style="font-size:15px;"> Give him his due, Joel smiled ruefully, acknowledging the hit. ‘We didn’t do a lot of talking,’ he confirmed, and she shook her head.
‘Perhaps you ought to start vetting your women a little more closely. This is the twenty-first century. Women are not merely sex objects any longer. They have brains, and have even been known to use them.’
Straightening, he moved round her and propped a hip against the desk, folding his arms as if prepared to stay there for ever. ‘I’m fully aware of that. I employ a good percentage of women in high-profile positions within my organisation.’
He rose a notch in her estimation. ‘I’m glad to hear it.’
Joel tutted. ‘Can we keep to the point? What I want to know from you is, can you repair the damage?’
Reproved, she folded her hands in her lap. ‘Yes, I can. But it’s going to take longer than I expected.’
His relief was palpable. ‘Take all the time you need. It goes without saying I will pay you whatever you ask. I’m not going to quibble over the bill, because I need those files, and I need them yesterday.’
Kathryn smiled sweetly and pushed up her sleeves. ‘Then you’d better let me get on with it. As soon as I’ve checked that there will be no nasty surprises, I’ll be able to move along more quickly. Would you have Drew get my box of tricks for me?’ she asked as she reached for the keypad once more.
‘I’ll get it. What does it look like?’
‘It’s a small black case. I left it on the dresser in my room,’ she responded absently, her mind already running through the checks she would have to make. She didn’t hear Joel leave the room, or come back a little later with the case, which he set on the desk beside her.
It was late when she finally closed down the computer and pushed back the chair with a groan as her body protested at having been fixed in one position so long. Yawning, she stretched, easing out the kinks.
‘Well, what’s the verdict?’ A soft voice posed the question from the other side of the room, and she very nearly jumped out of her skin.
Her arms dropped, and, turning startled eyes in the direction the voice had come from, she discovered Joel sitting at his desk, a sheaf of papers in his hand. ‘Have you been there all the time?’ she charged in amazement, and he nodded.
‘Pretty much. I went out for coffee once. Yours will be stone-cold by now,’ he told her with some amusement, and Kathryn blinked, only now seeing the cup which had been set at her elbow.
‘I didn’t hear you,’ she confessed, and he laughed softly.
‘A herd of elephants could have stampeded through here and you wouldn’t have heard them,’ he retorted with wry humour.
Her grin was rueful because it was all too possible. ‘I do tend to get a little wrapped up in my work.’
‘Just a little,’ he agreed.
They exchanged smiles, and in the blink of an eye the air seemed to thicken. Kathryn saw the look in his eyes change until its intensity scorched her and her eyes widened, her lips parting on a tiny gasp.
‘Are you going to come over here, or am I going to have to come over there?’ he asked her in a voice laden with so much passion she shivered.
Her body quickened, her senses silently screaming that either option would do. But there was still a sensible, sane portion of her brain in control, and she shook her head, albeit without any great deal of conviction.
‘I think…’ she began, only to stop when Joel set his papers down and rose to his feet.
‘Don’t think,’ he ordered huskily, rounding the desk and coming towards her. ‘I’ve been sitting here watching you chew on those luscious lips of yours for the past two hours and it’s been driving me crazy,’ he added with a groan.
Reaching out, he took her by the shoulders and lifted her to her feet. Kathryn tried to protest, but her heart wasn’t in it. Her hands rose to his chest to hold him off, but that was as far as they got. Instead of pushing him away, her fingers registered the heat of him and spread out like tiny fans to claim all of him they could. Swallowing hard, she stared up at him. Do something, her brain urged, and she did. Her eyelids closed as if weighted and his head descended. When his mouth claimed hers, a wave of such intense pleasure swept through her that her bones seemed to melt. At the brush of his tongue her lips parted, welcoming his possession.
In an instant the world spun away. There was only sensation. Somehow her arms were around his neck, her fingers gliding into silky hair and clinging tightly. From a long way off she heard Joel groan, felt his arms tighten, drawing her to his hard male body, and then his tongue was plundering her mouth with a devastating passion, and she met each thrust with her own, stoking a desire that set her blood sizzling in her veins and started up a throbbing ache deep within her.
It could have been one kiss; it could have been a dozen. Only the need for air finally forced them apart, and they stared at each other, hearts thumping, dragging gasping breaths through kiss-bruised lips.
Joel’s eyes had darkened to a deep stormy blue. ‘I think I got more than I bargained for,’ he confessed thickly.
Kathryn knew that she certainly had. She had always known that this man could make her feel with more intensity than any other man she had ever met, but with that kiss she had entered a whole new realm of experience. Her response had been so quick, so intense, so all-encompassing. Nothing would ever compare to it. Nothing would ever come close.
‘You shouldn’t have done that.’ She made the token protest in a whisper.
‘You didn’t stop me. You didn’t want to,’ Joel pointed out unnecessarily, for she knew how foolish she had been. It was too late to take back knowledge. From this point on she would always know what she was missing.
Kathryn pushed herself away from him with very shaky hands. ‘Maybe so, but we both know it was a mistake,’ she said as forcefully as she was able.
‘If that was a mistake, I hope to make more of them,’ Joel responded seductively, and the words trickled over her nerve-endings, setting them fluttering.
‘Don’t,’ she protested, then closed her eyes and sighed heavily. ‘OK, I admit I enjoyed it. But I’m here to work, not indulge in a…a…a liaison with you!’ she continued, with more insistence this time, as her system began to settle down to something approximating normal.
His brows rose quizzically. ‘Can’t you do both?’
‘I don’t want to do both!’ she lied, and they both knew it.
‘Sure you do,’ he countered chidingly, and she groaned, realising she was in a hole that would soon be too deep to get herself out of.
‘I don’t intend to get involved with you, Joel,’ she insisted, notwithstanding.
‘You can say that when not five minutes ago you went up in flames in my arms?’ he charged, and she didn’t thank him for reminding her.
Kathryn crossed her arms and raised her chin to a defiant tilt. ‘I am saying it.’
Much
