As if he felt the silent study, he glanced up and glared at me. I dropped my eyes to his crotch; that dark stain across the waistband and down his mid-grey trousers really was quite unfortunate. I shot him a small smirk. Okay, so I wasn’t being very nice but all my attempts to be helpful earlier had been rudely rebuffed.
His lips hardened and he stared at me. A hard stare. Shades of Paddington. Well, two could play at that game. I would stare back at him until he dropped his gaze. Unfortunately, he was made of sterner stuff and held my gaze without a trace of self-consciousness or any sign of backing down. I stiffened and sat a little taller, which made his lips curve very slightly with a touch of derision, as if this were some small sign of weakness. I took this as a direct challenge and lifted my chin. I raised an eyebrow, which gave me what I knew was a haughty air. Ros had told me off on more than one occasion for using this, saying it made me appear horribly superior, which I thought wasn’t necessarily a bad thing.
He raised one of his eyebrows as if to say, is that the best you’ve got? It was almost cute. He was almost cute. A little ping of recognition went off in my chest. I very nearly caved and smiled at his sheer arrogance and self-confidence. He was gorgeous and he knew it, but… no; I forced my mouth to firm into a straight, uncompromising line. He really did have the most amazing eyes and at the moment I had carte blanche to study them. It was rather liberating. The colour was almost sea green but with a touch of whisky. Now his cockiness had been replaced with sheer determination. Again, I nearly crumbled. I could almost see the testosterone boiling up. He was hell bent on winning this challenge. Well, so was I. I quirked my lips in an answering satisfied smirk, as if I knew something he didn’t. As I did, I was aware of the older man sitting next to him putting down his paper and tuning in to the show. It was like a domino effect, and now, in my peripheral vision, I could see the other commuters one by one turning to watch the silent battle of wills.
Oh dear God. What have we started?
There was a heavy, charged atmosphere in the carriage and my skin prickled in awareness of the glances flicking back and forth between me and this random stranger. I felt the flush heating my cheeks which made the cocky git smile, his wide mouth curving up to reveal a flash of white teeth. Nice mouth.
Oh yes, go the whole hog Claire. Imagine what it would be like to kiss him because that’s really going to help.
Yes, very nice mouth. His lower lip is full, sort of biteable…
Seriously. I’d really said that in my head. I was really thinking that. I sank my teeth into my own lips, imaging it a little too vividly.
From the sudden flicker of his eyes, I must have given myself away. He was a hunter. The sort that thrived on the chase. My heart fluttered, an honest-to-God flutter, and almost as if he sensed it, his eyes narrowed.
Oh heck, what is he thinking now? Does he know?
Does he know that I’m imagining bad things, inappropriate things? Wholly-inappropriate-on-a-packed-train things. Like taking that white shirt off.
I sat up smartly. This was not train behaviour. It wasn’t normal behaviour. Certainly not my normal. Despite all this weird stuff going on in my brain, I held his gaze.
It hadn’t been too difficult at all at the beginning to see exactly what he was thinking.
I’m going to win. I’m going to beat you. I’m going to grind you to dust under my superior staring skills.
Now he was warier and – I was pleased to see – a little bit impressed.
Yeah, sunshine. Not so arrogant now, are you?
He does have lovely eyes though…
The train pulled in to the next station and new people crowded into the carriage. One man was even grabbed and held back by a passenger to prevent him standing in front of us. Everyone was watching us, craning their necks to keep us in their eyeline. Oh God, we were the star attraction on board. There was no way either of us could give way now.
And the cockiness was back – he’d also realised that we were the centre of attention. I was conscious of the bated breaths around us against the backdrop of the noisy rattle of the train.
God, he’s sure of himself.
His eyes bored into mine and there it was again, the tiny trip in my pulse. This was quite sexy. A power of wills. I parted my lips and just touched my upper lip with the tip of my tongue. I saw the answering glimmer in his eyes, a fractional movement of his muscles. He’d noticed all right. I shot him a sultry smile which did more harm than good because his eyes widened ever so slightly, and if I hadn’t been staring so intently at him I wouldn’t have seen it.
Bad move.
This man was not backing down from a challenge and now I’d ramped it up. No, he wasn’t going to give way, not now I’d added sex into the mix. His brows rose again and he gave me a mocking smile, with enough kilowatts of sexiness to knock me back into my seat.
Whoops, big mistake. Huge.
But a thrill of adrenaline burst through me; I felt edgy and alive. Aware of my body. Aware of the sexual buzz that thrummed through my veins.
With a sudden jolt, the train came to an abrupt halt, sending the people hanging onto the rails pitching forward. A woman in a lightweight pale blue mac lost her handhold and tumbled forward, almost landing in his lap. Instinctively he glanced her way, his hands moving to steady her.
Ha! He’d lost. He looked away first. When he turned back to me, I gave him a small grin of triumph and with a lift of my brows, shuffled my papers and made much of going back to my presentation as if he was no longer worthy of my time. I was dying to sneak a peek at him but the challenge had been won. There wasn’t going to be a rematch. I ignored the voice in my head, all for being fair and honest, arguing the case that my victory was by default.
A few minutes later, after the train lurched forward again, it slowed into Leeds City station. Standing up, startled a little by a burst of regret, I waited until he raised his head and met my eyes.
‘Good luck with your meeting,’ I said with a victor’s smile and sauntered off the train.
I’d never noticed him before on my morning commute in the last six months of walking across the park to the station. Churchstone was a relatively small place, with a population I was sure I’d read somewhere of only thirteen thousand people – a hell of a lot smaller than I was used to, given the nearly half a million that lived in Leeds, where I’d spent the previous six years.
Part of me wanted to turn back and see where he was but I resisted. Would I ever bump into him again? Although, I could do without the ‘bump’ part. I glanced down at my coffee-stained chest and groaned inwardly.
Halfway down the platform, I felt a prickling down my back and a second later he pulled level. My heart leaped at the sight of his dark, handsome face.
‘I’d have won if it hadn’t been for the interruption,’ he said.
‘Ha, you’d like to think so.’ I felt a burst of pleasure. ‘Only losers look for excuses.’
‘Excuses?’ he all but spluttered. ‘She fell into my lap.’
I shrugged, biting back a grin, as if to say, not my problem.
‘Are you always this contrary?’ he asked as we mounted the stairs.
‘I’m not contrary,’ I said indignantly. ‘Most people think I’m lovely.’
Surprising me, his mouth curved into a sudden grin which did the whole clichéd transform-his-face thing, but it really did. Those eyes really were something and he had the most perfect teeth, except the bottom ones crossed each other very slightly.