying to push his arm away. It was like trying to bend steel.
He swore and released her.
‘This has really upset you.’
He thought she’d been crying so desperately over the publicity, she realised, something that was infinitely more preferable to what had really made her so upset last night: his rejection and how much of a failure she felt.
‘Yes.’
‘Hold on.’ He gripped her chin again and brought her eyes back to his. ‘Your eyes are blue today, not green.’