His gaze intensified.
She deliberately lowered hers and allowed a smile to touch her lips. Mona Lisa all the way.
The silence was long.
‘Why did you do it?’ His voice sounded rusty.
Their eyes met full on once more. She looked away first. She picked up the wine and took a small sip. ‘I guess I was young. At the mercy of hormones or something.’
‘And you’re still at the mercy of hormones?’
She looked back to him—instantly fell into the velvety darkness.
‘You still want me, Amanda.’
She forced herself to reply. ‘You’re an attractive man.’ Only a little bit of a wobble. ‘But I’m older now. You don’t need to worry. I won’t be hunting you down again.’
‘I won’t find you waiting in my bed for me late one night?’
‘My body might still find yours attractive, Jared,’ she said, fighting for breath, ‘but I wouldn’t sleep with you if you were the last man alive.’
‘Oh, really?’
She froze at the way he’d so coolly mimicked her words of this morning. Knowing damn well he had as much right to sound sarcastic as she had then. ‘You ruined everything.’
‘Did I? By not giving the spoilt princess her way? Were you not indulged for a while? I bet it didn’t take you that long to wind him round your little finger again.’
She calmed herself with a count to ten. ‘Like I said, it took a long time for him to cool down.’ And now he was in trouble. She had to keep that and only that at the forefront of her brain. She couldn’t let this haze of desire cloud her judgment and ruin everything—not again. ‘Look, Jared. We’re grown-ups now. Let’s laugh about it and move on. We have to work together and that’s the extent of our relationship. Professional, agreed?’
‘If you think you can manage it.’
That was it for her. She’d tried to parry him, she’d tried to be open, she’d tried to reason. No more. She stood.
His hand shot out and gripped her wrist. ‘Stay,’ he said. ‘I’m sorry. I promise I won’t refer to it again. We’ll leave that night behind.’
She hesitated, thought of Grandfather and Bronwyn and the others. Finally sat.
‘Thank you.’
He still held her—his hand completely encircling her wrist, his fingers resting on her pulse point. There was no way he couldn’t feel its wild beating. She stared at his bronze skin, but was somehow frozen, unable to pull away.
The waiter appeared with two plates that looked more like art than food—breaking the still moment. And as Jared lifted his hand she pretended she didn’t miss the weight of it. She picked up her fork and pushed the food around to mess it up a bit.
‘Is it no good?’ In what felt like a minute, he’d nearly eaten all his.
‘No, it’s lovely. I’m not hugely hungry, that’s all.’
‘I guess my teasing you isn’t helping.’
‘Not really.’
‘How is your grandfather?’
‘He’s OK,’ Amanda answered cautiously. ‘Much older of course.’
‘But still going strong?’ Jared asked. ‘He was always a busy man.’
‘Yes,’ Amanda said. Physically he was OK, his body still pretty healthy for a man in his eightieth year although he’d lost weight recently. But that was all that seemed to be working well—the body. The brain? Not so good. But she wasn’t going to share. Grandfather had a right to privacy and she didn’t want to open up her heartache to Jared of all people. She turned the conversation on him.
‘Why juice? Why this company?’
He grinned. ‘I worked there when I first left Ashburton.’
‘Really?’
He nodded. ‘I got a scholarship to university—double degree in maths and commerce. But I still needed to work.’
Amanda nodded, not surprised at his subject choices. She remembered Grandfather once saying that Jared had the best maths brain he’d ever encountered.
‘It was a good job—started early so it fitted in with my studies.’ He shrugged. ‘And I like juice.’
‘So have you been working there all this time?’
‘No.’ He laughed outright at that. ‘After I got the degrees I went overseas. Hong Kong.’ He anticipated her question. ‘I made money trading foreign exchange.’
Banking—sort of stuff Grandfather had been into. And she knew mega money could be made and lost. She also knew the young guys in the investment firms had some serious party lifestyles too. ‘Why did you come back?’
‘I hated it.’
That surprised her. ‘Why?’