Mistress Material. Sharon Kendrick
her eyes roamed. Oh, what a chest! Abroad, powerful sweep of hair-darkened muscle beneath the cream silk of his shirt.
Her mouth dried as her eyes finally reached his face, lingering all too briefly on the beautifully shaped lips which somehow managed to be both sensual and cruel. And that nose—with its proud, aristocratic Roman curve. Who would have guessed that a nose could be such a turnon? she thought, unable to stop herself from ogling it, like an art-lover confronted with a masterpiece for the first time ever. Reluctantly, her gaze drifted upwards to meet his eyes, and her heart stilled as she acknowledged the cold fire and the contempt which sparked from the dark depths and which he made no effort whatsoever to hide.
His mouth was nothing more than a derisory slash as he reached her lounger and towered over her. ‘So,’ he drawled contemptuously, ‘I see that the years have done little to temper your appetites, cara.’
Her precariously thin veneer of sophistication was vanquished in a moment by the wounding words, delivered in the deepest, sexiest voice she had ever heard, an intriguing mixture of transatlantic with a seductive European undertone.
Logical thought was impossible, and she was instantly on the defensive. ‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’ she demanded furiously.
‘Oh, come on...’ The mouth twisted with devilish scorn. ‘I refer to your leisurely scrutiny of my body, Suzanna.’
‘Suki,’ she corrected immediately.
Dark eyebrows were raised in a silent and aloof query. ‘Ah! Of course—Suki.’ He emphasised the word so that it sounded like some sultry profanity. ‘The name you acquired along with your glittering fame as a model, and your many lovers...’
Her mouth fell open and she made a little murmur of protest at such a patent untruth, but he carried on regardless. ‘But no matter,’ he said softly as he surveyed her from slitted, dangerous eyes, ‘what you call yourself. Your basic gutter instincts remain the same, do they not? You looked as if you would like to eat me up. Every inch of me,’ he emphasised hatefully.
Swine!
Colour rushed up to form two heated flares over her high cheekbones as she tossed the thick waves of her hair back over her slender shoulders. Head held high, she spoke from a throat which felt as if it had been lined with the roughest, coarsest sandpaper. ‘You flatter yourself, Pasquale!’ she shot back. ‘But then you always did!’
He gave a small smile then, allowed it to linger and play around his lips. ‘Do I—Suki?’ he returned silkily. ‘Flatter myself?’ And the sudden change in the timbre of his voice, the velvet caress as he spoke her name, sent her senses jangling. The flow of blood around her veins altered; became slow and heavy. She felt the pulse-points beating insistently at her temples, her wrists... and ... shamefully.. deep, deep within her groin as he stared down at her.
But more was to follow as his eyes roamed almost indifferently over her face, seemingly careless of her enormous eyes gazing helplessly at him or of her wide mouth throbbing in an unconsciously provocative moue.
The only flash of life and of interest came when his gaze came at last to alight on her breasts and then the indifference was replaced by a feral light and his eyes darkened as they took in the lush, creamy mounds. She felt them tingle, become heavy and swollen, the tips burning with tingling excitement. And as he gave a coldly triumphant smile she realised to her horror that the forgotten bikini-top had slipped right down, exposing most of her for his scathing delectation. ‘Oh, no!’ she cried, and clapped both palms protectively over her breasts.
He said something very softly in Italian as his eyes narrowed. ‘Please do not cover them, cara,’ he murmured, on a husky entreaty. ‘Such magnificent breasts. How I long to touch them. To take each tip into my mouth and to suckle each one until—’
Suki grabbed a towel and threw it over herself, squirming with embarrassment and an excitement which was painfully acute as she struggled to haul the flimsy gold material back into place, but faced with that look of hunger in those dark, magnificent eyes she was all fingers and thumbs.
She hadn’t seen him for seven years, and yet two minutes in his company was enough to plunge her into dark and erotic waters which were threatening to completely submerge her. It was a nightmare. ‘Get—away from me,’ she managed, on a croak. ‘Now!’
He didn’t move; he didn’t need to—because he was actually standing beside her, not touching her at all, but at her words he seemed to pull himself together, because the raw heat of need was wiped from his face leaving nothing but a coldly contemptuous mask. ‘Certainly,’ he concurred, in a voice which was strangely harsh and a touch unsteady. ‘There is little pleasure to be gained from a woman who offers herself so freely.’
Stung, Suki glared up at him from narrow amber eyes which threatened to glimmer with tears of self-disgust. But she kept them at bay.
Just.
‘I wouldn’t offer myself to you if you were the last man in the universe!’
‘No? You have undergone a radical change of personality, then?’ he mocked.
What could she say? She wasn’t hypocritical enough to deny just how dreadfully she had once behaved with Pasquale Caliandro.
Still clutching the towel to her, she sat up, and the glint in his eye was unmistakable. Curiosity warred with common sense; and curiosity won hands down. ‘What are you doing here?’ she demanded, her heart beginning to race erratically as a schoolgirlish hope she’d thought long dead re-emerged with startling strength. ‘You haven’t—followed me here?’
To her fury, he actually threw his dark head back and laughed aloud, a glorious, mellifluous sound which made several people turn round to look at them. But when he’d stopped laughing the face which regarded her was cold and unsmiling. ‘Followed you?’ he queried, and the trace of sardonic incredulity made her blood boil. ‘Now why on earth should I want to do that?’
Suki shrugged, a desire for revenge chipping away at her insistently. ‘Your reputation with women is legendary,’ she said coolly.
‘Is it, now?’ he queried softly. ‘I wasn’t aware that you had such intimate knowledge of my behaviour.’
She sought to disillusion him of the idea that she somehow spent all her spare time finding out about him and his fabled exploits with the fairer sex. ‘I read the gossip columns like everyone else,’ she said.
‘Ah!’ He nodded. ‘So you do. But at least, cara, I do not have the reputation of breaking up other people’s relationships. Unlike you,’ he accused, and he nodded again when he saw her colour heighten. ‘Yes,’ he affirmed. ‘You see, I too read the gossip columns.’
Oh, those wretched tabloids! According to them, she’d had more lovers than Mata Hari! ‘If you’re referring to that ridiculous scandal in New York—that was a pack of lies!’ Suki defended hotly.
He raised a disbelieving eyebrow. ‘Oh, really? So the photographer’s girlfriend made the whole thing up, did she? You weren’t sleeping with her boyfriend?’
‘No, I wasn’t!’
His mouth curved contemptuously. ‘And the newly married Arabian prince who courted you so assiduously in front of his young bride last year... Tell me, was that also a pack of lies?’
Suki sighed as she remembered that sorry little affair. She’d met Prince Abdul at a cocktail party thrown by the Foreign Office in Paris. He had been ridiculously infatuated—mostly, Suki suspected, because she hadn’t been the slightest bit interested in him. He had always had everything he’d always wanted, and he had wanted her!
He had actually asked her to be his second bride—but without even bothering to divorce the first one! She had intended telling Prince Abdul exactly what she thought of him, but one of the diplomats at the Foreign Office had sought her out for a quiet word. There was a big oil deal going through between Prince Abdul’s country and Britain. Best not to actually turn him down outright, but to let him down gently...