her mind. Not from the moment when, filled with the sudden inescapable realisation of why she had come here, she had suddenly felt that she was far, far out of her depth. All the temptation of the evening had suddenly coalesced into reality. The reality of what she was allowing to happen.
Why not? The voice had said to her again.
But at that fateful moment last night, looking down at the superb, lounging figure of the man who had simply knocked the breath from her body the first time she’d set eyes on him, the only words in her mind had been quite, quite different.
Oh, my God—what am I doing—what am I doing?
But she had known—known absolutely—what she was doing. Had known it all evening and had gone with it. Gone with the voice that had tempted her.
And she had known in that moment of standing there, at the end of the evening, that the moment of decision had come. She had known why she was there—known exactly why. There had been only one decision to be made—did she want to stay? To accept what was going to happen? To succumb to the temptation that had been beckoning her all evening?
She stared ahead of her, out over the dimness of the bedroom. What might she have answered had Alexeis not kissed her?
She didn’t know. Because he had kissed her, and in that very first moment, when his cool, long fingers had slid into her hair and his mouth had come down on hers, there had been only one decision—and it had already been made.
And she could not—did not—regret it! Not now, as she lay there, scooped back against the fantastic body that had done things to hers that she had never known were possible! How could she possibly regret it?
It had been a feast of sensuality—a banquet! His touch on her had melted through her like lava, drawing from her a response she had not thought possible. Touch after touch, each more arousing than the last, each more devastatingly intimate, until at last the sensations in her body, so incredible, so exquisite, had fused into an endless stream, intensifying until she was molten. Helpless in his arms, her head threshing from side to side, her body had been incandescent, burning like a flame that consumed all sense, all knowledge, all consciousness, making the whole world only what she was feeling, as if the whole universe were inside her head and nothing else existed!
Only the man making her feel that way. Only the one she’d clung to, cried out to, clutched with her hands, lifted her body to, to catch more, yet more, of that incredible, incredible experience—
She felt the afterglow still infusing through her, in her flesh. Her eyes were heavy, lids sinking. Her lashes fluttered. Around her waist she could feel, like a band, his strong arm pinioning her to him. Holding her where he wanted her to be.
In his arms. His bed.
CHAPTER FOUR
CARRIE sat in the wide leather seat in the first-class compartment of the aeroplane, overcome with wonder and disbelief.
What on earth am I doing? What on earth am I doing?
The words circled slowly in her brain. It was hard to think coherently, rationally. Hard to think at all. She didn’t want to, she knew. She wanted very much not to think. To simply—accept. Accept that something had happened that had never happened to her in her life before and never would again. She had spent the night—the most amazing, incredible, breathtaking night of her life!—with a man who had been a stranger twenty-four hours ago. And now, even more unbelievably, she was flying to New York with him!
It was like some kind of fantasy—the kind you dreamt up when life looked grim and you needed something rose-tinted and impossibly wonderful to think about. The mental equivalent of eating a cream cake or pigging out on a box of Belgian chocolates.
Her head turned to look at the most incredible man in the world, sitting beside her—an entire tray of cream cakes, a kilo of Belgian chocolates all in his own right!
She gazed helplessly, disbelievingly, at his profile. His attention was focussed on the screen of his laptop, resting on the table provided by the airline seat, his long legs extended.
Her heart swelled. God, he was so gorgeous to look at! She could gaze at him non-stop, like an idiot, just drinking him in. Everything about him was incredible—from the strong nape of his neck, the dark satin sheen of his superbly cut hair to the strong line of his jaw, the sweep of lashes around those eyes that could melt, melt, melt her into mush just by glancing at her…
A thrill went through her like a huge bubble of champagne, lifting her from her seat.
I’m with him—I’m really with him! He’s taking me to New York and I can go on being with him all that time!
That was the thought she wanted to go on thinking—feeling—like champagne in her veins, intoxicating her. But the other thought—the one that was trying to circle slowly—was also there.
What am I doing here?
The only answer she could give was the wonder, disbelief and delight that was intoxicating her. That was all the answer there was.
I’m here because I couldn’t be otherwise! I couldn’t turn it down—couldn’t say no. How could I have? How could I have?
In less than twenty-four hours her life had been turned upside down and she had been swept away. And she was helpless, quite helpless, to do anything else but let it happen.
A deep, heartfelt sigh of sheer happiness breathed from her.
Beside her, Alexeis, supremely conscious of the slender, beautiful body so close to his, heard her exhalation and glanced at her. Approval and satisfaction reflected in his eyes before he turned back to his work.
Yes, he had made a good decision. Definitely a good decision. A good decision to follow the unexpected impulse that had impelled him to order the car to stop as it drove past her, and a good decision to fold her soft, yielding body to his and make her his own. It had been an amazing night. Extraordinary not just for the novelty of it but for whatever it was that had made possessing her so deeply satisfying. He wanted—quite naturally, quite obviously—to repeat the experience for quite some time, he knew, and to do that he’d needed to make the decision he had made this morning: to take Carrie with him. Yes, it was an impulse. No, he did not normally take women with him. But so what? He was taking Carrie with him. Why? Because she was, right now, exactly what he wanted.
Rapidly, mentally, he ran through just why that was. She was beautiful, obviously—he wouldn’t have bothered with her otherwise. But hers was a beauty, a wide-eyed, fair-haired, tender-mouthed loveliness—that appealed to a taste in him that he hadn’t hitherto been aware of. That in itself was a charm that he was more than appreciative of. Her body was all that he could want—soft breasts, slender waist, gently rounded hips, long legs, and skin like the satin bloom of a peach growing into ripeness.
Caressing her, possessing her, had been a pleasure that was as rewarding as he had anticipated.
A slight frown flickered in his eyes. She had been everything he’d expected, it was true—soft, silken, and very, very seducible. And she hadn’t been, as he had known, a virgin. That, he knew, he would have found an impediment. However, she was not much experienced—certainly not in all the ways of pleasure he was used to. He had sensed her inexperience in some forms of intimacy, had sensed, too—a sensual smile of
