‘I’ll accompany you.’
‘Why?’
‘It’s in my interest as joint executor of Kevin’s will and a member of the directorial board to sanction any decision you make regarding the sale of estate assets,’ he evinced smoothly.
‘I intend staying overnight.’ An intention which should interfere with his business schedule.
‘No problem. I imagine you’ve booked the early flight?’
She wanted to gnash her teeth, and barely restrained herself from doing so. He’d very cleverly manoeuvred her into something she could hardly get out of, given that it was a legitimate business trip. But it was the overnight bit that irked, for the invention had worked against her.
Coffee was served in the lounge, and she sank gracefully into a single cushioned chair. Here at least she was safe.
Wrong, she acknowledged minutes later. Nicos came to stand within touching distance, and his close proximity had a measured effect on her breathing. As well as other more intimate parts of her body.
What was wrong with her? They were each enacting a part. As soon as their car cleared the gates, it would herald a return to the status quo. Separate bedrooms, separate lives. Connecting only for the sake of appearances.
So why did she feel as if her body was a finely tuned instrument awaiting the master’s touch? Every nerve was taut, each pleasure pulse acutely sensitised.
If he touched her, she’d go up in flames.
Did he know? Dear heaven, she hoped not! It would be a total humiliation. Hers.
She wanted the evening to end. To be able to go home, slip out of her clothes, remove her make-up, and crawl into bed. Alone.
Liar. You want to be with him. To experience once more what you once shared together. For the good times.
With Nicos, it had been more than sex. It had been intimacy, a physical expression of love between two people in tune with each other on every level.
All her protective instincts warned any attempt to revisit that special place would be akin to committing emotional suicide. And she was a survivor. She had to be.
It was after eleven when Nicos indicated they should leave, and she expressed her gratitude to their hosts, bade fellow guests goodnight, and walked at Nicos’s side to the car.
Minutes later they cleared the gates and soon reached the arterial road leading towards Point Piper.
Street lights provided illumination, and the tree-lined avenues cast looming shadows. Many of the houses were in darkness, but every now and again a lit window revealed activity within.
‘All talked out?’
Katrina turned slightly at the sound of that musing drawl, and could determine nothing from his expression. In the shadowed interior, his features were all angles and planes.
‘In recovery mode after playing charades,’ she declared, and heard his throaty chuckle.
‘That bad, hmm?’
In their hosts’ home there had been security in numbers. Now they were alone, and effects of the game still lingered. Yet she was conscious of an elemental danger, aware that if she didn’t tread very carefully she could unleash a situation she wasn’t ready to deal with…now, or at any stage in the future.
Had Nicos’s affectionate attention been entirely contrived? She told herself she didn’t want to know. Except there was a part of her that reacted to his touch, and it irked unbearably that she hadn’t been in total control of her emotions.
It didn’t take long to traverse the distance between Woollahra and Point Piper, and Katrina slid from the car in one fluid movement, entering the lobby a few steps ahead of her inimitable husband.
The click of her heels on marble tiles sounded loud in the night’s silence, and her steps were quick as she entered the spacious lobby and headed for the elegant staircase.
She was aware of Nicos resetting the alarm system, closing lights, and she fought against the instinctive need to run.
From what? a tiny voice demanded. Yourself?
She deigned not to answer, nor even give the thought any credence as she reached the sanctuary of her room.
Nicos hadn’t attempted to stop her.
So why did she harbour the intuitive feeling he had a strategy and a hidden agenda?
To seduce her?
Why? Except to prove he could?
And he had as much hope of achieving that as a snowflake’s chance in hell, she vowed as she slipped off her heeled pumps and discarded the beaded gown.
Make-up removal came next, then she donned a nightshirt and slid into bed, all too aware that sleep was never more distant.
After an hour of tossing restlessly from one position to another she pulled on a wrap and made her way downstairs to the indoor pool adjacent the gym. There, she cast aside the wrap and dived neatly into the sparkling, crystal-clear water.
Katrina stroked several lengths, then changed style, enjoying the feel of cool water against her skin as she covered length after length.
It was mindless exercise, but one she welcomed in a bid to bring on a state of semi-exhaustion that would enable sleep.
Maybe then Nicos’s image wouldn’t haunt her, or invade her dreams.
Her muscles were beginning to tire, and her breathing was no longer smooth or even. Time to stop, she decided as she reached the tiled edge, then rested there for several long seconds as she caught her breath and smoothed excess water from her hair.
‘Had enough?’
She gasped at the sound of that familiar male drawl, and went under as she’d inadvertently released her hold on the pool’s edge.
Seconds later she rose to the surface, spluttering with indignation. ‘You frightened the life out of me! How did you know I was down here?’
‘Sensor security,’ Nicos informed. ‘A modem beeps beside my bed if lights are activated inside the house after the alarm is set.’
Katrina trod water as she tilted her head to look at him. It seemed a long way up! ‘So you decided to investigate.’ In the reflected pool lighting he resembled a dark angel, and his navy towelling robe made her supremely conscious she wasn’t wearing so much as a stitch.
There were towels stacked in a nearby cupboard, but she’d have to emerge from the pool and walk several steps to reach one.
‘Are you through expending excess energy?’
‘Yes.’ Please, God, he wouldn’t guess why she’d chosen a midnight exercise stint.
He hunkered down and
