As I took a sip of coffee and gazed out at the water in the distance, I felt his eyes on me. I knew he was trying to figure out the reason for my abrupt mood change.
No explanations necessary, I reminded myself.
“Sure,” Jett finally said, a sliver of annoyance clear in his sticky-sweet tone. “I mean, of course, sir. Whatever you say, sir.”
I continued to eat for another minute, the silence uncomfortable as fuck. My skin prickled with awareness. Of how he sat, how he moved. Every small sound of his breathing.
He leaned forward, and it took all my self-control not to tilt in his direction. Instead, I looked out at the water again. The endless stretch of impossible blue, several shades darker than Jett’s eyes.
My skin felt like it was hooked up to an electric wire, the current so low I could barely tell it was there without stretching the limits of hyperawareness.
Jett stood abruptly and turned to push in his chair. I snuck a look at him, wondering what kind of underwear he could possibly be wearing with those pants. They were virtually transparent. The shape of his legs could be seen through the airy material.
His feet were surprisingly bare. The linen pooled around them and dragged on the floor a little. When he turned back to me, my eyes went to the loose drawstring at his waist.
He stepped closer and studied me for a moment. Maybe I’d been wrong about his eyes. They seemed the exact color of the Mediterranean at the moment.
Anger suited him.
“Come find me if you have need of me,Mr. Maris.”
And then he turned and walked away, his lazy gait doing criminal things to his ass in those pants.
It was clear he wasn’t happy.
But he was here on my terms. And hewasan employee.
Anything else would be impossible.
Work keptme busy for the next several hours. A video conference with investors in Dubai. Email responses to the head of R&D, an official signature on a letter to the trade secretary of Portugal, and a call with the finance team to discuss expansion funding. Through it all, I was vaguely aware of gardeners working outside. The open doors to my balcony framed a view of the pool terrace and the sea beyond it, but to the left were also views of and a short staircase down to my grandmother’s favorite garden.
It wasn’t until everyone on the finance call except my sister hung up that I realized one of the men working outside my room was Jett.
He’d changed out of the linen pants and into a pair of running shorts and shoes. A dark tank exposed his shoulders to the sun, and his skin carried the sheen of sweat. The gardener he was chatting with seemed oblivious to the sheer temptation Jett Davis presented.
“Sure you can’t come with me? Jasmine keeps asking me about you.”
I tried to focus on what my sister was saying. “Come with you to the Caymans? No. I’m in Italy. I thought I told you that.”
“You probably did. I’ve been buried in work.”
I forced myself to look away from the scene in the garden in which Jett had been gathering clippings between making the gardener laugh.
“You’re always buried in work,” I told Celeste.
“Yes, well. There are worse things.”
I hummed in agreement, thinking about the unspoken alternative. Our father hadn’t worked enough. Had played too much. Our mother had never worked at all.
“Anyway, I really wish you’d come with me. You need a vacation even more than I do.”
“I’m on vacation,” I said. “The Paxis players don’t show up until Friday.”
Her laugh was clear over the line, familiar and comforting for all that she was making fun of me. “A couple of days in the villa to prep for your silly gaming week is hardly a vacation. Besides, I might believe you if you tell me you haven’t checked in with the office today for more than a few minutes.”
I ignored her implication, my eyes sliding to the balcony doors and back away from them. The old gilt mirror on the wall by the suite door caught my attention. My grandmother had checked her lipstick in that mirror every time she’d left the suite.
“It’s weird being here,” I admitted.
