After-Hours Negotiation: Can't Get Enough / An Offer She Can't Refuse. Sarah Mayberry

hushed tones about her being uptight and dronelike? About how alone she was—still single—and how she was filling her empty hours with meaningless exercise?

      Suddenly Georgia’s suggestion that Claire should meet her friend Tony—a really amazing, laid-back guy—took on a whole new light.

      Hell, maybe everyone thought she was uptight. Miserable, she hunched down against the wall.

      She racked her brain, trying to think of the last time she’d done something spontaneous and impulsive. There’d been that time when she’d snuck in the back way at the movies with her boyfriend…but that was when she’d been sixteen, and didn’t really count anyway as she’d practically wet her pants with terror she was so worried about getting caught.

      What about that time she and some triathlete friends had gone skinny-dipping after a late night beach party? Except that she had been one of only a few who’d chosen to swim in their underwear instead of going the full skinny….

      Okay, all right. What about that crazy hat she’d worn to her best friend Jo’s party last year? She’d found it in an old magic shop, a top hat with a bunny jumping out of it. She’d won best prize at Jo’s party with that hat.

      She suppressed a groan and rested her head in her hands. A hat. She was trying to pin her personality on a stupid novelty hat.

      She glared across at the man who’d started all this, focusing all her self-doubt and insecurity on him and his big mouth and insensitive comments. What did he know, anyway? Who was he, sitting there with those stupid sandals and his perfect hair and his designer stubble? Just because all of life’s doors had swung open for him as he approached, he wrote her off at a glance. So she wasn’t one of the beautiful people, and she wasn’t gifted with the sort of charm that had eased his way through life.

      She’d always thought those things didn’t matter—no, she knew they didn’t matter. It was who you really were, inside and outside, that counted.

      But then she blinked, and she felt a tear run down her cheek. God, she hated Jack Brook.

       CHAPTER FOUR

      JACK STRETCHED HIS neck to one side and resisted the urge to check his watch, knowing it would only read five minutes past the last time he’d checked. Time dragged as only time could when you were bored out of your mind and stuck in a small, enclosed space with someone who was obviously thirsting for your blood.

      He didn’t need to be a mind reader to know that Claire Marsden was mentally sticking pins in his voodoo doll doppelganger right now. He’d intercepted one glance from her that was practically dripping with animosity and got the message straight off. Well, she could stew in it, for all he cared. It wasn’t his problem.

      Except, he couldn’t seem to stop glancing across at her every now and then. Just now she looked sad, infinitely sad, as she contemplated the toes of her shoes. He felt a twinge of guilt about what he’d said. Maybe he shouldn’t have been so up-front. People had to have their illusions about themselves, after all. And maybe, in her universe, she was a barrel of laughs, the life and soul of the party. Maybe, in her world, with her friends, she was considered a crazy caper merchant in her conservative suits and sensible, safe car. What was it to him, anyway?

      A trickle of sweat ran down his back and he became conscious of the increasing stuffiness of the elevator. Without thinking, he slipped open the buttons on his shirt and flapped the two sides to create a breeze. Across the car, Claire glanced at him and then averted her eyes as though he’d just dropped his pants and announced his intention to have group sex with her favorite aunt.

      Uptight, that was what he was talking about.

      Almost as though she could hear his thoughts, Claire suddenly stood and toed off her shoes. She looked taller from his position on the floor, and he had a mighty fine view as she reached for the hem of her skirt. Instinctively, she must have sensed this and she began turning toward the wall. She hesitated for a moment, an obvious battle going on inside her.

      What was she up to? He wasn’t sure, but it beat the hell out of not looking at his watch for entertainment.

      She glanced across at him, their eyes locking as she wrangled with her better instincts, and then he saw a muscle move in her jaw as she steeled herself. With great deliberation, she hoisted her skirt up in full view of him, reached for the waistband of her panty hose, and tugged them down. He scored a flash of black underwear—lace? He couldn’t be sure—before her skirt dropped down discreetly like the curtain at a peep show. Of their own accord, his eyes followed her hands as she rolled each leg of her panty hose down, down, down to the ground where she stepped out of them daintily. Aware he’d just been staring like a horny adolescent, he snapped his gaze away and contemplated the unmoving floor indicator instead.

      He simultaneously became conscious of the fact that his heart rate had just increased and he was sweating a little more. And he almost did a visual double take on himself when he realized that another part of his anatomy hadn’t been exactly unmoved by her actions, either.

      Wow, he must be really bored. This was Claire Marsden, after all, almost the antithesis of everything he considered attractive in a woman: she was brunette, he preferred blondes; she was serious, he preferred giggles; she was short, he preferred statuesque….

      His list of his favorite attributes trickled to a halt as he glanced across at her and caught a flash of extremely toned, tanned thighs as she settled down on the floor.

      A tan. Claire Marsden had a tan. His mind boggled. He simply couldn’t imagine her in a swimsuit. Another assessing glance at her. Nope, couldn’t do it. Her long-sleeved, high-necked, roomy blouse defied his attempts to make it disappear, and, for the life of him, he couldn’t come up with a mental image of what her body might be like. Well, apart from kind of square and boxy, like her car and her suits. Given his many years of training and expertise in imagining women naked or in their underwear, he decided this was another point in favor of his argument for boredom being the cause of any…interest his body might have displayed over the panty hose incident. Case closed.

      Still, her legs were in pretty good shape… He gave himself a mental slap. What, was he in high school again? Could he perhaps think of something that did not pertain to the bare-legged woman sitting opposite him?

      He was surprised how much effort it took for him to keep his gaze away from those legs and that tan. Concentrating fiercely, he imagined the next stage in restoring the antique dining table he was working on as a surprise for his mom for Christmas. It would look great in the corner of her living room, and he knew she would love it. Not that he’d be there to see her reaction. His parents were expecting him to fly home to Sydney, but he would send the table instead. He wasn’t up for the big family get-together this year. The gruff sadness of his dad, the empty place at the table, the grief in everyone’s eyes when they looked at him and saw Robbie. Jack had enough trouble with his own grief without dealing with the weight of theirs.

      For starters, there’d be the inevitable kitchen-sink conversation with his mom as she washed the vegetables for dinner. It was her favorite territory for heart-to-hearts, although in a pinch she’d take whatever venue was offered. She’d fix him with her knowing blue eyes and tell him it had been three years now, and he needed to let go. But she didn’t know how it felt. None of them did. Then his dad would invite him to tour the garage to check out his latest power tool acquisitions. And in between explaining the clutch on his new hammer drill, he’d make some kind of reference to Robbie and hope that Jack would open up. But that was never going to happen. His grief was like a rock inside him, granite hard and permanent, a part of him now.

      No. He wasn’t going home for Christmas this year. He’d find somewhere in the Caribbean instead, and go scuba diving and dally with bikini-clad tourists. His parents would understand. They’d have to.

      Across the car, Claire shifted and cleared her throat.

      “Do you think we should make contact with Ted again, see how things are going?” she asked.

      He