Читать книгу Sharon Kendrick Collection - Sharon Kendrick - Страница 9

CHAPTER ONE

‘PINCH me, quick! Who the hell is he?’

‘No idea—but just watch me find out!’

Lola, who had been shamelessly listening in to this conversation, watched as the two women tottered across the clubhouse towards the object of their desire.

And then her heart missed a beat. Or rather it missed several.

Lola blinked as the man glanced up and looked at her. And just carried on looking.

It was the classic, corny situation—the kind that Lola had read about in books and had never really believed could happen.

Well, it was happening now, and to her! Eyes meeting across a crowded room and all the things that went with it whether you liked it or not—the heightened awareness and the not so subtle body language which shrieked out mutual attraction.

Lola recognised him immediately. But he wouldn’t recognise her; of that she was certain. People never did! Lola was an air stewardess, and once she changed out of her uniform she was anonymous—it went hand in hand with the job!

She swallowed, unable to tear her eyes away from him.

As well as being the most outrageously attractive man in the room, he was making no effort to disguise his rather bored indifference. With eyes like storm clouds he was moodily surveying the proceedings as if he would rather be somewhere else.

Well, you and me both, buddy, thought Lola, with a touch of defiance!

She usually adored parties—the fact that she was invited to so many was one of the perks of her job with the airline—but this party was slightly different.

For a start she knew no one.

Everyone seemed to be standing around in large, impenetrable groups which didn’t look particularly welcoming. And she didn’t really feel like going up to one of them and saying in her best stewardess voice, ‘Hi, I’m Lola—who are you?’

The man with the stormy eyes was in the middle of just such a clique, and a scrumptious-looking blonde who had clearly poured herself into her black, sequinned dress without much thought of how she was going to get out of it was gazing into his eyes as if all her Christmases had come at once. And she wasn’t the only one. He seemed to have that hypnotic effect on just about every female in the room.

Lola could see exactly why.

He wasn’t precisely what you’d call good-looking, she decided, not in a boring, even-featured sort of way. His nose looked as though it had been broken—probably on the rugby field, thought Lola as she took in the broad, strong shoulders. But the imperfection only seemed to add to the rather devastating overall attractiveness of his face.

His mouth was sublime—he had the most sensual lips that Lola had ever seen—but there was an unmistakably hard, almost cruel curve to its corners which hinted at a powerful, sexual mastery which Lola loathed herself for finding attractive.

His shoulders were broad, as she had already noted, and his legs were long, and you could sense, rather than see, that every muscle in his hard-packed, spectacular body had been honed to perfection.

This was no rich, pretty boy, thought Lola, with the sense of being in the presence of someone remarkable; this was a real man—tough and strong and uncompromising. Unwillingly, she felt the first faint stirrings of desire.

The man glanced up from listening to the blonde bombshell who was now whispering excitedly into his ear, and, much to Lola’s fury, caught her watching him again.

He raised one quizzical black brow in a look which somehow managed to be both insulting and yet captivating, and Lola angrily stared down into her glass, which contained nothing more exciting than tonic water with a piece of lemon bobbing around in it.

Arrogant so-and-so! she thought disparagingly. And you are not to look at him again. He’s the kind of man who will misinterpret even one look—and have you down under his favourite category: easily seduced!

The buzz of party conversation, fuelled by ever increasing amounts of alcohol, was gradually getting louder and louder. More for something to do than because she was interested in the music, Lola moved towards the front of the stage, where the band who had been hired for the evening were now tuning up, and wondered how soon she could politely make her escape.

She had been awake since five a.m. this morning, and had only arrived back from Vienna an hour ago. Common sense made her wonder why she had bothered to come at all.

Simple. She had come because she had been invited by the Residents’ Association of the plush St Fiacre’s Hill estate.

St Fiacre’s Hill was the most amazing place to live, and she herself, unbelievably, was now a resident there—thanks to the totally unexpected generosity of one of Lola’s airline passengers who had taken a great big shine to her—and left her a house on one of the most exclusive developments in England!

She had come tonight because even after six months of living there she still did not really feel part of the luxury estate, and because sometimes she suspected that she never would.

But one thing was certain—she never would fit in if she shunned the events which studded the busy St Fiacre’s social calendar.

Which was why she was standing awkwardly and alone in the ultra-plush clubhouse, wishing that she were safely tucked up at home in bed. Alone!

A pretty boring ambition for a twenty-five-year-old, she thought wryly as she took another sip of tonic, then winced because it tasted flat and stale.

‘That looks as if it could do with a new lease of life,’ came a deep-voiced, confident observation from just behind Lola’s left shoulder, and she knew without looking that it was the man with the stormy grey eyes.

She forced herself to turn slowly, to meet what turned out to be a predictably mocking gaze, and gave him a steady and deliberate ‘You-don’t-impress -me’ kind of look, though in this case it was difficult because the man exuded a kind of earthy sensuality which made Lola’s breath catch in the back of her throat.

In her job as a flight attendant, she met gorgeous men every single day of her life—although, admittedly, they weren’t usually this gorgeous. Men who had women eating out of their hands like pussycats. Men whom Lola avoided like the plague. Men like this equalled heartbreak!

‘What does?’ she answered rather coolly, just as the lead guitarist chose that moment to break one of his strings. ‘The guitar?’

He shot her a deadpan look. ‘Actually, I’m clean out of guitar strings,’ he murmured, in the most amazing voice that Lola had ever heard—it was soft and deep and dark, with an attractive, almost musical lilt underlying it. ‘But no, that wasn’t what I had in mind.’

Something about the clean-cut sensuality of his mouth affected Lola in a very frightening and fundamental way. She felt tiny shivers of awareness skate tingling little pathways across her skin, and such a primitive, physical response to a man she did not know brought all her self-protective instincts to the fore.

In her job she observed human nature at close quarters most days and she knew that predatory men were intimidated by women who gave as good as they got. Even so, it still took an effort to make her voice stay calm as she said, ‘And just what did you have in mind?’ Which was, of course, the very worst thing she could have said!

‘Oughtn’t we at least be introduced before I start propositioning you?’ he mocked, the mouth hardening into a sexy line.

So he didn’t recognize her! He had no recollection of her bending forward, with her brightest smile, to put his drink down in front of him on the aircraft table.

For some reason, Lola felt slightly let down by this. There was nothing so insulting as not being noticed!

Ignoring the proposition bit, she held her hand out towards him. ‘Lola Hennessy,’ she said as evenly as she could, which was a bit difficult when confronted by that thoughtful stare.

‘Lola,’ he said slowly, and took the proffered hand in a firm grasp that felt quite wonderful. ‘Is that your real name?’

Lola shook her dark head. It was, at least, an improvement on the usual comment—most people assumed she had been named after the pop song! ‘I was christened Dolores.’

He nodded. ‘Yes,’ he murmured. ‘Lola is the pet form, isn’t it? So is Lolita.’ His grey gaze was ironic as his deep voice caressed the word. ‘Do they never call you Lolita?’

She gave him a steady look. ‘Lolita was a fictional nymphet,’ she answered acidly. ‘Are you trying to make a point?’

‘No, I’m not,’ he drawled, mocking amusement lighting the depths of the stormy eyes. ‘And besides, you’re a little too old to be classified as nymphet, aren’t you?’

It was hardly surprising, in the circumstances, that she should blush, and blushing only added to the feeling of intense vulnerability which had been present since he had first started talking to her. However, at least Lola had a pale olive tint to her skin, which masked the colour far more than a classic English rose complexion would have done.

‘Yes,’ she answered shortly, and tried to freeze him with an angry look which would have had a lesser man scuttling off in the opposite direction. ‘Much too old.’

But he seemed unmoved by her embarrassment, and uncaring of her anger—and instead allowed a grey gaze that was now cool rather than stormy to rove speculatively over her.

‘And you look like a Dolores,’ he remarked suddenly. ‘With that mane of curly brown-black hair and skin which looks as creamy as the best cappuccino. But your eyes should be dark, shouldn’t they? Mysterious and black. Yet yours are blue. Bright blue. The blue of a Mediterranean sky.’

Lola met many men in her job, but she had never met anyone who was quite so self-assured as this man—and she found herself stung into defence. ‘I’m an odd mixture,’ she found herself telling him. ‘Mum says she doesn’t know where I get it from.’ And then she looked down to discover that he was still holding onto her fingertips, in a parody of a handshake!

His grey eyes followed the direction of her gaze, to where her hand lay so acquiescently against his. ‘And what else are you going to tell me about yourself, Lola Hennessy—other than the fact that the touch of my hand makes yours tremble with awareness—?’

Furiously, she snatched her hand away. ‘Or revulsion, perhaps?’

He laughed. ‘I don’t think so. Unless your eyes are lying, of course.’

She pretended to consider this, both invigorated and unsettled by the game she was allowing herself to play. ‘And do you think that is possible?’ she queried. ‘For the eyes to be able to lie?’

‘I don’t just think so, I know so. Deception is an art which can be learned through practice just like any other.’

Lola felt like a child who had tentatively dipped her toe into a puddle and become submerged right up to her neck. ‘There speaks a true cynic,’ she observed caustically.

He shrugged his wide shoulders, and a look of faint surprise crossed the dark, handsome face. ‘I’m thirty-four,’ he stated, with an air of finality. ‘Therefore I am a cynic.’

Lola laughed nervously as she mentally worked out that he was nine years older than she was. ‘And why should that follow?’

His eyes were smoky with a kind of regret. ‘Because I have seen enough of life, and of women, to know that there are few surprises left. But even cynics are interested in young women who send out such mixed messages. Or should I say especially cynics...?’

His voice held a slumberous quality now, and to her horror Lola found herself imagining what that voice would sound like first thing in the morning, all husky and heavy with sleep.

‘And do I?’ she ventured boldly. ‘Send out mixed messages?’

‘Most certainly you do.’

‘How?’ she asked, even though something inside her urged her to walk away from him. Before he snared her completely in the silken bonds of his charm.

He lowered his voice, as if he recognised that the question had been unwise. ‘You recognise the danger in me, and you want to dislike me—even, perhaps, hate me,’ he stated huskily. ‘But you can’t quite bring yourself to, can you, Lola?’

And he was absolutely right, damn him! Lola adopted the unstressed, unflappable smile she usually reserved for passengers who had been hitting the duty-free in a big way. ‘Why on earth should I want to dislike you?’

The laughter which had lurked at the depths of the grey eyes disappeared and Lola was taken aback by how hard his face suddenly looked. And how cold. ‘I have absolutely no idea,’ he answered slowly, and his eyes narrowed into cool, granite chips.

Lola registered that her heart was racing, that the blood was thundering in her head in a most uncomfortable and unwelcome way. What would he do, she wondered, if she told him that the reason why she was reacting so bizarrely and so uniquely was because at the ripe old age of twenty-five she was experiencing an overwhelming desire to be in his arms and to have him crush his mouth down on hers?

Lola shivered, acknowledging her relative inexperience with men, despite working in the seemingly glamorous air travel industry.

Oh, she had been attracted to men in the past—of course she had. She had even come very close to having a proper love-affair. But she had never experienced feelings like this before. These dark, powerful, grown-up stirrings were a whole new and rather frightening ball game.

And she could not have chosen a worse candidate to be wildly attracted to—a rich, arrogant, gorgeous cynic! Lola was not an idiot, and she knew without someone having to tell her that this man was way, way out of her reach!

His voice had now dropped to a velvet caress. ‘So tell me, Lola Hennessy, just why you dislike me so.’

Sure! And boost his already massive ego still further? She was full of tricks like that! Lola gave him a bemused stare before delivering a gentle put-down. ‘How could I possibly dislike you, for heaven’s sake? I don’t even know you.’

Had he guessed that her indifference was feigned? Was that why his stormy eyes were now sending out shadowy messages which made another shiver of foreboding tiptoe its way up Lola’s spine?

‘Well, that’s one thing that is easily remedied,’ he replied silkily. ‘I’m Geraint Howell-Williams,’ he said, and his slate-grey eyes narrowed by a fraction as he waited for her reaction.

He was obviously someone, thought Lola—that much was evident just from his appearance—but did that infinitesimal pause after he had introduced himself mean she should have heard of him?

Arrogant so-and-so! Even if she had heard of him she would have pretended not to have! ‘How do you do, Mr Howell-Williams?’ she responded, her reply coming out all wooden and formal, and she saw his mouth harden very briefly before dazzling her with the most transfixing smile that Lola had ever encountered.

There was a hint of wicked amusement lurking in the depths of those eyes now. ‘Oh, call me Geraint, please,’ he murmured.

‘If you insist,’ she answered stiffly.

‘I wouldn’t dream of insisting,’ he mocked softly. ‘I’ve always found persuasion to be a much more effective tool.’

Now that she could believe! One more dazzling smile like the one he had displayed earlier and Lola could easily imagine being persuaded into doing almost anything he wanted...

‘I’m sure you have,’ she said softly, a wry note to her voice, and their eyes met for a moment of complete understanding, which left Lola feeling slightly shaken...

He threw her a thoughtful look. ‘This is some building,’ he commented slowly, as if determined to put the conversation back on a more conventional footing.

‘Yes, it is.’ Lola dutifully looked around the clubhouse, taking in the high white moulded ceiling and the pale marble pillars which gleamed so discreetly. On each pillar was mounted the distinctive navy blue St Fiacre’s crest, lavishly embossed with golden dragons and unicorns and vine leaves.

‘It looks less like a tennis club and more like a Greek temple—and an exceptionally sumptuous temple, to boot!’ Lola observed rather drily. ‘It must have cost an absolute fortune to build!’

‘I’m sure it did. But this is, after all, St Fiacre’s,’ he observed rather drily. ‘Where fortunes are ten-a-penny.’

‘You sound as if you don’t approve,’ she commented curiously.

‘Do I?’ He gave a brief shake of his dark head before fixing her with a steady look. ‘I was simply making an observation,’ he demurred softly. ‘Not a value judgement. If I disapproved of wealth and its occasional excesses, then I wouldn’t be here tonight, now would I?’

‘I suppose not,’ answered Lola, wondering what it was about him that made her skin alternately hot and cold as she veered between finding him distinctly dangerous and finding him almost irresistible—which was far more worrying!

‘So, Lola...’ he smiled ‘...now that we have the formalities out of the way, what would you like to do next? Eat?’

Before he had breezed over, Lola’s stomach had been rumbling loud enough to rival the London Philharmonic Orchestra, but now, astonishingly, it was silent. And her appetite had completely deserted her.

A first indeed! Perhaps if she stayed in this man’s company for long enough she might be able to zip up her black skirt before next Christmas!

‘I’m not hungry,’ she said.

‘Oh, Lo-la, you disappoint me,’ he drawled softly. ‘One of the things that makes you stand out from all the other women in this room is that you look as though you really take pleasure in eating.’

Lola glowered. ‘There’s no need to make me sound like a strapping great beast of the fields!’

He laughed. ‘That wasn’t my intention at all.’ His grey eyes flicked briefly over her body. ‘I’m sure that enough men have commented favourably on those lus-cious curves before me.’

There it was again. That lilting and unsettling way he had of addressing her—Lola couldn’t quite make out whether that last remark had been an insult or not. Or what the way he looked at her actually meant. It was as though he couldn’t quite make up his mind whether to dislike her or to...to...

Lola shook her head to rid herself of the horrifyingly erotic vision which had crept into her mind, which involved a lot of very old-fashioned macho behaviour, such as Geraint Howell-Williams throwing her over his shoulder, and then, then...

Besides, he should not make comments like that to someone he had never met before. Well, they had met, when she had served him with drinks en route to Paris a couple of weeks ago, but clearly he did not, as she had anticipated, remember her.

Being an air hostess was a bit like being a nurse—you all looked pretty much the same in uniform! And the passenger who had chatted away to you quite happily during a flight would usually stare at you blankly if you encountered him or her outside the confines of the craft or airport.

The surprising thing was that it usually worked the other way round, too, and Lola rarely recognised her passengers once they were off the aircraft.

But Geraint Howell-Williams was different. You would not need to be a genius to acknowledge that he was the type of man who, once seen, would never be forgotten...

Lola’s eyes glittered. ‘Actually, no,’ she contradicted him now icily. ‘Men do not usually comment on my figure, curves or otherwise. For a start, I don’t encourage personal remarks—’

‘Don’t you?’ he mocked softly. ‘Then what a shockingly boring life you must have led.’ His grey eyes locked with hers in an irresistible and yet somehow disquieting challenge.

‘I agree!’ she returned, with a sweet smile. ‘And standing here talking to you is just about as boring as it can get!’

Lola watched as for one swift, disconcerting moment his eyes darkened with an intensity of emotion which puzzled her hugely. She had made him angry, yes. Had she managed to wound his pride too? And, if so, might he at least now have the grace to look a little apologetic?

No way, she quickly realised. The anger had vanished, and so had the dark, intense look. And surprisingly all that was left was laughter—a reluctant kind of laughter which lurked in the depths of his grey eyes.

‘I don’t believe I bore you, Lola,’ he told her softly. ‘I believe that boredom is the very last thing on your mind right now!’

Oh, the arrogance of the man! Lola might have laughed if she hadn’t been so outraged by his inflated opinion of himself! ‘You find that such an improbable concept, do you?’ she queried coolly. ‘That a woman should find you boring?’

‘I do when she is demonstrating all the obvious signs of sexual attraction,’ he mused.

‘That’s probably just wishful thinking on your part!’ retorted Lola instantly, then wished she hadn’t.

He smiled, but it was the kind of smile that all the bad guys in films possessed—it didn’t make the corners of his eyes go all crinkly, and it didn’t have any degree of warmth in it either. Again, Lola felt that uncomfortable chill creep across the surface of her skin.

‘Is it? Does wishful thinking manage to manufacture eyes which keep darkening with passion, or lips that automatically soften and part in anticipation of being kissed?’ he drawled silkily. ‘As yours are doing right now?’

To her horror, Lola suddenly felt absolutely weak with longing as the deep, sensual words seemed to orchestrate her response. The fairly sensible, middle-of-the-road woman she considered herself to be had suddenly been replaced by a pathetic, swooning wimp! ‘St-stop it,’ she implored, despising herself for sounding so feeble but unable to do anything about it.

He shook his dark head. ‘But you don’t want me to stop it, do you? That’s just the trouble. You like it, Lola. And you like me. Your body is telling me just how much, isn’t it?’

And his eyes lazily flicked over her, lingering with undisguised interest on her breasts in a way that Lola would have found intolerable if any other man had done it. But she did not find it intolerable when Geraint Howell-Williams did it.

Beneath the dress of lapis lazuli velvet which made her blue eyes even bluer, Lola could feel her body betraying her, flowering beneath the approbation and the hunger in his eyes. She felt her breasts grow heavy and full, the tips begin to prickle with a kind of delicious ache which was actually more uncomfortable than enjoyable.

Because Lola recognised that there was only one way of taking that terrible aching away and that, astonishingly and shockingly, she wanted Geraint to touch her...

‘Do you normally behave like this towards women you have only just met?’ she demanded, her knees now weak with wanting.

‘Never,’ he responded softly, clearly mesmerised by the jutting thrust of her breasts against the rich material of her dress. ‘Do you normally react in this way to men you have only just met?’

Lola dragged a deep, determined breath into her lungs. ‘I think I’d better get out of here,’ she told him breathlessly. ‘Before one of us says something really offensive—’

‘You’re in no state to go anywhere,’ he responded wryly as he looked down at her searchingly, the stormy eyes narrowing in surprise at her wide eyes and flushed face. ‘Here, give me that.’

‘That’ was the glass she was clutching as if it were a lifeline, and smoothly—masterfully—he managed to remove the forgotten tonic from her hand and deposit it on a nearby table, then slowly pull her into his arms before she had time to make a protest.

‘Geraint, please...’ she whispered, aware of a tiny pull of pleasure as she said his name for the first time, and she found herself wanting to say it over and over again, as though it were some life-sustaining mantra.

‘Please what?’ he responded softly, his mouth pressed against her hair.

‘Please let go of me.’

‘If I do you’ll fall.’ His voice deepened. ‘Won’t you?’

’N-no, I won’t,’ she answered uncertainly, realising that she was actually enjoying the rather scary feeling of being this much out of control.

‘Try it,’ he suggested, and loosened his hands from where they had been holding her by the waist, and Lola actually felt herself sway, like a flu victim just out of bed for the first time. She wondered if she might have slithered to the floor, had he not renewed his hold on her with a steely strength that made Lola feel weaker than she had ever felt in her life.

‘See?’ he challenged softly.

Oh, yes, Lola saw all right. She saw that she had been sending out entirely the wrong messages to Geraint Howell-Williams since she had first clapped eyes on him tonight.

Or maybe—just maybe—she had been sending out the right messages, and he was just clever enough to pick up on them, realise that she was hopelessly infatuated, and then capitalise on that by having her almost swooning in his arms.

‘Relax,’ he urged softly. ‘Just enjoy the music.’

For a moment she did as he suggested. She gave in to temptation and to feeling, loving the exciting warm circle of his arms, the way his head rested so easily against hers.

She forgot all about the band playing and listened to the infinitely more spellbinding music of his body.

The beat of his heart. The rhythm of his breathing. The almost unconscious little thrust of his pelvis as he allowed himself to respond to the saxophonist who was the band’s only saving grace.

She knew that she ought to move, that a dance with a stranger should not be this intimate, and yet, to all intents and purposes, the dance was not intimate. They were just a man and a woman swaying loosely in each other’s arms, as others were all around them.

So this sensation of almost drowning in sweet, drenching pleasure—was this unique to her? Did this dance feel like any other to Geraint Howell-Williams? Lola wondered. Because it sure as hell didn’t to her! At that moment, drifting in his arms, she felt as though she was starring in every love story ever written.

Love story?

Her adolescent little fantasies brought Lola back to her senses with a start, and as the number trailed off with one final, lingering throb of the saxophone she took a deep breath and looked up at him.

‘Th-thank you for the dance,’ she said falteringly.

The grey eyes were enigmatic as he dropped his hands from where they had been lightly holding her hips. ‘My pleasure.’

‘It’s time I was going.’

‘Sure?’

That was, thought Lola wryly, what they called a leading question. To be honest, she wasn’t sure—she would have liked to hang around and dance like that with him all night.

But a girl had her pride to think of. He was the kind of over-gorgeous man who had probably had things much, much too easy in the past. And Lola’s turning him down was almost certainly going to help his emotional development enormously! ‘Quite sure,’ she answered firmly.

He nodded his dark head. ‘Where do you live?’

Lola had only been a resident for the past six months, and she still had not worked out how to answer this particular question without giving in to the toe-curling embarrassment of having to explain how she’d actually come to own a house worth almost a million pounds.

People always jumped to such awful conclusions when they found out that a pensioner she hardly knew had left it to her!

‘I live here,’ she told him. ‘On the St Fiacre’s estate.’

‘I see,’ he murmured softly.

Lola searched his face for the tell-tale looks of surprise—but there were none.

She was still extremely sensitive about living in a house on the estate once termed ‘the Beverly Hills of England’ by some enterprising journalist—one where all the residents were not just rich, they were seriously rich.

Except for Lola, of course.

The rich had a look and a lifestyle all of their own, and Lola did not possess either! She looked exactly what she was—a working woman who needed a bit of clever juggling to pay her bills. Although, admittedly, a working woman who lived in an enormous house. A house which she was fast coming to the conclusion she was going to have to sell.

‘I’ll walk you back,’ he said.

‘No!’ It came out more vehemently than she had intended, but really! A walk home in the moonlight with a man like Geraint Howell-Williams? Agreeing to a dream scenario like that would simply be asking for trouble!

‘And why not?’ he asked coolly.

He was very persistent, she would say that for him, although she doubted that he had ever had to use persistence with a woman before! ‘Does there have to be a reason?’ she parried. ‘Or are you implying that no woman in her right mind would refuse an invitation to have you walk her home?’

He fixed her with a steady grey gaze. ‘Did you come here with another man tonight?’

‘Do you think that I would have been dancing like that with you if I had come with another man?’ Lola demanded, instantly growing flustered. Now why had she mentioned the way they had been dancing—especially when it made his eyes gleam with such a hot, exciting look?

‘I have no idea.’ He shrugged shoulders whose breadth was emphasised by the exquisite cut of his dinner jacket. ‘Who knows what hidden agenda a woman might have when she agrees to dance with a man?’

Or vice versa, thought Lola with amusement. ‘Such as?’

He plucked two glasses of champagne from the tray of a passing waitress and handed one to Lola who took it without thinking. ‘Such as wanting to show off her figure in a clinging gown. That could easily apply to you...’

Lola, who had not intended to drink alcohol at all that evening, now took a huge, emboldening slug of the fizzy wine and was grateful for the warmth and the bravado it gave her. ‘This dress is not clinging!’ she declared, glancing down at the deep blue velvet.

There was smoky amusement in the grey eyes. ‘Oh, come on, Lola,’ he chided softly. ‘It probably wasn’t meant to be—but when you combine a sensual material like velvet with a Botticelli body clinging is what you get.’

‘You mean I look fat?’

‘I mean you look sensational,’ he murmured, sounding as though he meant it. ‘If you really want to know.’

Lola felt a rush of pleasure kick-starting at the pit of her stomach. This man whom she was trying so hard to dislike was flirting like mad with her, and right now she didn’t care!

Flustered, she swept a great handful of hair unnecessarily over her shoulder. ‘And what other reasons do women have for dancing with men?’ she queried, in an effort to stop him giving her that hungry look which was making her long to be kissed by him.

‘To make a boyfriend jealous, perhaps?’

‘But I haven’t got a boyfriend,’ said Lola instantly, and then could have kicked herself. There was no need to make herself sound as though she was desperate! Or on the shelf. Or both! ‘Not at the moment, anyway,’ she finished defiantly.

‘No,’ he said thoughtfully.

Lola found herself wishing that she could check her appearance somewhere. Was her nose shiny? Had her mascara smudged beneath her eyes? Was that why he was subjecting her to that highly disturbing, narrow-eyed scrutiny?

‘And there is, of course,’ he drawled, ‘the rather obvious reason why a woman agrees to dance with a man.’

‘And what’s that?’

‘Oh, I think you know the answer to that one.’ He gave her a long, steady look.

Lola took the look as a challenge. ‘No, I don’t.’

The grey eyes glittered. ‘That she can’t resist him, of course. That she wants to be in bed with him... and dancing is a socially acceptable substitute for sex. Sublimation,’ he finished on a mocking note, and then, as if sensing her objection, added softly, ‘You did ask, Lola.’

He was right. Perhaps it had been naive of her. But then again, there were civilised ways of answering naive questions, weren’t there? The glass froze halfway to Lola’s lips. ‘Are you trying to shock me?’

‘Why?’ he mocked, and their gazes locked for a fraught and sexually charged moment. ‘Am I succeeding?’

Not in shocking her, no—he was exciting her by saying things he had no right to be saying. It was crazy, thought Lola, how a deep voice and a sexy body could turn a normally sensible girl’s brain to jelly! ‘No comment!’ she declared firmly. ‘And I’m definitely going now!’

‘Did you drive?’

‘No, I walked.’

‘Then I am going to walk you home,’ he said, and shook his dark head firmly as he saw her open her mouth to refuse. ‘Please, Lola,’ he urged, almost huskily. ‘It’s a dark night for a woman to be out on her own.’

It was years since a man had said something so delightfully chivalrous to her, although Lola usually associated chivalry with a certain kind of innocence—and innocence was not a word which suited Geraint Howell-Williams at all!

She tipped her chin up to look him in the eye, so that her hair spilled down in mahogany spirals all over her shoulders. ‘And which, out of interest, offers me more in the way of danger?’ she challenged. ‘The dark night? Or you?’

‘You’re talking different types of danger, honey,’ he asserted, giving her a brief, hard smile—but it was an oddly disconcerting smile. ‘Though I can assure you that I will deliver you home in one piece. Does that satisfy you?’

It occurred to Lola that ‘satisfy’ was a particularly poor word to have chosen in the circumstances, but she nodded as he put their glasses down on one of the tables and guided her towards the door like a man used to being in command.

She felt her heart racing out of control. Calm down, Lola, she told herself firmly—he’s only offering to walk you home, not to trap you into a life of decadence!

She watched his hard, lean body covertly from beneath the dark sweep of her lashes and thought, most uncharacteristically, that perhaps in this case decadence might have something to commend it!

‘Did you have a coat?’ he asked as he pushed open one of the glass doors to receive the cold night air.

’N-no.’ Her teeth had begun to chatter. When she had left the house earlier it had been a deceptively warm and starry evening, but now a breeze was fluttering its cool fingers through the air.

‘Here, then—you’re cold,’ he said, frowning, and immediately removed his jacket to hang it loosely over her shoulders.

He turned left out of the tennis club towards East Road, as though he instinctively knew the way, and Lola wrinkled her nose. ‘But this is the way to my house,’ she said.

‘Don’t sound so surprised. Wasn’t the general idea to head in the direction of your house—as that’s where I’m supposed to be taking you?’

‘But I don’t remember telling you where I lived.’

‘You must have done,’ he answered quickly. ‘Or how could I have known?’

How indeed? Lola hugged his jacket closer, obsessively observing her surroundings in an effort not to concentrate on the tantalisingly subtle scents of musk and lemon which clung to his coat, but it wasn’t easy.

Huge banks of dark, glossy laurels lined the road, looming high on either side, protecting the vast houses behind them from the curious eyes of onlookers. Occasionally, there were high, impenetrable gates, bearing a stark picture of a barking guard dog that was meant to deter burglars—or curious sightseers, desperate to catch a glimpse of some of the houses and their often famous occupants.

In fact, Lola had long since decided that the word ‘house’ was a bit of a misnomer where St Fiacre’s was concerned. The smallest residence on the estate had six bedrooms, and the largest was rumoured to have twenty-two!

It was the world of the hidden camera and the stony-faced guard which so often went hand in hand with money—although the lush green acres surrounding the houses did much to compensate for the downside of extreme wealth.

She and Geraint walked side by side. Twice, cars slowed down—large, opulent and expensive cars, whose drivers were interested to know why a couple were actually walking around St Fiacre’s instead of driving!

Lola often thought that most of her neighbours wouldn’t know what to do with their hands if they weren’t holding a steering wheel!

They had almost reached the dip in the road where a branch of East Road ran up to join North Road when Lola said, pointing into a curving driveway, ‘I live here.’

He glanced up the drive to where the elegant white three-storey building sat amidst carefully manicured lawns. But instead of commenting on the house Geraint paused to look at Lola instead, his hard-boned face a series of shifting shadows cast by the pale moon and the even paler light from the stars.

‘You do realise that we’ve met before?’ he said suddenly.

Lola found that she couldn’t stop herself from smiling, ridiculously pleased that he had remembered. Of course, bearing in mind his no doubt colossal ego, she really ought to feign ignorance of him, but she dismissed the idea immediately. She wasn’t a good liar at the best of times and for some reason she baulked at the thought of Geraint finding her out in a lie!

She nodded, her glossy hair full of moonlight. ‘Yes, I do. It was on a flight out of London to Paris, wasn’t it?’

‘Ah! So you do remember.’

‘Yes,’ agreed Lola calmly.

‘But you didn’t mention it.’

Lola fixed him with a direct look. ‘Neither did you’

‘Maybe I thought that you wouldn’t remember a mere passenger—you must see thousands of men every working week.’

‘Not remember you?’ Lola gave a pale imitation of a smile. ‘Oh, come on, Mr Howell-Williams—please don’t indulge in false modesty on my account! You happen to be a very memorable man, as I’m sure countless women have told you. I remember you very well, as it happens. You kept requesting tomato juice.’

‘Heavens!’ he mocked. ‘You really do have a good memory, don’t you?’ He lifted his dark brows questioningly. ‘So why did you keep glaring at me whenever I asked you for another drink?’

Lola shifted in embarrassment. ‘It doesn’t matter.’

‘Oh, but it does.’ In the darkness his grey eyes were as cold and as glittering as the finest marble and Lola recognised that he was the kind of man who would chip away until he’d obtained all the answers he wanted.

She decided to give in without a struggle. ‘If you must know, I suspected your motives.’

He stilled. ‘My motives?’ he asked, in an odd, quiet sort of voice. ‘Just what do you mean by that?’

Lola shook her head. ‘Really—it isn’t important.’

‘Oh, but it is,’ he contradicted her, in a voice suddenly soft with menace. ‘Tell me.’

Lola gave him a steady look, realising that the atmosphere between them had suddenly changed to a big freeze, and wondering why.

She shrugged. ‘OK. I’ll tell you if you insist. We keep the tomato juice on the bottom shelf of the trolley because it is one of our least popular drinks. Some of the male passengers seem to have cottoned on to this, and they keep asking for it so that...that...’ Her voice trailed off in embarrassment as she saw the contempt hardening his lips. Oh, why hadn’t she kept her big mouth shut?

‘So that you have to bend right down to get it?’ he finished for her acidly.

Lola blushed again. Hateful, perceptive man! ‘Well, yes,’ she admitted, the look on his face making her wish that a hole could open up in front of her and swallow her up.

‘Do you really think,’ he said witheringly, ‘that I would be reduced to resorting to such juvenile ploys? And if I did want to see your knickers I would hardly need to make myself sick through drinking excessive amounts of tomato juice. After all, those abbreviated outfits that you wear for work leave very little to the imagination!’

‘Why, you—’ Maddened beyond thinking, Lola swung her hand out to slap his face, but his reactions were much too speedy for her, and he caught her wrist easily, pulling her right up against his chest and looking down at her, his wolfish smile making his shadowed face look both intimidating and delectably kissable.

‘You what?’ he mocked. ‘Beast? Brute? Bastard? Some or all of those? Want to think badly of me, do you, Lola Hennessy? Well, why not have some thing to really focus your anger on?’

And he did what she had been wanting him to do all evening. He gathered her into his arms and crushed his mouth down on hers in a kiss which sent all her senses into overdrive.

She was aware of the sweetness, of the intimacy as their tongues locked, of the desperate need to hold onto him as tightly as possible and never let him go.

She heard the low moan he made in the back of his throat as he sought to pull her even closer against him and Lola clung onto those wide, strong shoulders, massaging them like a woman possessed, the rocky bulge of his muscles steel-hard against her fingertips.

She could feel the leanness of his abdomen against her rounded belly, and she could sense the tension in him as he shifted his weight, moving his hips in a distracted circle, which made her acutely aware of just how easily he could be turned on too.

The realisation that things were spiralling out of control was what cleared Lola’s mind from the constricting mists of desire, and the facts began to seep coldly into her brain as she forced herself to remember how he had insulted her.

And yet here she was allowing herself to be meekly compromised by necking in a bush with him!

Angrily, she pushed him away. I don’t know what you think you‘re—’

‘Oh, spare me the hysterics, do,’ he interrupted calmly, and then he actually yawned—although Lola was convinced that it was deliberate! ‘When will you women realise that it really doesn’t count if you declare your unwillingness after the event? Particularly,’ he drawled insultingly, ‘when your willingness to participate was overwhelming at the time.’

His grey eyes glinted with remembered pleasure. ‘That was some kiss,’ he murmured softly, his eyes narrowing as he looked down at her, seeming taken aback by the dazed look on her face. And some of the abrasiveness had left his voice when he said, ‘Come on—I’ll walk you to the door.’

For about ten seconds Lola was completely speechless and then she made up for it. ‘Do you really think that I would let you anywhere near my house after that?’ she spluttered indignantly.

‘Why ever not?’ He looked perplexed.

‘Because I’m not used to being man-handled by jumped-up Lotharios who think that caveman tactics will have a woman swooning in their arms every time!’

‘And you are claiming not to have enjoyed my so-called caveman tactics?’ he drawled, his eyes glittering as he recalled that Lola had done exactly that. ‘I rest my case,’ he added insultingly as her hot, guilty cheeks added fuel to his argument.

‘Perhaps you’d better go,’ she suggested from between gritted teeth. Before she said something she might regret, she added silently.

‘Go? Sure.’ He gave her an unsettling smile and turned away with a lazy assurance which filled Lola with an inexplicable kind of fear. He did not look like a man who was going too far.

‘Goodnight, Lola.’

‘Wh-where are you going?’

‘Home.’ He raised his dark brows at her in sultry question. ‘Unless that was an oblique invitation for me to stay?’

‘Wh-where do you live?’ she demanded nervously. ‘On the estate?’

He smiled. ‘I’m afraid so. Although only temporarily, you understand. I’m staying at Dominic Dashwood’s house.’

‘B-but that’s next door!’ Lola spluttered. ‘To me!’

‘Exactly. So we’ll be neighbours.’ His eyes glinted with a wickedness that excited her, and with something else, too—something which unsettled her, unnerved her. Something she couldn’t define.

A chill, nebulous dread settled on her skin like a fog as she tried to imagine Geraint Howell-Williams living next door.

’N-neighbours?’ she stumbled.

‘Mmm. Now won’t that be fun, Lola?’