Cole reached for the bag, opened it and closed his eyes as the delicious smell of butter, chocolate and pastry hit his nostrils. He’d run eight miles on the treadmill and done a weightlifting session in the hotel gym this morning and eaten only bran and yoghurt for breakfast. He deserved something sweet and artery-clogging.
He broke off a piece of the croissant and nodded in approval when she did the same. He popped it into his mouth and closed his eyes at the hit of sweetness and spice.
As he ate, he tried to keep himself from launching across the table to find out what the combination of Lex and croissants tasted like. He watched as she unwound her scarf and shed her battered but still chic bomber-style leather jacket. Today’s tight long-sleeved T-shirt was a pretty mint colour and her skinny jeans disappeared into knee-high boots.
‘Did your sisters get off okay?’ he asked.
‘Yes. Snow cried a little, but she was fine by the time I left.’
Cole stood up, walked around the desk and perched on the edge of it, facing Lex, his thigh just an inch or two from her knee. Giving into temptation, he stroked the pad of his thumb across her cheekbone. ‘Why do your younger sisters live with you, Lex? Where’s their mother?’
Those incredible eyes met his and he saw a flicker of pain cross her face. ‘In Thailand. She’s been there since we were teenagers. We’ve had them for five years,’ Lex answered him, and he didn’t hear a hint of rancour or resentment in her voice. ‘Nixi was three, Snow two.’
So she’d been their mother, father and sister and the pillars of their world for five years and would be for the rest of their lives. She would’ve been twenty-three or twenty-four when they’d dropped into her life. He rubbed the back of his neck, unable to understand how nonchalant she sounded, as though taking in two small children was what young adults did every day.
‘And your father? Their father? Or fathers?’ he demanded, unable to make sense of the dynamic.
Lex lifted one shoulder and he suspected her blasé expression was well-practised. ‘My mum has a very relaxed attitude towards sex, and obviously contraception. And her lovers’ names.’
Lex hesitated before continuing. ‘She put the name of Addi’s father on her birth certificate, and she married Storm’s dad. My father was a guy called Seamus, but she’s not completely sure if she got the right guy on the right night.’
‘I don’t get it. Weren’t you angry? Frustrated? Bitter?’
‘At what? Not knowing who my dad is or being left to raise the girls?’
‘Either,’ Cole replied. ‘Both.’
‘I can’t be mad at my biological father. He doesn’t know about me and never will. I was the result of a random hook-up between two very drunk, possibly high, people.’ Lex shrugged and picked at a tiny thread on the cuff of her shirt. ‘As for raising my half-sisters, how would being angry help? Nixi and Snow were already feeling lost and uprooted, they didn’t need to know that they were unwanted too.’
His family hadn’t given him a fraction of the love and care Lex—and the other sisters—showed those two little girls. They’d had all the money in the world but had been emotionally bankrupt. The sisters, from what he gathered, were short on cash but long on loyalty. He couldn’t form the words to tell her how he was overwhelmingly impressed by her, that he admired her courage and intensely respected her, but she might get the message if he kissed her. So he did.
Lex sighed and her breath hit his lips, holding a hint of coffee, croissant and mint mouthwash. Cole fought the urge to take the kiss deeper, to haul her up so that her body was flush against his, her head tipped to take his deep, long and sexy kiss. Lex’s fingers came up to rest on his jaw, rough with stubble. Her lips softened, he tasted her sigh and then her tongue came out to brush against his, spicy and delightful.
Her mouth was a revelation with soft, unpainted lips, as smooth and soft as expensive ice-cream. All he could think of was getting closer to her, to having his hands on that soft skin. Forgetting where he was, who he was, he stood up, pulled her to her feet and pushed her so that her back was to the wall next to his desk. He crowded her with his body, chest to chest, his knee between her thighs. He gripped her hips, enjoying her slim but curvy body, but he needed to know whether her skin was as soft as he imagined. He pulled her shirt from his jeans and slid his hand under her fabric, sighing at the silkiness of her skin. Lex wound her arms around his neck and kissed him, as hot for him as he was for her.
Cole felt his erection straining the fabric of his trousers, hot, heavy and desperate. He placed his hands on Lex’s hips, easily lifting her so that their mouths were level. In a move that was as natural as it was unexpected, she wrapped her legs around his legs and rocked against him, releasing soft little sounds in the back of her throat.
Lex’s elegant hands slipped under his shirt and he shuddered as her fingers danced up and down his spine, and dipped behind the waistband of his trousers. Needing to know more of her, to know everything, he placed his hand on her breast and drew his thumb across her nipple. Would it be as pink as her lips? Would she like it if he captured it between his tongue and the roof of his mouth...?
Damn, he needed a bed, but there was a desk just a foot or two from them...
There was a desk...and they were in his office and, because he didn’t have a gatekeeper sitting at the secretary’s desk next door, they could be interrupted at any second. And the last thing he wanted was interruptions.
So he pulled back, blew out a long stream of air and led her back to her chair, which she sank into with a long sigh. Cole reached for his coffee, resumed his previous position facing her and stretched out his legs.
‘Another aberration, Cole?’ she asked, looking him dead in the eye, and Cole felt pinned down. Damn, she was so direct.
‘I don’t understand.’
‘You called our almost-kiss at the hotel an aberration,’ Lex explained.
That hadn’t been a good choice of words. Cole pushed his hand through his hair. ‘No, but kissing you was...is...ill-advised. I’m yourboss, Lex. I’m never anything but professional and the fact that you can make me lose my head is baffling.’
‘If it’s any consolation, I can’t afford to put my job on the line by making out with my employer,’ Lex told him. ‘If you do sell your Cape Town assets, both Addi and I will lose our jobs, so I need to make bank while we can.’
While he had more money than most—alotmore money than most—he did understand the pressure of only having himself to rely on, of knowing that if he didn’t make it work, nobody would do it for him. He couldn’t promise Lex a flexible job, but he could reassure her about Addi. ‘As I told Addison earlier, if I sell the hospitality sector to Jude Fisher I’ll make Addison’s job a condition of that sale. She won’t have to accept Jude’s offer, but he’ll have to employ her for at least a year if he wants to buy my assets.’
She looked at him as if he’d hung the moon and stars. Damn it, he could get used to seeing that expression on her face. ‘Thank you, Cole. That’s... Wow, an incredible offer.’