One Kiss in... Moscow: Kholodov's Last Mistress / The Man She Shouldn't Crave / Strangers When We Meet

‘You probably shouldn’t have,’ Sergei agreed dryly. ‘But sometimes a little impulsive action can be a good thing.’

Like now? For surely having dinner alone with this man was the most impulsive and maybe even imprudent thing she’d ever done. Yet Hannah knew she wouldn’t trade this evening for anything. She was having too much fun.

She gave him an impish look from under her lashes. ‘I’m surprised to hear you say that,’ she told him, ‘considering how you chewed me out this morning for leaving my passport in my pocket.’

‘There’s impulsive and then there’s insane,’ Sergei returned dryly.

‘I suppose it is a fine line.’

‘Very fine,’ he agreed softly, and she felt the thrill of his gaze through her bones.

‘So,’ she said, her voice only a little bit unsteady, ‘have you done anything impulsive like that? Imprudent?’ She took a sip of wine, savouring the rich, velvety liquid. ‘Let me guess,’ she joked. ‘You probably ate shoe leather and slept on the street in order to save to start your own business.’

Sergei’s face darkened in an eclipse of expression, his features twisting with sudden cruel savagery, and Hannah stilled. For a second, no more, it was as if she’d had a view of the true man underneath the hard, handsome exterior, and it was someone who held darker secrets and deeper pain than she’d ever imagined. Then his face cleared and he smiled. ‘You’re not that far off,’ he said lightly, and whatever had passed a moment before was hidden away again.

‘Well, this trip was important to me,’ she told him, matching his light tone. ‘Whether it made sense or not.’

‘So your mother called you back from university to help out. She couldn’t have got someone else to help, and let you finish?’

‘She gave me a choice.’ She still remembered the phone call, how her mother hadn’t wanted to tell her the truth about her father’s condition, insisted she stay at university.

‘Did she?’ Sergei asked softly and Hannah stared at him. What was he suggesting? And why? He’d never even met her mother.

‘She wanted me to finish, but I insisted on coming home,’ Hannah explained. She lifted her chin and met his thoughtful gaze squarely. ‘I wanted to be there.’

Sergei simply nodded, and Hannah knew he didn’t believe her. She laid down her fork, her appetite—and her excitement—gone for the moment. ‘What on earth has made you so cynical?’ she asked. ‘Everything is so suspect to you. Everyone.’ From the boys on the street to the woman at the embassy to her very own mother. ‘Why are you so—’

‘Experience,’ Sergei cut in succinctly.

Hannah shook her head and flung one arm out to take in their opulent surroundings. ‘You’re a millionaire so your life can’t be all bad.’

‘Don’t they say money can’t buy happiness?’

‘Still, some things must have gone right in your life,’ she insisted. ‘Can’t you think of one thing that’s good?’

He let out a short laugh. ‘You’re quite the Pollyanna.’

Hannah made a face. ‘That sounds kind of sappy. But if you mean am I an optimist as you said before, then yes, I’d say I am. I don’t intend on going through life with a doom and gloom attitude. What good does that do you?’

Sergei stared at her for a moment. ‘Well,’ he finally said, ‘at least it keeps you from disappointment.’

‘And it keeps you from properly living as well,’ Hannah returned. That was what this trip had been about: jumping in and just doing it, living life to the full. After six years of staying home, caring first for her father and then for her mother in the onset of dementia, she had been ready. She propped her elbows on the table and gave him a challenging look, eyebrows arched, lips parted. ‘Tell me one really good thing that’s happened to you. Or, better yet, one really good person you’ve known. A friend or family member. Someone who made a difference. Someone you could never be cynical about.’

‘Why?’ he asked and she rolled her eyes.

‘Because I said so. Because I want to show you that some things—some people—are actually through-and-through good.’

He leaned forward, and Hannah saw a steely glitter in those light blue eyes that sent a shiver stealing straight down her spine. ‘I could just lie.’

‘Where’s the fun in that?’

‘Are we having fun?’ he drawled softly, and Hannah gave him a playfully flirtatious look.

‘Aren’t we?’ she said, and saw gold flare in his irises.

He held her gaze, trapped her with it, and Hannah felt her body hum with awareness, an excitement uncoiling in her middle and sending its sensual tendrils throughout her body, taking it over. It was heady, thrilling, addictive. This was really living … and it was something she’d never really done before. She wanted more.

‘I suppose we are,’ Sergei said slowly and Hannah did not look away. ‘Alyona,’ he finally said, abruptly, and Hannah blinked, struggling to catch up. Just gazing at him had sent her mind—and body—into a kind of hyper-aware overdrive.

‘Alyona?’

‘Alyona.’ His neutral tone gave nothing away. ‘She was one good person I knew.’ And by the way he said it Hannah didn’t think Alyona—whoever she was—was in his life any more.

‘Well,’ she said, sitting back, the heady excitement leaking out from her like air from a balloon a week after the party, ‘there you go. There is someone good in your life. Someone you don’t need to be cynical about. Tell me about her.’

‘No,’ he said, flatly, and Hannah stiffened a little at the rebuke, strangely hurt. She had no right to demand his secrets, even if she’d been halfway to giving him hers … the ones she hadn’t even realised she had.

‘Well,’ she said, ‘at least you have one.’

‘Had.’ His forbidding expression kept her from asking any more questions. She was intensely curious about this Alyona, even though Hannah knew she had no right to know. Had she been a girlfriend, a wife? Had Sergei loved her? Was that why he seemed so closed, so cynical now? Maybe he was hiding a broken heart. Or maybe she’d just watched too many soap operas.

‘So why are you so suspicious of people?’ she asked, trying to sound light even though she really wanted to know. ‘Trusting no one?’

‘I told you, experience. Most people have a reason for what they do, and it usually isn’t a very nice one.’ His mouth curved once more in a sensual smile. ‘Except maybe you.’

‘Me?’

‘Yes, you. You have to be the most refreshingly—and annoyingly—optimistic person I’ve ever met.’

Hannah nearly sputtered in outrage. ‘Annoyingly?’

‘Optimism tends to irritate us cynics.’

‘Maybe you need a little more optimism in your life, then.’ Sergei considered her from heavy-lidded eyes, his gaze sweeping slowly, so slowly over her, and excitement exploded inside her. Did he know how sensual he looked when he gazed at her like that? Almost as if he were undressing her with his eyes. And Hannah felt awareness and desire race along her veins and nerve-endings, set her whole body to liquid flame. She wanted this. Whatever it was, whatever was going to happen, she wanted this.

His gaze flicked upwards to her face and rested there, assured, assessing. ‘Maybe I do,’ he murmured.

CHAPTER FOUR

WHAT the hell was he doing? Sergei watched Hannah’s eyes darken—with desire, he knew—and felt that guilt needle him again. He was tired of it; since when had he had a conscience? He couldn’t have done the things he’d done in this life and still keep a conscience. Yet it seemed he had, at least when it came to a woman like Hannah Pearl.

She’d reminded him of Alyona with the flashing in her eyes and the lift of the chin and the way she smiled so whimsically, as if life still offered good things. Hope. She’d even made him mention Alyona, and he never did that.

The realisation made him angry and he uncoiled himself from his chair, crossing to where Hannah waited. He held out a hand to help her rise from her seat and she took it unhesitatingly, her eyes still so heartbreakingly wide.

Did she realise how she looked? Sergei wondered. Did she have any idea of what her sweetness did to him, how it both lacerated him with guilt and filled him with need? Made him want to both believe in and shatter her illusions?

‘Come.’

‘Where?’

She spoke with such trust. Gently Sergei tucked a tendril of hair behind her ear. Her skin was achingly soft, and he could smell the snowdrop scent of her hair and see the pulse fluttering in her throat. ‘I have a private dining room for my personal use,’ he told her. ‘We’ll have a drink there.’

‘I think I’ve had enough to drink,’ Hannah said with a breathless little laugh.

Sergei smiled. ‘Dessert, then.’ She was certainly sweet enough.

Hannah stared at him, her eyes wide, and, no matter how innocent she was, Sergei knew she understood where this was leading. She bit her lip, her gaze sweeping downward for a moment and Sergei almost—almost—let her go. Told her to leave.

Forget him. Then she looked up, and he saw a new strength of determination in those violet eyes.

‘Lead the way,’ she said, lightly, and he threaded his fingers through hers and led her to the discreet wood-panelled door in the back of the dining room that led to his own private room.

The door snicked softly shut and he turned to her, the pretence of a drink or dessert dropped.

‘What—?’ she began, and then stopped, so clearly waiting.

‘What am I doing?’ he filled in, in a lazy murmur. ‘I’m going to kiss you.’

‘Kiss me—’ Hannah felt a bolt of amazed longing blaze through her. She could hardly believe this was happening, that a man like Sergei—so powerful, so incredibly attractive—could want her. She stopped, let out a soft sigh that she knew was her surrender. She wanted this. This kiss, and more than that. Wherever it led. Whatever happened. She was innocent, even naive, yes, but she knew what was going on. Knew what Sergei wanted … and what she wanted. This. ‘Kiss you,’ Sergei confirmed. He reached out to cup her face, his palm rough and warm against her cheek. He let his thumb slide down to touch the fullness of her lips. ‘Do you want me to kiss you?’

Hannah let out a little laugh. ‘You’re a man of some experience, I should think. Can’t you tell?’

He laughed back, softly. ‘Yes, I can tell.’

And Hannah wanted him too much to care if she seemed transparent, obvious, eager. She smiled, waited. She wanted this, but she still would prefer him to take the lead.

And Sergei did just that, sliding his hands under her hair, drawing her closer. She came, willingly, even as her heart thudded hard and her head fell back and she waited for the feel of his mouth on hers.

It was so easy. Too easy. Easy enough to be wrong. Sergei pushed the thought aside. He wasn’t going to think about her innocence or optimism or how she made him remember. He was just going to take what was on offer, because that was what he did. That was how he’d survived.

And that was the only kind of man he could be.

He cupped her face with both of his hands, letting his thumbs slide caressingly over her jawbone, enjoying the warm, silken feel of her skin. He slid his hands along her neck, under the heavy mass of her hair, and then he drew her to him, unresisting as he’d known she would be.

The first brush of his lips against hers was exquisitely painful, because he hadn’t expected to kiss her so softly, or feel it so much. Purposefully, wanting to obliterate that sweet longing and replace it with something more primal and stark, he deepened the kiss, nudging her lips further open so his tongue could slide into the moist warmth of her mouth and take sure possession.

She made a little sound, something caught between a gasp of surprise and a moan of longing, and her hands reached up to his shoulders, although whether to pull him closer or simply steady herself Sergei didn’t know. Refused to care.

He’d wanted to stay rational throughout this encounter, cold-bloodedly in control, but already her innocent and unschooled response was making rational thought—or any thought—impossible, and now he deepened their kiss because he needed to, not because he was trying to prove something to her … or to himself.

His hands moved down her body, sliding over her hips, fingers slipping under the soft material of her dress. Another gasp when his hand came in contact with the bare flesh of her thigh. Her every response was artless and open; she was as honest with her body as she had been with everything else.

Sergei slid one hand around the silken length of her thigh, nudging her leg upward towards his hip, his hand sliding down to her ankle as he hooked her leg around him. He moved closer, pressing against her, his arousal—and his intent—unmistakable.

It was enough to break the moment, which, on some level, Sergei knew, was what he wanted. Even if right now his body protested with unfulfilled desire, deepening need.

He still felt the guilt.

Hannah gasped and pulled away, just a little bit. Sergei let her go. Her breath came in gasps and her lips were rosy and swollen, her hair a dark, tumbled cloud around her flushed face. She looked gorgeous.

‘This … this is all going a little fast for me,’ she said, and gave an unsteady laugh.

Sergei smiled. ‘Is it?’

‘It’s wonderful,’ she said, still so achingly honest and open. ‘But I’m …’ She pressed her hands to her face in a desperate and pointless attempt to cool the blush that scorched her cheeks. ‘I’m not used to this.’

‘I know that,’ he told her. ‘You’re a virgin, aren’t you?’

Hannah’s eyes widened, her face flushing more, if that were even possible. She was positively crimson. ‘It’s obvious, I suppose,’ she said, and Sergei tilted his head in acknowledgement.

‘Very.’

She dropped her hands, her gaze sliding away from his as she let out a rueful little laugh that caught on its final aching note. ‘You must think I’m a complete idiot.’

He could have said no. He could have drawn her into his arms and assured her that she was beautiful, desirable, perfect. All true. And then he could have taken her upstairs and made love to her all night long. In the morning she would be gone, and so would he. Easy.

Sergei said nothing.

Hannah’s head was bowed, her hair falling forward in a dark swirl to hide her face. She looked young and fragile and Sergei could still taste her on his lips. He almost spoke. Then she lifted her head, her eyes darkened to the deepest violet, and took a step forward. She laid her palms flat on his chest, and he could feel the warmth of her hands through the silk of his shirt. His heart thudded hard under her palm. He stared at her, inhaled her honeyed scent, and his heart beat harder.

‘I suppose,’ she said softly, tilting her head back so she could look at him, her hair cascading down her back in a glinting chestnut river, ‘it all depends on whether you mind.’

‘Mind?’ he repeated blankly. The honest, artless placement of her hands on his chest—especially when he’d just, through silence, rejected her—made him incapable of thought.

He’d never been so blindsided by a woman before, not just by her touch but by her whole self. He could see such an openness, such a willingness to be hurt in Hannah’s eyes that it humbled and amazed and angered him all at the same time. No one should be so vulnerable. It could only lead to disappointment and pain.

‘Mind me being an idiot,’ she clarified in a whisper, her voice lilting and playful even though her eyes were dark and wide and he felt her fingers tremble against him. Sergei knew this needed to stop. He also knew how to do it.

‘Oh, I don’t mind,’ he assured her in a lazy murmur, and then he closed the space between their mouths in a kiss that was nothing like the gentle embrace of a moment ago. This kiss was hard, demanding, a proof of power.

You don’t move me.

He felt Hannah’s yielding response and he slipped his hands from her shoulders to her hips, pulling her to him in shockingly intimate contact. At least she was shocked, innocent that she was, for he heard her gasp against his mouth before he deepened the kiss once more, an endless demand for her surrender.

And surrender she did, her body becoming soft and pliant, melting towards his as her mouth slackened under his onslaught and her hands came up to clench his hair. Her heart trembled against his and her breath came in mewing gasps; Sergei lost all conscious thought, blindly driven by a need that was far more than merely physical.

Why did this woman—this irritatingly optimistic Pollyanna of a woman—make him feel so much? Need so much? Remember?

His hands slid under her bottom and he pressed her against the door, pulling her legs around his waist, his hands rucking up her skirt. Needing to feel skin against skin. Forgetting that this was just meant to be a way to make her push him away.

Her arms locked around his neck, her head thrown back, her lips parted as her heart thundered against his. His breath came in harsh, tearing gasps, and his fingers brushed the lace of her underwear. ‘Sergei,’ she said, his name a ragged whisper, and the desire and anger that had been rushing through him in a molten river of emotion so he couldn’t tell one from the other froze to an icy stream of lucidity.

She was a virgin.

And he was mauling her against a door, her mouth swollen and maybe even bruised from his kisses.

What was he doing? What had he done? He’d meant to scare her off with a kiss, but this … willing or not, she still didn’t know what she was doing.

He did.

He pushed away from her, half stumbling, a self-loathing so deep and consuming it felt like acid corroding the soul he’d thought he’d lost long ago.

‘Sergei,’ she said again, and this time he knew it was a question, one he couldn’t answer.

He ran his hands through his hair, dragged a breath into his lungs and then let it out in a long, slow shudder. Hannah straightened, fixed her dress. Her hands trembled.

Sergei looked away. It was better this way, he knew. Better to end something he never should have begun … for both their sakes.

It wasn’t supposed to go like this. She might be a virgin, innocent and optimistic as Sergei had said, but even with the most positive outlook possible Hannah knew this wasn’t good. Sergei wasn’t even looking at her. And after his mouth—and his hands—the places they’d been on her body, the way they’d made her feel—

Until now. Now she felt pretty close to wretched. She swallowed, her throat dry and aching. ‘I guess I’m more of an idiot than I thought,’ she finally said, trying to sound wry although her voice was little more than a croak. Still she tried to smile. She didn’t know what else to do.

‘Yes, you are,’ Sergei returned, his voice a savage hiss. Hannah jerked back at the fury in his tone. Even though he’d just pushed her away from him, she hadn’t expected it. Yet as she stood there, conscious of her tousled hair and swollen lips and rearranged clothing, her mind started to catch up to where her body had been blazing ahead. And she wondered what would have happened if Sergei hadn’t stopped … and if she would have regretted it.

Even now with her clothes in disarray, her body aching, the only sound their still-ragged breathing, she didn’t think she would have.

‘Sergei, why—?’

‘Don’t.’ He raked a hand through his hair once more, then dropped it to his side. ‘Go to your room,’ he told her, as if she were a naughty child. ‘Grigori will deal with you tomorrow.’

‘Deal with me?’

‘Your passport. Your flight.’ His lips curved in a grim smile. ‘You can be out of this country this time tomorrow night, milaya moya.’

She recognised the Russian. My sweet. And Sergei had never sounded more cynical than when he said the endearment. ‘Why did you push me away?’ she asked quietly.

Sergei’s nostrils flared, lips thinned. He looked so angry, yet minutes ago he’d been kissing her. Touching her. His hands—

‘Don’t, Hannah.’

‘Don’t what?’

‘Don’t be so bloody naive!’ He took a step towards her, his eyes blazing. ‘You want to know why I pushed you away? Because I don’t do virgins, milaya moya, especially not ones who barely know how to kiss.’

Ouch. Hannah blinked, swallowed again, and lifted a chin. ‘I don’t believe—’

Sergei let out a sharp bark of laughter. ‘Believe it.’

‘You’re just saying that,’ she insisted, because Sergei was too angry to have pushed her away out of boredom or even disgust.

His mouth twisted in a sneer. ‘There’s optimistic and then there’s deluded. You’re leaning towards the latter.’

Hannah folded her arms. Sergei’s sudden rejection didn’t make sense. She knew she was inexperienced, he’d known that, but she wasn’t so naive that she hadn’t felt the evidence of his desire. She’d felt it in his kiss too, in the way he’d reached for her. She’d felt the answer in herself. ‘I’m not deluded.’

He arched an eyebrow, so coldly in control. ‘Really?’

‘Really.’ Although she was starting to feel that maybe she was. She was so out of her element, beyond her experience, yet she still felt instinctively that Sergei wasn’t telling the truth. He hadn’t pushed her away because he’d stopped wanting her, so why?

Because he didn’t want to hurt her.

The thought popped into her mind like a translucent bubble, shining and perfect. Fragile too. For if that wasn’t a deluded thought …

Sergei was surely the coldest, most cynical man she’d ever met.

Cynical about himself.

‘I don’t believe you,’ she said slowly.

He let out a harsh laugh. ‘You really are some kind of Pollyanna, always wanting to believe the best of everyone. Well, don’t believe it about me—’

‘You’ve been kind—’ Hannah insisted, because she knew, deep down, it was true.

‘There is no such thing as kind,’ Sergei cut across her. His eyes blazed into hers, icy and hot at the same time, and full of fury. ‘I said everyone has a motive, remember? And usually not a very nice one.’ He took a step towards her, the action menacing. Threatening. Hannah held her ground. ‘You know what my motive has been, milaya moya?’

‘Don’t call me that—’

‘But you are very sweet.’ He touched her cheek, lightly, and Hannah flinched. There was something ugly about his actions, his words, and she knew he was ruining it all on purpose, even if she didn’t understand why. ‘My motive,’ he continued softly, still stroking her cheek, ‘has been to get you into my bed. Why do you think I intervened with those raggedy little pickpockets? You’re very beautiful, in an artless sort of way.’

Hannah swallowed. ‘Your seduction technique needs a little work, then,’ she told him. ‘When we first met you were positively unpleasant.’

His fingers stilled for a second, no more. Then he smiled. Hannah didn’t like this smile, this cruel curving of those mobile lips that was meant to convey just how coldly calculating he truly was.

‘Ah, but it did work, didn’t it? Taken as a whole. For I could have had you right here, against the door.’ His smile widened and his eyes glittered. ‘So I must have been doing something right.’

Hannah lifted her chin, ignored the lightning streak of pain his words caused to blaze through her. ‘Then why did you stop?’

‘Isn’t it obvious?’ He dropped his hand and stepped away. ‘I stopped wanting you.’

Boldly, she let her gaze drop down to where the evidence of just how much he’d wanted her had pressed against her. ‘Did you?’ she challenged. ‘I may be a virgin, Sergei, but I’m not that innocent.’

Sergei’s gaze flared and narrowed. ‘Admittedly, milaya moya, I could have taken my pleasure right here, but I am a man of more sophisticated tastes than I’m sure you’ve ever experienced. And frankly the effort wasn’t worth the reward. Virgins are so tedious, and tend to get all emotional afterwards. I really didn’t want to have to deal with your tears.’