He just smiled. "So what do you say? About . . . us?"
"I can assure you, Grayson, you won't be impressed by my . . . talent in that arena." My eyes momentarily shifted away from his.
His brow furrowed. "I think, little witch, that I'd like to make my own judgment on that score." His voice was like warm honey.
Fear moved slowly through me. No. No, I had no interest in going there with The Dragon. He'd likely been with countless women who knew exactly what to do in his bed. I wouldn't be compared to them. Plus, I'd seen the type of woman he was attracted to, and it definitely wasn't me. I shook my head. "It's not a good idea and I'm not interested anyway. I don't like you much and I find you . . . unattractive. Hideous actually."
He chuckled as if I hadn't just insulted and shot him down. God, he knew no woman in her right mind would ever find him unattractive. He did think I might be slightly insane, though, so that might work in my favor. "Also, you have the manners of a dyspeptic reptile," I added to strengthen my argument.
"I can be civilized if I put my mind to it," he said, that same charmingly boyish smile making my stupid, idiotic heart flip again.
"I doubt it," I muttered under my breath.
"I'll prove it. Be ready at six o'clock—I'll pick you up. We never did have that wedding dinner."
Wait, what? No. "I'm busy," I shouted as he turned away.
"Six o'clock," he shouted back. I gritted my teeth, considering standing him up. But the truth was, I was pitifully lonely and had been bored for a week. A dinner out was hard to resist—even if it had to be with my husband. Perhaps it would be good to talk, get his mind off this ridiculous notion of us becoming intimate, and start over as we had begun. This dinner could be a distraction for tonight, and tonight only. I'd be less inclined to come up with Very Bad Ideas if I was busy doing his books, and he'd be extremely busy soon anyway once the trust money came through. Things would smooth out, and soon I'd be able to leave here and wipe Grayson Hawthorn from my memory forever. But first . . . what did I have to wear to my overdue wedding dinner?
**********
Grayson's truck pulled up in front of my cottage at precisely six o'clock. I took a deep, fortifying breath and walked slowly through the brush. He was standing at the passenger side door, holding it open. "My, my," I said, "you do have manners when you care to use them. Who would have guessed?" His smile was that of a very satisfied, decidedly non-dyspeptic reptile—sweet, with a devilish twinkle. I took his hand and stepped up into the cab. He was freshly shaven and his still semi-wet hair glinted in the sunlight, the almost-black strands glossy and tousled. He was wickedly gorgeous and I looked away, making a vow to harden my heart against him. If there was one thing I knew, men like him were adept at getting what they wanted by using charm, and I wouldn't fall for it.
Once he was seated in the cab with me and we were pulling through his front gate, I asked, "So where are you taking me?"
"A local place I think you'll like." He said it casually, but a worried expression settled on his features for a brief moment before it flitted away.
I twisted the necklace I was wearing as I watched his profile, wondering what he was thinking. He looked over at me and his eyes moved to my hand where I had one finger wrapped around the chain at my chest, and then lowered to my cleavage, his gaze lingering for several beats before he looked back to the road. I had settled on an empire waist, yellow sundress and a pair of navy wedge heels. But at the moment, with the way Grayson's eyes had lingered on my exposed skin, and with the feel of the low simmer of sexual tension in the cab of the truck, I was wishing I'd chosen something less revealing—like a sari for instance or maybe a muumuu.
"So, Kira, you said you were in Africa up until recently. What was it you were doing there?" Grayson asked conversationally. Ah, now that he suddenly wanted me to warm his bed, he'd decided to take an interest in me. How typical. Little did he know, though, I knew his game and wasn't falling victim to it.
I cleared my throat. "A friend of mine was building a hospital. I decided to help with the effort."
He glanced at me. "A friend?"
"Well actually, a boy I had sponsored through a charity program. Anyway, Khotso had become a friend over the years—through letters of course. His mother had suffered with something called an obstetric fistula after his birth when she was only thirteen, and it fueled his lifelong dream to become a doctor." Pride filled my chest as I considered my friend. "It's practically unheard of here in America, but it's a big problem in Africa due to the very early age many girls marry and become pregnant. Their little bodies simply aren't ready to bear children and they have a wretched time—often in labor for days and days and frequently losing their baby, too—and then they live in a terrible state due to the fistula they develop. Anyway, Khotso opened a hospital to repair fistulas for these women, some of whom have lived with them for years, and to help those who have just lost babies. It's an amazing accomplishment for someone so young—" I suddenly stopped talking, realizing I'd gotten caught up in the passion of the project as I usually did when I talked about it. I felt myself blush. "Sorry, I . . ."
"You're passionate about it. It's admirable. And it sounds like a very worthy endeavor. You helped one person, who in turn helps so many now." He looked over at me with a look I thought might be sincere respect. My heart warmed despite my vow to keep it cold and removed. "So you helped see the hospital completed and you came home?"