The Demetrios Bridal Bargain (14 page)

No, that would mean admitting he wasn't totally invulnerable.

‘I'm sure he doesn't think that,' Rose said, wondering why it was that some men found it so hard to talk about their feelings. Half the family rifts in the world would be healed if men actually did more than grunt and look noble. ‘It's not like he actually said that…' She paused, her eyes sweeping his dark face. ‘He did!' Her soothing expression melted into one of angry indignation.

How could any man, no matter how much he was hurting, say something like that to his own son? She'd like to give the selfish old man a piece of her mind.

‘Alex was the exact opposite of me.' He made it sound as though this was a reason, an excuse even.

‘Why does the memory of your brother have to push you apart? That's the one thing you and your father have in common,' she pointed out, shaking her head in exasperation. ‘You both loved him.' You'd think that would draw people together, not push them farther apart.

‘Look, I didn't bring you here to bring about a reconciliation between me and Andreos. I'm not paying you to be an agony aunt.' He saw her flinch and hardened his heart against the hurt in her liquid-gold eyes.

Rose stiffened. ‘Don't worry, I won't forget my place again.'

‘Your place is not in my head.' He clasped a hand to his head and gave a frustrated groan. ‘Oh, for God's sake, don't look at me like that.'

‘Where is my place, Mathieu? Just so that I know.'

His burning eyes swept her face. ‘In my bed, damn you,' he said, turning on his heel and striding off.

R
OSE
knew Mathieu was in the room even before her nostrils flared in response to the scent of his body. His invisible presence was like an electric prickle under her skin.

‘You've been crying.' The visible damage, her red-rimmed eyes and the tear marks on her cheeks made something inside him twist.

‘I always cry when I get mad,' she said, keeping her eyes trained on the waves whispering on the moonlit shore. Behind her breastbone her heart was beating like a captive bird and as the last lingering effects of the wine at dinner had worn off she couldn't even blame that for her response.

‘Did you cry because you thought I wouldn't be back?'

His voice warm like honey came from just behind her. Paralysed by the insidious weakness that was spreading through her body, she managed a negligent shrug and suggested coldly, ‘You forgot something?' She turned her head and he nodded.

She wanted to look away but she couldn't stop staring. His glossy dark hair was sexily mussed as though he had just run his fingers through it. His jacket was gone, and his tie hung loose around his neck. But it was his eyes that made her stomach dissolve; they were burning like molten silver.

She cleared her throat, but the words wouldn't come. Her restless gaze moved over the shadow on his jaw following the line of his strong neck to the base of his throat, and lower then to the section of satiny golden skin revealed where the top buttons of his shirt had parted.

She sucked in a deep breath and stuck out her chin as she gave a shrug…a yawn would have been overkill, especially as she had a horrible suspicion he knew exactly what havoc he was wreaking on her nervous system.

The extra gust of wind that blew in from the sea ruffled his hair and made her shiver. The distraction enabled her to pull free of the sensual thrall that had held her immobile.

She turned her back on him and closed her eyes. ‘Then get what you want and leave.' Before I touch you…In her fevered imagination she already was; her hands were on his ribcage and sliding lower to his flat, muscle-ridged stomach. She put a stop to her treacherous thoughts…

‘That was my intention.'

She felt the warmth of his breath brush the side of her neck. A shiver of excitement chased a path down her spine as her heavy eyelids closed.

‘What are you waiting for?'

Her eyelids lifted abruptly when a moment later he took her by the shoulders and spun her around to face him. The lines of his face were taut with anger and frustration.

‘I'm waiting for you to stop pretending this isn't happening.' He looked down at her; the devouring hunger in his spectacular eyes sent a violent surge of bone-melting lust through Rose's receptive body.

‘Nothing's happening except I'm catching a cold standing in this draught.'

He lifted a hand and made a stroking motion that traced the outline of her head but did not make contact, although her nerve endings reacted as though he had.

His voice normally had nothing more than the faintest trace of an accent, but when he spoke it was now thickly accented. ‘Your hair looks silver in this light.'

Rose swallowed and shook her head. Things were moving too fast. At this rate the point of no return would have passed without her explaining that this wasn't what she wanted.

It was, of course, but that was irrelevant. As intellectual exercises went, the one where she had felt empowered and daring enough to plan being seduced by a man she had no emotional connection with—a man like Mathieu—now seemed totally ludicrous.

For starters there was nothing intellectual about the things the scent of his warm body did to her. The danger in him aroused and excited her. Primitive, raw instincts, she was discovering, were not something you could intellectualise, and as for no emotional connection…As much as she wanted to believe he had just woken dormant sexual instincts within her, Rose knew what she was feeling was far more complicated than simple lust.

A sensible woman like her didn't waste feelings on a man who had no use for them.

And she was sensible…wasn't she? A month ago she would have had no problem replying in the positive, but now she knew, and it was a shocking realisation, that if she let herself she could fall in love with him…The question was could she stop it happening, and did she actually want to?

But those were questions for later; her mind could not deal with them now.

‘And your skin looks like moonlight, so soft, so smooth.'

The throaty rasp shuddered through her and though she struggled she couldn't tear her gaze free from the burning silver of his deep-set eyes as they devoured her. A tremor rippled through her body as his fingertips grazed the side of her cheek. She closed her eyes and shook her head, desperately trying to cling to some semblance of self-control and sanity.

‘I don't know why you're trying to fight it. We have no control. It is coded into our DNA.'

‘Do many women fall for that “it's just chemistry” line, Mathieu?'

The lines of his chiselled face tautened with anger. ‘I'm saying that what we are feeling is as basic as the colour of our eyes. You may not like it but you have to live with it.' His glittered like liquid silver as his restless glance roamed over the soft contours of her upturned features.

‘Convenient fatalism, but I don't have to live with you and I definitely don't have to have sex with you,' she retorted.

There was a glow in his eyes that was sinfully suggestive as he bent close to whisper in her ear, ‘Great sex.'

His sensuous purr had a catastrophic effect on her sensitive stomach muscles. She plucked at the neckline of her dress as her skin prickled with heat. Her heart thudding with nervous excitement, she swallowed and shook her head.

He drew back a sound that was close to a growl vibrating in his chest as he ripped the loose tie from his neck and threw it on the floor. ‘Are you trying to tell me that you don't want to share a bed with me?' Actually the way he was feeling—the closest words in his extensive vocabulary that came anywhere close to describing that condition were
totally out of control
—meant the bed was by no means a prerequisite. Just about anywhere would do.

The urge to feel his skin in contact with her skin was overwhelming. If he wasn't able to satisfy the primitive instinct to sink into her softness and warmth and feel her tight around him it was possible he would lose what little sanity he had left.

‘Well?'

The words of denial shrivelled on Rose's lips the moment she met the smouldering challenge in his. She swallowed and squared her shoulders.

‘Just because you want something doesn't make it a good idea.'

‘And you want me.' He closed his eyes as a shudder of relief vibrated through his lean frame.

She doubted he could have sounded any more smug or complacent if he'd tried, but it was hard to feel the proper level of indignation over this when he couldn't have looked more sexy or desirable either.

And on that front, to give the devil his due, he never tried, he just…

‘If you don't, just lock the door.' Producing a key from somewhere, he held it out to her.

Rose caught her full lower lip between her teeth as she stared at it.

After a moment the key went the same way as the tie.

‘You can hardly stand up, you're literally shaking and I haven't even touched you.' He swallowed, his voice dropping a husky octave as he added, ‘Have you any idea what it does to me to know that? To know that you're weak with lust for me?'

‘I am.' Rose stared into his eyes, seeing her own reflection there along with the combustible mixture of the emotions that gripped him.

Her heart was beating so frantically that she could hardly breathe as she lifted a hand to touch the spot in his lean cheek where a nerve jumped. He turned his head and caught her hand, pulling it to his lips, drawing one finger and then the next into his mouth.

A fractured gusty sigh escaped her lips and her knees disintegrated. She would have fallen in a heap at his feet if he hadn't caught her at the last moment, wrapping an arm around her waist and drawing her upright.

Her heavy lids closed and she gave a dreamy sigh, savouring the tensile strength in his lean body, conscious of the febrile shudders that intermittently shimmied through the length of his body.

‘Are you all right?'

‘I'm amazing,' she said, tucking her head into the angle between his chin and shoulder. She had never imagined that weak and helpless could feel so liberating.

She felt the soundless growl of laughter vibrate in his chest. ‘Well, amazing Rose, I think we should take this discussion into the bedroom.' His urgency intensified, as did the ache in his groin as he anticipated the touch of her bare skin against his. His urgency deepened as he imagined her body closing tight around him. ‘Right now,' he added, bringing his other arm around her waist and hauling her higher and closer against him.

Feeling the pressure of his erection against the softness of her belly, she gave a startled, ‘
Oh
,' and her eyes flew open. As she gasped for breath her eyes connected with the heat in his and she melted some more. ‘
You're
incredible.'

Rose had never in her life felt the primal drive, the need to be possessed by a man. But she had been fantasising about being possessed by Mathieu Demetrios from the first moment she had set eyes on him. Maybe he was right, maybe it was about something programmed into her genes, but frankly she didn't care.

It didn't matter, she realised with a sense of relief—she had moved beyond the guilt, the tortuous heart-searching and trying to make sense of it.

Even if this was the worst decision of her life she was going to make it happen…Even if she spent the rest of her life regretting it, she wanted Mathieu so much it was more important than breathing and just as essential for her continued survival.

For the first time ever she understood the real meaning of all-consuming passion. She had met the love of her life and she might not be destined to spend the rest of her life with him, but she was going to savour every moment that she did have.

‘How can you be surprised? You must know how much I want you.'

‘Tell me,' she whispered in a husky voice he had to strain to hear.

He expelled a long deep breath and said, ‘I'll show you.'

She let out a small shriek as he cupped her bottom and lifted her upwards. As he swung her around and began to stride towards the bedroom door she wrapped her legs around his waist and, pressing her breasts against his chest, linked her arms around his neck.

She fitted her mouth to his and kissed him hungrily, opening her mouth in response to his probing tongue, and groaned into his mouth as the kiss deepened. When she came up for air her fingers still curled into the hair on the nape of his neck.

They were both breathing hard as they stared into each other's eyes.

‘You're staring,' he said thickly.

She nodded. ‘At your mouth. I think,' she mused, ‘that it is one of my most favourite things in the world.' It was strange not to be censoring her words, strange in a good way.

‘Your mouth is in my top ten,' he admitted, ‘and, while kissing it is even higher, you do realise that if you carry on doing that we're never going to make it to the bedroom.'

‘Beds are good, but the floor is fine.' Did I really just say that?

‘True, but the thing is I've been imagining you naked with your hair spread out over silk sheets since the moment I met you.'

He'd been imagining her, imagining her being some red-hot lover…Rose's insecurities came crowding in. She really ought to tell him up front there was every possibility she would be rubbish…enthusiastic but rubbish.

‘What's wrong?'

For once she wasn't dismayed by his ability to read her thoughts. ‘I don't want to make a mess of this.'

She leaned close so that her nose almost grazed his, her nostrils quivering as she inhaled the musky scent of his arousal overlaid by the light citrus tones of the obviously expensive cologne he favoured.

He was so totally delicious, everything about him fascinated and excited her.

‘Not possible.'

‘You say that now, but—'

‘Shut up.'

He was kissing her so she didn't have very much option and, anyway, about two seconds into the kiss she forgot what she wanted to say. A second after that she forgot her own name.

Still kissing her, he carried her across the room to the bed where he laid her down. Then not taking his eyes off her, he began to remove his clothes, the task made more difficult by the fact his hands were shaking so much.

He had fought his way out of his shirt and kicked off his trousers when she sat up and stretched her arms out to him. Not able to resist the invitation in her glorious golden eyes another moment, he knelt beside her on the bed.