right now, dealing with Lucas’s depressed mood, a mood she had never seen him in before in all the years she had known him, was what was important to her. Lucas’s happiness would always be important to her.
‘So,’ he spoke briskly, ‘was he the one?’ He looked at her interestedly, amusement darkening his eyes.
Christi relaxed slightly at his teasing. ‘No,’ she answered without hesitation.
‘Oh!’ Lucas looked surprised. ‘He seemed a nice enough chap to me.’
‘He was,’ she nodded. ‘But he wasn’t for me.’ You’re the man for me, she cried inside, wishing—oh, God, wishing he could see her as more than a young sister, or, even worse, someone he treated as being on the same age level as his two children! Much as she liked Robin and Daisy, her feelings towards them weren’t sibling, but more maternal. She longed to be their stepmother, to perhaps give Lucas other children. ‘Crying for the moon,’ her mother would probably have told her gently, her face softened with love.
Lucas sipped his whisky again. ‘How could you tell after just one date? Love doesn’t always hit you between the eyes like a fist, you know. Sometimes it takes time to develop and grow.’ He relaxed back against the sofa, watching her beneath heavy lids.
But sometimes it did hit you like that fist, and when it did it was the hardest thing in the world to live without! ‘Love doesn’t,’ she acknowledged with a nod.
He frowned. ‘Meaning something else does?’
‘Oh, yes,’ she smiled.
‘What—ah!’ He gave a knowing sigh, his mouth twisted into a smile. ‘That little monster lust rearing its head again,’ he derided.
The bleakness was starting to fade from his eyes, and he had put down the half-finished glass of whisky on the coffee-table beside him. ‘I don’t think of it as lust,’ she chided reprovingly. ‘Merely a case of physical attraction,’ she corrected with mock indignation, rewarded with a gleam of laughter in dark grey eyes.
‘Lust,’ he repeated drily. ‘But there was none of this—physical attraction,’ he teased her mockingly, ‘between you and Dick Crosby?’
Another few moments of this nonsense and she would have the old Lucas back again, and not the man whose barely leashed savagery distressed her so much.
‘Hm—maybe a little,’ she conceded with exaggerated thought.
‘On his part, at least,’ Lucas taunted knowingly. ‘Weren’t you attracted to him, too?’ he asked interestedly.
‘He was very handsome, fun to be with,’ she conceded with a shrug.
‘And?’
‘And nothing,’ she dismissed lightly.
‘You liked him, he was fun to be with, you found him handsome, and yet—nothing?’ Lucas said disbelievingly.
‘Hm,’ she nodded, mischief gleaming in her eyes. ‘I had my doubts throughout the evening, but it was the kiss that finally convinced me,’ she said sadly, laughter lighting up her eyes beneath demurely lowered lashes.
Lucas sat forward, his elbows resting on his knees, a frown between his eyes. ‘The man has got to the age of—thirty-one, thirty-two——’
‘Thirty-one,’ she confirmed.
‘To the age of thirty-one, and is still a lousy kisser?’ he said incredulously.
‘On the contrary,’ she drawled, ‘he was a very experienced and accomplished kisser.’
‘But——’
‘There are kisses. And then there are kisses, Lucas,’ she explained meaningfully, knowing they wouldn’t be having this conversation at all if Lucas hadn’t drunk the unaccustomed whisky. In the past, he had always shown a cursory interest in her dates, but they had certainly never discussed these sort of intimacies!
‘There are?’ he mocked.
‘Platonic kisses, polite kisses, meaningless kisses——’
‘I thought there was only one way for a man to kiss a woman he found attractive,’ Lucas drawled. ‘So that he leaves her in no doubt that he wants her.’
Christi felt her heart leap in her chest, knowing she could lose what she already had with Lucas, but also knowing she would perhaps never have another opportunity like this one. ‘Then maybe Dick did do something wrong,’ she accepted thoughtfully. ‘Maybe you could show me how it should be done? Oh, I realise you would have to pretend to find me attractive, but at least this way I know what to look for in a man,’ she concluded innocently, her hands clasped tightly together so that Lucas shouldn’t see their trembling, her heart beating so loudly, she felt sure he must be able to hear it. She could lose everything with him, but oh, how she longed to know the touch of his lips on hers just once!
His expression darkened. ‘I don’t think——’
She quickly got up from her chair and joined him on the sofa, her legs folded beneath her as she faced him. ‘How else am I to know what to want from a man if someone doesn’t show me?’ She looked at him imploringly.
He swallowed hard, a nerve pulsing at his jaw. ‘The men you dated last year——’
‘Did nothing for me, either,’ she dismissed, telling him clearly that she had never found any man attractive enough to let him do more than kiss her.
How could she let any other man but Lucas touch her? She had loved him long before she had taken any other man seriously, and loving Lucas as she did meant she couldn’t bear the thought of any other man making love to her.
Her heart pounded more loudly than ever as she waited for his answer, knowing she was perhaps taking advantage of the fogging the whisky had caused to his brain, but wanting—so much—to be taken in his arms. Regrets could come later. And she didn’t doubt that there would be many.
Lucas sighed, shaking his head, obviously not as affected by the whisky as she had thought—hoped!—he was. ‘I don’t think that would be a good idea.’
She sat back with a shaky sigh, his rejection a bitter blow. ‘Maybe Barry will be more cooperative,’ she challenged angrily, blinking back her tears of disappointment. ‘After mixing with all those Hollywood starlets, he’s sure to be very experienced!’
Lucas clasped her arms, turning her to face him, his expression fierce. ‘Don’t go playing games with a man like Barry Robbins,’ he warned grimly.
‘Why not?’ she said defiantly, so hurt she just had to hit out at him. She had taken the chance, and lost, but in a way that humiliated as much as it hurt. ‘He’s attracted to me, I can tell, and—oomph!’ She was abruptly silenced as Lucas’s mouth descended on hers, stealing her breath away.
He was kissing her out of anger, not passion, but to Christi it didn’t matter; she melted into his arms as he bent her back against the sofa, her arms moving up about his neck as she clung to him, gladly returning his kiss.
And then his mouth gentled on hers, controlling
