‘Are you sure?’
‘Yes.’
‘Anything you want to talk about?’
‘No.’
In the face of such intransigence Georgie gave up. She could try till she was blue in the face and she wouldn’t get anywhere. ‘OK,’ she said. ‘It’s your call. I rather feel that if you carry on like this sooner or later you’re going to burst a blood vessel, but have it your own way.’
‘Have it my way?’ he said with a bark of humourless laughter. ‘You have no idea.’
‘Then tell me.’
She shifted to make herself more comfortable, just in case he did want to talk, and suddenly something inside him seemed to snap.
‘All right,’ he said, his eyes blazing and his hands curling into fists. ‘You’re right. There is something.’
‘What?’
‘Do you think, for once, you could put on a bloody dressing gown?’
And with that he turned on his heel and strode out, leaving Georgie staring after him, reeling and agape.
What on earth...?
What was wrong with what she was wearing? There was nothing immodest about the baggy T-shirt or the board shorts that she had on, yet what he’d just said and the way he’d glowered at her while saying it implied that not only did he consider it to be the skimpiest outfit he’d ever seen but also that it bothered him.
However, why would it? He wasn’t affected by her. Unless he was, of course, and that tension he was obviously feeling could actually be some kind of sexual frustration because, contra
ry to what she’d assumed, he was still attracted to her.
But no. He couldn’t be. She’d seen no evidence of it. There’d been no long, heated looks, no off-the-charts chemistry and no sizzling subtext to their conversations. If that was the case, surely there’d have been signs...
But maybe there had been, she thought suddenly, her heart quickening as the clouds in her head parted to reveal possibilities that had hitherto been hidden. What if some of the looks Finn had given her over the last few weeks, some of his expressions that she hadn’t been able to decipher and some of the strange things he’d done, were in fact cases in point?
Take, for example, the way his gaze dropped to her lips pretty much every time they ate together. She’d always vaguely assumed he’d been staring at a stray crumb or perhaps a bit of parsley stuck between her teeth. But what if instead he’d been bombarded with thoughts of kissing her the way she always thought about kissing him whenever she caught herself looking at his mouth? And what about his habit of taking a step back whenever she approached? Could he be doing that because he found her proximity somehow disturbing?
He appeared to have such a tight grip on his control, but maybe the absence of a reaction hid a very different kind of response. What if when she’d barged in on him that night and found him naked save for a towel he hadn’t been as unmoved as he appeared? What if when her knee had brushed against his the day they’d had lunch, he’d been as affected as her? And what if his disappearance every night was less about catching up with work and more about avoiding her?
Or was she seeing signs where there were none?
It was entirely possible, but, if she was right and these were signs that she’d missed, then she was not only an idiot but she was also not as back to her old self as she’d imagined because that Georgie would never have missed anything.
But that wasn’t important right now. Assuming she hadn’t got things completely wrong, Finn appeared to want her and she might as well admit that she wanted him. She’d tried to ignore it and treat him like a flatmate, as if she were back in her old flat in Kensal Rise that she’d shared with three others, two of whom had been men she’d had no interest in, but that hadn’t exactly worked. Despite her best intentions, she hadn’t been able to entirely stop fantasising about him naked, about what they might get up to if she should happen to find herself in his vicinity naked too.
So what was going to happen next?
They clearly couldn’t carry on like this. Things would eventually come to a head and erupt. And what was she going to do when they did? Well, she was never having sex again obviously, but, assuming Finn was amenable, there was no reason they couldn’t do other things. From what she remembered he’d been spectacularly good at those other things and he hadn’t exactly complained about her skills either.
Did she have the courage to tell him what she now quite desperately wanted, she wondered, her heart beginning to pound with excitement as her stomach churned nervously. Once upon a time she wouldn’t have hesitated, but now... On the other hand, while she had been scarred by what had happened to her, it didn’t have to define her going forward, did it?
So how hard would it be to go to Finn and tell him what she wanted? All it would take was guts, and heaven knew she had plenty of those. If she tried her hardest and he still sent her away, if she’d read too much into things and got completely the wrong end of the stick, then so be it. After everything she’d been through she could handle a spot of mortification. She could handle anything.
* * *
Cursing himself for what he’d revealed, and deeply regretting his momentary loss of control, Finn stormed into his room and slammed the door. If only Georgie had backed off and left him to stew. Instead she’d pushed and prodded and told him to have it his way, which was an absolute joke since his way involved her being horizontal in his bed, sighing and gasping beneath his hands and mouth, a scenario that wasn’t going to happen. As if that wasn’t enough she’d then leaned back and lifted her legs to tuck them under her, a movement that made the fabric of her tiny T-shirt tighten enticingly against her breasts, and he’d lost it, any hope he might have had of making it out of there with his pride intact history.
His movements jerky, Finn yanked his T-shirt over his head and tossed it on the bed, only to spin round at the sound of his bedroom door opening. Georgie stood there, silhouetted in the space, and as a bolt of desire shot through him, nearly taking out his knees, he swore beneath his breath.