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‘Older or younger than you?’
‘Slightly younger.’
Jordan gave her a considering glance, sensing there was something that Stephanie wasn’t telling him. ‘How much younger?’ he prompted slowly.
Her eyes glittered in the firelight as she glared across at him. ‘About five minutes!’
‘Why, Stephanie,’ Jordan murmured teasingly, ‘does this mean that you’re a twin, too?’
Her mouth thinned. ‘Yes.’
‘And are you identical?’
‘Yes.’
Jordan’s brows rose incredulously. ‘You mean there are two of you with that unusual red and cinnamon-coloured hair, those flashing green eyes, a determined chin and an infuriatingly stubborn temperament?’
Those green eyes instantly flashed. ‘I do not have a stubborn temperament!’
‘And the grass isn’t green or the sky blue,’ he retorted.
‘Sometimes they aren’t!’ she pointed out triumphantly.
‘I’m sure that once in a blue moon you aren’t stubborn, either,’ Jordan jeered. He gave her a considering look. ‘Let me guess—Joey has short red hair and tends to wear mainly dark business suits and silk blouses?’
Stephanie gasped. ‘How could you possibly know that?
Jordan shrugged. ‘For the same reason Gideon and I are completely unalike in our tastes—twin or not, no one really wants to be a clone of another person.’
‘But you and Gideon aren’t identical.’
‘In colouring, no,’ Jordan said. ‘But we’re the same height, and we have a similar facial structure.’ He smiled. ‘Maybe we should introduce your twin sister to my twin brother and see what happens? As they’re both lawyers they already have something in common.’
Stephanie knew exactly what would happen if the fiercely independent and outspoken Joey ever met either of Jordan’s arrogant older brothers: sparks would most definitely fly!
‘Perhaps not,’ Jordan acknowledged dryly, seeming to read her mind. ‘Much as they sometimes annoy the hell out of me, I’m not sure I would want to wish that onto either of my brothers.’
Stephanie bristled. ‘Meaning?’
‘Meaning that having one stubborn McKinley sister around is more than enough for any man.’ He laughed huskily.
The wine had obviously relaxed Jordan. So much so that he was back to tormenting her. Making her less wary of his hair-trigger temper and more aware of the dizzying attraction of him that could be so utterly mesmerising.
Stephanie moistened dry lips as she stood up restlessly. ‘I think I’ll just go and check on dinner—’
Jordan reached out to grasp hold of her arm as she passed his chair, his fingers like steel bands about her wrist. ‘There’s nothing in the oven that will spoil, is there?’
She sincerely hoped that the sudden thundering of her heart at Jordan’s touch wasn’t echoed by the pulse beating beneath his fingers! ‘Not really.’ She swallowed hard. ‘I just thought—’
‘You think far too much, Steph. Why don’t you just allow yourself to feel for a change?’ he encouraged softly.
Stephanie was feeling too much already—that was the problem!
She could feel the strength of Jordan’s fingers curled about her flesh, the firm caress of his thumb against that rapidly beating pulse in her inner wrist, the heat of those gold-coloured eyes on her moist and parted lips, then moving lower to her rising and falling breasts. Holding her captive. Drawing her into the deep well of sensuality she could feel rising between them…
‘I believe I told you not to call me Steph,’ she murmured breathily.
‘Your lips have told me several things that aren’t echoed by your body language,’ he murmured as he placed his wine glass down onto the table. ‘You obviously have feeding me well in hand, so perhaps now would be a good time for you to amuse me,’ he suggested softly as he tugged firmly on her wrist.
Stephanie tried to resist that tug. And failed. Instead she overbalanced and toppled over the arm of the chair to end up sitting on Jordan’s thighs as he took her into his waiting arms. ‘Jordan, this is definitely not a good idea—’
‘I’m all out of good ideas, Stephanie,’ Jordan said gruffly. ‘Let’s go with a bad one, instead, hmm?’ he encouraged, as his head began to lower towards hers. ‘They’re usually much more fun, anyway.’
Jordan was going to kiss her. More than kiss her, Stephanie knew as she became instantly mesmerised by the intensity of his gaze.
‘Maybe we’ll have more success with this sitting down,’ he murmured throatily, his breath a warm caress against her parted lips.
Stephanie attempted one last appeal for sanity. ‘Jordan, we really can’t do this.’
‘Oh, but we really can,’ he muttered, and his lips finally claimed hers.
It was a slow and leisurely kiss as Jordan sipped and nibbled at Stephanie’s lips, tasting her, tantalising her, encouraging her to reciprocate, groaning low in his throat when her arm finally moved up about his shoulders and she pulled him down to her so that she could kiss him back.
Jordan felt a surge down the length of his spine as her fingers became entangled in the darkness of his hair when the kiss deepened, lips tasting, teeth gently biting, tongues dueling. Stephanie was obviously feeling a desire that was echoed in the pulsing hardness of Jordan’s thighs.
He shifted slightly in the chair, so that Stephanie lay back against the arm of the chair as his mouth left hers to trail sensuously down the long column of her throat, his tongue rasping across that silky flesh. She tasted of warmth and sunshine, the lightness of her perfume shadowed by the essence of sweet arousal. An arousal that reflected the hot demand rising inside Jordan to once again hear those panting little cries and breathy groans as he pleasured her.
His hand moved caressingly beneath the soft wool of her sweater as he continued to taste that creamy throat. Stephanie’s skin was as smooth as silk and just as delicious. He touched. Cupped her breast. Gently squeezed the rosy-pink nipple and then stroked that sensitive tip. Pushed the softness of her jumper up and feasted his gaze on those small and perfect breasts before lowering his head and claiming one of those roused tips in the heat of his mouth.
‘Jordan!’ Stephanie’s back arched into his caress even as she gasped at the intimacy.
His mouth reluctantly released her, his eyes hot and dark as he looked down at that plump and moist nipple. ‘You’re too delicious for me to stop, love,’ he murmured admiringly, and he stroked his thumb lightly over that plumpness before turning his attention to its twin, his tongue circling rhythmically across that rosy nub before drawing it into his mouth deeply, hungrily.
Stephanie was totally lost to sensation, her hand cradling the back of Jordan’s head as his tongue rasped skilfully across her swollen nipple. The rush of pleasure between her thighs moistened her, even as she felt herself ache for him to touch her there too…
Jordan’s eyes glowed deeply gold as he raised his head and held her gaze with his. He unbuttoned the fastening on her jeans before slowing pulling down the zip to reveal the black lace panties she wore beneath.
Stephanie couldn’t move, couldn’t breathe, moaning softly as Jordan lowered his head. She felt the softness of his tongue circling her navel, increasing the heat between her thighs as he plunged into that sensitive indentation even as his hands moved up her ribcage to cup and squeeze her breasts, to capture the swollen nipples once again in a rolling caress.
She was on fire. Hot. Aching. Wet. Needing. Oh, God, needing…!
Jordan answered that need as one of his hands moved to lie flat against the skin just below her waist before moving lower, and then lower still, slipping easily beneath the lace of her panties to seek out the silky damp curls below.
Stephanie cried out as he drew one finger lightly over and around the already swollen nubbin nestled amongst those curls. Over and over again. Round and round. Touching. Pressing. A rhythmic caress that increased the pressure building deep inside her.
Her cries became shaky gasps as she felt herself approaching a climax. Her fingers dug painfully into Jordan’s shoulders as his lips and tongue continued to arouse her breasts and pleasure built and built inside her, driving her higher and higher. But he seemed to know exactly when to stop the intensity of those caresses to hold her time and time again on the edge of that release.
‘Please, Jordan!’ Stephanie finally gasped. She was going insane with need. Immeasurable ecstasy was just beyond her reach.
Jordan’s mouth pulled on her breast at the exact moment he slid one long and penetrating finger inside the hot moistness of her, quickly joined by a second, stretching her, widening her to accommodate that invasion, even as the soft pad of his thumb continued to caress her sensitive nubbin.
Stephanie became so wet, so swollen, and those long fingers continued to plunge into her rhythmically, again and again, faster, harder, until the caresses pushed her over the edge into a climax so deep and prolonged it totally took her breath away and she could only cling onto him as she moved her hips into the burning intensity of that pulsing pleasure.
Jordan continued his caresses long after she had climaxed, the hardness of his own arousal continuing to pulse to the same rhythm as the echoing quivers still shaking her inside, and threatening to cause him to self-combust.
He had never been a selfish lover, finding as much satisfaction in giving his partner pleasure as he did in his own, and so he ignored the pulsing of his own body now to continue those caresses, wanting—needing—to give Stephanie every last vestige of physical pleasure.
He was less pleased with the sudden look of panicked awareness that widened those beautiful green eyes minutes later, as she returned to full awareness of where she was and what had just happened between them. ‘It’s okay, Steph,’ he reassured her huskily.
‘It is not okay!’ she groaned self-consciously.
‘Believe me, it is,’ he soothed, even as he slowly, carefully, disengaged his fingers from her quivering flesh before refastening her jeans and pulling her sweater down. But not before he had given in to the temptation to gently kiss the slight redness of her breasts, where the stubble of his day’s growth of beard had rubbed against that delicate skin.
He would have to shave twice a day if he wanted to do this again; he hated seeing even the slightest blemish on that perfect creamy skin.
His gaze was hooded when he finally looked up, to see that her face was flushed and her eyes fever-bright with uncertainty. ‘You were beautiful, Stephanie,’ he told her.
Her eyes were wide as she moistened dry lips with the tip of her little pink tongue. ‘I—What about you? You didn’t—’
‘We have all night,’ Jordan cut in as his hands moved gently from her breast to her thigh.
Her frown was pained. ‘We really shouldn’t—’
‘We really should,’ he insisted firmly.
She shook her head, her gaze not quite meeting his. ‘I’m not sure I’ll be able to stay on here if this is going to happen.’
Jordan’s arms tightened about her as she struggled to stand up. ‘Stay, Stephanie. Please.’
She looked up at him shyly. ‘But—’
‘If I had known you wanted to be alone, Jord, then I would have just telephoned you instead of flying up here to speak to you in person!’ a mocking voice drawled behind them.
Jordan didn’t need to turn and look across the room in order to know that the voice belonged to his twin brother Gideon…
CHAPTER SEVEN
‘OH, GOD!’ Stephanie gave a devastated groan and buried her heated cheeks against Jordan’s chest after shooting a single glance across the room and seeing the devastatingly handsome blond-haired, dark-eyed man who stood in the open doorway, looking back at her with a cynical expression on his face.
‘Not quite,’ the man said derisively.
‘Not even close, Gideon,’ Jordan retorted.
‘I guess you were a little too…preoccupied to hear the helicopter landing fifteen minutes ago?’ Gideon said pointedly.
‘I guess we were,’ Jordan said acerbically. ‘Does that mean that Lucan is here, too?’ The scowl could be heard in his tone.
‘I flew myself up.’
‘Why?’
There was a short, telling pause. ‘I would rather we talked in private, Jordan.’
‘Not yet,’ Jordan said grimly, his arms tightening about Stephanie as she trembled against him. ‘How about giving the two of us a few minutes’ privacy, Gideon?’
‘By all means,’ the other man murmured. ‘Would you like me to continue waiting in the kitchen or—?’
‘Will you just go, Gid?’ Jordan grated harshly, and Stephanie gave another groan as she burrowed even deeper against his chest.
Stephanie wanted to die of embarrassment! She had never felt quite so much like crawling away and digging a hole before burying herself in it! She had done some stupid things in her life, but surely never anything quite so stupid as this?
Not only had she become totally lost in Jordan’s kisses and caresses, but there had been a witness to that loss of control. Not just any witness, either, but obviously Jordan’s twin brother!
‘It’s okay, Stephanie, he’s gone; you can come out now,’ Jordan cajoled.
Gideon St Claire might indeed have left the room, but Jordan certainly hadn’t. And Stephanie was no more eager to look him in the face again after what had just happened than she was his brother.
What on earth had possessed her to behave in that totally uninhibited way?
With Jordan Simpson, of all men!
She had no choice now—no more arguments to make to the contrary. She had to leave. Immediately. She couldn’t stay on here another minute, another second—
‘Stephanie, calm down!’ Jordan ordered as she sat up and began to struggle for release from his restraining arms. ‘We’re both consenting adults and—Damn it, Stephanie, we haven’t done anything wrong.’
Stephanie stopped struggling long enough to glare up at him. ‘You may not have done, but I certainly have!’ She gave a self-disgusted shake of her head, eyes huge in the pallor of her face. ‘I have to leave right now, Jordan.’
‘Why do you?’ His arms tightened about her. ‘Gideon never stays long.’
‘As far as I’m concerned he’s been here far too long already!’ Her eyes flashed with the glitter of the emeralds they resembled as she glared up at him. ‘Let go of me,’ she pleaded, as she attempted to stand up and found the tightening of Jordan’s arms once again prevented her from doing so.
His jaw was clenched. ‘Not until you calm down.’
Stephanie was calm. Or as calm as she was ever going to be when she had just made a complete idiot of herself. Not just with Jordan, but in front of his brother too…
Stephanie inwardly cringed as she thought of how intimately Jordan had touched her. How completely unravelled she had become under the influence of those caresses. How her body, her breasts, were still so highly sensitised she could feel the brush of her clothing against her skin. How the heat of her thighs still quaked and trembled in the aftermath of that earth-shattering climax!
Jordan shrugged. ‘I accept it was a little inconvenient, having Gideon walk in on us like that, but—’
‘A little inconvenient?’ Stephanie gave a humourless laugh as she finally managed to wrench herself out of Jordan’s arms and surged forcefully to her feet, straightening and fastening her clothing before turning back to glower down at him. ‘How long do you think your brother was standing there? Do you think that he saw—that he heard—?’ She broke off with a groan as she thought of the way she had cried out loud as those powerful waves of release had surged through her.
Jordan shook his head. ‘Even if Gideon did see or hear anything, I assure you he’s too much of a gentleman ever to mention it.’
‘You’re just making the situation worse, Jordan!’ Stephanie said in protest, and raised her hands to the heat of her cheeks.
Jordan could see that as far as Stephanie was concerned that was exactly what he was doing. But, while he accepted that it was a little awkward to have had Gideon walk in on them in that way, he didn’t consider it quite as cataclysmic as Stephanie seemed to. ‘Look, just put it to the back of your mind—’
‘That’s easy for you to say when you weren’t the one caught in a compromising position!’
Jordan watched as Stephanie began to agitatedly pace the room, obviously unaware that her hair had come loose during their lovemaking and now fell in a fiery cascade about her shoulders, the firelight picking out the gold and cinnamon highlights amongst the fiery red.
She looked beautiful. Wild and wanton. Like a woman who had just been thoroughly made love to. Only not quite as thoroughly as he’d have liked!
‘Oh, I’m pretty sure that I was there too,’ he pointed out, the tightening throbbing of his arousal a sharp reminder that he hadn’t attained that same release.
Her eyes narrowed to icy-green slits. ‘I should warn you, Jordan, I’m not in the mood right now to appreciate your warped sense of humour.’
‘Then stop making such a big deal out of this,’ he snapped, his expression grim as he reached for his cane and rose awkwardly to his feet. It eased the confines of his painfully engorged arousal, if nothing else!
‘It is a big deal, damn it!’ Stephanie said emotionally. ‘Not only do I not normally behave in that—that abandoned way, but I certainly don’t do it in front of an audience.’
‘I told you—Gideon won’t refer to it again if you don’t.’
‘As if I ever want to think about it again, let alone talk about it!’ Stephanie exclaimed.
Jordan’s mouth tightened and he suddenly became very still. ‘Why is that, exactly?’ His voice was silky soft. Deadly.
‘Why?’ she repeated incredulously.
‘Yes—why?’
‘Surely it’s obvious?’
A nerve pulsed in Jordan’s tightly clenched jaw. ‘You wanted it. I wanted it. And as I said we’re both well over the age of consent—so what’s your problem?’ he snarled.
‘My problem is that Lucan hired me to be your physiotherapist, not to go to bed with you,’ she told him heatedly.
‘I don’t need a physiotherapist—’
‘Oh, yes you do—’
‘And we didn’t go anywhere near a bed,’ Jordan continued coldly.
He just wasn’t getting this, Stephanie realised impatiently. And why should he? Gideon was his brother, and if his closeness to his twin was anything like her own to Joey, then Jordan felt none of the awkwardness at his brother’s intrusion into their lovemaking that Stephanie did. But then, he wasn’t the one who had totally lost control. Who had screamed in ecstasy as he found release—
Oh, God, Jordan’s hands had been all over her body! In her body!
Stephanie sat down abruptly in one of the armchairs, putting her hands completely over the heat of her face as she felt the tears well up before falling hotly down her cheeks.
Jordan stared down in utter frustration at Stephanie’s bent head as he heard her quiet sobs, having absolutely no idea what he should do or say next. In his experience women didn’t usually cry after he had made love to them!
They didn’t usually cry after they had made love with world-famous actor Jordan Simpson, he reminded himself grimly; the crippled, useless Jordan St Claire was obviously something else entirely. Someone else entirely!
God, how he hated feeling so damned helpless. So unlike himself. It was—
‘I’ve been thinking…’
Jordan turned fiercely at the sound of his brother’s voice. ‘Get out of here, Gideon!’
‘That I’m probably an unwanted third,’ his brother finished unhurriedly, and gave a pointed look in the direction of the obviously upset Stephanie. ‘I can easily book into the pub in the village for the night and come back in the morning.’
‘No!’ Stephanie looked up to protest, hastily drying her cheeks as she stood up. ‘Of course you mustn’t leave, Mr St Claire—’
‘Gideon,’ he invited coolly. ‘Mr St Claire makes me sound too much like my older brother.’
‘Whatever,’ she dismissed uncomfortably. ‘You have as much right to stay here as Jordan does. I’m the one who should leave.’
‘Oh, I doubt my baby brother would be too happy about that,’ Gideon said, after a swift glance in Jordan’s direction.
The two brothers were like two sides of a negative, Stephanie suddenly realized: Jordan’s hair was long and dark, whereas his brother’s was the colour of gold and styled ruthlessly short. Jordan’s eyes were the same gold as his brother’s hair, and Gideon’s eyes were so dark and hard they appeared almost black. And the contrast in the way they were dressed was just as extreme. Jordan’s clothes were casual; Gideon St Claire wore tailored black trousers and a black cashmere sweater over a grey shirt unbuttoned at the throat, his black leather shoes obviously handmade.
They were also two of the most devastatingly handsome men Stephanie had ever set eyes on!
‘You’re right. He wouldn’t like that,’ Jordan answered his brother. ‘Let’s get the introductions over with and go on from there, shall we?’ he suggested. ‘Stephanie, meet my brother Gideon St Claire. Gideon, this is Stephanie McKinley.’
Stephanie didn’t know quite what to make of the fact that he didn’t add anything else to his introduction to explain what she was actually doing there. Although she didn’t feel too inclined to explain what she was doing there to the haughty Gideon St Claire, either, after the intimacy of the scene he had walked in on only minutes ago!
‘Mr St Claire,’ she said with a stiff nod.
‘Miss McKinley,’ he murmured, his features every bit as hard and chiselled as his twin’s.
Stephanie had no doubt this cynically tough man was a formidable lawyer. She would have to ask Joey if she had ever met him in court…
‘McKinley…?’ Gideon St Claire repeated slowly, his dark gaze narrowing on her in shrewd assessment. ‘Red hair. Green eyes. Hmm.’ His mouth compressed. ‘You wouldn’t happen to be related to Josephine McKinley, would you?’ he asked.
Oh, dear Lord! Stephanie’s sister and this man had met. But when? And where? Please, please, God, let it not be in any way connected with the Newmans’ pending divorce case!
Just thinking of Jordan’s reaction if he learned that she was being named as the ‘other woman’ in a divorce—albeit falsely—after the disgust he had shown for his own father’s infidelity, was enough to make her feel ill.
‘Her twin.’ Jordan was the one to answer his brother—economically. ‘And apparently she hates to be called Josephine,’ he added.
‘Do you know my sister, Mr St Claire?’ Stephanie eyed Gideon warily.
‘Not personally, no,’ he said. ‘I have heard of her, though,’ he added.
And nothing good, either, if the hard glitter in those piercing dark eyes and the contemptuous curl of those sculptured lips was any indication!
Stephanie knew that Joey had earned herself something of a reputation in the courts of law these last three years, and that many of her colleagues considered her to be ruthless and uncompromising in defence of her clients. Character traits Stephanie would have thought a man like Gideon St Claire, who so obviously possessed those same traits himself, would have appreciated.
‘What are you doing here, Gideon?’ Jordan demanded—and thankfully saved Stephanie from having to make any sort of reply to his twin’s enigmatic comment about her sister!
Instead of answering his brother, Gideon turned those cool, dark eyes on Stephanie. ‘I thought I smelt something burning when I was in the kitchen…’
‘The lasagne!’ Stephanie wailed as she remembered the food she had left cooking in the oven earlier. Before Jordan had begun making love to her and she had forgotten all about it! ‘Excuse me.’ She shot the two men a bright, meaningless smile before hurrying from the room.
It was patently obvious that Gideon wanted to talk to Jordan alone, and Stephanie was glad of an excuse to escape the intensity of emotion in being in the presence of two of the arrogantly overwhelming St Claire brothers.