‘It’s decision time,’ Dante said, edging closer, touching the pads of his fingers to her cheek, his touch electric. ‘So what’s it to be? Close down the hotel or warm my bed and give your colleagues a fighting chance? It’s up to you.’

Mackenzi shied away from his hand—more to hide the tremors that resonated through her than from any revulsion to his touch. ‘With no guarantees, of course.’

‘Life doesn’t come with guarantees. The fate of Ashton House is up to you. Decide.’

She squeezed her eyes shut, wishing she could so easily block out the scent of him and the acute awareness of his presence that fired her skin to simmering heat. It was an outrageous demand, no kind of deal at all, and she should turn him down flat. But in standing up for herself she’d be letting the hotel down. And in agreeing to share his bed the hotel might be spared after all. Did she really have a choice?

‘Yes,’ she whispered through lips suddenly ashen- dry.

‘I didn’t hear you,’ he said, extracting every last shred of humiliation from her.

‘Yes,’ she repeated, louder this time. ‘I’ll sleep with you.’

He smiled then, a smile that simultaneously turned her thoughts to panic and her nipples to bullets. ‘I knew you’d see reason.’

Trish Morey is an Australian who’s also spent time living and working in New Zealand and England. Now she’s settled with her husband and four young daughters in a special part of South Australia, surrounded by orchards and bushland, and visited by the occasional koala and kangaroo. With a lifelong love of reading, she penned her first book at age eleven, after which life, career and a growing family kept her busy, until once again she could indulge her desire to create characters and stories—this time in romance. Having her work published is a dream come true. Visit Trish at her website, www.trishmorey.com

Recent titles by the same author:

THE SHEIKH’S CONVENIENT VIRGIN

THE BOSS’S CHRISTMAS BABY

THE SPANIARD’S BLACKMAILED BRIDE

THE GREEK’S VIRGIN

A VIRGIN FOR THE TAKING

The Italian Boss’s Mistress Of Revenge

Trish Morey

www.millsandboon.co.uk

To my big sister, Toni.

Congratulations on achieving your half-century!

Happy birthday, Sis. Here’s to the next 50 years With much love, Trish xxx

CHAPTER ONE

IT WAS a filthy night. Which suited Dante Carrazzo’s filthy mood right down to the ground.

The BMW’s windscreen wipers struggled to keep pace with the blinding rain, while its headlights picked out little more in the night fog than the ghostly shadows of gum trees looming claw-like over the unfamiliar Adelaide Hills road. If there was a boutique-hotel anywhere in the area, it sure didn’t want to be found.

Which was probably no surprise, given his plans for it.

He steered the car tight around another bend, his frustration mounting as his headlights met nothing other than their own reflection over a slick ribbon of road disappearing into the gloom.

Tiredness tugged at his senses and stung his eyes, eight hours behind the wheel after a full day’s battling to bring the Quinn deal to fruition starting to take its toll. Dante clamped down on the weakness the same way he did any other, forcing himself to alertness. It had been a long time, but he knew this was the right road. It had to be here, hidden under this blanket of fog, somewhere…

He was past the poorly lit turn-off before he realized it. With a muttered curse, he wheeled the car around at the first opportunity and headed back, pulling the car into the long driveway and towards the distant, eerie glow of lights that heralded his destination.

Ashton House.

At last.

Shrouded in swirling mist, the old mansion turned boutique-hotel looked almost sinister, its windows dark and unwelcoming, the old sandstone walls glowing unnaturally in the muted lantern light. He parked the car, mentally adding to his description the words, “brooding” and “resentful”.

Almost as if it hated him just as much as he hated every last thing it represented.

So be it.

The fog wrapped around him as he stepped from the car, icy droplets stinging his skin. He pulled his bag from the car and strode the few feet to the arched entrance-lobby, leaning against the night bell as he swiped the dampness from his coat. He waited precisely ten seconds before pressing it again.

‘I have a reservation,’ he said, brushing past the open- mouthed night clerk into the warm interior the second the door finally opened.

Behind him he heard the massive timber-panelled door being shut, closing out the swirling mist and cold. ‘I’ll certainly check for you, sir,’ said the clerk, making his way to the polished timber reception-counter. ‘Although I’m afraid we seem to have a full house tonight.’

Dante fixed the clerk with a stare that would splinter rocks. ‘I hope that doesn’t mean you’ve given my room away.’

The clerk frowned, his eyes flicking nervously away to his screen. ‘It will only take a moment to check, sir. What name did you say?’

‘I didn’t. And it’s Carrazzo. Dante Carrazzo.’

‘Ah!’ The clerk straightened as if someone had shoved an iron rod up his spine. Dante caught the smell of fear that came with it. It came as no surprise. All of the staff would be wondering—now that he owned Ashton House lock, stock and barrel—exactly what it was he had in mind for it. All of them would be on tenterhooks.

He allowed himself a wry smile. Given his reputation, they had a right to be.

‘We…we weren’t expecting you tonight, not with all the Melbourne airports closed.’

‘Do you have a room for me or not?’ His eyes were stinging again, indigestion burning his stomach. After the day and night he’d had, what he needed right now was a few hours of precious sleep, not a discussion about his travel arrangements. And if they’d given away his room…

‘I’m sorry. Of course, sir,’ the night clerk blustered, passing a pen for Dante to sign the register, while at the same time reaching for the room key. ‘Your suite was held. It’s just that we didn’t expect you until morning.’

‘Last time I looked,’ he replied smoothly, his voice modulated to low while every word was aimed like a barb, ‘it was morning. Now, what time will the manager be here?’

‘Mac—Mackenzi will be on from seven.’

‘Good,’ he said, scribbling his signature on the registration form. ‘Have this Mackenzi meet me in the restaurant at nine. Now, remind me where I can find this suite…’ The clerk gave him directions as soon as Dante had convinced him he was capable of carrying his own luggage. But he’d barely started down the passageway before he heard his name.

He turned on a sigh, impatient and unimpressed. ‘What is it?’

The clerk shrank noticeably in response, as if already wishing he could take back his interruption. ‘I meant to tell you, Mr Carrazzo, the staff organized a welcome package for you. You’ll find it waiting in your suite. But please, don’t hesitate to let me know if there’s anything else you need.’

‘Oh, don’t worry,’ he growled, ‘I will.’ He turned and made his way down the old stone-walled billiards room, and through the passageway that led to the wing where the presidential suite took up half the space. If the staff really believed something as insignificant as a welcome package was going to change his mind about this place, then they were in for a major disappointment.

The plush carpet absorbed his footfall. The hotel slept silently around him, the only sound the burst of rain against the roof signalling the end of the brief respite, while the distant roll of thunder promised still more bad weather to come.

Weariness dragged at him now, muting the feeling of triumph that had come with learning Ashton House was his. He paused and took a breath, the key lodged deep into the timber double-doors that marked the entry to his suite—the same suite that Jonas and Sara Douglas had shared seventeen years ago.

Seventeen years it had taken him to get here.

Seventeen years, and now the last asset, the jewel in the crown of the Douglas Property Group, was finally his. That deserved some kind of celebratory toast, surely?

The door swung open to a dimly lit corridor as the heavens really opened above, the noise from the rain now a deafening roar. The bedroom lay to the left, he seemed to recall, so instead he turned to the right, remembering a sitting room, snapping on the lights and immediately dimming them down low. He dropped his bag and opened a timber sideboard. Bingo. He emptied two tiny bottles into a tumbler and took a swig, rolling the malt whiskey around his tongue before tossing it back, appreciating the burst of fire all the way down to his belly. He sighed an appreciative sigh. He’d needed that.

A few seconds later and he’d shrugged out of his jacket and reefed out his shirt, unbuttoning his sleeves as he circled the room. Unexpectedly, it wasn’t at all cold in the suite, despite the two walls where uncovered French windows looked out into foggy rain-streaked blankness. Another wall held a door that he remembered led to the bathroom and connected with the bedroom beyond—and a bed that beckoned.

Could he sleep in a room that had once housed Sara and Jonas?

Oh, hell, yes! It would be nothing more than the sweet, satisfying taste of revenge that would fuel his dreams tonight.

He finished in the bathroom, leaving his clothes where they fell noiselessly under the hammer of rain on the roof, and stepped naked into the bedroom.

And that was when he found her.

CHAPTER TWO

THE NAKED SKIN of lean shoulder-blades glowed pearlescent under the wash of light angling from the bathroom door, while copper-lit mahogany hair flowed in waves across the pillow. Her face was turned away, but even shadows couldn’t hide the fine line of her jaw or the sweep of long lashes over high cheekbones.

Some welcome package, he thought with reluctant appreciation, muscle weariness morphing into testosterone- fuelled interest in an instant. He moved closer to the bed. By rights, his bed.

He had to hand it to the staff here, they were nothing if not creative. Nowhere else had the personnel tried the Goldilocks approach, trying to soften his attitude by pressing a little tender flesh onto him. And that flesh did look tender, he mused. Tender, smooth and very inviting.

Not that he was really interested. No-one decided who Dante Carrazzo slept with. And no whore was about to change his mind about what he had planned for this place. She would just have to find herself another bed to warm tonight. It shouldn’t take her long, given her obvious attributes.

He was about to rouse her when he caught sight of himself and cursed. In this state, he’d never convince her that her services weren’t required.

Wrapped in one of the white hotel-robes from the closet, he reached once again for her shoulder, just as a clap of thunder shook the room, the curtained windows lighting up a scant second later. She stirred and murmured, and he thought his job already done, but she merely rolled over, sinking back into oblivion on a sigh.

Breath hissed through his teeth as his eyes drank in the new, improved view. Even with her eyes closed she was some temptress, her lips full and inviting. But it was the cream-skinned breasts topped with dusky nipples that shook his resolve, nipples he could see were already firming with their exposure to the air.

Not the only things around here firming.

Heat targeted his groin, ramping up the pressure to an ache, and relaying the message that he was now way, way overdressed. What had been before no more than a general but suppressible interest in the fairer sex, had combusted into something much more carnal. Much more necessary. What would it take to wake her up? If she could sleep through a storm like this, it might take a while to wake her by conventional methods.

Which left him with the unconventional.

He made a sound like a growl. Maybe he had been too hasty, wanting to dispose of her so soon. It wasn’t like he was about to change his mind about this place, but he was due a celebration. What better place to have it than in the very room where Jonas and Sara had lain the night before they’d smiled like sharks and had told him the truth?

Pain, savage and raw, sliced through him at the memories, turning to bile in his throat, as if it had only been yesterday and not all those years ago.

Damn them! He would bury every part of their memory, every part of their legacy, just as he buried himself deep inside this woman.

Then he would toss her out.

He returned to the bathroom, locating what he needed before dispensing with the robe. Now it was time to find out just how difficult his Goldilocks would be to rouse. The more difficult the better, he acknowledged. For tonight he didn’t want conversation.

Tonight was all about retribution.

She was still on her back when he returned, her face to one side, her arms flung wide, her perfect breasts exposed for the taking. His taking. He took a moment to drink her in. The face was almost angelic in repose, while the naked form of a goddess called to him like a siren. He took in the twin globes of her breasts, and the shapely dip to her waist, and what lay lower, hidden for now by the covers, but hinting at more hidden treasures. If he wasn’t mistaken, her lower end was just as bare as her top—and, if he’d had any doubt that his surprise visitor wasn’t intended for his pleasure, the fact she lay there naked removed any such doubt in a heartbeat. So, she was into saving time? He appreciated such little economies, especially tonight.

He dragged in a sudden burst of air, and needed to balance the weight of blood pooling in his groin. He was glad she hadn’t awakened when that clap of thunder had rent the skies. This way would be much more entertaining. ‘And much more satisfying,’ he murmured as he gently knelt down on the bed alongside her.

She barely stirred, even when he pushed a wayward coil of hair from her face. Unable to resist a further touch, he ran the back of one finger down one shadowed cheek and was rewarded by the merest hint of a sigh, her lips parting as she drew in air, lifting her chest and doing amazing things to those breasts.

His gaze lingered there, taking in the creamy glow of her skin and the pebbled peaks of her breasts, calling to him now like beacons. He would answer that call, but there was no rush, and right now he hadn’t finished with her mouth.

With the pad of one thumb, he gently traced the outline of her lips, feeling her warm breath against his skin, taking her murmur of pleasure as a sign of encouragement.

He dipped his head, drinking in the warm, feminine scent of her skin before giving her mouth the briefest of passes. She sighed, her head rolling to one side. He brushed her lips with his own, finding them warm and welcoming. She moved under his mouth, even in sleep finding that sweet spot where their lips meshed perfectly, inviting him to linger, inviting him to explore further.

Reluctantly he pulled away, watching her shadowed face as her body reacted to what he was doing, looking for any hint of her wakefulness but finding none. It was different, he realized, pleasuring a woman asleep, different and more arousing. There was something more evocative, more empowering.

Sex by stealth.

He allowed himself a smile as his hand found her shoulder, cupping it, enjoying the contrast of toned flesh and bone under his hand as his mouth once again met hers. Even in sleep her movements mimicked his, wanting to participate, trying to hold on longer to the fantasy. His tongue traced the line of her mouth, and she shuddered beneath him, turning the kiss electric. ‘Oh, yes,’ she gasped into his mouth on a sigh.

Her breathing was quickening, and he lifted his head, half-surprised at the jolt he’d just experienced, half-expecting that first flicker of wakefulness, because he knew she’d felt it too. But still it didn’t come, despite the firmed breasts and jutting nipples, despite the noticeable shallow hitch to her breathing. She was dreaming about sex, he could tell, imagining a lover who visited deep in the night and made her every wish come true.

He growled and gave a smile. Only too soon she would open those eyes and discover he was real. What colour would those eyes be? he wondered absently as he ran his fingertips along the curve of her collarbone. Brown, he decided, his fingers dipping into the space between them. They would have to be brown with her colouring. His hand made the return journey, his fingers spread wider this time so that his thumb scooped across the rise of her breasts.

This time she moaned, arching her back and shifting fractionally in her sleep, sending her bed clothes lower, exposing a hint of curvy waist above the sensual flare of hips. Honey-smooth skin, gleaming in the lowlight. His mouth went dry. Even asleep and unknowing she was an invitation. How much more so would she be when awake?

The ache in his groin turned more insistent, more demanding, the beast alive, wanting and hungry. Then she murmured something—a name, almost an entreaty. Richard?

Suddenly his little game lost appeal. Half of him wanted to take his time and play this game for all it was worth, to explore every curve and hollow of her flesh, to savour the secret pleasure while he waited for her to awaken, but the other half of him craved release. Release, followed by blessed sleep. The last thing he wanted was her thinking of someone else while he made love to her. He wanted her awake. He wanted her to realize just who it was making love to her, and then he’d proceed to obliterate every trace of ‘Richard’ from her memory.

And there would be time enough to explore later. Now it was time for business. His fingers scooped down her chest. Right now her breasts were at the top of his agenda.

‘Time you woke up, Goldilocks,’ he said, before his mouth descended on one perfect nipple.

The dream was back. Her night caller was here again—the one who spoke to Mackenzi not with words but with heated lips and sweet caresses, the dark stranger who drugged her with sensuality and reassured her that she was desirable and warm and all woman. The one who made her want to believe it.

And tonight he seemed more persuasive, more convincing and more real than ever.

But it was a dream—it was always a dream—and she knew the rules; that if she opened her eyes her dream lover would vanish and it would be over. And yet for just a dream her senses were buzzing, her pulse racing, and she wished more than anything that for once it was more than just a dream—because tonight she felt like a real woman, and because she wanted to believe, more than anything, what he was telling her.

So, so much!

She felt his fingers stroking her hair and her face, setting her skin tingling. She felt his lips pressed gently on her own, she even imagined she could feel his warm breath on her face.

So real.

So real that, she wondered, would tonight be the night? Or would her dream lover flee once more before the dawn and leave her tossing and turning, damp and slickened with sweat, yet still unfulfilled, and doubting herself more than ever?

And, worst of all, believing that what Richard had told her must be true.

That she was no kind of lover at all.

That she was frigid.

She drifted then, on a sea of sensation and unearthly pleasures, wondering vaguely why her mystery lover would return for a repeat performance if she was, wondering why only he seemed to unleash such unfamiliar passion in her. She sizzled inside now, as her mystery lover’s lips moved over hers, and heat became electric as she felt the dart of moist flesh zip from one side of her mouth to the other. She trembled under the caress, imagining that this time she could even taste him, while she willed his attentions on further. Further south. Where her need was building in an increasingly desperate ache.

If he could make her tremble like that by nothing more than a mere touch of his lips, what more could he do by moving his attention to other, more demanding locations?

She gave herself up to the sensations spiralling down her body, the sensual drug taking control as a familiar unfairness echoed once more through her senses. Richard. How was it that he had never elicited anywhere near such a physical response in her as her dream lover? Had it really been all her fault?

And then nothing mattered—not Richard, or her questions or her self-doubts. Her heart was beating so loudly now, her pulse a sensual drumbeat that turned to a throb deep down inside and drowned out such plaguing thoughts. If her dream lover could make her feel so good, so real, even just for the moment, then who cared? Not her. She just wanted to enjoy for as long as it lasted.

Sound outside her heartbeat interrupted her thoughts— a voice, and words that made no sense, tumbling together into fairy tales and nonsense—and then all was silent apart from her groan as she felt his tongue circle her nipple, sending flaming arrows deep down inside. From somewhere in the passion-blinded recesses of her mind it occurred to her: her dream lover had never spoken before, not with words.

Fear shimmied up her spine as she pushed away at the remnants of sleep, still at war with herself, torn between not wanting to do anything to banish her dream lover, and yet knowing that this time was different—that tonight something was majorly out of step.

Jagged lightning hastened her ascent, and she opened her eyes to a booming roll of thunder that made the building shake around her. Yet it was nothing compared to the thunderclap of finding his dark head at her breast.

It wasn’t a dream! The sensual web that had wound itself around her while she’d slept was no figment of her imagination, her arousal no fantasy. This man—and what he was doing to her—was shockingly real.

She cried out something garbled and panicked, jerking herself away, her hands reaching for the bed clothes and dragging them higher.

‘Good morning, Goldilocks, I was beginning to think you’d never wake up.’ His voice soothed, even as what felt like a steel band clamped around her, anchoring her to the bed. But she couldn’t have moved a muscle, even if she’d tried, not when another bolt of lightning lit up the room and the face of her dream lover with it.

A moment of frozen shock turned into a chill of abject horror, for even after the lightning had passed and the room plunged back into darkness, the lines and planes of the face hovering close remained boldly etched in her mind’s eye. The lines and planes of a face she knew only too well.

‘Dante!’

The very man with the power of life and death over the hotel. The very man she’d sworn to fight tooth and nail to ensure he wouldn’t destroy this property and the livelihoods of all who worked within it.

It hadn’t been a dream.

And the reality was far, far worse.

It was a nightmare.

He gave what looked in the gloom like a predatory smile, full of dark meaning and sinful intent, and she felt her insides lurch. He touched the back of the fingers of one hand to her cheek and against her better judgement it was all she could do not to lean into his electric touch. ‘I never would have guessed,’ he said cryptically, before unhooking the arm holding her prisoner and reaching for something on the bedside table. The spell broken, Mackenzi took the opportunity to back away across the mattress, clutching the bed clothes to breasts still too-acutely tingling after his tongue’s ministrations. She squeezed her eyes shut. Oh God, that had been Dante Carrazzo’s tongue!

‘I…I should be going,’ she stammered, still trying to come to terms with what he was doing here so early, and cursing herself for taking the easy option of making use of his vacant room rather than dragging a pull-out bed to the laundry. But even harder to come to terms with was how any man, least of all him, could have had that effect on her and made her feel so alive, so aroused.

And then she heard the rip of foil and he turned back with something in his hands, and she discovered in a rush of awareness something new about her late-night visitor— that, from what little light there was in the room, the gleam of his muscled torso told her he was, like her, completely and utterly naked. Her gaze moved lower and she swallowed, her tongue tied, her brain scrambled, forgetting everything in the rush of hormones that flooded her system.

Hormones she wasn’t supposed to have.

Hormones that wanted to leap from her skin when she watched in fascination as he rolled the condom along his long length. It was dark in the room, but even the shadows couldn’t disguise the dimensions being sheathed. How would that feel inside her? she wondered dry-mouthed as every bit of moisture in her body headed south. If indeed it were possible. And suddenly, inexplicably, insanely, she wanted more than anything to find out.

‘You don’t want to leave now,’ he assured her, taking advantage of her confusion when he’d finished his task to gather her in his arms, and leaving her to wonder whether now he’d taken to reading her mind. ‘Not when we’re only just getting to the main event.’

Even if she’d wanted to, she doubted she could have moved. Her body acted of its own volition, resisting any and all attempts to protect herself from his advances—especially when he dipped his head towards her breasts, his lips latching onto a nipple. She gasped, giving into temptation while battling to locate logical thought. This is a bad idea, she seemed to register from somewhere under the battery of sensations that accompanied his suckling. A very bad idea. But for the life of her she couldn’t work out why.

Not such a bad idea after all, another sinful voice crooned, if finally you get to experience what Richard’s been telling you you’re incapable of. And where’s the danger? the voice argued. It’s dark, he’ll be asleep in five minutes, and he’ll never even know it’s you.

He’ll never know it’s you.

The words echoed in her head like a mantra and she tried to keep hold of it, to believe it. She had to believe it. Because she’d reached the point of no return. Now there was no going back, no escape, even if she wanted to. She didn’t want to.

His hand ran down her side, tracing the curve of her hip and the outside line of her leg, and she shuddered into his touch. Then he turned at her knee and started the slow, sensual trip back along the inside. She pressed her head back into the bed. Had anyone ever died of anticipation? When his hand found her curls and lingered there, combing her lazily with his fingers, she could believe it. When he parted her and found that tightly wired centre of her existence, jolting her like an electric shock, she could almost believe she had.

‘Please,’ she urged, not sure what she was asking for, just that it be mercifully quick.

His heated mouth moved to her throat, nuzzling below her ear and turning her spine along with her defences to liquid. So it was no wonder that her legs fell open when he levered himself up and positioned himself between them.

Later she knew she would be shocked by her complicity, but what choice did she have? If only it didn’t feel so good, she told herself. If only it didn’t feel so right. But how could she fight what felt so essentially good? And how could she fight what seemed so essential?

It was as if her dream lover had come to life and had stayed to beckon her on, even after she’d opened her eyes. It was as if her every wish for sexual gratification had come true. She was too far gone, too fuelled by a sensuous dream that had primed her senses to within a fraction of release, her body already hell-bent on a course that demanded completion, a completion drawing deliciously closer by the second.

He nudged, poised against her opening, and her whole being focused on that one spot, that one sensation, where her muscles instinctively tightened to draw him in. She reached for him then, unable to pretend she was uninvolved, that this was merely something happening to her. For she was part of this too. Hot and smooth, skin had never felt so delicious, and it was impossible to resist running her hands down his toned sides to his flanks, drinking in the heat through her palms, testing the firmness of his tight buttocks with her fingers.

He groaned against her throat, and gave a thrust of his hips that sent him surging into her. So this was how it felt, she thought, as every nerve ending in her body lurched with the thrill, every muscle focused on accommodating him; this was what it should be like.

He pulled away, and she wanted to cry out with the sense of loss, but he returned on another stroke, pressing deeper, giving her more of him. She accepted hungrily, a delicious pressure mounting inside her, and each successive thrust taking him further until he was planted deep inside. He paused then, and if that had been the end of it it would have been enough, the sensations he’d awakened in her already too many and too wondrous to catalogue. But he started to move again, to rock back and forth, setting up a rhythm, a delicious friction. She angled her hips up to receive him, as if it were possible to take him deeper still, using muscles she’d never known she had, making moves she hadn’t known she knew, feeling things she hadn’t known possible to feel.

Already she wanted to cry out in exhilaration for all she felt, and still he was taking her higher.

Her hands clung to his chest, clung to heated skin now slick with sweat, against chest hair that coiled possessively around her fingers, against a nipple that intruded tight into her palm as his heartbeat thumped out a song to lure her in. She tossed her head from side to side as he continued the onslaught, leaving her gasping for air as her senses seemed determined to spiral out of control.

But instead of oxygen the air she breathed was filled with the scent of him, the testosterone-laden notes intoxicating, compelling, compounding the experience until he was everywhere—inside her, around her, in the air she breathed.

His pace was frantic, her own need building with it, having no choice but to go with the forces spiralling inside her. He dropped his head to one breast and took a nipple deep into his mouth, suckling on it tightly and triggering what felt like lightning bolts inside her. Her back arched and her fingers lodged tight in his skin, the combination of excruciating pleasure and exquisite pain connecting with the delicious fullness between her thighs, completing the circuit.

She came apart like the force of a sky rocket, exploding into myriad tiny stars that sparkled and shone and floated on the breeze as they drifted back down to earth.

He followed her, pumping his release with a roar that sounded like a cry of victory, before collapsing alongside her on the bed.

She dragged up the sheet and lay there panting, staring up at the darkened ceiling, disbelief uppermost in her mind. Disbelief that someone who’d been told she was frostier than the polar ice-caps could have burned up so completely with a stranger. Disbelief that that stranger should be none other than Dante Carrazzo.

Fear zipped down her spine. Now that she’d been satisfied, now that she’d given into her body’s desperate desires, there was no place for her mind to hide, no place for her fear.

What the hell had she done?

She squeezed her eyes closed, clamping one hand over her mouth to prevent her from crying out in distress. What had she been thinking? How could she have allowed anyone—especially him—to do that to her?

But there’d been no room for thinking, no room for logic, not with the bevy of sensations he’d triggered off inside her. Even now her muscles still hummed, as if clinging onto the memories of unfamiliar passion. Unfamiliar yet very welcome passion.

Would she have done anything differently if she’d had her time over? She doubted it. She dragged in a breath, sorting out her options.

He’ll never know it’s you. The words of her mantra came back to her. She stole a sideways look at him. Oh no, it wasn’t as simple as that. Dante Carrazzo couldn’t recognize her—or her cause was doomed even before she’d started.

She sensed the subtle change in him that she hoped signalled sleep. She turned her head as the digital clock behind him flicked over to three a. m., the light from the display casting a red glow on his outline, making him look even more ruthless than she knew him to be, the chiselled line of his jaw hard and uncompromising, his mouth set and unyielding.

Unlike before…

She waited a few moments more, listening to the steady rhythm of his breathing and assuring herself he was really asleep, before easing herself from the bed, gathering up the pile of folded clothes she’d left on an armchair and bolting from the room.

Oh no. She would not think about how amazing that mouth had felt on her skin.

She would not!

CHAPTER THREE

HE WAS ALREADY waiting for her, seated in a private alcove at the far side of the busy restaurant, his attitude bearing all the hallmarks of one reputed to be so ruthless in business, his expression grim and with a jaw that looked as if it was used to being permanently clenched. Even so, there was a something about him that kept female heads around him turning. It wasn’t that he was classically handsome under that dark scowl, with too many strong angles, too many shadowed recesses, and too little compassion marking his features. It was more a kind of terrible beauty that he wore, a smouldering intensity. Compelling. Dangerous.

Just looking at him was enough to make Mackenzi’s internal muscles clench involuntarily with memories of how that smouldering intensity had felt inside her. Dante Carrazzo was the most striking man in the restaurant, exuding power in every movement and impatient gesture— and thinking about how he’d filled her so completely just a few short hours ago…

Mackenzi tried to ignore the sick feeling roiling through her gut and smoothed her palms down her skirt, telling herself for the hundredth time that he’d never recognize her. Not with her clothes on. And with her hair up, and her reading glasses perched defensively on her nose, she must look radically different. Besides, it had been dark in the suite, and he’d been far more interested in getting his rocks off than being bothered with introductions.

What the hell kind of man did something like that anyway—launched himself on a sleeping woman like he had a God-given right to have sex with her? She might have been sleeping in the bed reserved for him, but he hadn’t been expected to arrive for hours, and she certainly didn’t recall tattooing ‘take me’ on her forehead before she’d gone to sleep.

She swallowed back on her guilt. Just because she hadn’t backed away when she’d had the chance, didn’t make it right. And just because she’d enjoyed it didn’t make it right. He’d taken advantage of the situation, and of her.

A couple emerged from the lift behind, making their way past her into the busy restaurant, reminding her that she should be doing likewise. Standing in the doorway was no way to save the hotel. A deep breath later, her face schooled into cool professionalism, she once again clamped down on the fear that threatened to turn her stomach.

He wouldn’t recognize her. He couldn’t…

The maître d’ threw her a worried frown as she entered the buzzing room, mouthing the warning, ‘Table one,’ and flicking his head in Dante’s direction as she passed. She forced a thin smile and nodded, knowing the staff needed her to be confident and strong right now, rather than a weak-kneed woman who’d just been bedded by the boss. A pity that was exactly how she felt.

She stopped close to the table where he sat flicking impatiently through the business pages. Beyond him the picture windows revealed nothing but a wall of white as fog still held the hotel prisoner. Right now it felt like that same fog had shrink-wrapped her lungs. Oh God, how the hell was she supposed to do this?

‘Mr Carrazzo.’

He tossed a careless glance in her direction before glancing down at his watch, and then turning his attention back to the paper. ‘I’ve already ordered.’

‘You asked for a meeting, Mr Carrazzo,’ she ventured, trying to keep the tremor from both her voice and her fingers as she held out her hand to him. ‘Mackenzi Keogh.’

This time the look he gave her took much longer, the appraisal much more thorough, and Mackenzi felt her cheeks begin to flare as his eyes lingered on her face, a slight frown creasing his brow.

‘You’re Mackenzi?’ he asked, without taking her hand.

‘That’s right.’

‘You’re a woman.’

She raised an eyebrow, half-tempted to tell him he’d well and truly discovered that fact already. Instead she dropped her hand, grateful beyond belief that he hadn’t taken it—and that she hadn’t been subjected to the warm press of his flesh once more—and let go an uncharacteristic retort. ‘That’s right. At least, last time I checked I was.’ And she proceeded to slide into the chair opposite.

He scowled at her as a waitress appeared, curtailing conversation as she poured Mackenzi a coffee before topping up his. And Dante continued to regard her while she busied herself arranging and then rearranging her napkin in her lap, steadfastly avoiding his gaze as she declined an invitation to order breakfast. Nothing was going to sit comfortably in her stomach today, but the coffee might at least lend her strength.

‘What kind of name is Mackenzi for a woman?’

‘It’s my name, Mr Carrazzo,’ she answered, still edgy, but for the first time daring to look him anywhere near in the eye, her confidence edging upwards. If he hadn’t recognized her yet, then maybe, just maybe, he never would. After all, she’d hardly been a face to him last night— merely a service-provider. ‘And I presume,’ she continued, ‘you didn’t arrange this meeting to discuss the merits or otherwise of my parents’ choice.’

Not many things surprised Dante Carrazzo. Not any more. But Ashton House had already provided him with a hat trick of surprises. First had been the discovery of the welcome package warming his bed, the woman who’d ensured him a rapid and very satisfied descent into sleep.

Second had been her absence this morning. Sure, he’d been intending to throw her out anyway, but it had grated that she’d been the one to leave before he’d really had a chance to determine when he was finished with her. Surely a welcome package should hang around until she’d outlived her welcome?

But he’d woken this morning and found nothing more than her scent imprinted on his pillow and a need for her in his loins that had had to go unsatisfied.

And now yet another surprise—a manager with a man’s name and an attitude that wavered between acute edginess one minute and open hostility the next. He’d been expecting the latter, he was well used to it, but he’d also been expecting the same smell of fear that the night clerk had radiated. Yet the way she’d blushed when he’d looked at her, and then plucked at her napkin like an adolescent on her first date rather than meet his gaze across the table, was something different.

By rights she should be fearful. Surely she realized how vulnerable her position was? He sipped his coffee, all the time weighing her up, trying to put his finger on exactly what it was about her that struck him as not quite right. She sat shifting in her chair, her eyes never quite meeting his, her teeth plucking at her lower lip like she was uncomfortable in the pause. Good.

Silence could be useful like that, telling you more about a person than when they spoke. Like her body was telling him right now. So she was uncomfortable when he looked at her—why was that? Most women had no problem with his perusal—most welcomed it, many more invited it.

And she must be used to men looking at her. She was really no hardship to look at, even in her mousy little manager’s outfit. She had pleasant enough features; maybe her nose was a little crooked, but there were curves under that corporate shirt that hinted at some kind of promise.

She made a small sound in the back of her throat, and he unapologetically adjusted his gaze higher. ‘Mr Carrazzo,’ she ventured cautiously, staring from behind her glasses at a point somewhere over his shoulder. ‘I’ve taken the liberty of pencilling in a ten-thirty a.m. meeting with the staff to outline what plans you have for Ashton House, but in the meantime, perhaps you might permit me to summarize some of the staff’s concerns?’

He gave a brief nod, still more interested in what it was about this woman that bothered him than any pointless attempts at getting him to change his mind.

‘Ashton House is the premiere hotel accommodation in the Adelaide Hills,’ she began. ‘A boutique-hotel, whose roots go back to the mid-eighteen hundreds. Here we employ fifty staff, all of whom are now anxious to know where their jobs stand. More than anxious given the way you’ve seen fit to close at least half of the other properties you’ve acquired in the last two years. Naturally, the staff is nervous. They need to know if they have a future here, and for that they need an assurance that Ashton House will be retained by you as a boutique-hotel.’

‘Is there any particular reason why I should keep it?’

Mackenzi blinked, clearly thrown by his question. ‘Because it’s worth it. Nothing else in the Adelaide Hills, probably in all of Adelaide, comes close.’

‘Why?’ he demanded, already bored. ‘What is it that brings people here?’

‘The beauty of the district, for a start,’ she countered. ‘The views…’

He turned his gaze pointedly to the expanse of windows beside them, where nothing existed but a swirling world of white. ‘Oh yes,’ he mocked. ‘I can understand that.’

She slumped back in her chair and he smiled. She’d dropped herself into that one and she knew it. Maybe that was what her nervousness was about—she was just completely out of her depth, too inexperienced to know what it felt like to have the rug pulled out from under your feet. In which case this experience could only benefit her.

He took a sip of his coffee, already satisfied he would meet little opposition with his current plans, and turned his attention back to the article he’d been reading.

‘Mr Carrazzo.’

He looked up, half-surprised she hadn’t already scampered off somewhere to nurse her shaky nerves and bruised ego.

‘If you don’t mind me saying, the staff has a right to know what the future holds for their jobs. They need to know, now that you’ve taken possession of Ashton House, exactly what you have planned for it.’

His breakfast arrived and he bided his time, letting the tense-looking waitress place his plate just so, grinding on pepper, and topping up his coffee. On the waitress he could sense the familiar fear, the overwhelming need to please and then get the hell away from him. So why not on the woman sitting opposite—who appeared to be all fire and sparks one minute, nervous like a schoolgirl the next?

‘I own Ashton House,’ he said, injecting his voice with more than a hint of menace. ‘I can do with it whatever I damn well please.’

He watched her chest swell on a breath as she sat up ramrod straight, her hands clasped tightly together on the table. ‘Like you’ve done with those others you’ve acquired?’

‘Those properties are hardly your concern.’

‘But what you’ve done with them is! Three perfectly good businesses destroyed, three hotels gutted and turned into apartment blocks. And all for what?’

Revenge, he thought, rolling the word around like he was savouring it. How sweet it is. But he didn’t expect anyone else to understand. Nobody else could. Nobody else had been to that black hole he’d been thrust into and had had to clamber his way out of, one bleeding hand over the other. ‘That’s progress,’ he tossed off casually. ‘The world moves on.’

‘And is that the kind of progress you have in mind for Ashton House? Are you planning for the world to “move on” here too—so you can fill up the world with more of your precious apartment blocks?’

Dante put his knife and fork down deliberately before taking another sip of his coffee, contemplating her over the rim of his cup. Her colour was up again, the chest below her shirt rising and falling rapidly, and once again he had the feeling there was something he was missing.

Or was it just that she was the first person he’d met along this journey who hadn’t moved out of his way and bowed to the inevitable? He would never have expected such impassioned argument from someone who’d looked so meek and nervous when she’d first appeared.

‘Not an option,’ he said, shrugging off that line of thought, and getting back to her question in the next breath. ‘The local council here would never approve it.’

‘Which means you’ve considered it, then!’

It was an accusation rather than a question, but he ignored the jibe. He hadn’t come here to make friends with anyone, and he didn’t care what anyone thought. It was far too late for that. ‘As it happens, I have an entirely different fate in mind for Ashton House.’

‘What does that mean exactly?’ Her eyes narrowed. ‘Do you plan to keep Ashton House going after all?’

Despite her cautious words, he could see the hope lining her features, hope that he knew would be tragically short- lived. He leaned back low in his chair, his hands finding his pockets as a smile of satisfaction tugged at the corners of his mouth. He’d achieved almost everything he’d set out to do just seventeen short years ago, and the proximity to his goal was like a drug fuelling his bloodstream. Now there was just one final act.

He couldn’t think about it without smiling. ‘I’m going to destroy it,’ he told her. ‘I’m going to pull out every window and every door and then leave it to the elements to moulder, until it’s nothing more than a crumbling ruin.’

Shock exploded inside her, wrenching away her voice, so that when it came it was more breath than voice, a whisper that felt like she’d swallowed sandpaper. ‘Why would you do that?’

‘Because I can.’

His voice was cold as ice, his eyes devoid of life. No, Mackenzi realized, shaking her head with disbelief at his callous announcement—not lifeless. They were frozen and hard, but there was anger lurking in those dark depths, anger that swirled between them now like the dank fog rolling past the windows.

Terrifying eyes on a terrifying man. No wonder the former owners had been devastated when they’d finally lost control of Ashton House to this man. Poor Sara and Jonas. They’d tried valiantly to fend off the corporate raider, losing property after property to his insatiable greed.

Shock now turned to anger on their behalf. ‘That’s no reason for wanting to pull down such a beautiful building and destroy a thriving business in the process. What are the employees supposed to do?’

He shrugged, a careless hitch of his shoulders that ratcheted up her anger tenfold, before he sat up, turning his attention back to his breakfast. ‘Find other jobs, I expect.’

‘Just like that?’

‘If they’re any good, as they should be in a place that, as you say, claims to be the best, then it shouldn’t be a problem.’

Every answer as callous as the one that went before. Every answer building on the burgeoning rage she already felt inside. But she’d be damned if he thought she was going to sit by and watch him destroy such a beautiful building—the very building in which her own parents had celebrated their marriage forty years ago—and jobs and careers into the deal. There had to be a way of saving the hotel from this madman. But she would need time.

‘So when’s all this supposed to happen?’ she asked, doing all she could to keep the snarl out of her voice. ‘Given we have forward bookings more than twelve months out, are you saying the hotel’s got a year? Eighteen months? How much time will the staff have in order to find new positions elsewhere?’

He shook his head. ‘No.’

‘What do you mean, “no”?’

‘I mean that there is hardly any point advising people that their positions will no longer be required in twelve months’ time when they may well be gone in six. Then there would be positions to fill. Better that there is a clean break all around.’

‘So…how long do we have?’

‘The hotel will close in three months.’

‘What? That’s impossible. There’s no way—’

‘Ms Keogh, one thing I have learned in business is that nothing is impossible. The hotel will close. End of story.’

‘But I…I can’t let you do that.’

He laughed, and the sound fed into her anger.

‘And how do you propose to stop me?’

‘By convincing you that this property is worth much more to you as a going concern. I’ve prepared reports for you, projections—’

‘You had a hearing,’ he argued. ‘You told me people come here for the view.’ He lifted one hand towards the fog- laden exterior. ‘So it’s not like they’ll be missing out on one hell of a lot if I close this place down, is it?’

Her knuckles turned white in her lap. ‘It’s winter in the Adelaide Hills, Mr Carrazzo. And, in winter, we sometimes get fog. Not every day. Not every other day. Just on occasion. This happens to be one such occasion.’

He didn’t rush to respond, just bided his time that way he did, like he was bored and wanted to be done with it.

‘Three months. That’s all you have.’

Her anger turned incendiary. ‘You’re insane! You must be. What about all the forward bookings? We have weddings booked—and conferences. People have paid deposits. You can’t just cancel them.’

‘They will be cancelled. Compensated as well, if need be. As manager that will, of course, be your job.’

She scoffed. ‘So you expect me to be the apologist for your act of bastardy? I don’t think so.’

‘You’re refusing to do your job, Ms Keogh? I’m sure we could arrange an earlier termination for you if that’s so. Say, today?’

Mackenzi gasped, the cold, hard reality that she might walk out of here jobless, not in three months but as soon as today, starting to bite. She was luckier than most—her home, a tiny stone cottage deeper in the hills, was almost paid off courtesy of a single life and a reasonable income. Still, a termination payment would keep her going only for how long?

On the other hand, there was definitely something to be said for getting out of here as soon as possible—very definitely before he discovered the truth. If she wasn’t going to have a job in three months, that was one very attractive option.

‘Put it like that,’ she said, her voice crisp as frost as she made up her mind, ‘and you leave me no choice. I’ll go. Today.’

She had him there, she could see by the brief flicker of surprise across his features that her acceptance was the last thing he’d been expecting. He’d thought she was going to beg for her job—no way!

He raised one cynical eyebrow. ‘Making the grand gesture? Don’t expect me to ask you to stay on.’

It was liberating, she realized, losing your job. Empowering. For now there was no reason for her to curb her tongue; she no longer had a job to lose. And suddenly all the things she’d been itching to say since she’d first sat down could have their moment in the sun.

‘You know, Mr Carrazzo,’ she said with a smile, returning his own formality, ‘despite what we’d heard, I actually believed there might be some point talking to you, some point in pleading our case to your better self. But there is no better self, is there? You really are a heartless bastard.’

‘That’s half my problem,’ he acknowledged with his own wry smile, finding this intercourse much more entertaining than he’d been anticipating when the mouse had first appeared. ‘I do have a reputation to uphold.’

‘I don’t understand how you can sleep at night!’

‘Is that why you provided the woman? Because you assumed I’d need entertaining while my guilty conscience kept sleep at bay?’

Twin slashes of red stained her cheeks. Her eyes shakily held his before she hastily turned her face away, pretending an interest in the sea of fog beyond the glass, while in her lap her hands twisted her napkin into a rope. ‘I don’t know what you’re talking about.’

Dante smiled at her. At least, he projected a smile, one that would no doubt have made a crocodile proud. ‘The woman in my bed last night. You’re the manager here. Don’t tell me you didn’t arrange for her?’

Her eyes snapped back, her mouth set grimly, the knotted napkin forgotten as she rose shakily to her feet. ‘I don’t have to listen to this.’

He stood up and barred her exit from the table. ‘Did you honestly believe that having some whore waiting for me in my bed last night was going to make me feel more kindly towards keeping the hotel operating as a going concern?’

He watched her chin kick back on a swallow, saw her hands fisting at her sides. ‘So, tell me, where is this “whore” now, Mr Carrazzo? Waiting for you to return for a repeat performance of your no doubt magnificent services? I’m surprised you could drag yourself out of bed.’

Her words grated, rubbing him raw. She knew more than she was letting on, that was for sure, and she was guilty as hell. They’d set him up with some whore in the vain attempt that she might soften his intentions. Not likely, especially when she’d barely managed to soothe anything before she’d so rapidly disappeared. ‘You know she’s gone. What were you doing—paying by the hour?’

‘While I can quite understand why it would be necessary to pay anyone to sleep with you, Mr Carrazzo, I can assure you nobody was paid to be in your room. Maybe this so-called woman was never even there. Most likely she was just a figment of your imagination. So perhaps now you might let me pass? I have an office to clean out.’

His teeth ground together. Now she was laughing at him, her green eyes flashing like emeralds behind her modest glasses, the only splash of colour in her otherwise pale face.

Green eyes?

And suddenly he was back in his bed, her hair streaming across his pillow, the eyes he’d so wrongly imagined must be brown open wide in surprise.

Green eyes!

The same vivid green as those of the woman standing before him right now.

Mentally he unravelled the hair, now coiled tightly behind her head, peeled away the glasses and dispensed with her starched uniform—and every imaginary step only confirmed what his eyes had already told him to be true.

His hands found his hips while inside him anger rose like magma, his body tensing, a volcano about to erupt. Whatever game she was playing, it was game over. ‘So tell me,’ he invited, his teeth barely parting as he aimed the words like bullets, ‘who is the better lover—me…’ he paused for effect ‘…or Richard?’

CHAPTER FOUR

SHOCK MOMENTARILY punched the air from her lungs. She hadn’t thought of Richard in days—no, more like weeks. At least, not until that dream last night, and then it had been only to wonder why he’d never made her feel as good as her dream lover.

But, just like her dream had never really been a dream at all, his question similarly had nothing to do with Richard.

He was telling her that she was the woman in his bed, the woman he’d called a whore.

He was telling her that he knew!

Fear pressed down on her, wrapping about her psyche like a cold, dank shroud.

‘I…I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about,’ she lied, her mind furiously backtracking over her words, wondering what she’d done to give herself away, and wondering what she could do to make up for the gaffe.

‘You mean Richard’s never told you that you talk in your sleep?’

The waitress hovered nearby uncertainly, looking to make a move for his empty plate, and Mackenzi knew it was way past time to take this discussion out of a public restaurant and to somewhere much more private.

‘If you’ve finished your breakfast, Mr Carrazzo, I think it’s time we concluded this discussion in my office.’

‘Alternatively, there’s always my suite,’ he suggested, cold civility in his tone and damnation in his eyes. ‘You seemed to feel quite at home there last night.’

‘That’s enough!’ she snapped, doing her best to ignore the shocked expression on the waitress’s face, and the turning heads of curious patrons. She headed off purposefully through the tables on her way to the exit, leaving him to follow in her wake, half-hoping he wouldn’t.

She’d taken his offer of redundancy thinking it would protect her identity. But now he knew she’d been the woman in his bed, the woman he’d decided to have sex with before she’d even been awake, the woman who had failed to turn him down even when she had finally opened her eyes.

Where did that leave her now?

‘You didn’t have to say those things,’ Mackenzi asserted, rounding on him the moment he’d entered her office and closed the door behind him.

‘And you didn’t have to be in my bed.’

‘I never said I was.’

‘You didn’t have to. Your reaction to the Richard word was confirmation enough.’

She looked away. ‘That proves nothing. I was merely shocked at what you said.’

‘Then why did you practically flee from the restaurant?’

‘With you making accusations like that? Why do you think?’

‘I think you’re avoiding the truth.’

Dante paused, regarding her curiously for a few moments, before his hand went to the door once again, turning the key in the lock.

‘What are you doing?’ she protested, feeling a sudden surge of panic.

‘You wanted privacy. I’m ensuring we get it.’ Then he stepped closer, and all of a sudden she was regretting the move to her office. She’d wanted to get things less public, but suddenly the air in the room seemed to have been sucked out, the space shrinking to miniscule proportions now they were both locked inside it.

Shrinking until there was nothing in her office but Mackenzi Keogh and Dante Carrazzo, and the heavy weight of what had transpired between them in the early hours of the morning.

And the heavier weight of whatever was to come.

‘So what did you really think you were going to achieve by pulling that little stunt last night?’

She backed away, trying to put the desk between them, but he only followed her, trapping her once again, her back to a filing cabinet in the space between desk and window. She crossed her arms defensively while he stood broad- shouldered in front of her. One arm was stretched across to the windowsill, the other hand planted on the desk, a human barricade. She had to hand it to him—this man made intimidation an art form. Even so, she was aware of the ever-present heat she felt in this man’s presence steadily building up steam once again.

‘I really don’t see the point of continuing this line of conversation. Not when you’ve already decided on your course of action for the hotel and terminated my services. I’d rather you turned your mind to how you’re going to inform the staff, and I’ll get on with cleaning out my office.’

‘Why not talk about it—because your little ploy didn’t work?’ His hand left the windowsill to reach out to her, stroking the line of her shirt’s shoulder-seam. She flinched at his touch, his fingers scorching her flesh through her shirt, leaving a trail of fire in their wake. How was that possible? Sure, he’d made her feel good last night— amazing, in fact—but how could he still affect her when she hated the man? Because there was no way she couldn’t hate him now with what he had planned for Ashton House.

Mackenzi stiffened her spine, determined not to let him see how his touch affected her, determined to deny everything. His assumption that everyone, including her, would be falling all over themselves to please him was enough to get her back up. ‘What ploy?’

‘To soften up my attitude. To make me feel more generous about the fate of the hotel. I must say, you do an impressive job of going above and beyond the call of duty.’

She shook her head as his hand moved down her arm, his thumb tracking perilously close to the swell of her breast. She could unfold her arms, but then she’d feel too exposed, too open to him, and he’d surely hear her heart thumping crazily. ‘And I must say you have a very fertile imagination. Now, would you please leave me alone?’

‘You didn’t mind me touching you last night, as I recall. In fact, you seemed to enjoy it—a lot.’

She didn’t want to hear it. Those feelings she’d experienced last night, the feelings she was having now when he merely brushed her arm or came close to her breasts, she didn’t understand them. They were all too new, too unfamiliar. She didn’t understand why this man, of all men, would be the one who would so comprehensively mess with her thermostat.

Frustrated, she unfolded her arms in a rush to fend him off as she tried to push past. ‘You’re mad. Let me out of here.’

But he just smiled and moved the same way so that their bodies collided. She bounced back from the contact, short of breath, only to have what breath was left in her throat wrenched away deftly as he removed her glasses, letting them fall gently onto the desk blotter beside them.

‘Hey!’

His smile widened. ‘You have the most amazing eyes,’ he told her. ‘They’re the most brilliant shade of green—almost like emeralds. I knew I’d seen them somewhere before.’

She looked away. ‘Lots of people have green eyes,’ she said, only to feel his hand working at something behind her head. Before she could protest, she felt her hair slip free from its clasp, weight pulling it tumbling down over her shoulders and beyond, helped on its way with a comb of his fingers. Her scalp tingled, but it was her entire body that trembled. ‘There, isn’t that better?’

‘Not really, no.’

He lifted a coil of her hair and snaked it around his fingers, dipping his head and inhaling deeply. ‘I woke this morning with the scent of your hair on my pillow. Why did you leave so soon?’

‘I still don’t know what you’re talking about.’

‘You can’t still pretend it wasn’t you in my bed?’

‘I told you, it was probably a dream.’

He tugged on her hair, drawing her closer. ‘Oh, it was better than a dream. Much better.’ His voice was a warm, silk ribbon that curled around her as his eyes held her prisoner. ‘And so much more satisfying.’

He was too close. So close she could breathe in his own personal scent, between the shower freshness and breakfast coffee—a scent that flung her back, more than anything, to where she’d been just a few short hours ago. A scent that filled her lungs and was pumped around her bloodstream, reminding every last part of her of what they’d shared, and just how amazing he’d felt inside her. How he’d stretched her so deliciously. How he’d fitted her so completely.

She shook her head. She couldn’t afford to think about that. ‘Look, Mr Carrazzo—’

‘Call me Dante.’

‘Wh…?’

‘After what happened last night, maybe it’s time we were on first-name terms.’

Denial, she thought; there was still hope in denial. And in backing away. Even if there were only cold, hard filing cabinets at her back to welcome her. They were solid and real, and in a world where everything she knew had gone pear-shaped she needed their straight, metal lines and reassuring rigidity. ‘Nothing happened last night.’

He followed her, placing his hands on the cabinets either side of her. ‘Why did you disappear? I missed you this morning.’

She was shaking her head. ‘No.’

He lifted one hand to touch the pads of two fingers to her chin, tracing the line of her jaw to her ear, before letting his fingers trail down her neck. ‘We had so much more to explore together.’

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