Christmas at Eden Manor Read online

  “Wow,” she breathed, a tension aching in her chest. “I sometimes feel exactly the same way. As if everyone else has found life, and I’m just treading water, watching other people’s ships go by.”

  He chuckled. “That’s an excellent way of expressing it.” He reached over and covered her hand with his. “I’m glad I’m not the only one who feels that way.”

  Their eyes met again but now with a deeper emotion. And Brie was starting to resent the table, which was keeping her apart from him.

  She wanted to touch him, more than just their hands. She wanted to kiss him the way they’d been doing the evening before.

  She wanted to do even more.

  But he made no further moves, just kept his hand resting over hers. It was a strange sort of intimacy—more emotional than physical—and Brie had never really experienced it before.

  It excited her. And also scared her.

  She would need to keep remembering that what was happening between her and Cyrus could only last this one week.

  ***

  A couple of hours later they were drinking coffee in an outdoor café, and Cyrus was trying to remind himself that he just had this one week with Brie.

  He’d enjoyed today even more than the day before, and it was just halfway over. He wondered if each day with Brie would keep getting better.

  Brie was moaning her delight over a gooey pastry he’d bought her, when a crowd started to gather across the street.

  “What’s that?” Brie asked, wiping her mouth with a napkin.

  He shook his head. “Looks like a tour or something.” He wondered what kind of delusional tourists would waste their time on a guided tour, paying good money to be herded around like sheep.

  “Oh, I wonder where to.” She craned her neck around to look at the tourism booth across the street.

  They hadn’t been having a particularly deep conversation—just occasionally making random comments—but Cyrus had been having an excellent time, watching Brie lick her lips around the pastry and seeing her brown hair and fair skin shining in the luminous sunlight.

  It was a warm, sunny day. It might be December, but Savannah had never cared about the restraints of a calendar. It offered days like this all through the year.

  She stood up unexpectedly. “I’m going to see what it is.”

  “Why?” Cyrus asked, frowning up at her.

  “Just curious.”

  He shook his head with an amused smile as she hurried across the street. She was a rather nosy, spontaneous woman, but he liked that about her. He wondered if she had any idea how incredibly tempting her rounded, swinging hips were.

  He was imagining what they might do this evening—and telling himself not to let his mind stray in dangerous directions—when Brie came back. To his surprise, she leaned over his chair with an alluring smile. “Thanks for the coffee and pastry,” she said huskily. Then she captured his mouth with a soft kiss.

  Cyrus responded automatically, one of his hands lifting to curve around the back of her head and his tongue sliding along her lips. He could taste the honey from the pastry. His body immediately tightened in pleasure.

  She pulled back, still smiling. And while he was dazed from the kiss, she pulled him up out of his chair. “Come on.”

  “Where are we going?” he asked, falling in step beside her.

  “The tour is visiting a nearby winery and plantation. It looks like fun, and it leaves in fifteen minutes.”

  “What? If you want to go see it, we can take a car.”

  “That’s not as fun,” she insisted. “The tour ends with a wine tasting.”

  “I can arrange a wine—”

  “Cyrus, you’re missing the point. I want to go on the tour.”

  Cyrus groaned as he looked at the gathered crowds—including elderly couples outfitted with fanny packs, sloppy children sucking on candy, college-aged kids who couldn’t keep their hands off each other. “Brie,” he said, trying to stage a hasty retreat. “You can’t be serious.”

  “I am,” she said cheerfully, dragging him over to buy tickets. “It’s my day for choosing our activities.”

  With a sinking feeling that he was trapped, Cyrus gave it one more try. “Brie, it’s a bus tour!”

  She looked up at him with a blissful expression. “I know. Won’t it be fun?”

  ***

  The bus ride to the winery was every bit as bad as Cyrus had feared.

  While the bus itself was in decent shape, it hardly compared to the comfort and luxury of his normal means of transportation. A tour guide, with an annoying penchant for making bad jokes, rambled on about the landscape and sites they happened to pass. Directly behind them sat a young couple with an infant who insisted on screaming in Cyrus’s ear for most of the ride. And across the bus aisle from him was a talkative elderly woman who decided he needed to hear every agonizing detail of all her various health woes.

  The only thing that saved the ride from being a complete disaster was that Brie sat beside him and became deliciously touchy. Of course, it was as he was gritting his teeth over the baby’s screaming that she decided to wrap an arm around his waist and press herself up against his side. And it was in the middle of the elderly woman’s dissertation on her upper GI that Brie decided to massage the back of his neck. So Cyrus didn’t have focus to respond appropriately.

  When the one-hour drive to the winery was finally over, they were herded off the bus and, after a brief introduction, were allowed to explore the plantation and vineyards. Cyrus immediately steered Brie away from the masses, and he actually had a decent time wandering the fields with her. While the place was overdone with less-than-historical details in order to please tourists, the day was lovely and the vineyards charming.

  Brie appeared to genuinely enjoy herself, asking questions and gushing about the scenery. Cyrus knew the answers to most of her questions, and he made up answers to the ones he didn’t. His cool, dry commentary made her giggle.

  When she took his hand as they strolled, Cyrus felt a little odd. The gesture made him feel young and weirdly conscious of his body at the same time. He couldn’t remember the last time he’d held someone’s hand, except last night when it was the only safe way he’d been able to touch Brie without going too far. He never imagined such a simple, innocuous gesture would pull him so far out of his comfort zone.

  More than once on the walk he began to pull his hand away. But he never quite did.

  At the scheduled time, they returned to the main house for the wine tasting. Cyrus kept Brie entertained with his under-the-breath remarks on the mediocre samples they were given and the clueless, pretentious visitors who pretended to know something about wine. His particular target was an obnoxious middle-aged man who’d complained for most of the trip and who tried to lord his superiority in oenology over the rest of the group.

  When the guide asked Cyrus for his opinion of one of the wine selections, Cyrus was prompted by a frivolous bit of inspiration. Keeping his expression sober, he launched into a long, imaginative description of the aroma, texture, balance and back notes, and he used every piece of wine-tasting vocabulary he had at his disposal. The result was impressive, and almost no one (including the obnoxious man) seemed to realize that it was absolute nonsense.

  As he graciously acknowledged the guide’s praise and the awed looks from their fellow tourists, Cyrus darted a quick look over to check Brie’s expression.

  Her gray eyes were huge and glowing with pure delight. And she was fighting to keep her lush lips from twitching in helpless amusement.

  For a moment Cyrus felt like a teenager again—ridiculously proud of himself for earning the admiration of a pretty girl.

  After the wine tasting was over, they had a half hour before the bus left to return to Savannah. Citing too much wine, Brie went to stand in line for the lady’s room. Cyrus wandered over to lean on the rail of a balcony and stare out at the landscape, which was lovely even in December.

  It hadn’t been a bad da
y, really. Just a weird day. And the accumulation of unexpected moments left him feeling at loose ends, like he wasn’t quite the self he’d always been comfortable with.

  When he felt a hand on his lower back, he smiled and turned to greet Brie.

  Except the woman touching him wasn’t Brie.

  Cyrus blinked, vaguely recognizing the attractive blonde as one of the members of their tour. She was tall, slim, and very tanned, and she looked to be in her midforties.

  Cyrus just raised his eyebrows at her. “Did you need something?”

  “You looked lonely,” the woman said, standing far too close to Cyrus. “Feel like some company?”

  He almost gaped, he was so surprised. She was obviously coming on to him. And while Cyrus never doubted his ability to gain the attention of a woman when he was in his element, at the moment he wasn’t at his best. Someone had dribbled wine on his trousers, his shoes were dirty from the fields, and his shirt was sticking to his back from perspiration.

  The woman must be insane.

  Or else she knew who he was.

  “I have company, thank you.” He gave her a polite smile and nodded in the direction of the bathrooms.

  She made a face. “The brunette? I don’t see a wedding ring. And she’s way too young and inexperienced for you. You can definitely do better.” With a sultry look, she trailed a hand down Cyrus’s back.

  Cyrus was half-annoyed and half-amused, although he was convinced now that she’d recognized him as a billionaire, which was the only thing that could have prompted her ridiculously bold advance. He wasn’t remotely tempted, but he was fascinated by the idea that someone would use a half-day tour as a means of finding a man. “I’m not interested,” he began, starting to remove the woman’s hand from where it was getting far too low on his back.

  He didn’t get a chance to finish his sentence or remove the woman’s hand. Instead, he was grabbed and swung around so that his back was pushed against the railing.

  Then a soft, lush body was pushed against his front. “Excuse me,” Brie said, giving the woman a hard, narrowed-eyed glare. She then grabbed the back of Cyrus’s head and pulled him down into a kiss.

  Taken by surprise, Cyrus didn’t respond immediately, simply let Brie tug on his lower lip and then flutter her tongue just inside his mouth. When his mind finally caught up, he wrapped his arms around her and pressed her breasts tightly against his chest before he slid one of his hands up to tangle in her long hair.

  He was too distracted to pay much attention, but he was vaguely conscious of the blonde flouncing off in a snit.

  When they were alone on the balcony, Brie released his head and pulled back. “The nerve of that tramp,” she huffed, her cheeks rosy and eyes blazing.

  Cyrus just chuckled.

  Brie scowled at him. “Sure, you think it’s funny. You probably liked it. And I didn’t see any signs of your removing her hand from your ass.”

  “I was about to,” he insisted, trying to subdue his amusement.

  “Right. I’ll have you know, Cyrus, that you’re with me today. So don’t be getting ideas of sneaking off behind a grapevine with a trampy, ass-grabbing blonde.”

  Cyrus couldn’t even be offended by the implication. Her words were obviously prompted by jealousy—something that thrilled Cyrus to no end. And the hint of insecurity that Brie had revealed made his own minor uncertainties today far more palatable. Stroking his fingers through her soft hair, he murmured, “I know I’m with you. I have no desire to be with anyone else.”

  Brie sniffed a little. “Oh. Good.”

  “Brie?” Cyrus asked softly, moving a hand forward so he could rub one her cheekbones with his thumb.

  “What?” She avoided his gaze although she had her hands fisted in his shirt.

  “Brie, were you actually jealous?” His heart was beating with ludicrous speed as hope, excitement, and desire started to course through his body with his blood.

  “Of course not. I was annoyed. She was just being rude and inappropriate.”

  “Not even a little jealous?”

  “Well, how would you feel if some guy came along and was feeling me up when you were just in the bathroom for a few minutes.”

  “I would be quite angry.” He knew it was the truth, and he had to acknowledge that it meant certain things about his feelings for Brie that he never would have expected.

  “So we’re in the same boat then.” She looked up at him, partly self-conscious and partly deeply sincere. “We’re with only each other this week.”

  “Agreed.” He tried to fight against his physical response to her closeness, but he felt himself hardening just a little—which was both surprising and completely inappropriate—and he couldn’t quite even out his breathing.

  And he was starting to wonder if it would really be so wrong to give in to his feelings for Brie, if only for this week.

  Four

  The next morning, Brie checked herself out in the mirror of her room at Mitchell and Deanna’s house.

  She wore another long cotton skirt—this time in a lovely brown and rose floral print—and a casual top that made the most of her breasts, which she admittedly could only do so much for since they weren’t her most impressive feature.

  She thought she looked pretty though. As pretty as she was capable of looking.

  It might not be enough to get Cyrus into bed though.

  They’d eaten dinner on the way back from the vineyard, and he’d held her hand as they’d walked to her car in the dark. Then he’d kissed her—not quite so gently as he had the evening before. She’d been so completely into him that she wouldn’t have hesitated at all had he invited her to his place for the night.

  He hadn’t though.

  She knew it wasn’t because he didn’t want her. She’d felt very clearly in his body that he wanted her in his body. He was a lot older than her, but he wasn’t that old.

  But something else was holding him back.

  Maybe he wasn’t the kind of man who would consider sex in a situation like theirs—when there wasn’t any future to offer. He was rather old-fashioned about a lot of things. She certainly knew that by now. She liked it about him.

  She would also like to have sex though.

  But she wasn’t going to try to jump him. She knew instinctively that would never work on a man like Cyrus. He came across as calm and unassuming, but he had a really strong will and an air of authority that sometimes surprised her.

  She wondered what he did for work. He must have advanced to a fairly high level, whatever it was. He just had that sense about him—like he was used to always being in control of the room.

  She cleared her thoughts, reminding herself that his job and the rest of his life didn’t really matter. They’d met on Monday, and now it was Friday. The week was almost over.

  If she was ever going to have sex with him, it would have to be soon.

  It would be a deep disappointment in her life if she never got the chance.

  With a sigh, she leaned over to dig her shoes out of the closet—velvet ballet slippers in the same shade of brown as her skirt. Before she could slide them on, though, there was a knock on her door.

  “Brie?” Deanna’s voice came through the closed door.

  “Come on in.”

  As the door swung open, Deanna continued, “Do you want to come Christmas shopping with me and Rose tod—” She broke off her words as she saw Brie.

  Deanna’s sister Rose was standing beside her in the hall, pretty and curvy and smiling sweetly.

  “Hi, Rose,” Brie said with a smile. “Good to see you. I’m sorry I can’t go shopping with you today. I already have plans.”

  “With your mystery man?” Deanna’s grin was mischievous now.

  “Ooh, there’s a mystery man?” Rose looked from her sister to Brie.

  “There’s no mystery man! I mean, it’s nothing serious.”

  “You look awfully pretty today for it to be nothing serious,” Deanna said, eyeing Brie
from head to toe.

  “And you painted your toenails,” Rose chimed in.

  Brie sighed as she looked down at her bare feet and pretty pink toenails. She’d done a lot more than that this morning as she got ready.

  If Cyrus was going to see her naked today—which might be a long shot but was still a possibility—she wanted to look as perfect as possible.

  “I’m trying to keep it in perspective,” Brie explained. “We’re just hanging out for the week. It’s not ever going to go anywhere.”

  Deanna and Rose looked at each other. “It doesn’t really work very well,” Deanna said slowly. “Trying to keep things with a guy in perspective, even when you know better. At least in my experience.”

  “My experience too,” Rose agreed. “That’s the thing about the heart. It doesn’t understand perspective.”

  “Well, mine’s going to have to.” Brie put on her shoes and then squared her shoulders. “I’m not letting myself hope or dream of anything else beyond this week.”

  “Okay. I hope that works out for you then.” Deanna didn’t sound convinced, but her smile was supportive and Brie figured that was the best she could expect.

  It didn’t matter if no one else understood. She and Cyrus understood.

  She was doing what she wanted this month. And she wanted to spend as much time as possible with him—even if it never went anywhere.

  ***

  They went out for brunch, but neither one was in a very energetic mood, so they agreed to go back to Cyrus’s house and just hang out for the afternoon.

  If Brie was hoping that “hanging out” would mean sex, she was disappointed however. They lounged together on the big chaise in the garden, talking about books. Then they went inside to watch an old British film that both of them enjoyed. Cyrus wrapped his arm around her shoulders, and she leaned against him, but he didn’t deepen the embrace beyond a few kisses brushed into her hair.