"Yes." Floundering in her argument, she turned away, only to see the Hursts heading down the path towards the pool. Anxious to end this confrontation, she turned back to him. "Let me get past, Daniel. I don't want to discuss this anymore."
"Why not? You started it."
She sighed, exasperated with her own weak stance. "There are people coming."
He didn't budge. "Good. That gives you about—" he glanced back up the path "—twenty seconds to tell me exactly why you don't want to discuss this . . . whatever this is . . . like the adults we are."
Resentful of his implication that she was behaving childishly, Laura's eyes flashed fire. "There's no point in discussing anything, because I have no intention of a repeat performance!"
His eyes glittered. "You're right about one thing—it was only dinner, and that was all I'd ever intended it to be. But it went a little beyond that, and since that involves both of us, you're not the only one who has a say in whether there'll be a repeat performance or not!"
As the Hursts rounded the hedge, he stepped out of her way, but when she moved to pass him, he spoke again. Conscious that they had company, he kept his voice low. "I'll call for you at eleven tomorrow in case you change your mind. You seem pretty good at that."
And before she could argue, he stalked away.
****
Furious, Daniel slammed into his room, picked up his car keys, and headed into town earlier than planned. He couldn't have felt less like spending the evening trawling the restaurants there, but part of his job was getting to know an area before he recommended it with full personal knowledge to his clients.
As he drove, he willed himself to calm down. The woman was driving him mad! He couldn't fathom her changing moods—irritable one minute, polite and professional the next—and underneath it all, a seductive quality he suspected she didn't even know she had.
He wasn't happy about the way things had been left. As far as he was concerned, the way their evening had ended yesterday was unfinished business. He had a feeling it wouldn't have ended quite so chastely if that light hadn't startled them, and he couldn't help wondering why she'd run. It might have been the gentlemanly thing to let her go, but he wasn't a gentleman who liked loose ends.
But she'd refused to discuss it this morning, and since there was nothing he could do about that, he'd gone off to meetings at several hotels in and around town, drunk far too much strong coffee, and told himself his heart missing a beat or two whenever he saw her was only a natural reaction for a red-blooded male. His disastrous affair with Natalie might have served him up a healthy portion of caution alongside its attendant fireworks, but Laura's appeal was hard to ignore.
He was still having trouble shaking off the image of her coming out of the pool this afternoon. Distracted by the droplets of water glistening against her lightly tanned skin, he'd been wrong-footed by her change of heart over the boat trip, and as though he'd used up all his diplomatic skills during his meetings, he'd acted like an arrogant idiot.
Even so, he couldn't see why she was making such a fuss over a simple dinner date. Then again, he wasn't sure why he was, either. He was hardly in a position to embark on a long-term relationship, and she was obviously skittish about anything more frivolous—she'd made that perfectly clear by the pool.
As he parked in town and began wandering the streets, Daniel had to force himself to concentrate on the task in hand. He'd learned his way around over the past couple of days, and now he wanted to take in the evening atmosphere. After tomorrow's boat trip, he would have to spread his sights further afield to the surrounding towns and cities, the countryside, the beaches . . . it made him tired just thinking about it. Five years ago he would have been full of enthusiasm. Even two years ago. Now he just wanted to stay in one place for more than two minutes at a time.
Choosing a popular-looking restaurant on one of the main thoroughfares, he allowed himself to be led to a table and glanced over the menu handed to him without interest. It seemed he was becoming jaded about eating out, too. He supposed he could have chosen to stay in a hotel that offered evening meals, but his clients were often the independent type who disliked that sort of arrangement, and he felt obliged to sample the sort of restaurant and nightlife they would experience if they came here.
The menu choices blurred in front of his eyes as he allowed his mind to drift. He wondered what Ben was doing tonight. He supposed Becky would have cooked a nice, simple meal that they would have shared as a family unit. Not that anything else was simple about Ben's family life, and Daniel certainly didn't envy him his complications. Well, maybe just a little. It must be nice to know where you were going to sleep each night, what you would eat, who you would eat and chat with. His mind wandered back to yesterday evening with Laura—the candlelight between them, her animation as she chattered about her work, her catching enthusiasm as she told him about the hotel and its surrounding area. Her eyes shining, her hair soft and long and . . .
"If you're dithering, the swordfish is good here."
Rudely jolted from his reverie, Daniel looked across to where Natalie was throwing her jacket across a chair. Disorientated by the reality now sitting opposite him instead of the memory of the woman who had been seated across from him last night, he could only frown as his eyes swam back into focus.
When they did, he slapped his menu down on the table. "What are you
