and all she remembered was that every time she had looked up, it had seemed as though he was there, waiting to capture her eyes in his simmering gaze. And all the while the discussions had gone on around her, the finer points ofthe agreement hammered out, and all she’d been able to think about was discovering the sinful pleasures promised in his deep, dark eyes.
And when she’d gone to help organise coffee and had met him on the way back, she’d felt warmth bloom in her chest and pool in her belly when he’d smiled at her, and let him draw her gently aside with no more than a touch of his hand to her elbow that had almost had her bones melt.
‘I want you,’ he’d whispered, shocking her with his savage honesty, thrilling her with his message. ‘Spend the night with me,’ he’d invited, and his words had poured into all the places that had been empty and longing all her life, even the tiny crevices and recesses she’d never known existed until then.
And she, who had never been noticed in her life by anyone with such intensity, let alone a powerhouse of masculine perfection like this man, had done the only possible thing she could do. She’d said yes, maybe a little too breathlessly, a little too easily, for he’d growled and pulled her into a room stacked high with row upon row of files, already pulling her into his kiss, one hand at her breast, another curving around her behind even as he manoeuvred her to the furthest corner of the room.
Blown away by the man, blown away by the red-hot magma of sensations surging up inside her, she hadn’t made a move to stop him, hadn’t entertained the possibility until, with one hand under her shirt and his hard thighs wedged between hers, the door had opened and they’d both stilled and waited while whoever it was searched a row of files, pulling one out with a swish and exiting the room. And he’d pulled her shirt down and pushed the hair back from her face from where he’d loosened it from the coil behind her and asked her name,before he’d kissed her one more time. ‘Tonight, Eve,’ he’d said, before he’d straightened his tie and gone.
Cups clunked together under the suds and banged into the sides of the tiny sink, a sound reassuringly concrete right now. For this was her reality—a ramshackle bungalow it would cost a fortune to tear down and rebuild and probably more if she decided to renovate and try to preserve what original features might be worth saving.
She finished up the dishes and pulled the plug, letting the water go. She had commitments now. Obligations. A glimpse at her watch told her that her most important obligation would be waking up any minute now.
Would her life be any different if she had spent the night with Leo that night, if he hadn’t been called away with barely a hurried goodbye to sort out a hiccup in the next billionaire deal he had been brokering somewhere halfway around the world, and if they’d actually finished what they’d started in that filing room?
Or given how she’d been incapable of saying no to him that day, maybe her child might simply have been born with skin even more olive, hair a little thicker?
Not that Leo would make those kind of mistakes, she was sure.
No, it was better that nothing had happened that night. He wouldn’t be her client now if it had.
Besides, she knew what happened to the women Leo bedded. She could live without one of those terse thank-you notes, even if it did come attached to some pretty piece of bling.
The room darkened and she looked out the window in time to see the first fat drops fall from the dark clouds scudding across the sky and splatter against the glass.
‘I thought I warned you,’ she growled at the sky,already making for the back door and forgetting all about Leo Zamos for one short moment.
Until the phone rang again.
CHAPTER TWO
S HE stood there, one hand on the door handle, one thought to the pattering rain growing louder on the tin lean-to roof, and yet
And when she’d gone to help organise coffee and had met him on the way back, she’d felt warmth bloom in her chest and pool in her belly when he’d smiled at her, and let him draw her gently aside with no more than a touch of his hand to her elbow that had almost had her bones melt.
‘I want you,’ he’d whispered, shocking her with his savage honesty, thrilling her with his message. ‘Spend the night with me,’ he’d invited, and his words had poured into all the places that had been empty and longing all her life, even the tiny crevices and recesses she’d never known existed until then.
And she, who had never been noticed in her life by anyone with such intensity, let alone a powerhouse of masculine perfection like this man, had done the only possible thing she could do. She’d said yes, maybe a little too breathlessly, a little too easily, for he’d growled and pulled her into a room stacked high with row upon row of files, already pulling her into his kiss, one hand at her breast, another curving around her behind even as he manoeuvred her to the furthest corner of the room.
Blown away by the man, blown away by the red-hot magma of sensations surging up inside her, she hadn’t made a move to stop him, hadn’t entertained the possibility until, with one hand under her shirt and his hard thighs wedged between hers, the door had opened and they’d both stilled and waited while whoever it was searched a row of files, pulling one out with a swish and exiting the room. And he’d pulled her shirt down and pushed the hair back from her face from where he’d loosened it from the coil behind her and asked her name,before he’d kissed her one more time. ‘Tonight, Eve,’ he’d said, before he’d straightened his tie and gone.
Cups clunked together under the suds and banged into the sides of the tiny sink, a sound reassuringly concrete right now. For this was her reality—a ramshackle bungalow it would cost a fortune to tear down and rebuild and probably more if she decided to renovate and try to preserve what original features might be worth saving.
She finished up the dishes and pulled the plug, letting the water go. She had commitments now. Obligations. A glimpse at her watch told her that her most important obligation would be waking up any minute now.
Would her life be any different if she had spent the night with Leo that night, if he hadn’t been called away with barely a hurried goodbye to sort out a hiccup in the next billionaire deal he had been brokering somewhere halfway around the world, and if they’d actually finished what they’d started in that filing room?
Or given how she’d been incapable of saying no to him that day, maybe her child might simply have been born with skin even more olive, hair a little thicker?
Not that Leo would make those kind of mistakes, she was sure.
No, it was better that nothing had happened that night. He wouldn’t be her client now if it had.
Besides, she knew what happened to the women Leo bedded. She could live without one of those terse thank-you notes, even if it did come attached to some pretty piece of bling.
The room darkened and she looked out the window in time to see the first fat drops fall from the dark clouds scudding across the sky and splatter against the glass.
‘I thought I warned you,’ she growled at the sky,already making for the back door and forgetting all about Leo Zamos for one short moment.
Until the phone rang again.
CHAPTER TWO
S HE stood there, one hand on the door handle, one thought to the pattering rain growing louder on the tin lean-to roof, and yet
Similar Books
The Legacy of Gird
Elizabeth Moon
No More Dead Dogs
Gordon Korman
Claiming Her Innocence
Ava Sinclair
Warrior
Zoe Archer
Find My Baby
Mitzi Pool Bridges
Love, Chocolate, and Beer (Cactus Creek)
Violet Duke
ARC: Cracked
Eliza Crewe
Silent Witness
Diane Burke
Bea
Peggy Webb