Laura Wright - The Ashtons - Paige, Grant & Trace - The Highest Bidder / Savour the Seduction / Name Your Price

Slowly she lifted a hand to her face. Her cheeks were wet—soaked, in fact. And the salty taste trickling in her mouth wasn’t sweat.

She was crying.

She tried a quick laugh, but it came out as another sob. She wanted to curse herself, her childish, insecure self. Why was she crying?

“You have quite an effect on me,” she finally said. “I don’t know why I’m crying.”

A dark expression colored his face. Gingerly he lifted his hands from her, placing them on the chaise and hoisting himself up.

“I do,” he said simply.

The finality of his tone neutralized all the sensations zinging through her nerve endings. She reached for his arm, but he backed farther away. “C’mere, Matt.”

She sounded desperate. Who cared? She was desperate. For more of his body, his mouth, his—

“No. We have to stop.”

“What?” She pushed herself up on two hands, her jaw opened in shock. “Why?”

“We have to.” In one move he was off her, refastening his pants, refusing her eye contact. Which hurt almost as much as his denial of body contact.

What was going on? “Matt? What are you doing?”

He wet his lips and ran his hand through his hair with a hand that now trembled nearly as much as her whole body, but still he didn’t look at her.

With a deep sigh, he finally perched on the side of the chaise. He lifted her sweater from the ground, turned it right side out and gently laid it on top of her, covering her bare breasts.

All that erotic desire that had delighted her thudded to the bottom of her stomach. Of course. He didn’t want her. She wasn’t attractive. When you got right down to bare skin, she wasn’t enough woman for him.

“I’m really sorry, Paige. I got carried away.”

She just stared at him. “I think the carrying was two sided, Matt.”

He finally looked at her, the discomfort clearly visible on his face. Of course. He didn’t know how to tell her. She just wasn’t for him.

“You deserve better than this,” he said softly.

That was a clever way of saying it.

Without arguing she sat up and pulled the sweater over her head. She had some shreds of pride left, damn it.

With all the regal bearing she could muster, she stood, tugged the sweater over her jeans and smoothed her hair. He watched her, a questioning expression on his face.

“Paige.” He stood next to her but didn’t touch her. He was really over this, she thought bitterly. “I didn’t mean to make you cry.”

Tapping her jeans pocket to be sure her car keys were still there, she looked at the door. How would she get across this endless room without letting yet another sob give away her shame and hurt?

She would. She just would.

“No need to apologize, Matt.” There. Her voice was under her control. “And I really didn’t mean to…” What? Lead him on? Beg for sex? Respond like a woman? “Flirt with you.”

Squaring her shoulders, she crossed the room and opened the door without looking back. She was all the way to her car before she realized she’d left her bra on the floor.

Well, he could burn it for all she cared. Isn’t that what happens when you play with fire?

Sticking her key into the ignition of her car, she took one more look at the sun-drenched stone of Auberge du Soleil. Why had she cried? Was she so uncertain and pathetic that one man’s attention reduced her to a weeping mess?

No more, she swore silently. She’d gotten burned, yes. But she’d be damned if she’d let Walker or Megan or Matt Camberlane know. He could flip her underwear across the conference room table for all she cared.

Because she would most definitely be seeing him at their scheduled meeting tomorrow. She didn’t know what made him suddenly pull back from her, but he couldn’t have faked his response to her.

He wanted her. Whatever changed his mind…could be changed back.

And this time everything would be different. She wanted him just as much, and, damn it, she was going to get him. Or at least make him miserable wondering what he’d missed.

Matt lifted up the whisper of white lace that lay crumpled on the floor, muttering an angry, ugly curse of frustration.

What the hell did he just do?

He closed his eyes and brought the silky thing to his face, torturing himself with a deep breath of lavender or roses or some delicate flower. Paige. She had a floral scent all her own. And a taste and feel and sound all her own.

And tears all her own. Damn it. The tears had annihilated him.

At the sight of them, the realization of what their coupling meant to her kicked him square in the face. What was he thinking, seducing an angel? God, she could be a virgin for all he knew. And he’d treated her like any other girl who succumbed to his charm. Some easy conversation, a few quick kisses, then back to his room like another piece of—

He squeezed his eyes shut. He couldn’t even think of the expression in relation to this beautiful, real, precious woman. He let her undergarment fall to the chaise longue and dropped his head into his hands. A pain in his chest was just as uncomfortable as the swollen erection that hadn’t yet gotten the message that playtime had ended. His blood was nowhere near settled. God only knew what was causing the hurt in his chest.

Could that be his heart?

He blew out another disgusted breath and got up to go to the bathroom.

No doubt he could have handled that situation way better. But the tears. The tears just killed him.

The only reason in heaven or hell to have a woman in his life was to have one in his bed. Women were for sexual comfort and gratification. Period. That was the lesson he learned from his miserable marriage to a woman who had used him. He’d vowed he would use them right back.

He stared at his reflection in the bathroom mirror, but only heard the silent promise he’d made two years ago. Never, never again would he lay out his heart like a welcome mat to have high heels dug into it.

He flipped on the cold water tap and stuck his hands under it, hoping it would cool off his heated skin.

Heat caused by Paige’s body and mouth and incredibly sexy desire for him.

He hadn’t been lying, but she didn’t believe him. He meant what he’d said. She deserved better than casual sex.

But casual sex was the only kind he knew.

Surely there was some worthy man, someone who would treat her like the goddess she was. Someone who would wipe her tears and not get freaked out by them. Someone who might even cry with her for how much he loved her.

He splashed a handful of cold water on his face.

Whoa, bud. That someone was not Matt Camberlane.

Tomorrow morning he’d go to his office, fax a copy of the contract cancelation to Ashton Estates, then he’d hand the whole event over to someone in his Marketing Department. And then, he’d forget he’d ever met Paige Ashton. Or kissed her. Or ached for her in the most fundamental, frightening way.

The problem was, he thought, as the water sluiced down his cheeks and into the corners of his mouth, he’d never forget her.

But he had to. He just had to.

She sailed past the security guard with the claim of a meeting with Matt Camberlane. But as soon as a no-nonsense, slightly overweight administrative assistant hustled into the lobby of Symphonics, Inc., Paige knew she was about to get the brush-off.

“I’m Eleanor Bradford, Mr. Camberlane’s assistant.” She held out her hand in greeting but wore a frown and backed it up with a gentle shake of her head. You don’t have an appointment, her body language screamed.

“Paige Ashton.”

Her eyes widened a bit and she leaned back in a not-so-subtle reappraisal. “Are you one of the Ashton Winery family members?”