Page 20 of Reckless Intentions
By the time they finished their last course of sorbet and dessert wine, the restaurant was practically empty. When the waiter came over with their bill, Olivia reached for her purse.
“Don’t be ridiculous.” Brody covered her hand with his and tingles rippled down her Olivia’s spine. “I’ll get this.” His thumb briefly caressed hers, increasing the sensations coursing through her body until he drew away. He tossed a platinum credit card onto the table. “I’ll be back in a minute.”
As he walked away towards the bathrooms, Olivia took a moment to admire his muscled shoulders. Clad in a tight, dark green polo shirt, his body tapered in towards his hips. She couldn’t help but ogle his arse—the delightful arse she had already seen naked—and imagined what the rest of his body was like. She blinked, bringing herself back to the present. That was a fantasy for later. To distract herself, she grabbed her phone and tried to focus on the screen. It looked like there was a message from Caro, although the words swam around in front of her. She gave up and shoved the device back into her bag.
When Brody returned a couple of minutes later, a frown clouded his clean-cut features. “Why don’t you get off? I’ll see you at the club tomorrow.”
“What’s wrong?” Disappointment flooded through Olivia. She’d been looking forward to him walking her home.
“It’s nothing. I, Valentina called.” He looked down at the tablecloth, unable to look at her.
Valentina.Of course, he wasn’t interested. He had a girlfriend already.
Olivia pushed her chair back with such a force it crashed to the floor. The waiter rushed over and picked it up, asking her if everything was okay. Tears clouded her vision. Nothing was okay. She was a complete idiot. Blindly, she pushed her way out of the restaurant and along the promenade by the seafront.
After a couple of minutes of walking, nothing around her looked familiar. She’d gone in completely the wrong direction. She turned abruptly and bumped straight into a group of four men in their late teens, who she hadn’t realised had been following her closely.
“Sorry, excuse me,” she said.
Two of them blocked her path and said something to her in Spanish that she didn’t understand. Olivia span around to walk away from them, but the other two were in her way. Surrounded at all angles, panic bubbled up inside her. She didn’t know what they were saying, but it sounded threatening. One of them stepped towards her and tried to grab her bag. She pulled it closer to her, grateful the strap went across her body. With a hefty tug one man ripped the bag from her and snapped the strap, she screamed loud enough to make her lungs hurt.
“Aléjate de ella!” Brody’s rich tones filled the air. “Aléjate de ella!”
Olivia stumbled in the direction of his voice, and watched him run towards her, closely followed by the waiter from the restaurant. The four teenagers took one look at the two men bearing down on them and ran. The one who took Olivia’s bag dropped it a few feet away as he dashed away. The waiter went to pick it up, while Brody went straight to her.
He wrapped her in his strong arms and crushed her against his chest, while his hands gently stroked her hair. “Are you okay?” he whispered. “I shouldn’t have let you walk home alone.”
“I thought you wanted me to go? You were going to see Valentina.” Olivia was shaking. The incident had scared her to her core, but the feeling of being in Brody’s arms was soothing and she tried to settle her nerves.
“I was,” admitted Brody. “Then I saw the direction you walked in. I knew it was wrong, so I followed you. Looks like it was a good thing I did.”
Squashed against his pecs, Brody’s cologne invaded Olivia’s nostrils, something woody and manly, much like Brody himself. “Thank you,” she said, her voice low and breathless.
The waiter held out Olivia’s bag and spoke to Brody in rapid Spanish. He nodded and replied, “Si, gracias,” without letting go of her. “Let me take you home.” He turned his attention back to her as he spoke. “At least I know you’ll get back without any further trouble.”
He slung a casual arm around her shoulders as they walked silently back to Caro’s apartment.
“Will you be okay from here?” Brody asked, breaking the silence, as they reached the gate.
“I think so.” Olivia shivered uncontrollably as she glanced down the walkway into the shadows. “Could you walk me to the door?”
He nodded and placed a hand in the small of her back. His light touch made her insides flutter and warm. She fumbled in her bag for the keys, but then dropped them on the ground. As she bent over to pick them up, she swore she could feel Brody’s gaze sweeping over her buttocks as the hem of her playsuit rode up.
“At the risk of repeating myself, thank you, again.”
Brody didn’t speak, his olive-green eyes boring into hers. He brought a hand up to her cheek, his thumb gently tracing her jawline, then running along her bottom lip. She pushed her tongue out and brushed it with the tip. He smoothly slid it between her lips and her involuntary reaction was to suck. Although she knew it wasn’t his thumb she wanted in her mouth.
“Olivia.” He groaned. As quickly as it happened, Brody withdrew. He stared at her, his gaze full of unbridled longing. “I’ll see you tomorrow.” With that, he turned and walked away.
Olivia watched him go, struggling to come to terms with what had almost happened. Why had he walked away? She thought she’d been giving off the right signals all night. Her sigh was deep and heartfelt as she let herself into the apartment.
He didn’t see her as anything more than a spy for Caro.
