His skin practically crackled with energy as they neared the lab. Here, he would find out if the succulent Nicole was as attracted to him as he definitely was to?—
No.He was going to look at Sidewinder’s future products,and that was all.
Thatwas the reason he’d goaded Nicole Lamb into taking him upstairs.
Thatwas the reason he was in California and Sidewinder Golf in the first place, to evaluate the company so he could win the damn bet.
Being distracted by a pretty face and an hourglass figure and a cute sense of humor and a shared passion for golf was the last thing Kingston Moore needed.
So he kept his eyes to himself as he trod behind her. He intently watched the elevator floor numbers flicker when they were in the confined space where in two steps he could have her up against the wall with his mouth on hers and his hands inher hair, and then he followed her down the corridor to her lab where she once again badged him in.
Again, they donned the crackling Tyvek suits, plus the masks, goggles, and gloves that protected them from flying metallic debris and the prototype clubs from the oils on their hands and other detritus from their bodies.
He’d thought that once Nicole was swathed in a papery burka, he’d be able to ignore his rising infatuation a little. Still, every time she flashed her dark eyes full of intelligence and humor at him, even from behind plastic safety glasses, he didn’t want to look away.
She looked at him when she straightened from bending over, sliding the blue gauze booties over her shoes, and his focus wrapped his mind around her gaze. “Okay, you asked for it. I’ve got to warn you, though. This is all just pie in the sky cogitating, not actual clubs for release,” she said.
“I understand,” Kingston said, arrested where he stood by her, looking at him and himself staring back at her. “I just want to see.”
No, he just wanted to touch.
But hemustnot.
“Okay!” she said, her voice as perky as a pixie. “You’re paying for it. Let’s go look at these golf clubs that don’t exist and probably never will.”
Kingston hadn’t meant to dawdle, but every club on every computer-driven lathe might have been the magic wand that boosted Sidewinder’s sales into the stratosphere.
At Last Chance, Jericho Parr had his spreadsheets where he divined a company’s worth from digits like tea leaves. Mitchell Saltonstall was a showman who could sell oil to Saudis.
But Kingston was good at finding sociological niches that needed a product.
He didn’t mean taking a square product and hammering it into a round population niche, but looking at a group of people, figuring out what they wanted, and then giving it to them.
Kingston loved golf. He loved the challenge and the mechanics of it.
He knew everything that golfers needed.
He was looking for what they would want.
Nicole stopped at every machine in her lab and prodded her introverted techs into talking to Kingston.
“This is—well—it’s not done yet,” the first guy said, a lanky fellow with graying hair.
“Yes, Arvind, Iunderstandit’s not done,” Kingston said. “Tell me what youthinkabout it, though.”
Those poor techs must never have anyone genuinely interested in their jobs. Once they understood that Kingston was serious in his inquiries, they snapped open like popcorn and told him everything in their heads.
It’s a good thing Kingston wasn’t an industrial spy for Titleist. The Big T would have scooped Sidewinder’s lines for the next five years with all the information, theories, and strategies these techs were vomiting out at the slightest provocation.
Nicole, meanwhile, hung back once she’d gotten them talking and watched, her dark eyes never missing a thing behind her bulbous safety glasses.
The way she’d crossed her arms over her chest, plumping up her breasts even under her paper jumpsuit, distracted Kingston.
The techs were talking, telling him exactly what he needed to know. He had toconcentrate.“Yes, and if you hadone clubyou would stake the company on, which one would it be?”
Out of the corner of his eye, he watched Nicole slip her cell phone from her pocket and swipe, texting or writing something.
She kept it in her hand, obviously working hard, furrowing her dark eyebrows behind her goggles and tapping on the screen as she edited.
