Mr. Irresistible

by Karina Bliss

  Jordan’s grin broadened. His gaze moved casually down her body, taking stock of her attire, then he started to chuckle.

  It was an easy sound to listen to, lighthearted, and Kate’s lips twitched involuntarily before she clamped them shut. She was already self-conscious about her clothes. The outdoor adventure specialist had assured her the lightweight pants and multipocketed blue parka were essential for such a trip, and she’d spent a fortune on polypropylene this and thermal that.

  In contrast, Jordan wore old jeans softened and faded with wear, and sturdy black hiking boots. Hanging out of the pocket of the blue-and-black-checked Swanndri was a black beanie.

  With a sinking feeling, Kate realized her getup only trumpeted her inexperience. The new clothes rustled as she picked her way over the loose stones. “I see I should have bought a coonskin cap.”

  “No need to apologize.” If eyes could dance, Jordan’s could’ve led the Bolshoi Ballet. “We’ll skin a possum en route.”

  She bit her lip. “And cook up the rest for supper, I suppose?”

  Jordan considered. “Only if it’s your birthday.”

  Damn, she hadn’t meant to smile. Reluctantly, she held out her hand, lost it in his powerful grip before pulling free. “I won’t be bossed, so if you think you can strut around like Tarzan of the Jungle—”

  “I have no illusions, Red, believe me.”

  “Brown,” she corrected automatically. “My hair is brown.”

  He started to disagree and stopped. “You’re trying to provoke me into an argument. Well, it’s not going to work. The color of your hair is brown, pink or purple…whatever you like. We’re here to be friends, remember?”

  “You might be. I’m here to assess your true character. And right now the only thing I know for sure about you is that you’re unscrupulous when you want something.” Or don’t want something. Kate looked around at the bush, which was cool, dark and deep, and shivered. “Where are the others?”

  He could say she drowned, then bury her anywhere. She’d never be found.

  Jordan sighed. “You keep attributing all these devious motives to me, when any of my friends could tell you subtlety and I are not acquainted. My nephew, Andrew, has taken the four-wheel drive to pick up some last-minute supplies. The other kids are due any minute.” He reached out and uncrossed her tightly folded arms. “Relax, Kate, my only agenda is to charm the pants off you.”

  It was the worse thing he could have said. She stiffened.

  “Okay, let’s get one thing straight,” said Jordan. “While I don’t regret that kiss, I have no intention of laying a hand on you without an invitation—and even that has to be explicit.”

  “I’m engaged now,” Kate reminded him. She never had been a good liar, though, and his gaze immediately dropped to her ring finger. Empty. “I didn’t want to damage it, so I left it at home.” For the sake of Peter’s pride, she’d maintain the charade, but Kate hated wearing the ring.

  Jordan’s eyes returned to hers with an indefinable expression. “Well, then, I guess you’re perfectly safe, aren’t you?”

  To her relief, a black four-wheel drive pulled up and a kid of about seventeen climbed out. Blond-haired and blue-eyed, with the greyhound build of a teenager, he was plainly Jordan’s nephew. Andrew smiled, but he ducked his head and blushed when Kate smiled back, and she realized he was shy. Not so very much like his uncle, then.

  She wanted to be useful, but it soon became apparent that the men could load faster without her help. This pervasive sense of vulnerability so early was unnerving, she decided, shivering in the river-damp air. Her mobile phone rang and she answered it with relief. “Hello?”

  “Katie, it’s me.”

  “Danny! Is everything okay?”

  He laughed and Kate laughed with him. Growing up, he’d been such a ratbag, she still reacted to an unexpected phone call as if it was an SOS.

  “I’ve got a wife to keep me out of trouble now, remember?”

  “You mean she’s still there?” Danny and Roz were in the second week of their honeymoon. “What part of the high seas are you calling from?”

  “The cruise ship’s docked in Rarotonga. We’re here for a couple of days.”

  There was a sheepish note in his voice she recognized. “You are in trouble, aren’t you?”

  “No, we’re having a great time, only…”

  “Only?”

  “We ran into Dad.”

  Kate stared blankly at the dark, fast-moving water.

  “Katie, you still there?”

  “I’m here.”

  “He was in the bar we went to.” No kidding. “He’s settled in Rarotonga with this really nice woman—” never short of a female “—and they’ve invited us to dinner tonight.”

  She tried to sound neutral as she asked, “Are you going?”

  He sighed. “I knew you’d be pissed. That’s why I’m calling. I didn’t want you thinking I’d gone behind your back.”

  Kate wanted to be adult about this, she really did. “You’re a grown-up, Danny. You don’t need my approval.”

  “Dad said he’s been writing for years.” There was a hint of accusation in his tone now. “But you’ve been sending back the letters unopened.”

  “I don’t want that man in my life.”

  “That’s fine, Katie,” he said carefully, “but you don’t have the right to keep him out of ours.”

  It took Kate a few seconds to find her voice. “But you and Courtney don’t care,” she insisted. “C’mon, Danny, you never talked about him.”

  “Not to you, because you always got so uptight…but between ourselves? Often.”

  She could find nothing to say.

  “Look, none of us is perfect,” he said gently. “Dad made mistakes—a lot of them—but he’s still our father.”

  Kate resisted the urge to laugh. As the eldest, she’d protected her siblings from their father’s worst excesses. Now their ignorance was enabling Danny to treat the man kindly.

  “Why don’t you—”

  “No!” In the distance she saw Jordan glance over, and she walked farther along the riverbank. “If you want to see him…go ahead, but don’t ask me to do the same.” She knew she sounded judgmental, unnecessarily harsh. But if she told him why, Danny would hate their father as much as she did, and she wouldn’t wish that on her worst enemy.

  Kate spent the next few minutes convincing Danny she didn’t consider his meeting their father a desertion. But she hung up feeling exactly that.

  “PASS THE BUNJEE CORDS, will you, Andy?” Jordan had to ask twice before his nephew heard him and complied. As he used them to secure the storage barrels in the canoe, it occurred to Jordan that Andrew had been very quiet on the five-hour trip from Auckland.

  Since they’d left at 5:30 a.m., he hadn’t thought much about it. Now he glanced over. Yep, there was a hangdog expression on the kid’s normally sunny face. An expression Jordan had seen in the mirror all week. “Woman trouble?”

  “No.” Then Andy blushed, confirming it. Oh great.

  “No teen angst, mate, not this week,” Jordan reminded him. “Remember, we have to make a good impression on Kate.”

  “Yeah, yeah, I got it.”

  Jordan told himself to relax. A lot depended on this trip, but he was taking two great kids in Andrew and his ex-girlfriend’s son, Dillon. Okay, Dillon’s friend was an unknown quantity, but Jordan was confident he could manage one brat if necessary.

  He’d team the novices—Kate and Dillon’s mate—with himself and Andrew in the two canoes. Dillon would paddle the kayak Jordan had given him for his twelfth birthday, trading places if he got tired.

  “Hey, we’re here!” Dillon yelled excitedly. “Were you getting worried?”

  Jordan turned around, a big grin on his face for his favorite kid. Dillon was hanging out of the open window of an old station wagon with a kayak tied to its roof rack. The vehicle had barely stopped before the boy jumped out.

  “Man, I th
ought we’d never get here. First Ryan called to say he couldn’t come, and that made us late, and I was scared you’d think we weren’t coming and go without me—”

  About to hurl himself into Jordan’s open arms, he stopped, his expression conflicted. Jordan knew exactly what was going through his mind—was he too old for this now? Jordan took the decision away from him by enfolding Dillon in a bear hug that swung the delighted boy off his feet. “Don’t give me that too-cool-to-hug crap,” he said.

  Putting him back on his feet, Jordan received a look of intense dislike from the short, bald man getting out of the driver’s seat. Oh, great, Dillon’s father had volunteered for the drop-off.

  The guy had serious competition issues, which was ironic, considering it was Jordan who had persuaded Claire to let Mike back in their son’s life a year ago. Ungrateful bastard.

  Jordan had bitterly regretted it ever since he’d met him. Still, he could be polite for five minutes. He gave Mike a curt nod and received one in return.

  Jordan returned his attention to Dillon, who was still laughing up at him, his brown eyes wild with exuberance. Dillon lived at the other end of the North Island, so they only saw each other every six to eight weeks. “You’re growing, man,” Jordan said gruffly.

  Dillon stood as tall as he could. “Really, you think so?”

  Because he knew it was important to him, Jordan stepped back and took another look. Dillon hated the fact that the only pants that stayed on his skinny little frame were size ten, and even then he had to keep hitching them up over the satin boxers that all the kids wore.

  He compensated for the size ten pants by buying size fourteen sweatshirts, which always made him look as if he’d been cut off at the knees. Jordan hid a smile. His style at least, hadn’t changed. “Definitely taller,” he said emphatically.

  “Yeah—” the kid’s shoulders slumped “—but I’m still the shortest in my class.”

  Jordan tried to think of a reassuring response, but since he’d always been the tallest in his class—which had its own disadvantages—he couldn’t think of a damn thing.

  “It’s much more important to be cute than tall. Hi, I’m Kate.”

  Dillon brightened. “You mean with girls, right?” She nodded. “Cool.”

  “This is Dillon,” said Jordan, amused.

  “And you’ve got years of growing yet,” she continued. “My brother was the smallest in his class until he was fifteen, and now he’s over six feet tall.”

  Mike sauntered over. “Don’t go on about it, son, you’re boring everyone. Save it for family.”

  Jordan reduced five minutes to three. “So, Mike,” he said, “how’re things?”

  “In the real world?” Mike considered Jordan’s wealth divorced him from the concerns of the common man, conveniently forgetting that Jordan’s company supported not one family but hundreds. “Well, I’m still overworked and underpaid, but at least I’m not in the papers.” He held out a hand to Kate. “This is a real pleasure, Ms. Brogan.” For a few minutes they chatted about her columns, while Jordan seethed.

  “Well, always great to see you, Mike,” he interrupted after another minute, “but we’ve got a current to catch.” He turned to Dillon, who was bouncing around impatiently. “Since your friend couldn’t make it, Dil-boy—” he glanced toward the car “—you know that means we won’t need the kayak.”

  “Dad’s coming instead,” Dillon said casually.

  “No…” Jordan started to say. Kate looked at him. “Kidding,” he finished lamely. “That’s great…really great.” He pumped Mike’s hand, each man’s grip iron hard. “Give us a chance to know each other better…. So, you done much paddling, Mike?” And we don’t mean in the sea of self-pity.

  “No, but I’m sure I’ll pick it up.”

  Swallowing his frustration, Jordan helped Mike lift the kayak from the roof rack. “I thought your nephew, Andrew, could use this,” Mike suggested, “and Dillon and I would share one of the canoes.”

  It made sense. The kayak required a proficient paddler. Still, for a few seconds Jordan indulged himself by imagining the kayak rolling and trapping Mike underneath. “Good idea,” he said reluctantly.

  Dillon’s face fell, but the kid didn’t say anything. Jordan knew he’d been looking forward to being master of his own ship. “Don’t worry, mate,” he said, ruffling the boy’s dark hair. “There’ll still be opportunities for you to have a paddle.”

  “And much better to have your dad along,” said Kate, sounding a little wistful. “I wish I had a dad who dropped everything when I needed him.”

  She smiled at Mike, and Jordan thought, Oh, great, just what I need. An alliance between those two.

  He started to feel desperate, and a glance at Andrew didn’t help. His nephew sat on a rock, glumly throwing stones into the water. “Snap out of it, Andy.” He turned back to see Kate unzipping one of the trillion pockets on her ridiculous parka and tucking away her mobile phone. “You won’t be needing that,” he said. Barring one hot spot with a repeater, they were going to be out of range for most of the trip.

  She looked alarmed and her grip tightened. “But I’d planned to do some work.”

  “Then of course, bring it along,” he said smoothly.

  “But it won’t—” Andrew stumbled as Jordan gave him a push toward the canoe.

  “Never mind that…. Okay, everyone put on their life jackets and let’s get going.” Once they were in the current there would be no turning back, and most of their journey was through wilderness, inaccessible by road.

  This wasn’t the section of river Jordan intended using for the camp, but his top priority now was closing off Kate’s potential escape routes.

  He started to feel more optimistic. Whatever the others did, there was still one person’s behavior he had total control over. Time to begin the charm offensive.

  “Kate?” Gallantly, Jordan offered her his arm and escorted her to the canoe. “Watch your step now.” Out of the corner of his eye he saw Mike’s lip curl. Okay, the line between charm and smarm was a fine one. He’d work on that.

  Unfortunately, Kate didn’t look too impressed, either. “Just think of me as one of the guys.”

  Easier said than done, he thought wryly, watching that sweet ass as she clambered into the canoe. Resolutely, he shoved his attraction deeper into his subconscious. There were enough things to worry about on this trip without his libido becoming involved.

  And at some stage he knew he’d have to tell Kate about Peter’s behavior behind her back. He couldn’t let her marry that jerk.

  But—Jordan moved the canoe into deep water, climbed in skillfully and picked up his paddle—he’d do it after the trip.

  When she liked him.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  BROW CREASED in concentration, Kate watched her paddle slice cleanly into the river, flipping like a playful fish in the clear water. Suddenly she sensed the elusive rhythm she’d been chasing—tantalizingly close. Ignoring the bulky life jacket, she swung her shoulders in careful rotation and repeated the movement smoothly. Behind her came Jordan’s voice, quietly encouraging. “You’ve got it.”

  Kate let out a triumphant whoop and the next stroke slapped and wobbled as if on jelly. She re-focused and the paddle found water again.

  Glancing to her left she saw that Mike, sharing the other canoe with Dillon, was having similar trouble. At least it wasn’t a girl thing.

  Five minutes later Jordan broke into her absorption. “You can look at the scenery, too, you know. Put up your paddle for a minute, I’ll keep us on course.”

  Obediently, she lifted her eyes and blinked.

  On either side of the canoe, forested banks rose. In some places, the bush sloped gently down to small, pebbled beaches. In others, the hills looked as though they’d been sliced in half, the massive trees above their lined, sandstone faces marching almost unbroken to the skyline.

  Silver ferns sheltered under towering stands of tawa, rata, rimu and rewarewa, a
nd even the steepest cliffs were prey to clumps of tenacious moss, sedges and ferns. Ahead, the river twisted and turned, its glassy surface reflecting its surroundings in a slow-moving kaleidoscope of browns and greens.

  Andrew sculled effortlessly past in the blue kayak, oblivious to the beauty around him. Something was definitely troubling that teenager.

  “Aww!” Kate gasped as icy water struck her full in the face.

  Mike and Dillon shot past, green ripples arrowing in their wake.

  Apprehensively, Dillon looked back at Kate. He hadn’t been too sure when Mike had said, “Let’s put some fun in this. Give Jordan a splash.” Jord loved jokes, but somehow the way Mike had said it made it sound more like a trick. “Go on, son, do it.”

  It had been cool, sneaking up behind them and using his paddle like a spoon to flick water. Except just as Dillon hurled it, Mike had put on a burst of speed and the water had hit Kate instead.

  Oh, boy. Dillon started to feel sick. She looked kinda mad with water dripping off her hair and making marks on her nice jacket. Then she wiped her face on her sleeve and started to laugh. “Let’s get ’em!” she yelled to Jordan, and they dug their paddles into the water and started chasing them.

  Dillon half giggled, half gasped. “Go, Dad.” This was fun.

  “They’re catching up,” his father said urgently. “Harder, son, paddle harder.”

  Dillon gritted his teeth and did his best, but Mike’s steering was still wobbly. Out of the corner of his eye he saw the other canoe’s bow nudge forward, and he started to giggle. He ducked too late, and water slapped him on the back of the head and trickled down his neck.

  “Gotcha!” yelled Kate.

  He dropped his paddle and twisted back to look at his dad. “That was cool fun.”

  “Yeah.” His dad was staring after Jord and looking kinda upset, even though he hadn’t got very wet.

  “It’s okay,” Dillon reassured him. “No one ever beats Jord unless he lets them.” He looked at the man in the fast disappearing canoe, trying to find words to describe how he felt about him. “He’s the best.”