Cracking the Dating Code

‘You coming?’ he said, and without a word she slid into place behind him with her bag in between them like a wall. No hands at his waist, no cheerful flirty quip. Just a colleague of Tomas’s who’d come here to work.

It took them fifteen minutes to reach the house.

A fifteen-minute ride along a rough dirt track up the side of a steep hill and along a plateau that today boasted a view of endless ocean blending seamlessly into the hazy blue of an unsettled sky. Wind whipped at Seb’s hair and hers and a wayward caramel tendril cut across his cheek before sliding around his neck like a slender hangman’s rope.

He gritted his teeth, cursed his wet jeans and asked for all the speed the bike beneath him had.

The roughest patch of track curled around a rock ridge, just before the house came into view. The back wheels always skidded on slick rock and this time Ophelia West’s hands clutched at his shoulders.

An involuntary shudder rippled through him, not a prelude to desire but full-blown, roaring lust. Too long without a woman, he decided grimly. Far too long on this island alone, with only bleak thoughts for company.

‘Sorry,’ she murmured and withdrew her hands the moment the quad found traction again.

‘Leave them,’ he rasped. ‘It only gets rougher from hereon in.’

This time she set her hands to the waistband of his jeans, probably under the misguided impression that it was the better alternative to skin on skin.

It wasn’t.

Seb’s body took her hands at his waistband as a signal that his jeans would soon be coming off.

Fifteen minutes all up, until they stood inside the house and out of the wind, with Ophelia West looking around curiously but not saying a word.

Seb should have found her actions reassuring; the fact that she felt no need to befriend him or force him into inane conversation.

He didn’t.

All Poppy West’s silence did was make him want to know what she thought of the island and of the house. A house made of concrete and glass and metal. One that cut into the rock face at its back and enjoyed expansive ocean views from every room. He’d designed it himself. Built a fair chunk of it himself too. Took pride in its rugged beauty and the challenges that had gone into its design.

Whatever the mouse thought of the place, she wasn’t letting on.

‘May I use a bathroom?’ she asked and he told her where one was and headed for the kitchen.

Coffee would help. Had to help, and then he’d show her the office, fry up some bacon and then disappear for the day while she did whatever it was she’d come to do and he worked off his hangover, his foul mood, and his awareness of a little grey mouse who was trying hard to be no trouble, no trouble at all, and by doing nothing whatsoever to engage him had captured his attention more thoroughly than anyone had captured it in years.

Seb dumped a wagonload of ground coffee into the shiny stainless steel machine, leaned into the counter and rested his head against a cupboard door.

He closed his eyes and tried to remember what else his brother had said about Poppy West. Tried to remember if Tom had been interested in her, and if so, whether he’d ever acted on that interest.

Probably.

She was exactly his brother’s type. Classy. Smart. Kinda sweet, whereas Seb… Seb far preferred his women assured, adventurous and heading towards sinful.

‘Coffee smells good,’ said a quiet, measured voice, and he straightened and opened his eyes to find her standing uncertainly in the doorway.

‘It is.’ Was that his voice? That raspy, ill-used croak? ‘There’s sugar around here somewhere. Long-life milk too. Somewhere.’ Probably in a box down at the warehouse. He’d bring some up later.

‘I’ll take black with one.’

Easy to please, this woman with perfect lips and a planet for a brain.

She’d taken her jacket off and stood there in designer cut jeans and a dove-grey T-shirt that emphasised fine bones and slenderness. Small, high breasts. Plenty of leg.

A man who wanted a piece of her would have to be gentle; he’d have to take care….

‘You want something to eat?’ he asked the mouse. Mousemousemouse. His brother’s little grey mouse. Business partner. Whatever. He’d find out soon enough.

‘No, thanks. I had a big breakfast.’

Birdseed and yoghurt, what was the bet? ‘I’ll fill up an Esky for you to take down to the guest house,’ he told her. ‘There’s a fridge there. You’ll have to turn it on. Not sure if the bed’s made up. I’ll get you some linen too.’

He probably should have checked the guest house for spiders. Lizards. Snakes. Gracious hospitality wasn’t exactly his forte.

‘Change of plan,’ he muttered. ‘I’ll sort the guest house. You just do whatever you’ve come here to do on the computers. Tom wasn’t very specific.’

Ophelia West shrugged. ‘It’s not very interesting to a layman. But I’d really like to see the computer set-up. Tomas promised me big things.’

‘C’mon, then, geek girl. Let’s show you what he’s got.’

He still hadn’t put a shirt on.

Poppy tried to pay attention to her surroundings rather than the man who strode down the hallway in front of her, but it took concerted effort. The house had been built into the cliff face, it seemed, for the rear side wall consisted solely of cool to the touch smooth grey rock. The white ceiling disappeared into it and so did the grey slate floor.

At the end of the hall he opened a door and Poppy followed him into an office.

Generously proportioned, it boasted floor-to-ceiling windows on two sides and a perfect 180-degree view of the ocean. Photos of floating oil rigs and pipelines lined the walls—Sebastian’s achievements, one would assume. A framed mathematical proof, written in Tomas’s scrawling black hand, stood out amongst them. There was a large draughtsman’s table. Two high-end brand–name computers sat on nearby desks.

It was a very nice office, by any standard except the one that mattered most. Poppy stared at the computers, aghast.

‘Something wrong?’ he asked and she looked up to find Sebastian Reyne studying her intently.

‘I hope not,’ she said. ‘I mean, it’s a beautiful workspace, don’t get me wrong, and the view is magnificent if you like that kind of thing, but those computers are not what Tomas promised me.’

‘What did he promise you?’

‘Grunt,’ she said. ‘And lots of it.’

The corner of Sebastian’s eyes crinkled, and Poppy paused, mid panic. Gorgeous eyes. Smiley hell-raiser eyes, enjoying a private joke.

‘You’d be after the bat cave, then,’ he murmured, and crossed the room and opened a door she hadn’t noticed earlier. He slipped his hand just inside the doorway, flipped on a light and stepped aside. ‘Behold, the promised land.’

Poppy approached the door cautiously, peered inside the room and promptly uttered a favoured phrase she’d picked up from her brothers. And it wasn’t Well, glory be.

Cooling panels warred with monitors for space. Cable had been built into the walls during the original build, which meant no stepping over it, and memory banks took up almost half of one wall.

Tomas Reyne had built himself a supercomputer.

‘This enough grunt for you, Miss West?’