Charm

At last I make it to the bar. As I take a look around I take a deep breath, smile and make a conscious effort to relax. I’m on holiday after all and this is an adventure for me. I’ve never been this far west.

The bar’s larger than I expected. It’s more a reception area for a selection of restaurants. Tall windows open onto the palm-fringed terrace around the pool, letting in warm, scented night air from the Texas heartlands. To me it’s as exotic as the South Seas.

As I weave my way through the tables I feel a flare of excitement. My short silk dress in a plain bright colour fits well and feels good. The matching heels I stuffed in my case at the last minute make me feel tall and graceful. I’m no great hairdresser but my hair’s out on parole from its daytime ponytail and piled up loosely on my head, stray curls and wisps peeking out shyly and doing duty as decoration. I don’t wear much jewellery.

I feel heady, like I’m on a date.

As I catch sight of Darnley my heart gives a thump. He’s at the far side of the room talking with a small knot of business people. He looks handsome and distinguished in a dark suit. Cliff Face hovers nearby and I notice a few more of the stony-faced henchmen, formally dressed now and kind of blending into the crowd, their watchful expressions giving nothing away.

I can only hope they’re having fun.

The next instant Darnley looks up and sees me, sweeping me with a look that shifts the ground under my feet. Heat flares through me in a flame of arousal so acute I feel almost weak. How exciting must it be to actually date someone like this? Maybe I should have called that number after all …

But as I walk across the room to greet him I pull myself together. Everything about him warns me this man is dangerous. Something tells me he doesn’t date Miss Normal from New England without good reason, and the odd, slanted questions he fired off at me this afternoon mask some kind of problem.

He watches me draw near, once more unnaturally still. ‘Ella.’

The sensual lilt he gives to my name sends a thrill through me. The intensity of his look paints colour in my cheeks.

We find a quiet table in an alcove and toy with our drinks until the waiter leaves us in peace. I’m foolishly asking Darnley whether he’s here for business or fun – forgetting his company’s hosting some function soon so obviously he’d be here – when all at once he reaches out and runs a finger along my wrist bone.

I halt mid-sentence.

‘Your wrist is very slender.’ He’s gazing at it, his expression rapt, his attention suspended. I hold very still as he takes my hand, turns it over in both his own, slides his fingertips over my wrist and circles it with his thumb and forefinger. His touch is doing strange things to me.

The feel of his hand holding me like this is exciting but oddly his touch is not close. It’s like he’s measuring me. What’s so interesting about wrists? Is he making up his mind to say something else?

‘It was a shock, seeing you again.’ His murmur is so low I barely hear it. He might be talking to himself.

His attention is still focused on my wrist and for a few seconds he circles it with his finger and thumb. They curl round it easily, meeting to complete the circle on the soft, sensitive place at the inside where my pulse is now in overdrive.

There’s something very intense, disturbing even, about his stillness as he does this. I hardly dare breathe. At the same time I’m keenly aware that we’re in a public place, surrounded by smiling, elegant people, but for some reason I don’t understand this is a sudden and very private moment between us.

When he lifts his eyes to mine I see a brief gleam in them that fades quickly into a polite smile.

‘You were saying?’

I take a deep breath. Do I care why he’s here? The main thing is he is. And Ryan may get here any moment and then all hope of saying anything personal will be lost for ever. ‘I may have given you the wrong impression the first time we met. I’m not really the person you think I am.’

Darnley’s smile twists instantly in a sardonic gleam. ‘You thought I hadn’t guessed?’

‘I just thought you should know,’ I backtrack, stiff and a tad offended.

I expected – what? Surprise? Disappointment? His open, forceful sneer is a shock.

His anger practically flows over me in a wave of heat. I flounder, stunned as much by his sudden change of mood as by his low tone, now hard-edged and bitter.

The flash in his eyes punctures the illusion that this was a romantic moment. ‘I guessed soon after. I can’t say I’m surprised. Oldest trick in the book.’

How cruel. A stinging feeling prickles behind my eyes. I fight it back and hold my ground. ‘Yes, well, I just thought you should know. And for the record I really enjoyed it. I guess you should know that too.’

His eyes snap in disbelief. ‘You enjoyed it? So that makes it OK, does it?’

I swallow, bewildered at his cruelty but determined to finish. ‘It was – the most thrilling night of my life.’

His grin turns into amazed disbelief. ‘Thrilling? So how do you plan to top it? Raid Fort Knox?’

I frown. ‘Wait – what are we talking about here?’

His eyes burn into mine as he leans forward and lowers his voice. ‘Hey, that’s a good question. What are you talking about?’

I colour and look away.

His low murmur etches into me like acid. ‘Ah, yes, the honey-trap. That’s what made me smell a rat. I’m talking about you and your former boyfriend defrauding me of five million dollars.’

There’s an explosion between us as my glass shatters on the rim of the table and sprays vodka martini everywhere.

* * *

Fifteen minutes later we’re alone in his suite. Attentive waiters and offers of medical help have all been impatiently waved away. On the way up here shock dried the roof of my mouth and kept my blank gaze fixed on his face. Now feeling’s flooding back and I want answers.

‘Just tell me what’s going on, Darnley, please. And start at the beginning. I’m sure this is all a simple misunderstanding.’

To do him justice, he seems equally shaken. Concern furrows his face as he fetches me water when I decline brandy and start to shiver.

‘Hey, you’re cold. You’re in shock.’ He puts his arm around my shoulders as I sip and I recover quickly, his warmth and closeness bringing a glow to my cheeks faster than any spirit.

He looks worried but the barrier’s still there. I nestle closer for warmth and all at once I sense him grow still.

‘Ella, can I try something?’

I stare up at him in alarm. ‘What kind of thing?’

What now? He wants to examine my phone? Check my emails? Prove I’m a liar?

He frowns, like he has to concentrate, his face barely inches from mine. ‘I’m not sure. I just want to make up my mind about something.’

He brushes my lips with his. I sit perfectly still for a long moment as sensation rockets through me. All at once something that reignited the second I saw him earlier this afternoon flares into a forest fire and I launch myself at him. In seconds I’m pinned beneath him on the sofa and he’s kissing me deep, his tongue surging into my mouth in a full-on invasion. One hand captures my wrists and hauls them high over my head. The other dives deep into the cloth-filled spaces between us as he probes the soft warmth between my thighs. The mounds of my breasts are crushed under the weight of the pounding heartbeat drumming through the muscles of his chest.

I writhe below him, thrilled at my capture, relishing imprisonment. I offer up all the spent, frustrated passion I’ve battened down so long, burning all the more fiercely now because it had no hope of release until he suddenly unleashed it.

Miss Normal heads for home.

At last he pulls away and I remember to breathe. He sits up and helps me rearrange myself and now I feel shakier than before, for different reasons.

I smile up at him through my eyelashes before I remember he doesn’t do playful. ‘Did that help any?’

He’s still panting, his chest hauling in air like he’s just run a race and inexplicably failed to finish. He darts me an irritated look. ‘Not really. Where were we?’

‘Industrial secrets?’ I prompt, gently.

He quits the sofa like he needs more air. Briskly he pulls up a chair, sits and leans forward with his arms on his knees, his fine long hands clasped loosely between them. ‘Know anything about thermal imaging?’

I roll my eyes and he sighs.

‘OK. Put simply, it’s taking pictures of heat sources. Detects people or animals in the dark. Useful for surveillance, war-zones, hunting, riot control. One of my companies was developing a cheap, mass-produceable micro-imager that could be used in home surveillance units. Not only that but it could calibrate the image to a precise enough ratio to give an instant read-out of the likely size and type of the source. So, say your home alarm system is triggered late at night while you’re away, it would tell you or your local police whether the intruder’s a cat, or a man or a group of men, their height and weight, whether they have weapons, and then send the data to your phone so you could decide on the best response.’

This is not entirely new to me. Ryan often came over all technical – one of his few charms, as I recall. Anyway it made a change from literature. When he took the trouble to keep it simple I even managed to follow some of it.

‘Did Mitchell talk much about his work?’

‘I only know he majored in surveillance technology. I gathered that was why he joined your company in the first place. But what’s the connection?’

Darnley’s eyes narrow to slits. ‘We sacked him. He was caught passing commercially sensitive stuff to a rival. But he was part of the team developing the thermal imaging software and when he left he took the untested version and all the plans with him and immediately set up his own company to develop it.’

I frown. Ryan was always wrapped up in his work. I could forgive that – so am I. What finished it for me were tiny lies, the constant lateness and the feeble excuses. He even filched money from my bank account. But this? I shake my head. ‘I can’t believe he’s a criminal. I’ve known him since college. He’s just – self-absorbed.’

As far as I was concerned it was the upgrade that did it. She was the last in a long line of female straws.

Troubled, I scan Darnley’s stern, classical face. With a shock I see he’s looking at me intently, his expression alive with something almost like pain. ‘So – you want to find him and make him give it back, is that it?’

He’s frowning now. ‘No, I just want to give him a piece of my mind. He used our resources to work on our idea and then stole it – along with the time and effort we’d invested in it. But his version’s untested, unreliable. He won’t get far if he tries to sell it on. I want you to give it back.’

I grin in disbelief. ‘Me? It’s got nothing to do with me.’

His eyes glitter dangerously. ‘I’d like very much to believe that. But we both know there’s a little more to it than that, don’t we, Ella?’

‘We do?’ Once more the conversation is slipping away from me. Miss Normal has given up and gone home and now nothing’s normal any more. And to prove it he suddenly says something so high and wild I know I must be dreaming.

‘Yes, we do. The patent he applied for is in your name. Right now you must be worth – at a rough guess – some five or six million dollars.’

CHAPTER THREE

I stare at Darnley, once more in shock. I’ve just found out that Ryan, my ex, is a criminal, Darnley, my once-only one-night stand, is now a bitter enemy and I’m rich beyond reason. Plus I’ve been on the road since dawn.

It’s been a long day.

What I need right now is a stiff drink, space to think and sleep. I rise shakily to my feet and head for the door. ‘If you don’t mind, I’ll turn in. This has all been –’

Darnley’s there before me. His hand closes over mine the second I touch the handle. Once more the shot of electricity from his touch fires instant arousal. Once more I’m helpless in the fierce intensity of his gaze, mesmerised by the force of his will.

‘Not yet, Ella. Please.’

I bridle, nerves still jangling. I’m puzzled but angry. In my current state it’s an unhappy mix.

His face softens. ‘Look, you’ve had a shock. You shouldn’t be alone. Stay here tonight. I’ll be told the minute Mitchell comes in. I’ll wake you.’

Stay here? I wrench my imagination back from the wild images spiralling before me. Mitchell? Who’s that? Oh, yes, my ex … for a split second I’ve forgotten his existence.

I lick my lips. It’s a tempting offer …

Darnley must read something of this on my face because I see his mouth twitch at the corners and his eyelids lower. He senses my weakness, predator that he is.

‘There’s more than one bedroom.’

His voice is silky now, his hand firmly planted over mine. I feel his thumb move gently. It grazes the tips of my knuckles in a tiny, subtle caress.

‘But I have to get my things,’ I falter, feeling my will drain away in the white heat of his steady gaze.

‘I had them brought up. You’re in the room on the left.’

‘What?’ I snap to attention. ‘Before you even asked me?’

He loosens his grip on my rigid fist and slides his hand up my arm. ‘Come and sit down again. You’re a terrible colour. I’ll get you a drink.’

His look is veiled, his tone calm, but it’s one shock too many.

I glare at him. ‘I’m fine. Please show me my room.’ I clamp my lips in a firm line so he won’t see them tremble and guess I’m on the point of giving in.

With an impatient sigh he leads me through the vast spaces of his suite to a large, gauzy room with filmy drapes. The bed is already turned down, my slip prettily laid out across the pillow. I turn to thank him but he’s already gone.

Still on autopilot I shower, brush out my hair and prepare for bed. At last I perch on the unfamiliar satin sheets, pull my knees up to my chin and gaze at the wall, trying to make sense of all that’s happened tonight.

* * *

The small pool of light from the bedside lamp makes strange shadows in this sumptuous, unfamiliar room. They mirror my thoughts. Nothing adds up. However I come at this I can’t seem to untangle it. All that stays with me is the strange feeling I had when I walked in here earlier today that I was on the brink of something new.

After a while – minutes? Hours? I can hardly tell – there’s a light knock. I look up with a start. News at last? I hope it’s nothing bad. I can’t take any more shocks tonight.

It’s Darnley. He slips into the room and stands in the shadow by the door, letting it close quietly behind him. As I take him in I hold my breath. He’s wearing a short robe in black velour, tied at the waist. He looks lean and muscular. On his chest I catch a gleam from the small wolf’s-head logo embossed in silver. In the shadows he looks stunning, the hollows in his cheeks etched in the dim light from the lamp, emphasising the jutting, predatory cheekbones, the tough line of his jaw and the cruel possibilities of his long mouth.

He looks like he’s trying to make up his mind about me and fast losing patience because he’s still undecided. ‘Are you OK? You’ve been awake for hours. It’s late.’ He walks slowly across the room, his easy grace at odds with his troubled expression. ‘Can’t sleep?’

He runs a finger lightly over the taut knuckles clasped around my knees. ‘You’re cold. How long have you been sitting like this?’

He holds my gaze as he sits down beside me on the edge of the bed, prises my hands away and folds them into his. His warm clasp revives me enough to shift towards him and stretch out my stiff, cramped legs.

‘Did my lamp wake you?’ I shiver as feeling prickles back into my calf muscles in a shower of pins and needles.

His frown deepens and he folds his arms around me and pulls me close, his gaze stern. ‘Not exactly. The thought of you sitting in here with the light on is putting me off. What makes you sleep, Ella? What is it you need?’

I lean forward and breathe in his glorious aroma, heady and feral, and as I lift my eyes to his I see that he knows. He knows all about what I want.

At the same time a tiny part of me notices he’s still fingering the bones on my wrist, his touch gentle, warm, like he’s measuring, probing. It’s oddly arousing, just that faint, persistent touch. I’d no idea that part of me, just at the inner base of my hand, at the thinnest part of my arm, could be so sensitive.

Or maybe it’s because whenever he touches me there he seems unnaturally still.

The rest of me suffuses with deliberate, blatant lust. My breath quickens as my breasts graze the soft fabric of his robe through the thin satin stretched taut by their weight as I lean forward.

A flicker of awareness crosses his face. He can tell. The faint tilt of one eyebrow shows his reaction as clearly as if I’d said it out loud. ‘Really? Is that all?’

I reply with the faintest brush of my lips along the edge of his jaw. He sits very still for a moment as I move round to touch them to his earlobes, his neck and then the delicious hollow at the base of his throat. It’s a kind of homage but I’m powerless to invest it with any meaning. I’m simply reacting to the sensual force field that’s building around us.

‘Can I ask you a favour?’ His smile is friendly, his expression veiled.

My eyes widen briefly and then I kiss him again, scared he’ll ask me to stop and this might be my last chance.

‘Can I tie you up?’

He might be asking me to pass him a tissue. I sit up, wondering if I’ve heard him right. His expression’s calm. He’s waiting for an answer. I’ve heard about this. I’ve even heard it’s fun. But nobody’s ever asked me to do it.

My pulse shoots into overdrive, pounding in my ears and almost drowning out my instant, unthinking reply. ‘Yes.’

In minutes his velour sash is looped under the corners of the mattress and first one and then the other slim, quivering wrist is slip-tied to one of the loose ends. When he pulls on my ankles to drag me down the bed a little way, my arms are stretched wide over my head. Without the sash to confine it his robe swings open as he works, his movements brisk and efficient as he spreads my legs wide to get me into position.

I gaze entranced at the sight of his rippling skin, gleaming in the low light from the lamp as he bends over me to fix me into place for whatever enormity he’s planning.

The thought that he’s done this before – and, judging from the efficient way he’s tying me up, often – sends arousal rocketing through me in sheets of flame.

Now the power of his spell is overwhelming and I’m falling fast. I cling to reality by blurting out one more question, my voice shaky. It’s not from panic but real curiosity. It’s also a feeble bid to assert myself against the floodtide of his energy, its force so great it threatens any minute to sweep me away. ‘Why? Why are you doing this?’

He pauses as he kneels over me, his powerful thighs warm at either side of my face, the crotch of his boxers already thrillingly filled and bulging and very close to my mouth. I can smell the heady aroma of mingled spice and earth that pervades his body heat.

He shrugs off his robe and hurls it across the room where it flaps over a low chair like a defeated vampire. ‘Because I want you to keep still.’ His eyes glitter as he leans over me, his jutting erection making his intention plain.

He grabs my ankles and hauls me down the bed a little further, forces a pillow under my hips and then pushes my thighs apart until they ache. He leans back on his haunches to admire me for a moment before he swoops down to kiss me on the lips, his tongue insistent and probing, forcing gently into my mouth and then lingering, massaging mine in a gentle greeting – or is it staking a claim? – before pulling away.

He looks deep into my eyes and for a second I see a glimmer of heat. ‘And because I like it.’

He pulls away and moves back down my body to where I’m splayed wide, open to his inspection and now throbbing painfully, powerless and aroused to the point of numbness. ‘Are you always as swollen as this?’ He peers at me intently and begins to probe me gently with his fingers, easing into me with the sure touch of an expert.

I gasp at his touch, my thighs jerking back together in a reflex utterly beyond my control, but his response is swift and painful.

He slaps me hard on my inner thigh. ‘Keep still or I’ll tie your ankles too.’

Now I’m staring at him in shock, my neck aching from the effort of holding up my head to see what he’ll do next. I’m starting to tremble and it’s making me jumpy.

He probes again, his fingers intimate and wildly provoking. He watches me closely as he does it. ‘Hey, easy. Lie back. I’m not going to hurt you, Ella. I just want to try something.’

What kind of thing? I stare back at him, helpless in his gaze as he probes me again, his eyes fierce but his touch gentle as a whisper, as if to prove he can do nice as well as nasty. And all at once I want both, and fast. I grin at the enormity of my surrender, my lips parted to drag in air. ‘Yes.’

It’s all he needs. Triumph flickers in his eyes as he lowers his head and begins to feast.

His tongue could launch ships or start wars. I’ve never been so tormented, so teased or so relished in all my life. He sweeps its long, strong tip all along one side of my wide, splayed dip, skims the apex and then runs it down the other side, sending bolts of arousal shooting through me. Then he does it again. And again. And infinitely slowly he works his way into my folds, testing and tasting deep into my petals, parting each layer with patience and careful skill as if each hidden secret he finds there is precious and each act of separation an experience not to be missed.

I writhe and buck under his exquisite torment, tugging on my soft velour bonds like a captive doe in the hunter’s grasp. Each time I twitch out of reach he slaps me, and soon he growls low in his throat as he does it, the sound almost a snarl, inflaming me further. At last he reaches my centre and the first light, tingling touch of his tongue on my pulsing, swollen bud makes me scream aloud in rage and frustration.

He slaps me again, harder now. ‘Quiet. You’ll have half the hotel in here. Use some self-control or I’ll have to resort to discipline.’

He’ll what? Ye gods … what have I started?

He stays on target, his tongue edging back through my layers and probing deeper, below me this time, to where my rump hovers, trembling over the void on its pillow hill. Now he brings his fingers into play, pushing them into me, first one, then more, and cruelly grazes my bud with finger and thumb, splaying me open with his other hand to expose me fully and deny me even the small satisfaction of feeling my own softness close and maybe tip me over the edge.

I whimper as his fingers continue to graze me, gentle and insistent, but never enough – never close enough, never hard enough – always easing away just as I think the pressure will make me erupt.

Now he cruelly abandons my quivering, pulsing, lustful little crater as he looms back into my line of vision. He leans up over me and continues his torment along my taut, rippling belly and finally reaches my jutting, heaving breasts. Here he takes his time, folding his hands around them and kneading hard, making them bulge and swell up before me like mountains. He smiles down at me as he rolls my nipples between his fingers and thumbs, softly at first and then increasing the pressure until I cry out.

As he slaps me again I feel something drip somewhere, I can only hope on the pillow. It tickles madly, adding to my torture, and right on cue he releases one breast and searches down below with his hand. ‘Someone wet already? We’ve got a long way to go yet.’