outweigh a few inconveniences like a wife.’ Natalia reined in the anger that still fired her temper whenever she thought of the man who owned the property next door. ‘The only thing that comforts me about that situation is the look on his face when I said, no, thank you, I have this strange, old-fashioned idea that marriage means trust and fidelity, so although you’re a very sexy man I’m not going to bed with you!’
‘He was a rat,’ Liz soothed. ‘You know, I suppose it never occurred to Dean that you’d find out he was married. Just as well my mother has this network of old friends the full length of New Zealand, or you might have been really hurt.’
Natalia shrugged. ‘He hurt my pride and dented my heart a little, that’s all.’
‘More than a little, I think.’
Natalia looked down at her restless fingers in her lap. ‘I was an idiot,’ she said quietly. ‘I suppose I thought he was Prince Charming, and that he might be the one to whisk me off and marry me and rescue me from my life of drudgery. He was funny and intelligent and very attractive, and he seemed genuine.’
‘I’m sure he was genuine.’ Liz’s tone was both understanding and crisp. ‘He saw a woman he wanted, and he didn’t care whether he broke your heart provided he got you.’
‘He didn’t break my heart,’ Natalia said steadily.
‘I know,’ Liz said. ‘You’ve got too much sense to let an attack of wishful thinking blind you for too long.’
‘Thanks for the vote of confidence.’ But Liz didn’t know just how close she’d come to succumbing to Dean Jamieson’s practised charm.
‘Think nothing of it.’
Natalia said evenly, ‘What really makes me mad is that he told everyone in Bowden that I knew he was married.’
‘It was a lousy, malicious, petty thing to do, but at least you know what sort of man he is.’
‘You’re so right. A snake. One I came perilously close to falling for, which gives me a very low opinion of my intelligence!’
Liz primmed her mouth and endeavoured to look affected—difficult when her small face was alight with laughter. ‘Anyone can be taken in once. The important thing is to not let it happen again.’ She relaxed into a sly grin. ‘So I’ll do my best to find out who the newcomer is, and whether he’s got an encumbrance. I don’t think the woman with him is his—she’s too hungry. And he doesn’t look like a man who believes in abstinence.’
Half an hour later, as Natalia was coming back into the ballroom after a swift visit to the cloakroom, she was hailed by an old friend, a man who’d been a couple of classes ahead of her at school. They were laughing together when his wife of six months arrived with the speed, determination and subtlety of a mother rhinoceros seeing a lion examine her infant.
Cold-eyed, proprietorial, she snapped out a thin smile. ‘Hello, Natalia, nice to see you. Max, why don’t we dance this one?’
He looked embarrassed, and suddenly shifty. ‘Oh, yes, of course,’ he said. ‘See you around, Nat.’
Natalia’s lashes drooped as his wife all but dragged him away. Damn Dean Jamieson and his lies. How long was it going to take her to live down the reputation he’d deliberately saddled her with?
‘He might see you around,’ a disturbing masculine voice murmured from behind her, ‘but not if she sees you first.’
Stiff with pride, Natalia turned abruptly, only to collide with a large, immovable object. Before she had a chance to trip, hands clamped just above her elbows. Powerful fingers held her for a moment, startlingly tanned against her pale skin.
Of course she knew who it was.
‘Sorry,’ she muttered, lifting her head to look the stranger in the eyes.
Their impact drove the breath from her lungs. Behind the black silk mask, narrowed tawny-gold slivers were fringed by black lashes in a watchful, almost calculating scrutiny. In spite of that, Natalia was left in no doubt that he liked what he saw.
On the right-hand side of his face a thin, faded scar slashed downwards to the point of his jaw. Although it heightened the forceful, uncompromising power of his honed features, Natalia had to stop herself from tracing it with a finger.
Latent sensation flamed into life inside her—a volatile mixture of fire and ice, honey and gall, velvet and steel that combined in a fierce, terrifyingly elemental hunger.
‘I’m sorry—I knocked you,’ the unsmiling stranger said.
‘No, it was my fault—I wasn’t looking where I was going,’ she returned, reckless in her desire to get away.
One hand slid down her forearm. As she stared, dumbstruck, lean fingers rested on her pulse, testing the rapid, heavy throbbing of her heartbeat in the fragile blue veins.
Face hot, she wrenched free; he didn’t try to hold her.
‘You can feel mine if you like. It’s beating just as fast as yours,’ he purred, his devil-dark voice pierced by a shockingly intimate note.
She couldn’t breathe. Perhaps this was an asthma attack; she’d heard they could come on like this, unexpected, terrifying…
‘No, thanks,’ she said, appalled by her unsure tone.
His laughter shivered through her, stroked her slowly, as sensuous as sleek fur against her skin.
‘Dance with me,’ he said, and without waiting for her answer took her hand in his and led her to the floor.
Later she wondered what on earth he’d done to her, why she hadn’t walked away from him back to her own party. Perhaps the old-fashioned waltz had cast some old-fashioned spell on her, melting her into docility.
Turning her into his arms with practised skill, he swept her on to the floor. Of course he was a brilliant dancer.
As ravishing Viennese music filled the room, Natalia’s brain switched off. For the first time in her life she experienced the mindless pull of desire, existing only through her senses—senses swamped by the man who guided her through the crowds on the floor. Lost in a silent, erotic fantasy, they danced the whole set without speaking.
Until the music changed she’d begun to think he was never going to speak; then, as though that wordless, fiercely intent communion had never happened, he said, ‘I’m Clay Beauchamp, and you’re Natalia Gerner.’
Like its owner, his voice had immediate impact. Its masculine depth—emphasised by an undertone of raw strength—lifted the hair on the back of Natalia’s neck as she retorted, ‘And I don’t like being ordered to dance.’
Although she was staring rigidly over his shoulder she caught a flash of white teeth when he smiled. ‘I’ll remember that in future.’ The fingers around hers tightened fractionally, then loosened.
Natalia stiffened and almost missed a step. ‘Sorry,’ she said tonelessly.
‘My fault,’ he said, and pivoted with a lithe masculine grace.
As
