Australian Boss: Diamond Ring: Australian Boss: Diamond Ring

The dress showcased her beauty, but her beauty itself was what stopped his heart for a moment before a deep, warm feeling washed through him.

He couldn’t explain it. Only that Fiona was soft and curvy everywhere. He wanted to immerse himself in that softness, body, mind and…something even deeper that he didn’t fully understand that had something to do with all the softness there hadn’t been in his lifetime.

Okay. So that was fine. Any man would want that softness anyway. It didn’t need to mean anything particularly deep. Brent’s body tightened.

‘Good evening. You look wonderful.’ Husky words, his gaze locked probably too intimately and directly on hers as he battled to pull his thoughts and reactions into place.

‘Good…good evening, Brent. And thank you. I thought about not wearing heels but you won’t mind if I’m eye to eye with you?’ She stepped forward on the killer high heels in question.

Her hair was piled onto her head and pinned back with some kind of butterfly clip. Wisps kissed her nape, and she looked tentative and a little uncertain of herself, and the way she walked in those heels…

Why would she see herself as anything other than stunning? Brent’s gaze rose slowly to her face and locked there. ‘I won’t mind.’ He might go mad from the results of all that not minding, but no. He wouldn’t mind.

Some of the tension seemed to leave her and her gaze shifted to encompass all of him in a swift examination.

Brent had just started to relax himself when she did that, and the blue of her eyes deepened. Her smile wobbled and she hesitated there in his foyer while a delicate flush rose in her cheeks. Desire flared, a small flame burning brighter, back and forth between them.

‘You look wonderful, Brent.’ Her quiet words held conviction, and unease, and a wary consciousness. ‘I hope I’m not too early. Alex let me in. I’ve kept the taxi waiting, as you suggested.’

‘The timing is perfect.’ Everything about her right now was perfect and, because that was so, it seemed a good idea to get out of here and get his focus onto the business of the evening. ‘I’m sure tonight will be a good PR exercise.’

‘I’m looking forward to it.’ Fiona chatted on about it as they made their way outside, almost as though she too felt the need to distract herself. ‘The guest list should provide some opportunities to mingle both with industry professionals and also members of the public who appreciate what we do.’

‘Those contacts will make the night worth it,’ Brent agreed.

Worth stepping outside his usual guardedness, worth letting people see past his privacy and defences to a little of the man beneath.

Brent guided Fiona to the outer door with a hand on her elbow. She trembled beneath his touch, just slightly, just enough to make it impossible to think of anything but touching her.

When they climbed into the back of the taxi, closed themselves into the confines of that rear seat that somehow seemed so isolated despite the driver right in front of them, Brent noticed that intimacy again.

It was there in the knowledge of his body close to hers, their thighs touching where his legs sprawled and hers were folded neatly in front of her.

‘I’m excited to have the chance to attend the Awards ceremony with you.’ Fiona smiled as she turned her head to search his gaze. Smiled with an edge of awareness that he should have wished wasn’t there.

Instead, a part of him that just didn’t want to obey him revelled in her reaction, even as he thought of all the things he wouldn’t like about the evening. ‘I don’t exactly adore public events, but this one is important for my work.’

‘I could take them or leave them most of the time myself,’ Fiona admitted, ‘but I’m excited about tonight. I want your nominated design to win. I’ve studied all the candidate works and yours is by far the best.’

Her faith in him made him smile. ‘I appreciate your confidence in me, though there are several other very talented contenders.’

They discussed the other works and their designers for the rest of the journey. Brent talked, but he never lost his awareness of her. She smelled of soft woman’s skin, of subtle perfume that made him think of a tropical stretch of beach at midnight at the height of summer.

As they arrived at the converted mansion that would house the Awards ceremony, Fiona vehemently assured him there was no chance anyone else would be the winner tonight.

Brent wanted so very badly to lean forward and kiss the passionate declaration right off her lips. He allowed himself one brief touch of her forearm with his fingertips instead and they climbed from the taxi and made their way past several function rooms to the largest one, reserved for the ceremony. He had to do better than this and yet, with each passing moment, his determination to keep at arm’s length from her became more and more difficult to follow.

The venue was busy, with multiple functions taking place in a variety of rooms. Brent turned his attention away from all of that and focused on the woman at his side. On their joint interest in the night’s events, he meant!

‘Oh, why can’t he stop droning on and hurry up and just announce it?’ Fiona couldn’t hold the words back any longer. She whispered them against Brent’s ear where they sat at the table with a number of other guests.

Yes, she shouldn’t have leaned in so close and let her lips touch him that way, and no, she simply couldn’t care about that fact right now.

They’d done all the right things all night, had mixed and mingled and every other thing they had to do. And all the while, through everything, the awareness of each other had simmered. Something had changed. Maybe it was Brent, maybe it was Fiona herself. Or perhaps it was both of them, striking sparks off each other in this different setting.

If he truly was attracted to her, if he was the exception rather than the rule…

A short bark of stifled laughter came from her employer’s lips. He turned to smile at her, turned his head quickly enough that her lips brushed fully across his ear before she pulled back.

His smile turned to sensual consciousness between one breath and the next.

Fiona’s senses fluttered as their gazes caught and held. A moment later she sat straight in her seat again and Brent sat straight in his and the keynote speaker continued his spiel about the history of the award. There’d been no break in proceedings, but her heart was pounding. That expression in Brent’s eyes…

‘The award.’ She murmured the words beneath her breath. That was what was important right now. She shouldn’t have said anything about the keynote speaker going on too much. She should have waited patiently and then she wouldn’t have ended up with her mouth pressed to Brent’s ear.

Well, right now patience wasn’t her strong suit. Her senses were all out of whack because of what had just happened. And she wanted that award for her boss!

Are you sure you don’t just simply want your boss?

Tonight, in formal suit, white shirt and bow tie, he looked better than James Bond. She could attribute his impact on her to the flattering clothing and the tie that exactly matched the colour of her eyes.

Her eyes. As though he’d chosen to wear it to complement her, not himself.

That’s rather whimsical, don’t you think, Fiona?

And attributing his appeal to any of those surface things simply wouldn’t be honest, and she knew it.

Brent bent his head to hers and whispered, without getting too close to the shell of her ear, ‘Whether I win the award doesn’t matter one way or the other, you know.’

To a degree he was right. He would still be the highly successful landscape designer he was. But she wanted the industry recognition for him, believed he’d earned it, and wanted his peers and the various connections here tonight to see him win.

Fiona was about to explain those things when he reached out to cover her hand where it rested on the snowy linen of the tablecloth.

His deep voice whispered into her ear again. ‘Don’t stress, okay? We’re fine here and look on the bright side. Whatever the outcome, we got a nice meal out of it.’

‘We did, didn’t we?’ She laughed, as he had no doubt expected she would. And her hand turned. Her fingers curled around his and held on.

‘For luck,’ she murmured, and knew it was far more than that.

Brent made no attempt to break away from their joined touch. Instead, his fingers repeatedly stroked over hers as the speaker finally announced the third place, and a runner up, and finally, after a pause in which the whole room seemed to wait breathlessly…

‘And the winner of this year’s Deltran Landscaping Award is…Brent MacKay of Brent MacKay Landscaping Designs, for his design of Tarroway Gardens!’

‘Oh, I knew they’d give it to you. I’m so proud, Brent. Congratulations!’ Somehow Fiona ended up with her arms around Brent’s shoulders.

By itself that would have been okay, but his arms closed around her in return and she felt the touch of his fingers against the flesh between her shoulders, the press of strong forearms covered in suit cloth against her upper arms.

The scent of his aftershave and his skin filled her senses and his mouth pressed against her hair. The moment of congratulation and excitement became something more, became a promise of what she had wanted all through this public night.

But people clapped, and the room and their surroundings came back. Brent got to his feet and gripped her hand and used that grip to tow her onto the podium with him. He introduced her and her role in the company, said a little about his work as he held their tucked hands at his side.

His acceptance speech was short and succinct and witty and wry. He stopped once in the middle and his shoulders tensed. His hand squeezed around hers before he seemed to relax and everything seemed all right again.

And then, award gripped in his other hand, he returned to their table and to a round of congratulations as the formality of the evening dissolved into industry talk, mingling and people drinking one last glass of wine while others lingered over pungent coffee served by waiting staff in smart grey coats.

There were some people like Brent’s difficult client, people with certain aspirations, who now suddenly found Brent’s business most interesting indeed.

Brent handed them business cards and let them know that if they wanted to book appointments to see him they’d be waiting at least a month. Fiona stayed at his side and simply gave herself the pleasure of watching people acknowledge his success. Pride in him joined other feelings and blended together inside her.

Finally they left the function room and made their way through the building’s long winding corridors towards the front exit.

The doors to another of the function rooms just ahead swished open. Two men stepped through, one garrulous and talking a mile a minute, the other with his face turned half away, doing his best to ignore that man’s effusiveness if his body language was anything to go by.

Fiona observed this and leaned on Brent’s arm to peer across his body at the award statuette. ‘It’s a rather elegant tree, really. Sort of “eternal lifeish” in appearance, don’t you think? I’d like to display it in a glass-fronted cabinet in the reception area at work.’

Brent seemed distracted by the men before them, but he forced a nod. ‘We’ll put your awards up at the same time—’

The men in front of them glanced their way as they drew closer. Probably they heard every word being said, but they weren’t private words really so it hardly mattered, did it? So why did Fiona feel uneasy suddenly?

‘Displaying all the awards would be nice,’ Fiona murmured.

She would simply have walked on, but something about the stillness of one of the men drew her attention and she looked his way just as Brent drew a deep breath and did the same.

As they all drew level, Brent wrapped his free hand around her wrist, a gentle touch that guided her to a stop, yet his expression when she looked into his eyes was not gentle, but oh, so determined and guarded and…braced. For what?

Fiona left her wrist in his hold. She wasn’t sure if he even knew he had it clasped there.

Brent could have done without this, but he looked into the face of one of the two men before him and waited for recognition to dawn. Oh, not for himself. He’d recognised Charles immediately. But for the older man—God, for his father—it was apparently taking longer.

Memory hit Brent. Of his father frowning, pushing Brent into a car, muttering that he couldn’t be the father of a freak. Brent had tried so hard as a child to control the outward signs of his condition. He couldn’t remember any other way. Even now he could feel his body tightening, trying to make sure nothing of the autism showed.

Well, it had been too late then. Tight-lipped and silent, his father had taken him to the orphanage, signed him over and walked away.

‘It’s been a long time.’ Brent was proud of the flat, even tone of his voice. He hoped that calm extended to his expression, even if his body was braced.

Charles was older, his hair was grey, but the dawning expression in his eyes was the same. Displeasure, discomfort, rejection.

For a moment Brent thought the older man might simply walk on, not speak, and in that moment Brent knew he would not allow that. This time he wouldn’t be ignored, brushed off. He opened his mouth to speak again.

‘If I’d realised you’d be here—’ Charles broke off, glanced at his companion and his frown deepened.

Brent recognised that look, too. It was amazing just how much came back to him. He’d thought it almost all forgotten. A twitch built at the base of his neck. He banked it down.

Fiona’s glance made him wonder if she’d sensed that tension building. Her hand turned and her fingers closed around his wrist, and he thought she murmured, ‘I know now where I’ve seen that before…’ before she leaned into his side.

Then she gave a polite, plastic smile and said in a normal tone, ‘Won’t you introduce me, Brent?’

‘Fiona Donner, meet Charles MacKay.’ He didn’t explain Fiona to Charles. He didn’t explain his father’s identity to Fiona.

Fiona’s nostrils flared and the sparkle in her eyes flattened out until they were pure blue, expressionless chips. Her gaze turned to his and came back to his father and a thick silence fell.

Into that silence, Charles’s companion spoke.

‘You’ve won an award. Congratulations.’ The man stepped forward and leaned in to examine the award, either oblivious at this point to the tensions in the air, or convinced he could actually do something about them. ‘Oh, I see that’s the landscaping industry award. I read about that in the club notices a few weeks ago. What do you think, Charlie?’ He turned to address the question to the second man.

And what did ‘Charlie’ think? Was he surprised by Brent’s success? Pleased by it? Discomfited by it?

Why care? His opinion means less than nothing. It’s meant less than nothing for a long time now.

‘The family resemblance is strong.’ Fiona’s words were low, the unspoken words written all over her.

This was the man who had given his son away. Somehow she understood so much. That knowledge hit Brent while a raft of emotions washed through him.

Old rejection. A need to understand.

His father’s rejection, Charles’s inability to love the child he’d helped create?

Brent pushed it all away before it could go any further. It was all past news. There was no point revisiting, though he couldn’t be sorry this meeting had happened. At least he could say it was done now, and let go of the feeling he’d carried around of waiting to stumble across this man.

Yeah? So why didn’t Brent feel any better or more resolved?

Because Charles was acting just the same, and some deep down part of Brent had maybe hoped, just the tiniest bit…

‘Yes, we should be going, Fiona. I think we’re done here.’ As he spoke the words, Brent became truly aware of the curl of Fiona’s fingers around muscles that had set like concrete. His free hand came up to close over Fiona’s, to register the tension in her fingers.

She gave a sturdy tug, as though to shepherd him away from there, and her entire body pressed into his side.

The level of protectiveness he sensed in her in that moment stunned Brent and touched him in ways he couldn’t define.

‘Wow.’ The jolly man’s mobile face worked.

No doubt in another moment he would voice his conclusion that Brent and Charles were ‘father and son’.

How would Brent’s father explain that? He’d done such a good job of ignoring the fact that Brent had ever existed.

How had Charles MacKay dealt with that? An inconvenient accident that had taken his son so soon after the death of the older man’s wife? If so, Brent was rather inconveniently ‘resurrected’.

‘If you’ll excuse us.’ The blandest of bland phrases. Brent decided it was somehow fitting.

He steeled his muscles to keep under his command. There would be no twitching of his head to the side, no drumming of fingers or anything else. Not in front of this man. No exposure. Brent started to turn away.

‘Surely you’d have realised the major industry event in my calendar year was at this venue tonight.’ His father’s words stopped him. The displeasure and self-centredness in them was clear. ‘You should stay out of the limelight altogether. I can’t have—’

‘I do what suits me. I’ve been in charge of myself for a long time now.’ Anger made its way through Brent’s reserve. That, too, he squashed down. It really wasn’t worth it, was it?

Charles couldn’t be proud of his success. The older man couldn’t see past the shame he felt in Brent’s existence.

You let Charles’s shame impact on you, on how you live, how you present yourself.

Had Brent done that? Would he have looked at his autism differently if Charles had done so?

Well, Charles hadn’t done, and that hadn’t changed. Brent spoke with that thought fresh in his mind. ‘If that doesn’t appeal to you, you’re welcome to stay clear of anywhere you think I might show up.’

As for Charles’s business activities, Brent had little clue and planned to keep it that way. If they crossed paths again, so what? Brent wasn’t about to actively keep away from anything for the sake of avoiding this man. What could Charles do, after all? Reject his son?

Been there, lived that, got the new and better, loving, close-knit family with Linc and Alex to prove it.

With that thought calmness came back to him. He did have Linc and Alex and they were what he wanted. Not the cold stranger in front of him.

‘Good evening. Don’t feel it’s necessary to speak the next time we meet—’

‘You must be highly medicated to succeed at hiding your flaw, even temporarily, for something like this evening.’ His father’s words held ignorance, accusation, harshness and confusion. ‘I didn’t know autis—’

‘Obviously you don’t know much.’ Brent spoke over the top of the older man. ‘Goodbye.’

He whisked Fiona away then. And he noted with some almost detached part of himself that his body responded perfectly to each of his commands.

Grip Fiona’s hand. Lead her around the two men. Nod politely at the goggle-eyed companion in passing.

Stride away, relying on the length of those beautiful legs of Fiona’s to allow her to keep up with his pace until they got outside and he sucked in a deep breath of cleansing air.

‘There’s a taxi. We’re going. We’re getting right away from here and from that—’ Fiona’s words were shocked, shaken. She flagged the cab forward with a hand that visibly trembled.

Brent turned his gaze to her and something deep and protective came to life in him. His voice was soft as he spoke, deep and gentle…‘Don’t worry. Everything’s fine—’

‘No. It’s not.’ She shook her head, a decisive shake that said she wasn’t about to be convinced.

And what else had she registered? Charles’s final word? That Brent had autism?

Moments later they were ensconced in the back seat and her shoulder was pressed to his, their bodies tucked as close as she could get them as she gave her address to the driver without sparing him as much as a glance.

All her attention was for Brent. In part that made him uncomfortable, and yet…

‘I should explain.’ Brent cleared his throat. ‘He’s not…I don’t…’

‘What? He isn’t important? You don’t care that he rejected you because you’re autistic?’ The words burst out of her and then she chewed her lip. ‘I’m sorry. I heard him, but I’d already wondered.’

It shouldn’t surprise him that she’d come halfway to figuring it out. But now, thanks to Charles, Fiona completely knew the one thing that Brent had worked to keep to himself, where he could guard it and control it…and no person could judge him for it.

‘Yes, I have a form of autism. It’s less of a challenge physically or in other ways than many people live and deal with daily, but it’s still an inherent part of me.’

The mix of emotions he felt as he told her this was difficult to define.

Fiona’s face tightened and she whispered, ‘How could he treat you like that?’

And Brent realised that for all he’d believed he’d resolved this in his heart and mind long ago, there was still…something there. ‘I—don’t know. I don’t know how he could have done that.’

The glitter in her gaze was anger and other emotions mixed. It made something inside him clench. He curled his fingers because suddenly he wanted to lace them with hers.

‘This explains your ability to concentrate your focus so intensely when you’re producing those amazing landscape designs.’ Fiona drew a determined breath, deliberately seemed to calm herself. ‘I’ve thought that was amazing. Now I understand it.’

She turned Brent on his ear by addressing his condition as though it were of benefit.

God, she was amazing, even if she wasn’t seeing the whole picture. ‘Well—’ Brent realised he was simply sitting there, soaking in her warmth. He would have drawn away from Fiona then. He had to get this back to some kind of ordinary footing before his body started leading the rest of him, short-circuited what his brain knew he had to do, namely leave her alone, and got him in trouble.

‘Please don’t…shift away yet. I need…’ Her words were low, a blend of anger and hurt and heart.

She had a generosity in her nature that Brent couldn’t seem to help responding to.

‘I know…that man revealed something about you that you obviously feel wasn’t my business.’ Her words were low, careful. ‘He had no right to do that, but you can trust me with the knowledge. I’m just…furious about…’

‘It doesn’t matter.’ Yet he couldn’t deny his anger and old resentment. ‘I don’t need Charles MacKay’s approval.’

‘Maybe not, but you deserved his love and acceptance.’ Fiona turned to fully face him and all her fury was in her eyes. Her fingers gripped his once again. ‘You probably don’t even want to think about him. We’ll talk about the award. The night we had. It was a good night. You deserved to win. I said you’d get it, didn’t I?’

She probably would have kept going, but he squeezed her fingers and laid them against his thigh and covered her hand with his. Set the award on the floor of the taxi so he could focus solely on her. ‘I dealt with my father dumping me a long time ago.’

‘What happened so that it was only your father making the decision to…stop parenting you?’

To reject Brent? Pass him off into strangers’ hands because he didn’t want to deal with a child who was different? ‘My mother died. I was young. All I remember was he couldn’t cope with my issues. Now he’s got the problem that I grew up, made something of myself, and he doesn’t want to have to acknowledge my existence.’