The Dark Side of Desire Read Free Page B

grandmother’s best interests. And if that meant denying herself the kind of life that she might have been leading as an independent solo woman of twenty-five—well, she would accept that.
    So it really didn’t matter a jot that her father’s guest had had such a powerful impact on her—it was completely irrelevant! Leon Maranz was nothing to do with her,
could
be nothing to her, and would stay that way.
    She gave a little shake of her head. For heaven’s sake—just because he’d had an impact on her, obviously it didn’t mean she’d had an impact on
him
. OK, so he’d seen her looking at him when he’d been standing near the doorway, but so what? With looks like his, a magnetically brooding presence likehis, every other women here would have done the same—were doubtless doing it right now! All she had to do was get a grip, stop reacting to him in this ridiculous way, and avoid him for the rest of the evening. Simple.
    ‘Tell me, are you always so short with your guests?’
    She spun round, dismay and shock etched in her face.
    Leon Maranz was standing not a metre away from her in the empty room. His expression, she could see instantly, was forbidding. Equally instantly every resolution she’d just made about getting a grip on her composure and not reacting to him utterly vanished. She could feel herself go into urgent self-protective, defensive mode. She stiffened.
    ‘I beg your pardon?’
    The words might be polite, might theoretically mean what they were saying, but her tone implied utterly the opposite. It was as freezing and as clipped as if she was cutting the words out of the air with a pair of the sharpest scissors.
    His expression hardened at the icy tone. ‘You should,’ he said. ‘What reason did you have for snubbing me when your father introduced me?’
    ‘I didn’t snub you!’ She spoke shortly, aware with part of her mind that she was once again bordering on rudeness, even though she didn’t mean to be. But her nerves were on edge—yet again. His presence seemed to generate such an overpowering reaction in her she couldn’t cope well with it.
    He raised a sardonic eyebrow. ‘What do you do when you
do
snub someone, then?’ There was a taunt in his voice, but beneath the taunt was another note. Something she could recognise because she knew there was justification for it.
    Anger.
    For a moment, just the briefest moment, she almost made a decision to do what she knew she must—apologise. Mollify him with a soft word. Defuse the situation. But even as she made that resolve, she made the fatal mistake of meeting his eyes.
    And in them was an expression that she’d have recognised even if she’d been blind.
    She’d have felt it on her skin—felt it in the sudden heat of her blood, the quickening of her pulse. Felt the wash of his eyes, the open message in them. Felt the breathless congestion in her chest.
    He was looking her over … signalling his sexual interest in her … making it plain …
    For one long, disastrous moment she was helpless, out of control, taking the full force of what was being directed at her. She could feel the hot, tumid breathlessness in her lungs, the flare of heat in her veins, and then—even worse—the betraying flush of her skin. A tautening all through her body, as if a flame were licking over her …
    She couldn’t move. Couldn’t break away from the eyes holding hers.
    Then slowly, deliberately, he smiled. Lines indented around his mouth, emphasising the strong blade of his nose, the sensual twist of his lips. Long lashes swept briefly down over his sloe-dark eyes.
    ‘Shall we start again, Ms Lassiter?’ he murmured, and the deep, faintly accented voice was rich with satisfaction.
    And she knew why—because he now knew
exactly
the reason she’d been so short with him. Had found a reason for it that brought that sensual smile to his lips. The smile that was playing havoc with her resolve to be immune to him, to have nothing whatsoever to do with