Anna Cleary - Untamed Billionaire, Undressed Virgin

She slumped down in her chair. Perhaps she should alert Elliott, but she wasn’t ready to give up yet. He’d seemed so paranoid at the idea of the news getting out. Not that she could blame him altogether. Her existence had come as a complete shock to him. She pitied him for what he must have gone through when he found out. Anyone— anyone would have been upset.

She tried to crush down a nasty feeling at how he might react when he knew the letter was out of her hands. Then, with some relief, she remembered he said he’d be out of town for a week, and brightened a little. At least that gave her a bit of breathing space. He might not have even received his copy yet.

And, honestly, what was the worst that could happen to him if the news got out? Thousands of people had given up their children for adoption, for all sorts of reasons. It was hardly such a shocking scandal anymore. His wife should be capable of understanding something that had happened twenty-three years ago.

And it wasn’t as if she wasn’t an independent adult. She hoped she’d made it absolutely crystal clear that it wouldn’t cost him anything to invite her into his life—their lives. Only a bit of friendship. Not a relationship, exactly. She knew she couldn’t expect that.

But there was no denying her disappointment. Elliott’s utter dismay when she’d made that first contact had been almost tangible. He’d tried to disguise it with his smooth manners, but she’d been able to sense how he truly felt. In the subsequent meetings, in the coffee shop and the bar, he’d seemed more concerned to find out who she might have told rather than how she’d spent her life to date, while she …

Her heart had been so full, so brimming over with joy and hope, she’d wanted to know everything about him. And Matthew.

But she felt sure, when someone got to know him, he was a wonderful person. When he got used to the idea, he would come round to seeing the fantastic side of having a daughter.

Restlessly she got up and started tweaking some brown-edged leaves from her geraniums on the window ledge. She hadn’t felt such confusion for years, not since Henry and Bea had told her they were staying on in England for a bit. Possibly for ever. She lifted her gaze to the Botanical Gardens across the street, wishing she could go across right now, before she saw the first of the children on her morning’s list. Somehow the soothing essence of those cool, leafy pathways always managed to soak into her like balm.

Connor O’Brien was to blame for this turmoil. A wave of puzzlement swept through her. What was wrong with him? Why had he been so mocking, almost distrustful of her?

His behaviour had been so arrogant, so callous and indifferent, as if her anxiety had been a joke. And as for that crack about her never having been kissed…

Of course she had. Countless times. He’d only been teasing, using a typical male ploy to start a flirty conversation, unless he’d been suggesting… A chilling possibility crept in. If, by some quirk of fate, a woman still happened to be a virgin, surely that minor detail wasn’t obvious to people? Could there be something about her that flagged her status to the world?

And if so, what? Could it be her clothes? Her conversation? The way she walked?

She’d never thought it worth worrying about before. It was just—the way things had turned out for her.

It wasn’t that she hadn’t had opportunities. Plenty of men had been keen to relieve her of it. And she had no philosophical objections to sex. In fact, she fully believed that every woman should drink deeply from the cup of life, although the values Henry and Bea had instilled in her had quietly insisted that the drinker should be in love. And there was the little matter of trust. She’d tried a few tentative sips once or twice, but for some reason the trust factor had always intruded and she’d stalled at a certain point.

Leah and Zoe, her flatmates, called her a late bloomer. Sooner or later, they declared, some ruthless hunk would send her completely overboard and she’d plunge right in. And that was where she needed to beware, because someone as dreamy and impulsive as Sophy Woodruff was at risk of a broken heart.

If she wanted to land a man, she needed to do her research, they’d said. Find a solid prospect with financial security and a career trajectory, and plan a campaign.

‘But what if we have nothing in common?’ she’d argued.

The answer was stern and unequivocal. ‘Plan a campaign. Build things in common.’

What Zoe and Leah didn’t understand—well, they did, but they scoffed about it—was that she had dreams. And dreams didn’t go with campaigns. In fact, she preferred to rely on her instincts about people, though she couldn’t always, she had to admit. She had been mistaken more than once, sometimes quite spectacularly. But she’d known definitely at once that those boys she’d turned down just didn’t have the chemistry, and never, ever would.

As for her needing to become more proactive, with a plan and some cold, hard strategy, she doubted she could bring that off. Campaigns weren’t her style. In the situation she was in right now, though, some cool, ruthless strategy was definitely warranted.

She felt a little shiver of apprehension.

There was only one thing for it. Whatever it took, she would have to find a way to seize her letter back. She couldn’t allow Connor O’Brien to ruin her chance to know her father before it had even begun. And he wouldn’t win any future encounter with her, either, dammit. He’d better learn that, kissed or unkissed, Sophy Woodruff was a force to be reckoned with.

Somehow, if it killed her, she would find a way into his office.

It gave her an eerie feeling to realise that at this very second he might be on the other side of her wall, gazing out at the very same view.

Connor frowned out across the treetops, beyond the Gardens, to where a strip of Walsh Bay glimmered under a hot blue sky. It occurred to him that not so very far away, as the crow flew, he owned a house. Most of his father’s things had been auctioned for charity, as became the possessions of the extremely wealthy, but it might do, especially as it wasn’t too far from the haunts of Elliott Fraser. He was sure he’d left some of his law books there. Slightly outdated perhaps, but he could pick up some of the current publications later. It might be interesting to see what had changed this side of his old profession.

He stepped back from the window and gazed appreciatively around at the high-ceilinged rooms with their ornate cornices. If he’d been setting up for real, he couldn’t have found a more pleasing location.

He glanced at his watch. Organise a car, then take some time to pick up his books and some stationery supplies before the office furnishings were delivered. Consider his next encounter with Sophy Woodruff….

His pulse rate quickened. He wondered what the letter was she’d been searching for. The anxiety in those stunning eyes had seemed genuine enough. With her sweet low voice, the ready flush washing into her cheek, she’d seemed amazingly soft, too soft to be any of the things Sir Frank suspected. But he was too hardened a case to be sucked in by appearances. Women in the profession could be superb actresses…

Whatever she was searching for, his challenge would be to find it first.

He remembered the fire that had flashed in those blue eyes when he’d touched her, and his blood stirred. He could so enjoy a worthy protagonist.

* * *

At lunchtime, on her way down to the basement deli, Sophy saw Connor O’Brien assisting some workmen to manoeuvre a handsome rosewood bookshelf through his door. She grimaced to herself. No doubt he needed it for storing other people’s private documents.