Drew grinned, pleasure evident on his face. “I learned to drive here when I was sixteen. Gran insisted on it so that I could chauffeur her and her friends around. When I got home and asked my father for the car keys he was…well, he didn’t like it.”
A dark cloud passed over his face, one Kate recognized whenever Drew mentioned his father, but she chose to let it go. He obviously had more than the normal amount of issues every kid has with his parents. She doubted that he’d ever talk about those for the book, but since he brought it up…”
She looked at the passing scenery for a while, wondering if she should risk the ease between them. “That story about learning to drive here and your dad not giving you the keys back home is the kind of thing that young skiers who idolize you would love to know about you. We should include it in the book.”
Drew tightened his grip on the steering wheel until his knuckles turned white and his brows lowered into a scowl. “Can we not talk about the fucking book!”
“But Drew…”
He lowered the window and breathed in the cool, Irish morning air. “I’m sorry. This place has a lot of memories for me, so I need a few days to adjust to being here. Can we just be Drew and Kate for a while, not author and subject?”
“I knew this was going to be messy.” What had she gotten herself into? She proposed a compromise, “It’s Friday. Can we be tourists for the weekend and start work Monday?” She turned toward him and rested her hand on his knee. “All right?”
The hand he placed on hers was warm. “This is hard for me. I’ve told you there are things…”
She placed her fingers against his lips. “Shhh, not now. We’re on vacation, remember?” As he steered the car onto the motorway, she looked around, confused. “Where are we headed anyway? Galway is north of the airport, but that sign said we’re going south.”
“We’re sightseeing. There’s someplace I want to show you. I think you’ll like it. ”
An hour later, Drew slowed the car to a crawl as they drove through the village of Adare. The main street was lined with thatched roof, whitewashed cottages fronted by colorful flower gardens or low stone walls.
A delighted grin lit Kate’s face as her head swiveled from side to side, not wanting to miss anything. “Are you kidding? Are we in a fairy tale or at the Irish Disneyland?”
Drew threw his head back and laughed. “It looks like it, but I assure you that it’s a real place, with real people who wisely preserved the village’s character.” He expertly steered the small car into an equally small parking spot, then reached out the window to fold the side mirror against the car’s body.
“Why did you do that?” Kate asked as she stood and stretched.
“You’ve seen how narrow our roads are and if the mirror is left sticking out, it can get knocked off by a passing car.”
“You said ‘our’ roads.”
“Ah, picky, picky. I sometimes forget that you work with words. When I’m here, suddenly I’m Irish again. Not American-Irish, just Irish.” He shrugged, almost as if he didn’t understand it himself.
“Then I’m very lucky to have a native show me around.” Kate smiled and kissed his cheek. Drew grinned with pleasure and wrapped his arm around her waist as they strolled through the village. Occasionally, someone would look at him as if they recognized their country’s only gold medal skier, but no one invaded their privacy or took his picture.
“I can see why you like it here,” Kate said quietly once they found a small café and ordered breakfast. “You seem much more relaxed.”
He leaned back in his chair. “It’s that obvious?”
“It is. For starters you walked down a street with your arm around me. In New York, you don’t even want to be seen with me.”
“Kate…I told you…” He reached across the table for her hand.
“I know. You don’t want the paparazzi to hassle me or start tabloid speculation about Drew’s latest conquest.”
“I’m just delaying the inevitable. You can’t imagine how invasive that kind of attention can be until it happens. Your life ceases to be your own. I’ve told you I want to protect you from that — both of us, actually — for as long as I can.”
“I can handle it.”
“I’m sure you can. What I don’t know is if I can.”
“Meaning?”
Without realizing it, his thumb went to his mouth and he gnawed on the nail.
“Now you’re tense. I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“How do you know I’m tense?”
“It’s that thing you do with your thumb. Whenever you’re uncomfortable about something, it goes to your mouth.”
He immediately lowered his hand to the table and looked away from her, an embarrassed flush on his face. “I sucked my thumb for a long time as a child. It soothed me somehow. I guess the habit stayed with me.”
“Sometime we’re going to have to talk about your childhood,” she said, gently.
“It wasn’t pretty. I think I could tell you things I haven’t told another human being, but I’d want that conversation to be with Kate, my girlfriend, a woman I’m learning to trust, not Kate Porter, my co-author.”
Kate glowed and felt a flutter in her chest. This was the second time he’d called her his girlfriend and this time there was no one around to hear it but her. “We’ll sort that out when we need to. For now, let’s drop it and go back to just enjoying ourselves. Okay?”
“Good idea,” Drew agreed. Breakfast finished, he walked around the table and politely pulled out her chair.
“Such a gentleman,” she said, covering his hand with hers.
“I try,” he said, grinning, the earlier tension gone.
After a full day of wandering the village and climbing hills to explore the ruins of churches and monasteries, they drove to a majestic country estate that had been converted into a luxury hotel.
“Nice place. I hope they have a room for us,” Kate said.
“We have a reservation,” Drew answered, lifting their bags from the car before leaning toward her with a murmured promise. “Once we’re in our room I’m going to do all the things I’ve thought about since our foreplay on the flight over.”
They hurried toward the hotel’s entrance, but just before reaching it both of their phones vibrated. Drew looked at Kate and raised his dark brows, leaving the decision about reading the texts up to her.
A quick check showed that Kate’s message was from Liz. Drew’s was from Charles. “I bet they both wrote about the same thing,” he said.
“Maybe they eloped. They’ve been inseparable since that night in my apartment. We might as well see what’s so important before we go inside so we can do what you promised without wondering about what they want. Okay?”
Drew nodded and pulled up Charles’ message. Kate did the same. “Damn it to hell,” he shouted. He dropped their bags and stalked back toward the parking lot, muttering to himself. Kate watched him, her mouth open in shock. He pounded the roof of the car with his fist. “I knew this would happen!”
She followed him, afraid to read Liz’s message. “Tell me,” Kate said, clutching his shirt. “Has something happened to one of them?”
Drew was breathing hard and his eyes flashed as if he wanted to kill someone. “They’re fine. Give me a minute.”
Kate wrapped her arms around his waist and heard his heart pounding when she rested her head on his chest. His arms came around her and they stayed like that, holding each other, until he was ready to talk.
“Someone on our flight must have taken pictures of us and then sold them to some online gossip site. Now they’re all over the place. There are a few of us kissing in the airport and one of us asleep together on the plane. Charles included a link to the story which he said is pretty bad.”
“Is that all? You made me think that something awful had happened. You’re a goddamn celebrity, Drew, and there are cell phones everywhere. You’re overreacting. Why are you so upset?”
; He walked away, his head lowered and hands tucked in his pockets, until he whirled around to face her. “Why am I upset? I’m not ready for you to become the target for every nut job that admires me, that resents me, that has a grudge against me, or just wants to make money off of me. There will be speculation about our relationship that will hurt you and women from my past will happily add to it.” He gentled his voice. “You never asked to be famous and I told you that I wanted to protect you from all that. I didn’t.”
She couldn’t stand how miserable he looked. “Drew, you can’t beat yourself up over this. It’s not your fault.”
“It is. I should have left you alone, not gone forward with a book I don’t even want to do…but I wanted you. It was selfish and as soon as I realized how much I…” He raised his hands, palms upward in exasperation. “I should have walked away from you. Maybe I still should.”
Kate’s body stiffened and she glared at him, hands on her hips. “Andrew O’Connor! Are you forgetting that it was me who made the first move? Remember? When we were in the limo, after our non-date at that dive bar it was me that decided to spend the night. Come on, Drew. I’m strong and I can deal with this.”
“Oh, you can deal with this? Sure, like you did when you saw pictures of me with Inga? You were hurt because you and everyone else assumed I was fucking her. That kind of shit will happen again and again. I won’t be able to keep the sharks from speculating about us and dissecting your appearance, your job, everything about you, until they get bored and move on to some other poor bastard.”
“If you hate it so much, then why are you such a public person?”
“I’ve questioned that a lot recently, but I have multi-year contracts that require me to appear in ads and make public appearances. I’ve considered buying my way out of them, but I always honor my commitments. Charles knows that when these expire, that’s it for me. I don’t need the money and I certainly don’t need or want the attention any more.”
“Oh? And what do you think will happen when this book comes out?”`
He sighed. “That’s different. I’ve learned how to not let it get to me when it’s only about me. But when people I care about, people who never looked for fame, are suddenly targeted because of their connection to me, that makes me crazy.”
She grinned. “You’ve made that crystal clear.” She took his hand in both of hers, raised it to her lips and kissed each of his fingertips as she spoke softly. “But for now we’re in Ireland at a beautiful hotel and I want nothing more than to get naked with you. Do you think you can go along with that?”
He lowered his gaze to the ground and stayed that way for a few minutes until he suddenly lunged for her, a huge smile on his face. His hips, arousal evident, pressed against her abdomen. “Does that answer your question?”
Her rogue was back, Kate thought with relief. “It does answer my question and very impressively.”
Fingers entwined, they checked in and quickly found the suite he’d booked. A fire blazed in the hearth of the large sitting room and Kate stood warming her hands near the flames. Her eyes stayed on Drew as he carried their bags into a bedroom dominated by a huge, canopied, four-poster bed. He turned toward her and winked. “What do you want first? Food, a bath or…” he glanced at the bed then back at her, “me?”
She frowned and tapped her foot. “Hmm, that’s a difficult choice, O’Connor. I am hungry, but I told you I want you naked and I still do. Food can wait, although the smells coming from the dining room were heavenly. And after dinner we can do it all over again.”
“I’m starting to think that the day you fell into my arms at St. Patrick’s was the luckiest day of my life.”
“And mine was when you walked into my office because I thought I’d never see you again,” Kate murmured. She watched Drew’s eyes blaze as she slowly walked toward him intent on shedding her clothes, but he held his hand up like a traffic cop. “Wait!” he ordered and she paused in mid-step.
He sat at the edge of the bed and leaned back on his elbows, his eyes focused on her. “Slide your sweater over your head. Slowly.”
She tilted her head to the side and looked at him flirtatiously through lowered lashes, turned on by the way he’d taken control. She watched his reaction as she raised her arms to pull the sweater over her head. The movement bared a slice of her stomach when the skimpy tank top she wore beneath it shifted. Face flushed, she tossed the sweater to the floor and waited.
“I can see your nipples through that top.” Drew was breathing harder and his eyes devoured her. “Take it off,” he growled.
Again, Kate obeyed. She liked dominant Drew and whatever game he was playing.
“Keep your bra on and unzip your jeans.” She did as he asked very slowly. “Now turn around and bend over while you pull them down. I want to see your beautiful ass.”
The silky red thong she wore gave him the view that he’d wanted. Her narrow jeans imprisoned her ankles as she slowly bent forward and dark hair tumbled around her face. “Like what you see?”
Drew stroked the bulge in his pants. “Oh, yeah. Step out of your jeans.”
Dressed only in a bra and thong, she playfully asked, “More?”
Suddenly Drew was behind her, his own jeans and black boxer briefs around his knees. He checked Kate’s readiness with one finger before sliding her tiny underwear to the side and plunging into her. She leaned forward to support herself on a nearby chair as he bent over her back and nipped her neck. He undid the clasp of her bra and his fingers pinched her nipples, then tugged on them as he slid in and out, in and out. “I’m not going to be able to wait,” he panted.
“Oh God, Drew, don’t stop.” He lowered one hand from her breast and slid it through her slippery heat to tease her, all the while thrusting harder and faster. Kate’s thighs quivered as her climax hit and a moment later he followed.
He wrapped a strong arm around her waist and slowly lowered them both to the thickly carpeted floor where they lay with bodies entwined, until sleep claimed them. Drew woke first and studied the woman who’d only been in his life for weeks. He didn’t know what to do about her. She made him feel and that made him vulnerable. If things continued this way his heart would be at risk and he wasn’t sure if he could deal with that. It would probably be better for both of them if they ignored the pull between them and kept things professional. The trouble was, he couldn’t imagine not wanting her and he was a man who got what he wanted. He sighed and stroked Kate’s flushed cheek with one finger, then carried her to bed, wrapped her in his arms, and joined her once more in sleep. They never made it to the hotel’s restaurant for dinner.
Early the next morning, after eating every bit of a full Irish breakfast of oatmeal, eggs, bacon, toast and scones, they set out for Galway. Although the direct route would have had them there in two hours, Kate wanted to see some of the countryside, so Drew stuck to back roads instead of the motorway.
A twenty-minute ferry ride across the River Shannon took them from County Kerry to County Clare. They followed the coast until reaching the spectacularly dramatic Cliffs of Moher, high above the Atlantic Ocean.
Kate lost her breath for a moment as they looked down at the steep, seven hundred foot drop to the roiling sea below. She pushed her wind-whipped hair off her face before tightening her grip on Drew’s hand. “You ski faster than any human should and ride a Harley. Should I be worried about you doing something dangerous here?”
Drew laughed, his eyes sparkling. “My stupid days are over and besides, a few people get too close to the edge each year and fall onto the rocks. I don’t need that kind of thrill any more.”
“Good to know.” Kate shaded her eyes and pointed to something in the distance. “Are those islands?”
“They’re the Aran Islands — Inisheer, Inishmaan and Inishmor. There’s a ferry from Galway if you want to go. Inishmor has a totally unfenced cliff with a drop off way, way steeper than this one. It’s so abrupt that it looks like you’ve come to the edge of the w
orld. It terrified me as a child.”
“Why?” Kate noticed that his face was suddenly shadowed, as if haunted by some memory.
“My father once threatened to push me off it. I was six-years-old, so I believed that he would do it.”
She abruptly turned away from the view. “Your father did that to you? What kind of parent would deliberately scare a child like that?”
He looked at her for a moment. “We should go.” And then he left.
Kate watched him jog downhill toward the car park without even checking to see if she followed, effectively shutting her out. Stunned by his behavior, she felt like her feet were glued to the ground. Not for the first time she wondered who the hell he was, this confusing man she was sleeping with, this man who could be so much more to her.
Damn it. As his co-author, she should be thrilled that he’d told her about something that helped to shape him. But it was very clear that he regretted it. It was obvious that he’d shared that painful memory with his girlfriend, not his co-author and the two roles were incompatible. She couldn’t be both, so now what?
She walked back to the car and found Drew leaning against it, arms crossed in front of his chest. Without a word, he held the passenger door open and she got into the car. Once they were on the road, she turned to him. “Why did you leave me there alone like that?”
He took a deep breath and said the words that had been running through his mind since that morning. “I shouldn’t have brought you here and I never should have agreed to this book. There are things in my life, in my past, that are better left buried. I’ve done that successfully so far and I mean to keep things that way. If that’s a problem, this is where our working partnership ends.”
Kate’s body tensed. She narrowed her eyes and aimed a murderous glare at him before quickly turning away. Instead of bringing them closer, this stupid book was driving a wedge between them. Drew might be able to trust a girlfriend, a lover, with his secrets. But his co-author? Never. She felt like they were in the midst of a pool of gasoline waiting for the inevitable flame that would blow them sky high.
Falling Into Drew Page 10