Nico’s eyes were locked to hers, and he shifted restlessly as the waiter approached, setting up one of the low tables closer to them so that he could arrange the selection of tapas for their enjoyment.
‘Say what you have to say,’ he murmured huskily. ‘I don’t bite. Not unless asked.’
Grace sucked in a sharp breath and her eyes widened as she found herself on shifting sands. His eyes...there was a smoky burn in them that made her felt hot and addled. She sifted her fingers through her hair and reached for a plate and a cloth serviette and one of the tapas only to realise that her hand was shaking.
Telling him what she thought would bring this situation back in hand. He didn’t like having his walls breached. If she breached them now, then at least it would burst the suffocating tension threading through her, making her feel as though she’d suddenly been plugged into a live socket. Why should she allow him to have fun at her expense?
His irritation would surely be preferable to...to...this, whateverthiswas.
‘You must have been young when all of this took place.’ She took a bite of one of the pastries, which was filled with delicious curry. Her tongue darted out, licking some of the sauce from the side of her mouth. ‘Maybe things seemed straightforward then, but if you look at the same situation now you might see things differently.’ Another bite of the tapas. It was moreish. ‘Aren’t you having any? They’re delicious.’ She reached for another, and just like that she felt the touch of his finger by her mouth and it was electrifying. She couldn’t pull away. She couldn’t say anything. All she could do was stare at him as he gently wiped something from her mouth.
‘Some sauce at the side of your mouth...’
Grace blushed a furious red and wiped where he had touched with the back of her hand. He’d sat back and was staring at her with brooding eyes.
‘You were saying?’ he asked. He raked his fingers through his hair and glanced away for a few seconds before gazing at her once again.
What had she been saying? Everything had flown out of her head and she had to think hard to remember. Defusing the situation...that was what she’d been aiming to do before he’d sent her thoughts into frantic meltdown by touching her.
‘I was saying...’ she cleared her throat and dived for another, less tricky tapas ‘...maybe your uncle was a little wild then he came here and found whatever it was he’d been looking for. Maybe he went off the rails because he didn’t know what he wanted from life but here...he found it. You can tell. There’s love here. It’s in the furnishings and the food and it’s there in all the people who worked for him. So he didn’t carry on being dissolute. He changed. People do.’ She thought of her mother. ‘Sometimes.’
‘Maybe.’ Nico smiled. ‘Maybe you have a point. It’s not something I’ve ever considered.’
‘I’m sorry if I overstepped the mark but you did ask me to be honest with you.’ Grace stared at his mouth, blinked and then found she couldn’t tear her eyes away as he reached for an intricate pastry, making far less of a mess of eating it than she had.
‘So I did.’
‘I hope you’re not angry.’
‘You veer from spectacular frankness to fawning apology. Grace, we’ve worked alongside one another for years. You’re going to have to find a middle ground that allows you to tell me what’s on your mind without being wary of somehow angering me. I’m a big boy. I can deal with whatever you have to throw at me.’ He flashed her a killer smile.
He didn’t look angry and the killer smile was doing all sorts of things to her body. If she’d planned on diverting him away from whatever he was doing that was heating her up by getting under his skin, then she’d misread the situation. Nico wasn’t fazed by her probing. He was fired up by it because, as for her, the buffer zone between them had been removed and he was enjoying himself seeing what had been hiding underneath it. She wasn’t getting under his skin. She was amusing him.Hewas the one getting underherskin because she was taking all of this seriously.
‘So tomorrow...’ She reached for something else and noticed that the cocktail had been replaced with a glass of chilled wine, which she ignored in favour of the bottled water that had been brought to their table.
‘Tomorrow?’
‘I know we’ve covered a lot of ground today...’ Grace could feel her cheeks getting pinker and pinker as he continued to look at her with an expression she couldn’t quite read, an expression that could have been one hundred per cent business or one hundred per cent inappropriate flirting.
‘And you have my sincere apologies for that,’ Nico returned, pushing his plate to one side with his finger so that he could earnestly lean towards her, his elbows resting on his knees, his hands loosely linked. ‘I managed to get things in motion before you arrived, and I figured it might be a good idea to strike while the iron was hot. Get things wrapped up as fast as I could.’
‘The employees must be saddened by everything that’s happened.’
‘They’ll get to keep their jobs. I’ve made it abundantly clear that there will be no sackings.’
‘So everything will stay the way it was?’
‘That...’ Nico frowned ‘...is not something I can guarantee but why would that be important? Provided they get to keep their jobs, then it’ll simply be a change of scenery, so to speak. Of course, if extensive renovations need to be done then I can always write in a clause that protects jobs for the duration.’
‘Have you considered that they may have been attached to your uncle? I was chatting to a couple of the guys yesterday who work in the bar and they’ve been there for ever because they really cared about Sander.’
‘They’ll recover.’
‘Why do you sound so surprised that I’m even asking about this?’
‘Because it’s just going to be a change of ownership, Grace. Everything else is...emotionalism and I don’t have time for any of that.’
‘You’re so cold, Nico?’