the doorbell rang.
She opened the door—to a dark-suited stranger.
‘Ms Montrose?’
‘Yes.’
‘May I come in?’
‘But I don’t think I know you,’ she said slowly.
‘I’d like to remedy that,’ he replied expressionlessly.
‘Do I have an option?’
‘Actually—no.’
‘I see.’ Clare took an unsteady little breath. ‘Then you had better come in.’
He stepped across the threshold and waited while she closed and bolted the door. Then he took her in his arms and murmured, ‘It’s almost as if you’ve been waiting for me, Ms Montrose.’
‘Not you, someone else,’ she whispered.
‘I hope I’m able to take his place.’ And he trailed his long fingers down the side of her throat.
She shivered slightly. He looked into her eyes then lowered his mouth to hers.
When they broke apart, she was breathing raggedly and he took her hand and turned to lead her into the main bedroom.
She followed after a slight hesitation. The sun had set and a blue dusk was starting to fall beyond her wide windows.
She stood unresisting although she was tense and she kept her eyes veiled as he started to undress her. The zip at the back of her dress went down to her hips and the silky watermelon-pink material slipped off her shoulders. She glanced at him briefly but he only looked narrowly intent as he watched the dress slip farther down. She stepped out of it.
Her underwear appeared to hold his interest for some moments, a beautiful, dusky pink bra with elaborate silver embroidery and a matching pair of high-cut bikini briefs with a tiny silver ribbon bow.
He looked into her eyes again. ‘I wonder if they realize, when you’re in court and being so very professional, Ms Montrose, how seductive your underwear is?’
Clare licked her lips. ‘I don’t...always wear... these.’
He smiled briefly. ‘Good old Bonds Cottontails for work? Does that mean you wore these especially for the man you were expecting tonight?’
‘Yes...’ It was the bare echo of the word.
‘So he likes you to be sexy and seductive?’ He raised an eyebrow.
She didn’t answer.
‘Or do you like to be that way for him, Ms Montrose?’
Again she didn’t answer but looked at him proudly.
‘Spoken like a true feminist,’ he drawled. ‘But, on his behalf, I don’t believe I should allow this moment to go unrequited.’ And he pulled off his jacket and loosened his tie.
But he undressed no further. He took her into his arms first and kissed her thoroughly again before he went to release her bra.
Clare resisted and said huskily, ‘Do I have the right of reply, at least?’
‘Be my guest,’ he invited.
She smiled briefly and undid the knot of his tie and threw it on the bed, and started to unbutton his shirt.
‘Ah, that kind of reply,’ he murmured.
‘Even if I have to do this, I might as well make a statement of my own.’
‘Ma’am, I can’t take exception to that.’
‘Good. How sexy does this make you feel, sir?’ Her eyes glinted as she slipped her hands beneath his open shirt and ran them up and down his chest, curling her fingertips in the springy hairs then allowing them to wander down his hard, trim torso towards the waistband of his trousers.
He looked at her wryly but replied gravely. ‘More and more so, Ms Montrose.’
Tantalizingly, she let her hands roam up to his shoulders again and eased the crisp white cotton shirt away. The skin of his wide shoulders was smooth and tanned and she bent her dark head and kissed him lingeringly on the base of his throat at the same time as she freed his shirt from his trousers and once again rested her fingers on his waistband.
‘May I?’ he said, not quite so evenly.
‘Be my guest,’ she whispered, with the faintest gleam of victory in her aquamarine eyes.
They said no more as they dispensed with the rest of their clothing, although she trembled at each touch of his hands on her body—her breasts, the smooth curve of her hips, her inner thighs—and what the contact with his body did to her—igniting her senses and turning her slim, pale figure into an instrument of growing, sheer desire.
Then she was lying beneath him on the wide bed as they came together in a breathtakingly sensual rhythm and, finally, a union that left them both gasping with delight.
‘That was a cheap shot at my underwear in court, Mr Hewitt.’ She snuggled against him and laid her cheek on his chest.
She felt a jolt of laughter run through him as he combed his fingers through her hair. ‘I gathered that—if looks could kill! But you played your part perfectly, Slim. You even managed to turn the tables on me.’
She grimaced. ‘You did look like a stranger. I’ve never seen you so formally dressed before.’
‘I went straight to the airport in Sydney from a business conference, and came straight here from Ballina airport.’
‘Did you—?’ She stopped and bit her lip.
‘Tell me,’ he prompted gently.
She lifted her head so she could see his eyes, leant her chin on her hands and said slowly, ‘Did you think that after six months we’d still have that kind of effect on each other?’
‘I ... had no way of knowing,‘ he said thoughtfully. ‘But I can’t complain. Can you?’
‘No ...’
‘You don’t sound too sure.’ He sat up and she followed suit so they were sitting side by side, and he took her hand.
Clare thought for a moment and discovered that her uppermost emotion now was a sense of disbelief. Here she was, a mother-to-be, but indulging in lovely, sensual games—well, to be honest she could no more help herself than fly to the moon, but was it right? Shouldn’t she be feeling less sexy and more—what—responsible?
‘Clare?’
‘I suppose I had no way of knowing either and no, I’m not complaining,’ she said humorously. ‘In fact, I’m also going to be very traditional and unfeminist right now. Lie back and I’ll bring you a drink which you can enjoy at your leisure whilst I have a shower and rescue dinner.’
