RONAN
I reach the pool early and swim fifty lengths without breaking a sweat. As I slump against the mosaic-tiled pool ledge, Savannah enters the pool area wearing a hot pink bikini and a definitive pout.
‘Good morning, sunshine,’ I call, hoisting myself out of the water. The mere sight of her smooth, supple curves makes my dick twitch in my shorts, despite the fact I got off twice last night.
Dropping a kiss on her flawless face seemed like an appropriate greeting in the bar, but judging by the rage rolling from her in waves, today it would be dangerous.
I could have almost sworn she was warming to me. Our exchange at Elixir was brief, but there was no missing the heat radiating from her every pore in that revealing jumpsuit. Heat and hunger. I smelt it like a shark smells blood, and if she looks at me with even a hint of the lust I saw in her eyes last night, today I’m going in for the kill, metaphorically speaking, of course.
‘What’s good about it?’ Savannah saunters towards the pool, snapping a hairband from her wrist and twisting herhoney-streaked locks into a messy bun on top of her head. Her slender neck is the most elegant thing I’ve ever seen. The urge to sink my teeth into her skin and mark her as mine surges through my soul.
She’s not mine, though.
She’s not anyone’s.
She belongs to the millions of women following her. Looking up to her as a role model or a symbol that they too can go it alone. It would be easier if she were married to a man instead of her job.
‘The company, for a start.’ She glares at me.
I extend a hand to help her into the water as she crouches to a sitting position by the edge, but she shakes her head vehemently. Fiercely independent as ever.
Does that keep her warm at night? I doubt it.
‘I’d rather spend the day with Adolf Hitler than the next hour with you.’
‘Who pissed in your cereal?’ I contemplate splashing her with water, but she might actually thump me.
‘Nobody,’ she spits, her blue eyes blazing with an inexplicably higher level of anger than her usual playful disdain. ‘Unlike you, I don’t bring strangers home, so that’s something I don’t have to worry about, along with catching crabs, of course.’
Realisation strikes my stomach.
She thinks I took that woman home last night. The drunk one in the white dress. And she’s… angry about it.
No wait, is that jealousy?
A grin splits my face in half. ‘I don’t take strangers home. Well, not often, and I certainly didn’t last night.’
She rolls her eyes like a petulant teenager. ‘I watched you walk out the door with her, but whatever. I don’t care. It’s none of my business. As long as those crabs you caught can’tswim.’ She eyes my swimming shorts with what looks like hate and hunger.
‘I took that woman toherhome. Not mine.’
Savannah huffs. ‘Well, I suppose that’s perfectly fine then… as long as you didn’t piss in her cereal.’ She drops her legs into the water and my gaze is drawn to those shapely thighs. Specifically, the cerise triangle they extend up to.
‘I didn’t go anywhere near her cereal, or any other item in her house, because I didn’t make it past the front door.’
Savannah’s shoulders drop an inch and her eyes flash to mine with what looks like relief. Something stupid like hope stirs in my chest.
Sheisjealous!
Which means I’m not imagining the crackling surges of electricity between our bodies. The weight of her stare when she thinks I’m not looking. The way her skin prickled when I took her hands last week.
‘Saw sense, did she? Realise your cock’s had more rides than a merry-go-round?’ Her eyes flit to my shorts again, shrouded beneath the water.
‘No. She was drunk. I wanted to see she got home safely, and it provided the perfect excuse to escape my brother, who was trying to force me into doing shots with him. She tried to drag me inside, but I made it clear to her that not only do I not sleep with drunk women, I like someone else.’ I pause to allow the last few words to sink in. ‘Then I went for a long, hot shower.’ I wiggle my eyebrows meaningfully to make her laugh.
It doesn’t work.
Fire blazes in her eyes. She sucks in her lower lip. The meaning of my words isn’t lost on her.
