Cracking the Dating Code

As for her lips…they’d been the first thing he’d noticed when he’d opened his eyes and he’d known instantly exactly where he wanted them.

He should have taken it as a warning.

Hell, he had taken it as a warning.

He’d been all set to send her back with Mal, only somewhere along the way she’d treated him as a man of his word and the next thing he knew Ophelia West was staying and Mal was going and everyone was expecting Seb to conjure up a badge of honour out of nowhere and be a better man.

Just like that.

Damned if she didn’t make him at least want to try.

He headed for the office, found his sunglasses, put them on and sighed as the light dialled down a notch or four. He tried looking at Poppy West again, mighty relieved when she blended into the surroundings a whole lot better than she had before.

Maybe he’d just been imagining the calamity of her touch and the way her eyes had widened and those angel’s lips had parted when his thumb had practically encircled her wrist.

Bacon and coffee. Caffeine and fat. Get those into him, shut her in Tom’s office and, if she was anything like his brother, she might not emerge for days.

It sounded like a plan.

He picked up her bag and headed for the quad. Slung his leg over the seat and started it up, wincing at the noisy rumble that played right along with the pounding in his head.

Lots and lots of caffeine and fat.

‘You coming?’ he said, and without a word she slid into place behind him with her bag in between them like a wall. No hands at his waist, no cheerful flirty quip. Just a colleague of Tomas’s who’d come here to work.

It took them fifteen minutes to reach the house.

A fifteen-minute ride along a rough dirt track up the side of a steep hill and along a plateau that today boasted a view of endless ocean blending seamlessly into the hazy blue of an unsettled sky. Wind whipped at Seb’s hair and hers and a wayward caramel tendril cut across his cheek before sliding around his neck like a slender hangman’s rope.

He gritted his teeth, cursed his wet jeans and asked for all the speed the bike beneath him had.

The roughest patch of track curled around a rock ridge, just before the house came into view. The back wheels always skidded on slick rock and this time Ophelia West’s hands clutched at his shoulders.

An involuntary shudder rippled through him, not a prelude to desire but full-blown, roaring lust. Too long without a woman, he decided grimly. Far too long on this island alone, with only bleak thoughts for company.

‘Sorry,’ she murmured and withdrew her hands the moment the quad found traction again.

‘Leave them,’ he rasped. ‘It only gets rougher from hereon in.’

This time she set her hands to the waistband of his jeans, probably under the misguided impression that it was the better alternative to skin on skin.

It wasn’t.

Seb’s body took her hands at his waistband as a signal that his jeans would soon be coming off.

Fifteen minutes all up, until they stood inside the house and out of the wind, with Ophelia West looking around curiously but not saying a word.

Seb should have found her actions reassuring; the fact that she felt no need to befriend him or force him into inane conversation.

He didn’t.

All Poppy West’s silence did was make him want to know what she thought of the island and of the house. A house made of concrete and glass and metal. One that cut into the rock face at its back and enjoyed expansive ocean views from every room. He’d designed it himself. Built a fair chunk of it himself too. Took pride in its rugged beauty and the challenges that had gone into its design.

Whatever the mouse thought of the place, she wasn’t letting on.

‘May I use a bathroom?’ she asked and he told her where one was and headed for the kitchen.

Coffee would help. Had to help, and then he’d show her the office, fry up some bacon and then disappear for the day while she did whatever it was she’d come to do and he worked off his hangover, his foul mood, and his awareness of a little grey mouse who was trying hard to be no trouble, no trouble at all, and by doing nothing whatsoever to engage him had captured his attention more thoroughly than anyone had captured it in years.

Seb dumped a wagonload of ground coffee into the shiny stainless steel machine, leaned into the counter and rested his head against a cupboard door.

He closed his eyes and tried to remember what else his brother had said about Poppy West. Tried to remember if Tom had been interested in her, and if so, whether he’d ever acted on that interest.

Probably.

She was exactly his brother’s type. Classy. Smart. Kinda sweet, whereas Seb… Seb far preferred his women assured, adventurous and heading towards sinful.

‘Coffee smells good,’ said a quiet, measured voice, and he straightened and opened his eyes to find her standing uncertainly in the doorway.

‘It is.’ Was that his voice? That raspy, ill-used croak? ‘There’s sugar around here somewhere. Long-life milk too. Somewhere.’ Probably in a box down at the warehouse. He’d bring some up later.

‘I’ll take black with one.’

Easy to please, this woman with perfect lips and a planet for a brain.

She’d taken her jacket off and stood there in designer cut jeans and a dove-grey T-shirt that emphasised fine bones and slenderness. Small, high breasts. Plenty of leg.

A man who wanted a piece of her would have to be gentle; he’d have to take care….

‘You want something to eat?’ he asked the mouse. Mousemousemouse. His brother’s little grey mouse. Business partner. Whatever. He’d find out soon enough.

‘No, thanks. I had a big breakfast.’

Birdseed and yoghurt, what was the bet? ‘I’ll fill up an Esky for you to take down to the guest house,’ he told her. ‘There’s a fridge there. You’ll have to turn it on. Not sure if the bed’s made up. I’ll get you some linen too.’

He probably should have checked the guest house for spiders. Lizards. Snakes. Gracious hospitality wasn’t exactly his forte.

‘Change of plan,’ he muttered. ‘I’ll sort the guest house. You just do whatever you’ve come here to do on the computers. Tom wasn’t very specific.’

Ophelia West shrugged. ‘It’s not very interesting to a layman. But I’d really like to see the computer set-up. Tomas promised me big things.’

‘C’mon, then, geek girl. Let’s show you what he’s got.’

He still hadn’t put a shirt on.

Poppy tried to pay attention to her surroundings rather than the man who strode down the hallway in front of her, but it took concerted effort. The house had been built into the cliff face, it seemed, for the rear side wall consisted solely of cool to the touch smooth grey rock. The white ceiling disappeared into it and so did the grey slate floor.

At the end of the hall he opened a door and Poppy followed him into an office.

Generously proportioned, it boasted floor-to-ceiling windows on two sides and a perfect 180-degree view of the ocean. Photos of floating oil rigs and pipelines lined the walls—Sebastian’s achievements, one would assume. A framed mathematical proof, written in Tomas’s scrawling black hand, stood out amongst them. There was a large draughtsman’s table. Two high-end brand–name computers sat on nearby desks.

It was a very nice office, by any standard except the one that mattered most. Poppy stared at the computers, aghast.

‘Something wrong?’ he asked and she looked up to find Sebastian Reyne studying her intently.

‘I hope not,’ she said. ‘I mean, it’s a beautiful workspace, don’t get me wrong, and the view is magnificent if you like that kind of thing, but those computers are not what Tomas promised me.’

‘What did he promise you?’

‘Grunt,’ she said. ‘And lots of it.’

The corner of Sebastian’s eyes crinkled, and Poppy paused, mid panic. Gorgeous eyes. Smiley hell-raiser eyes, enjoying a private joke.

‘You’d be after the bat cave, then,’ he murmured, and crossed the room and opened a door she hadn’t noticed earlier. He slipped his hand just inside the doorway, flipped on a light and stepped aside. ‘Behold, the promised land.’

Poppy approached the door cautiously, peered inside the room and promptly uttered a favoured phrase she’d picked up from her brothers. And it wasn’t Well, glory be.

Cooling panels warred with monitors for space. Cable had been built into the walls during the original build, which meant no stepping over it, and memory banks took up almost half of one wall.

Tomas Reyne had built himself a supercomputer.

‘This enough grunt for you, Miss West?’

‘Poppy,’ she muttered distractedly. ‘You may as well call me Poppy. I’m going to be here a lot.’ She started turning on units, she couldn’t help herself. ‘Thank you,’ she said. ‘Thank you for letting me stay.’ She stood on the spot and turned a slow circle, taking everything in.

‘I take it you have everything you need?’ he asked dryly.

Poppy smiled at him, really smiled at the man, and wondered why he blinked. ‘Oh, mama,’ she said with utter reverence. ‘Yes, indeed.’

‘Are you a gamer too?’ asked Seb from the doorway as Poppy began lighting up the various screens. In true geek style, she seemed to have forgotten his presence the second she’d spotted Tom’s computer rig. He didn’t know whether to be amused or insulted. Eventually he settled on being a bit of both.

‘Sometimes I game,’ she murmured as she examined one piece of hardware after another. ‘You?’

‘Sometimes. You ever play with Tom?’

‘Mmm-hmm.’

More lights came on, accompanied by the whirring of fans.

‘With him or against him?’ he asked next.

‘Both.’

‘Ever beat him?’

‘Once or twice.’

‘Ever sleep with him?’

Poppy blinked and turned back to stare at him. Cornflower-blue eyes and a world of incomprehension. ‘What?’

‘My brother. Do you sleep with him?’

‘I, ah…no.’

The no sounded solid without being vehement. ‘Ever want to?’

‘What?’

That wasn’t vehemence either. That was pure and utter incomprehension.

‘Don’t mind me,’ he murmured silkily. ‘I’m just trying to figure out what the deal is between you and Tom. Maybe he’s got plans for you. It’d help if I knew.’

‘Help how?’

‘I’d play nice and leave my brother’s toys the hell alone.’

He watched her eyes widen and her lips part as the intent behind his words sank in. He watched her gaze skitter over his chest, and then the rest of him, lingering just a little too long over areas that bulged beneath clinging wet jeans and, just like that, all thoughts of playing nice fled.

Warm colour crept into her cheeks and did nothing whatsoever to stem Seb’s need.

‘I, ah…’ She cleared her throat and started again. ‘Yes, your brother has plans for me,’ she said. ‘Big plans. Huge.’ Her gaze had dropped below his waist again. Seb allowed himself a tiny smile.

‘Really?’

‘Oh, yes.’

She couldn’t lie for squat. Seb cocked his eyebrow and shot her a smile and Miss Ophelia West met his gaze and blushed.

‘Your brother’s waiting for me to become self-assured, playful, sexy and somewhat on the curvy side,’ she murmured. ‘That’s how he likes them, you know? And as soon as I become all of those things I fully expect him to fall at my feet and worship. He’s going to let me know just as soon as I meet his requirements.’

‘So you’ll be having bacon and eggs, then?’

‘What?’

‘For the curves.’ Seb swept his hands through the air, outlining imaginary curves with his hands. They were very buxom curves.

‘Oh.’ She seemed mesmerised by his hands.

‘You want extra bacon?’ he said, and smiled a crooked smile.

She shook her head, her smile fey and fleeting. ‘No, thank you.’

‘I don’t think you have any intention of moulding yourself to meet my brother’s requirements,’ he murmured. ‘I think you’re waiting for slender, geeky and socially awkward to become the new sexy.’

‘It’s going to be a long wait.’

‘Maybe.’ And maybe not. ‘Coffee’ll be in a pot in the kitchen,’ he added. And because he was a gentleman and a good brother and the situation he found himself in required far more consideration than he’d given it so far, ‘Get it whenever you want.’

He left her alone after that. Poppy heard the clang of pots and pans in the kitchen and soon enough she smelled bacon frying, but Sebastian Reyne didn’t come near her again, and eventually she heard the quad rumble to life. A glance through the window confirmed that Sebastian was indeed heading back down the rough dirt track on the quad, his destination unknown.

He’d changed into cut-off canvas trousers in beige and he’d added a black T-shirt, but it didn’t make the slightest bit of difference to her reaction to him. She still looked, and she sure as hell still wanted. She tried to count how many other men she’d wanted with the intensity that she wanted this one. The counting didn’t take long.

None.

Poppy retrieved her carryall from the living room and hauled it to the computer room. She dug out her hard drives and plugged them in and then settled down to see what security measures Tomas had put in place. No internet signal was the biggest gift that kept on giving, but there were other safeguards in place and Poppy approved of them all. No way for anyone outside this room to know what went on in here, and as for leaving a mess behind for Tomas to clean up, that wouldn’t be happening either. Before she left she’d strip this computer back to this time today, with no record whatsoever of her use of it.

It took a while, but eventually Poppy stopped thinking about her host and let herself sink into the work. No looking over her shoulder required. For the first time in weeks she could truly concentrate on the task at hand. It was time to find out where her older brother was—as in what the hell he was doing and for whom.

‘Okay, Jared,’ she murmured coaxingly. ‘I’m here, I’m fearless and failure is not an option. Where are you?’

The afternoon stretched into evening before Poppy managed to break free of the code in her head and go to the kitchen in search of that coffee. The unpredictable Sebastian still hadn’t returned from wherever it was he’d been going and for that Poppy was surprisingly grateful.

She needed the caffeine and she needed some time alone to think about what she was going to do about her interest in him, and, more to the point, what to do should he continue to display a decided interest in her.

The man was grieving, and probably bored. Looking for a distraction, any distraction would do. A bottle. A woman. Something to take his mind off an explosion that had cost him one friend and injured another. Poppy didn’t know what to do with the information Mal had given her. Didn’t know what kind of guilt Seb was dealing with or what it was doing to him.

Didn’t know whether to act on her instant attraction or leave the poor man alone.

Guilt had been Jared’s constant companion too, as they’d sat in plastic chairs in the hospital, waiting for their sister to come out of surgery. Jared’s anguish over Lena’s injuries had been wordless and all powerful. He’d waited for word that Lena would survive. He’d seen her and spoken to her and told her everything would be all right. He’d sworn vengeance on those who’d betrayed them and then he’d left.

Seven months and twenty-eight days ago.

That was the sum of Poppy’s experience of a man consumed by guilt, and if she hadn’t been able to help her brother deal with his pain how the hell was she supposed to help Sebastian Reyne shoulder his?

Unless he wanted to use her as a distraction?

Flirt with her, get naked with her.

Humour her.

No real emotional connection beyond blind desire for sexual satisfaction. Would that really be so bad?

Because she had the blind desire part of the equation well and truly covered.

Time to raid the kitchen cupboards and nab a couple of biscuits from the biscuit tin. Not making herself at home in Sebastian’s home, just ensuring she didn’t crash from a mixture of hunger and nerves.

And then came the rumble of the quad bike outside, followed by unhurried footsteps, and Sebastian strode through the door, dominating the space and making it his own.

Which it was.

‘I made more coffee,’ she said, barely resisting the urge to tuck her hands behind her back, guilty-villain style. ‘Stole some biscuits.’

She tried not to get lost in those eyes and that face. Tried very hard to ignore that hard, muscled body so carelessly showcased in castaway clothes.

Tried very hard to play it cool, never mind that her core temperature had just soared.

‘You finished for the day?’ he asked.

‘I can be.’

He came closer, bringing the scent of the sea with him. ‘The guest house is ready for you.’

‘Thank you. But you’re going to have to give me directions.’

‘Why don’t I just show you where it is? Where’s your bag?’

‘By the door.’ She gulped down her coffee, refilled the cup with water and set it in the sink. ‘Can you give me five minutes with the computers?’

‘Are we talking a regular five minutes or the five minutes that magically turns into five hours the minute a computer tragic gets in that room?’

‘I’m talking five regular, round-the-clock minutes,’ she said. ‘Ten at the most.’

‘We’ll see.’ Sebastian headed for the coffee pot and the assessing glance he shot her did absolutely nothing to cool her down.

Resisting the urge to run, Poppy headed for the cave.

She found him ten minutes later, in the garage beneath the house, and followed him back to the quad.

‘How far away is the guest house?’ Colour her ignorant, but she’d assumed that guest house and main house would be within shouting distance of each other as opposed to, say, opposite ends of the island.

‘It’s a twenty-minute walk back down the hill. Half that by quad. The guest house sits halfway between here and the boatshed if it’s orientation you’re after. There’s another quad there that you can use to get around the island. It’s fuelled up and the same as this one. Get on.’

Poppy got on. Left room for him up front, and the ghost of a smile crossed his lips.

‘You’re driving. Move up.’

She moved up, tentatively tucking her coat between her legs. Ladylike not.

But he didn’t seem to notice.

‘Key,’ he said, his forearm brushing her shoulder as he showed her where it was and she turned it as instructed. ‘Foot on the brake.’ She did that too, no brushing against him required. ‘Kill switch on.’ He showed her where it was. ‘Now press the start button.’

The engine roared to life and Sebastian slid onto the quad behind her, no carryall in between them this time, for it was slung over his shoulder and, from the looks of it, that was where it would stay. Poppy glanced at him, glanced down at the seat and Seb’s strong, long thighs, and swallowed hard. She scooted forward to give him more space. He wasn’t a small man, he needed more space.

She needed more space.

She took it slowly down that first rocky, steep bit of track, and she tried to pretend, when his thighs brushed her buttocks, that she’d felt such thighs before and that her heart wasn’t about to burst through her ribcage every time a bump in the track slid her into him just that little bit more.

Five minutes down the track he leaned forward, put his lips to her ear and told her to take the fork to the right.

The guest house they came upon a couple of minutes later was a far friendlier version of the big steel-and-glass house. There was still steel, and there was plenty of glass, but the dimensions were smaller and more inviting, and the steepled roof and the generous front deck filled with an assortment of mesh chairs and a hammock had a simple island charm to it that the sophisticated, sparsely furnished main house lacked.

If Poppy’s legs wobbled ever so slightly as she got off the quad it was his fault not hers, and if she took one look at his back and stumbled and bit her lip as she followed him up the steps, that was undoubtedly his fault too.

The interior of the guest house was dust free and fully furnished. A king-sized bed dressed in delicate white linens. A white gauze mosquito net hanging from a ring screwed into the ceiling. The netting tucked in behind the pillows for now, ready for sorting out later.

It could be whatever you wanted it to be, a bed like that. A pirate ship or a kingdom ruled by a benevolent princess. A kid would have a ball in that bed, and as for an adult, well…

‘What happened to your lip?’ asked Seb abruptly and Poppy stopped staring at the bed and touched her fingers to her bottom lip and then stared at them instead.

‘Nothing,’ she said, for her fingers had come away clean, but his narrowed green gaze seemed fixated on something so she gave her upper lip a once over with her fingers too. ‘Biscuit crumbs?’

‘You’ve bitten it,’ he said gruffly. ‘On the way down.’

‘Oh.’ Well, yes. ‘Only a little.’

Time to cut the tension that whipped through her, and turn away and study the rest of her surroundings rather than him. Poppy didn’t know how to play this game of hyper-awareness between man and woman. She had absolutely no idea what to do next.

There were no curtains on the floor-to-ceiling windows and every window was currently open. Fortunately, the windows were screened. A sucker-footed gecko watched her from his place on the whitewashed wall.

‘They’re harmless,’ said Seb, noting the direction of her gaze. ‘Bathroom and kitchenette are to the rear, your quad’s in the shed out the back and the key’s in it.’ He set her bag down beside the bed. ‘There’s fish curry in the fridge and a microwave to heat it up in. Other food too. Hopefully you’ll find something you like.’

‘Thank you.’ Thank-yous she knew how to do. Polite smiles too. Nervousness—she had that one well and truly covered.

‘There’s no phone in here,’ he said next. ‘But there is a two-way that’ll get you through to the boatshed or the house. If you need to call home, you’ll have to come up to the house and use the sat phone. It works most of the time, but not all of the time.’

‘You really are quite isolated here, aren’t you?’

‘Tom didn’t tell you?’

‘Tom did tell me,’ she murmured wryly. ‘The reality of isolation just didn’t quite sink in.’

‘You get used to it,’ he said. ‘Come up to the house whenever you’re ready in the morning. Just go in. Make yourself at home. I probably won’t be there.’

‘Where will you be?’

‘Fishing. Swimming. Rock climbing. Something.’

‘Uh-huh.’ Man with an almighty need to conquer something. She knew the type. ‘Ah, Mr Reyne?’

‘Seb.’ He waited until he was out of the door before turning back.

Right. Seb. She wasn’t sure she trusted herself to say his name right now without layering it full of lust. ‘There, ah, don’t seem to be any keys to this place.’

‘Yeah, we lost them.’

‘So how do you lock up?’

‘You don’t.’

‘I what?’

‘Let me guess,’ he murmured. ‘You live in an inner-city apartment block surrounded by a million people and you know none of them.’

‘You’re very perceptive,’ she countered lightly. ‘I divide my time between Oxford and Sydney. My father’s based in Hong Kong. I’m very fond of Hong Kong. Plenty of people. Locks too. Keys.’ Not that she wanted to labour the point.

‘Relax, city girl. The doors still lock from the inside. Just make sure they’re not set to lock when you shut them in the morning.

Your stuff will be perfectly safe here, I guarantee it. There’s no one else here.’

No one he knew of.

‘What about pirates? Shipwrecked fishermen? Critters? Blackbeard?’