She was open and he was closed. She was warm and he was cold. She was fresh and funny and optimistic and he was stale and moribund and staunchly, immovably pessimistic.
But somehow Abby had melted his resolve like a blowtorch blasted at butter. His body was drawn to her by an irresistible force, like lightning was drawn to metal, and his pleasure had been just as earth-shattering. Had he ever felt satisfaction like it? Or had it been too long between drinks to tell with any certainty? It was like making love for the first time and yet so much better, because his first time had been rushed and clumsy and over all too soon.
This time, his pleasure had lasted for ages inside his body. He could still feel the slight hum of it lingering in his flesh like the rumble of distant thunder.
Abby moved against him again, stirring his blood into a deep throb of longing. She opened her eyes and smiled at him. ‘Hey, did that just happen or am I dreaming?’
Luke brushed an imaginary hair away from her face, keeping his own expression a little less open, stilling each facial muscle as if he was folding down the four top sections of a box. ‘It happened.’
A frown flickered across her brow. ‘You already regret it, don’t you?’
He traced a fingertip over her bottom lip. ‘I’m concerned you’re going to think this is more than what it is.’
‘You mean more than just sex?’
‘A week-long fling is a week-long fling, it’s not for ever,’ Luke said, carefully gauging her reaction to his words.
She gave a soft laugh. ‘Who are you really worried about losing perspective on our one-week fling? Me or you?’
That was exactly what he was worried about. He had already blurred the boundaries he had maintained for so long. Crossed a line he couldn’t uncross. He had given in to the desire he had long suppressed or ignored or been too busy to allow to become a priority.
He could not undo their lovemaking.
It would always be something they had shared. Something unique and special, something she would never experience with anyone else and, he suspected, nor would he. The uniqueness of it encased it in an impermeable membrane of memory.
‘Cute theory, but no,’ he said. ‘I know what I’m capable of and commitment is not something I’m interested in.’
‘But we’re going to be exclusive, right? While we’re together this week?’
Luke was faintly annoyed she felt the need to ask. Did she think he was the type of man like his father? That it was a case of like father like son? He lived by very different principles from his father, who had worked his way through several partners since his initial affair. ‘Of course we’ll be exclusive. You have my word on that.’
‘You have mine too,’ Abby said with a smile. ‘I think it’s cowardly to cheat on someone. Why not be honest and say you’re not happy with how the relationship is going? It seems only fair, in my opinion.’
‘I couldn’t agree more,’ Luke said. ‘When my father cheated on my mother she had no idea. No inkling anything was wrong. Only the month before, he had taken her to a nice restaurant to celebrate their seventeenth anniversary. He’d even bought her flowers the week before.’
Abby’s frowning expression showed her disgust at his father’s behaviour. ‘That’s nothing short of cruel. What type of man is he? A sadist?’
‘Yeah, well, I don’t have too much to do with him these days,’ he said. ‘I can’t bear listening to him bragging about his latest conquest, especially when I know another couple of his exes took it badly when he dumped them.’
She stroked his cheek, her soft hand catching on his stubble, her eyes luminous. ‘You’re a nice man, Luke Shelverton. A decent man with standards that put other men like your father and mine to shame.’
Luke’s ears pricked up at the mention of her father. What she’d told him about her mother had shocked him to the core. She had seemed reluctant to discuss either of her parents with him the day before. He couldn’t help feeling touched she had let him in on such a painful secret. ‘He’s alive then? Do you ever see him?’
She looked down at his chest, where her fingertip was following the line of his right collarbone. It was as if she was mentally preparing herself—each stroke and glide of her finger against his collarbone was somehow building up her courage. ‘I haven’t seen him since I was five and a half.’ Her gaze climbed back up to his. ‘Family Services thought it would be good for me to have a connection with him after my mother died, even though they’d split up and he hadn’t had anything to do with me for months.’