like punching the air in triumph? Because he’d never wanted to win this way—with Savannah reduced to a small, shivering shadow of herself. And now that she’d somehow slit a hole in his tough outer shell, he wasn’t sure he wanted to win at all. Not if it meant her going back to Auckland. Not if it meant he’d never see her again…
He stepped closer and gently clasped her chin, turning her face to his.
Flashing with temper, sparkling with laughter, soft with kindness, hard with determination, smoky with arousal—he’d experienced all of those emotions in her eyes. Now her green irises, with the pretty flecks of gold near her pupils, were dull. Defeated. Tank empty.
He hated it.
“The one thing you’ve never been is a quitter, diva. Don’t start now.”
A spark lit deep in her eyes, and her upper lip curled slightly away from her teeth.
“You’re right,” she said. “I’ve never been a quitter because I’ve never known when to quit. No, no, not me. I applied to the New Zealand School of Drama when everyone said I’d never make it as an actress. I went to audition after audition, wouldn’t quit when I got knocked back. Then I worked my tail off, movie after movie, refusing to believe my golden days were over. No one would label me a quitter.”
She placed cool fingers on top of his and drew his hand away from her chin. “But the downside of not being a quitter? Marrying Liam, even though I didn’t really love him, then staying married to him when a sensible woman would’ve divorced him years ago.”
He took a step away from her, conscious of Tom rummaging through drawers down the hallway. “Ending a long term relationship isn’t an easy thing.”
Especially if one of the people involved was an ambitious, manipulative dickhead who’d do anything to hold onto what he considered his property. At least, that had been Glen’s opinion of Liam on the few occasions he’d run into him when they were younger. He imagined the teenage 1.0 Liam hadn’t improved much in the adult 2.0 version.
“No.”
“Sweatpants, tee shirt, woolly socks,”—Tom stepped out of his room mid-sentence with a stack of clothes—“and an ugly orange fleece my mum insisted on packing. Sorry.”
Savannah eased away from Glen, placing her script on a small hallway table then taking the clothes from Tom.
“Thank you, Tom. It’s very kind of you to lend me your clothes.” Her light, easy tone demonstrated how quickly Savannah switched masks from vulnerable to cheerful.
“No worries.” Dimples appeared in the boy’s cheeks. “Though they’re not as cool as your onesie.”
She flicked Glen a sideways glance. “And thank you too, Glen.”
And in one sentence, politely spoken without a trace of the vulnerability she’d shown moments before, Savannah reduced him to her unwanted tenant who’d helped out in a tight spot.
***
Showered, dressed in Glen’s baggy sweats and tee shirt, and wearing Tom’s socks, Savannah made her way to the family room. She’d slipped back on the panties she’d worn beneath the onsie but minus a bra, unfortunately, since the underwire was the first to hit the laundry pile at the end of the day.
Could’ve been worse, she told herself, as she spotted Glen stretched out on the couch in front of the fireplace. She could’ve been au naturel when Glen found her. As a reminder that ‘Glen’ was a trigger word, her nipples gave a happy little tingle. Sav folded her arms over her breasts—in case the tingle showed—and perched on an armchair.
Flames flickered low in the fireplace, the bed of embers the only other light in the room aside from an end table lamp.
Glen cast her a sleepy stare. “Better?”
“Much better. Now I can talk without my molars clacking.”
“Good to hear.” He stretched his arms over his head, muscles playing beneath his tanned biceps, bulging into two smooth mounds as he laced his fingers behind his neck. “I’ve changed the linen in the bedroom. I’ll crash here for the night.”
On a couch that couldn’t contain six-feet-plus of male without his feet propped up on the arm? The couch folded out into a bed, but not a comfortable one for a guy as big as Glen.
“That’s very sweet of you, but I’m a much better fit. You look hideously uncomfortable.”
He crossed his ankles, nearly taking out the end lamp. “I’ve slept on worse than this.”
“Not since uni days, I’ll bet.”
The grin he sent her caused her blood to flow like a tide to the moon’s beckoning. A lethal current that dragged