Blame It on the Bikini

chapter TWO



MYA ignored the fact that Lauren was still babbling in her ear and jabbed the phone, shutting it down. She shoved it back in her pocket and tossed her head to get her fringe out of her eyes. ‘It seems my phone’s died,’ she said with exaggerated effervescence. ‘Can I borrow yours?’

Brad’s silent chuckle became a quick, audible burst before he summoned the control to answer. ‘Really?’

She nodded vehemently, pretending she couldn’t feel the rhythmic vibrating against her thigh.

‘But your phone is ringing.’

Yeah, there was no pretending she couldn’t hear the shrill squawks over the beat of the bar music.

‘What is that?’

‘It’s a recording of dolphins talking to each other,’ she answered brightly before hitting him with a bald-faced lie. ‘But while my ringer is working, the person on the other end can’t hear me.’

‘Maybe you hit mute.’

‘Look, can I use it?’ She dropped all pretence at perky and spoke flatly. Oh, she wanted to curl into a ball and roll behind a rock. Now. This was why he was here tonight. What had he thought? Surely he hadn’t thought the picture was meant for him and he’d come to her? As if she’d called him?

Mya bit back hysterical laughter. Teen Mya would have loved Brad Davenport to hunt her down for a hookup. Adult Mya had learned to avoid sharks. And of all the people she had to mistakenly send a picture to, it had to be her best friend’s brother? Her best friend’s completely gorgeous, speed-through-a-million-sexual-partners brother?

Brad held her gaze captive with his warm, amused one. ‘But my phone cost a lot of money and I don’t like the way you’re holding that glass of water. I don’t think my phone can survive the depths.’

Was the guy a mind-reader? Of course she wanted to drown the thing—she’d drown Brad himself if she could. Or better still, herself.

How could she have made such a mistake? This ranked as the most mortifying moment of her life. Why had she gone with the scarlet bikini with the see-through sides?

‘How come you have my number anyway?’ he asked lazily, confirming the worst.

‘This was an old phone of Lauren’s.’ Mya groaned. ‘She passed it on to me.’

‘One of the ones she lost and made Dad replace?’

Hell, that would be right. For a while there Lauren had made her father pay—literally. ‘She told me he’d given her a new one and she didn’t need this one any more.’ She didn’t like the frown in Brad’s eyes.

Yeah, she was the bad influence, wasn’t she? The one who came from the wrong side of the tracks to lead Lauren astray. Did he think she abused her relationship with Lauren to get things? Lauren’s parents had thought that. Indeed, Lauren had tried to give Mya things. Mya had refused to take most of them. The little she had, she’d hidden from her own parents. She didn’t want them feeling bad that they couldn’t afford those kinds of gifts—indeed any. Even then Lauren had tricked her into taking this phone and she’d taken nothing since.

And now? Now there was no dignity left in this situation. ‘Would you please delete it?’ she asked. Yeah, begging already.

‘Never.’

Incredibly, his instant laughing response melted her but she couldn’t be flattered by this. She just couldn’t. ‘It wasn’t meant for you.’

‘More’s the pity,’ he said softly. ‘Do you often text pictures of yourself in underwear to your friends?’

‘It wasn’t underwear,’ she said indignantly.

His chin lifted and the sound of his laughter rang out, crashing and curling over her like a wave of warmth. ‘It’s a bra.’

But Mya couldn’t float in that tempting sea. ‘It’s a bikini.’

He shook his head, his brown eyes teasing. ‘Sorry, Mya. It’s a bra.’

She was still too mortified to be teased. ‘I was in a swimwear store. I wanted Lauren’s opinion on it. It was a bikini.’

‘There were see-though bits.’ He gestured widely and half shrugged. ‘There was underwire. Looked like a bra to me.’

‘You’d know because you’ve seen so many?’ She tried to bite, but felt her blush rise higher.

‘Sure,’ he chuckled. ‘And for the record, yes, you can definitely get away with it.’

Brad watched Mya closely and couldn’t bring himself to take the polite step back despite knowing the doll was embarrassed beyond belief. But no way in hell was he ever deleting that image. She was gorgeous—far more gorgeous than he’d realised. The picture had been the teaser, but seeing her like this now? All flushed and snappy, pocket-sized but bright-eyed—he was beyond intrigued.

Her hair was swept into a ponytail. Now he remembered the colour had frequently changed. She and Lauren had spent for ever in Lauren’s room, giggles emanating as they did outrageous things to their hair. Though right now, instead of hot pink and purple, Mya’s hair colour looked almost natural—a light brown with slightly blonde streaks round the front. Her wickedly high cheekbones created sharp planes sloping down to that narrow little chin. Those teeth and that impish smile broke the perfection, yet were perfect themselves. The all-black ensemble was unusual for her but it didn’t hide her body. Despite her slender limbs and pixie face, she wasn’t boyishly slim. Her jeans were painted on, and the apron around her hips didn’t wholly hide her curvy butt. As for those breasts … Plumped up by the bikini/bra in the picture, they’d been so bountiful they’d spilled over the edges. Now, disguised under that plain black tee, their silhouette was minimised. But no simple cotton covering could fully hide the softness that seemed sinfully generous in proportion to her small stature.

His heart drummed a triumphant beat. Blood pulsed, priming muscles. Because he’d seen the way she’d looked at him—the flash she hadn’t been able to hide when he’d first walked into the bar. There’d been that pull, that instinctive reaction. He knew the signs—the second glances, small smiles, the heightened colour. The sparkle in the eyes, the parting of the lips. Brad Davenport also knew his worth. He knew he had a body that attracted a second glance—oh, and the cynic in him knew most women would never forget his trust fund. So he was used to being wanted and he knew when a woman wanted him.

Now the tip of her tongue briefly touched that too-wide top lip and then she bit back her smile. Yeah, she still had that gap between her two front teeth.

With just a look she’d had those stag-party guys competing to catch her close and hold her. Only she’d held them off with a few words and a hint of fire. And he wasn’t thinking of the lighter flame.

Brad’s entire body was on fire, and for the second time that night he gave in to impulse. He took her glass from her and put it on the table next to his.

‘What are you doing?’ A breathless squeak.

‘We’re old friends,’ he said softly. ‘We should greet each other properly.’

‘I wouldn’t have said we were friends.’ Her voice wobbled.

He smiled at the sound. He’d stirred a small response from her, but he wanted more. And he was used to winning what he wanted. Before she could say anything more, he stepped close and caught her mouth with his.

She instantly tensed, but he kept it light. When the stiff surprise ebbed from her body—pleasingly quickly—he lifted his head a fraction and stepped closer at the same time. He flicked his tongue to feel her soft lips, tracing their uneven length, and then sealing his to hers again and tasting the delight inside her mouth. And then she kissed him back and that fire exploded. Man, Mya Campbell was a hell of a lot hotter than he’d ever thought possible.

For a split second Mya wondered if she were dreaming. Then the heat blasted into her and she knew not even her imagination could come up with this. She held her head up without even realising—no thought of pushing him away. Because the guy did wicked things with his tongue—sweeping it between her lips. Deeper and deeper again. Caressing her mouth as if it were the most delicious pleasure. She softened, opening more. And he stepped closer, taking more, giving so much more.

His chest pressed into hers. She could feel how broad and strong he was. It was a damn good thing she had the wall behind her—she was sandwiched between two solid forces and it was utterly exquisite. His mouth was rapacious now. His body insistent. Like yin and yang—hard versus the soft. And yet there was tension in her body too, that fierce need for physical fulfilment unfurling inside.

She slid her hand over his abs, the heat of him blazing through the white cotton shirt. She could feel those taut muscles and shivered at the thought of them working hard above her, beneath her—every way towards pleasure.

Her rational mind spun off into the distance while her senses took centre stage, demanding all her attention. She all but oozed into him, utterly malleable, his to twist and tease. And he did—grinding against her, kissing her mouth, her jaw, her neck and back to her mouth. She threaded her fingers through his hair, opening yet more for him.

His hand slid to the curve of her hip, lower still to her butt. He spread his fingers, pulling her hips closer to the heat of his—so she could feel his response even more. A moan escaped as she felt his thick erection pressing against her belly. So hot, so soon, this was just so crazy.

But all thought vanished as his other hand slid up from her waist, cupping her breast. She momentarily tensed, anticipating the pain—she was too sensitive for touch there. But his fingers stilled, not following through on their upward sweep; a half-second later he moved again to cup her soft flesh, avoiding her nipple. Good thing, as both were overloading already just with the pressure of his chest against hers. She relaxed against him again as she realised he somehow understood. Instead he pressed deeper—his tongue laying claim to her mouth, his body almost imprinting on hers.

And despite this oh-so-thorough kiss, she wanted so much more than this.

She moved restlessly—tiny rocking motions of her hips. It was all she could manage given how hard he was pinning her to the wall. But with every small movement she drew closer and closer to the hit of ecstasy that she suddenly needed more than anything else in the world.

It wasn’t a kiss; it was a siege—he’d encircled her and demanded her surrender. It hadn’t taken her long to cave at all. Her fingers curled instinctively into his cotton shirt as wicked tension gripped her. Almost at breaking point—the convulsions of ecstasy were a mere breath away.

‘Excuse me!’

Mya froze and she felt Brad’s arms go equally rigid. She pulled back and met his eyes—he looked as startled as she felt.

‘Mya, you’re way over your break time.’ Drew, her boss, snapped right beside her. ‘What do you think you’re doing?’

All but stupefied, Mya turned and stared at her boss. She literally didn’t know. Couldn’t think. Couldn’t answer. She was still trying to process the chemical reaction that had ignited every cell while in Brad’s embrace. But as she looked at the extreme irritation on Drew’s face, reality rushed back. Her boss was furious. Panic slammed the door shut on the remaining good vibes—she couldn’t afford to lose this job. What on earth had she been thinking?

‘Drew, I’m so sorry,’ she said in a breathless rush, stepping further away from Brad. ‘I wasn’t aware of the time. I didn’t—’

‘No kidding,’ Drew interrupted rudely, her scrambled apology having no effect on his temper. ‘This is—’

‘My fault.’ To Mya’s horror, Brad coolly interrupted Drew. ‘I distracted her.’

Drew turned his glower on Brad. But within a second his expression eased a fraction as he got a good look at the man now stepping up in front of him.

Mya watched the two men square off. All of a sudden Brad seemed both taller and broader as he moved to put himself partly between her and Drew. Oh, this wasn’t good—she really didn’t need Brad interfering; she was on the line as it was. She could handle Drew herself without any macho-male stuff.

Brad sent her a quick glance but seemed oblivious to her wordless plea to shut the heck up and back off. Instead he turned back to Drew.

Mya held her breath but then Brad smiled—that big, easy smile, with just a hint of the ‘born-to-it-all’ arrogance. ‘My name’s Brad Davenport.’ He extended his hand as if it were not in the least embarrassing that he’d just been caught kissing the brains out of Drew’s employee when she should have been working. ‘I want to hire out your bar.’

‘Drew.’ Mya’s manager paused a moment and then shook Brad’s hand. ‘This is a popular place. I’m not sure you’ll need the whole bar for one small party.’

‘It’s not going to be a small party. I want the whole bar,’ Brad answered calmly. ‘Obviously we’ll pay to secure absolute privacy for the night.’

Mya watched the change come over Drew as he assessed Brad’s worth. It didn’t take much to know the clothes were designer, the watch gold, the self-assurance in-built …

‘I’m sure we can come to some arrangement.’ Drew’s demeanour changed to sycophantic in a heartbeat.

‘I’m sure we can.’ Brad smiled his killer smile once again. ‘It should be good. This place has an atmosphere I like.’

Mya watched the Davenport charm in action as he arranged a meeting time with Drew. He got everything his own way so easily. Utterly used to doors swinging open—and women’s legs parting on sight of that smile too. And while she was totally relieved he’d just saved her neck from the block, she was also irritated with the ease with which he’d done it. The man had everything. Money, looks, brains, charm. Had he ever known what it was to have to fight for something? To really have to work for something? Mya knew what it was to work, hard.

‘You have two minutes,’ Drew said to Mya, as if he were an emperor granting a favour to a lowly serf. ‘Then back behind that bar.’

‘Of course.’ Mya nodded as he disappeared into the crowd. Then she turned back to Brad. ‘I’m afraid you’re going to have to follow through on that meeting.’

‘I’m looking forward to it.’ Brad didn’t look at all bothered. ‘I think a night here could be fun.’

Mya chose to ignore the hint of entendre in his expression. ‘Have you got a reason to party?’

‘Who needs a reason?’ Brad shrugged.

‘Because life’s just one big party?’

He merely chuckled and then stepped closer. ‘I’m sorry we were interrupted. Things were getting interesting there.’

But that close call had firmly grounded Mya. ‘Things were getting out of hand,’ she corrected, opting not to look any higher than his collar. ‘I’m sorry about that. You took me by surprise.’

‘Wow,’ Brad said after a pause. ‘I’m intrigued to think what it’ll be like when I give you fair warning.’

Mya shook her head and stepped away. ‘You’re not getting another chance.’

She felt his hand on her elbow turning her back towards him. His hand slipped down her arm to take her fingers in his.

The touch made her look up before she thought better of it. His surprisingly intense expression incinerated her but she hauled herself from the ashes of easiness. Mya liked sex, but she preferred it within the context of some kind of relationship, not the one-night-stand scene Brad was champion of. And she was steering well clear of any kind of entanglement for the foreseeable future. Long-term future. She had too much else to do—like work, study and occasionally eat and sleep.

Also, this man had always had everything too easy. She’d just seen him in action—twice already tonight. He wasn’t having her that way again. She truly had just been caught by surprise, and her response to him was simply a reflection of his expertise and her lack of any physical release in the last while, right?

The swirling frustration and embarrassment inside her coalesced and came out as temper. ‘You thought that picture was a booty call, didn’t you?’ She called him out with sarcasm-coated words. ‘From a woman that you haven’t spoken to in at least five years?’

‘Have we ever spoken?’ He laughed off her accusation. ‘I thought you and Lauren just paraded around fake-Goth-style and giggled behind closed doors. Interesting to think what was really going on behind those doors given the pictures you send each other. Thinking about it, you two went to prom together, didn’t you?’

‘With her boyfriend,’ Mya answered.

‘Oh, a threesome.’ Brad laughed harder.

‘If you remember, she tried to get you to take me.’

‘Oh, yeah.’ His eyes widened as he thought about it. ‘That’s right.’

Unlike him, Mya had never forgotten what for her had been the most mortifying moment of that night. He’d been home from university. He’d had some silvery-blonde girlfriend with him. Tall and sleek, she’d had the obligatory blue eyes and the label clothes and the ‘born to it all’ attitude. Mya had hated her on sight. The girlfriend had spent most of the time spread on a sofa being kissed to glory by Brad.

‘You were wearing one of Lauren’s dresses,’ he said slowly.

‘Yes.’ She was amazed he’d now remembered that detail. Mya had butchered one of Lauren’s many formal dresses. A soft, pretty pink dress—never a colour she’d normally wear. She’d taken to it with a pair of scissors and completely cut away the back and secured it with long, trailing ribbons. She’d been aiming for a soft romantic look.

It was the dress that she’d hoped might garner her the attention she’d thought she’d wanted. All she’d wanted to do was fit in—to be popular and accepted. To be just like the rest of them and not different for once. She’d wanted it to all be easy. But it was never as easy as a change of clothes. Make-overs didn’t change the person underneath. She hadn’t just been sixteen and never been kissed. She’d made it all the way to eighteen and first-year uni before that honour had fallen to a fellow student who’d seemed sweet enough until he’d had what he wanted.

But back at that night of the dance, she’d had the whole prom fantasy. What wallflower schoolgirl didn’t? The one where the hottest guy in school asked her to dance and it was all perfect and ended with a kiss. Or the super-hot brother of the best friend asked her? Yeah, she’d been such a cliché. And she’d felt like a princess for all of five minutes, until Brad had ignored her. She’d been pretty and dressed up and hadn’t even been able to turn the head of the most sexually hungry male she knew back then.

‘You were too busy wearing that blonde to answer at the time,’ Mya said dryly.

The dimple in his cheek deepened. ‘Yeah, that’s right.’

He hadn’t appreciated his younger sister’s interruption. Mya had seen the raw lust in him, the tease, the firmness with which he pulled the girl onto his lap—his strong arm wrapped around her waist, his confident hand close to her breast. And for a few minutes, she’d wanted to be that girl. Now for five minutes she had been. And it was better than any fantasy.

Mya sucked up her stupidity and turned her self-scorn towards him instead. ‘That’s all irrelevant anyway. What’s really the issue here is how pathetically horn dog you are. You get a look at a woman in her bikini and you’re suddenly hot for her? When you’ve never so much as looked at her in the last decade?’

Amusement still burned in his eyes. ‘You were a child a decade ago.’

‘It’s still pathetic.’ And frankly, insulting.

‘Maybe that prom night isn’t so irrelevant at all.’ His smile widened. ‘Did you have a crush on me back in high school? Your best friend’s older brother?’

She gaped.

‘Because,’ he leaned closer and drawled outrageously, ‘you wouldn’t have been the only one.’

Hell, the guy had an ego. Unfortunately what he’d said was true. There were several girls who’d done the faux-friendship thing to Lauren just to get close to her brother. Mya shook her head and denied him anyway. ‘Girls that age are at the mercy of hormones just as boys are and they fixate on the nearest object. Their fixating on you was probably more a matter of locality than your attractiveness.’

He grinned wolfishly. ‘So if it wasn’t me your hormones fixed on, then who?’

‘I didn’t have the time.’

‘Everybody has the time.’ He moved closer as his voice dropped to an intimate whisper. ‘Who did you used to dream of?’

‘No one.’

‘So rebellious on the outside, such a square inside.’ He shook his head.

Mya gritted her teeth.

‘No wonder you erupted with one touch—you’ve been repressed too long.’

Mya couldn’t answer because that was actually true. She’d been without too long; that was the reason she’d inhaled his touch like an attention-starved animal.

‘Did you wish I’d said yes to Lauren and taken you to the ball? Is that why you’re trying to cut me down now? Did I burst your love-struck teen bubble?’

He was so close to the mark it was mortifying. But she’d never, ever admit it. ‘I’m sure you’ve burst many poor girls’ bubbles, but you never burst mine.’ Mya willed a languid tone. ‘Fact is I’ve always seen through your charm to what you really are.’

‘And what am I?’

‘Selfish, spoilt, arrogant. Insufferable.’

‘Is that all?’ He paused a moment. ‘You don’t want to add some more about how unattractive you find me?’

Very funny. ‘You’re so up yourself it’s unbelievable.’

‘But you still want me.’ He breathed out and then laughed. ‘You’re never going to be able to deny it. Not when you kissed me like that.’

‘You were the one who kissed me.’ Cross, she licked her extremely dry lips.

‘It started that way but within two seconds you were clawing my shirt off.’

‘I was trying to push you away.’

The rogue laughed harder. Mya pulled her hand free of his grip and strode back through to the bar. She got behind it and found he was right there in front of her, waiting to be served—and still annoyingly amused.

‘You have to go now,’ she told him firmly, determined not to let that smile affect her. ‘I have work to do.’ She pulled out a chopping board, some lemons and a knife to prove it.

‘No.’ He shook his head. ‘I need you more than ever now.’

Yeah, right. He’d never needed her before. And while she didn’t want to think he’d kissed her on a whim, the fact was he had. He’d never wanted to kiss her before, remember? The guy who had his pick of every woman in every room in the world hadn’t noticed her until she was hardly dressed. It really didn’t do much for her ego. And even less for his character. It showed he was simply attracted to the lowest common denominator—bared flesh.

He shook his head in mock despair. ‘You suspect my motivation.’

‘Your reputation does precede you.’ She maintained her cool. ‘And all you’ve said and done so far tonight merely confirms the worst.’

‘Actually, Mya, I really do need you.’ His expression went serious. ‘I’m not just going to hire out the bar. I’m going to hire you.’