Soft and sensuous, it was still warm from the heat of Constantine’s body, and the tangy scent of the cologne he always wore still clung to the material, agonisingly familiar. It was impossible not to recall how in the past, when she had been held close to him, that fragrance had always filled her nostrils, intoxicatingly blended with the more subtle, personal aroma of his body. If she closed her eyes she could still feel the heat of his skin under her fingertips, the brush of his black hair against her cheek…
‘Grace?’
Constantine’s husky-voiced question intruded into the torrent of sensual memories that had flooded her mind, snapping her back to reality with a painful jolt. Wide and startled, her eyes flew open to clash sharply with his frowning black ones.
‘Where did you go?’
‘Nowhere!’
Her sharp response was too fast, too spiky, arousing his suspicions instead of subduing them. She saw his dark brows draw together swiftly and hastily set herself to covering her tracks.
‘I—I’m just a little tired,’ she invented hastily. ‘It’s been a difficult week at work. We’ve been having problems with a new campaign…’
‘You are still at Henderson and Cartwright?’
‘Yes…’
That was better. Her voice was back under control, calm and even.
‘I was promoted recently. Now I’m in charge of… But you don’t want to know this.’
She didn’t want him to know it. She didn’t want to let him know anything about her life or what was going on in it. He had relinquished that right when he had turned his back on her, and she had no intention of ever letting him in again.
Constantine’s shrug dismissed her comment as irrelevant.
‘I thought you were making polite conversation,’ he drawled indifferently. ‘It is something you are so good at here in England. It is so very civilised, especially in an uncomfortable situation.’
‘I’m not uncomfortable!’ Grace snapped defensively, grey eyes flashing defiantly.
‘Perhaps I meant myself,’
‘Oh, that I can’t believe!’ With a wave of her hand she dismissed Constantine’s silky murmur. ‘I’ve never seen you fazed by anything. You wouldn’t have got where you are if you let anything get to you. And you’ve been trained by an expert—your father.’
But she was on dangerous ground there. She knew it from the way his proud head went back sharply, the flare of something menacing in his eyes. But when he spoke no trace of his inner feelings shaded his tone.
‘Nevertheless, this could be somewhat…’ He hunted for the right word. ‘Awkward for you.’
‘That’s something of an understatement.’
Biting her lip, she wished the careless words back as she realised the advantage she had thoughtlessly given him.
He was quick to pounce on it, of course, that sensual mouth curving into a sardonic smile at her discomfiture.
‘You are clearly at a disadvantage here—Ivan gave you no warning of the fact that he had invited me, and I presume that some people here will know what passed between us.’
He knew only too well that almost everyone Ivan had invited would be aware of the fact that two years ago she had been about to marry this man, but that the wedding had never taken place. They might be unclear on the gruesome details, but after that final, appallingly public scene in the foyer of the agency, no one could be in any doubt that Constantine had tossed her aside and walked out of her life, ignoring her pleading for a second chance.
The fact that she had also been at fault in the beginning brought the additional complication of a guilty conscience to an already volatile mixture of emotions roiling inside her. Under the cover of the coat, her hands clenched tightly, crushing the expensive material.
‘That was two years ago, Constantine,’ she told him coldly. ‘Two years in which I have got on with my life, as I presume you have with yours.’
His nod of agreement was curt to the point of rudeness.
‘I’m over it,’ he declared bluntly.
‘And so am I.’ Grace wished she could sound as assured as he had done. ‘People have short memories. You and I might once have been a nine-day wonder, but now we’re stale news. Neither of us can leave—it would upset Ivan too much. So we’re just going to have to make the best of things. Don’t you agree?’
The look that seared over her was icily assessing; black eyes narrowed thoughtfully for a moment.
‘It should be easy enough,’ he said at last, his tone a masterpiece of indifference. ‘I shall simply do what I have done every day for the past two years, and that is to wipe your existence from my mind, forget I ever met you.’
‘In that case, why come here at all? You must have known…’
‘Obviously I knew you’d be here, but the wish to please Ivan on his birthday was strong enough to overcome the repugnance I felt at the thought of seeing you again.’
It was meant to hurt, and it achieved its aim with all the ruthless efficiency for which Constantine had achieved his reputation in the business world. Grace was deeply thankful for the protective concealment of the coat she still held as she crushed it close to her, feeling almost as if she needed to stem some agonising internal bleeding that had sprung from the wound he had deliberately inflicted on her.
‘But I don’t have to spend any more time with you. There are enough people here to distract us…’ An autocratic wave of one hand encompassed the crowded room at the far end of the hall. ‘And the room is quite large enough to keep us apart for some time.’
‘I couldn’t agree more.’ She had to force herself to say it. ‘If we’re really lucky, we won’t even have to see each other again.’
She would do it if it killed her, would rather die than let him see just what it was doing to her to have him here like this. Constantine nodded slowly, his gaze already drifting away towards the other room where other, obviously more attractive company awaited him.
‘That would make it possible to salvage something from this appalling evening.’
‘Then don’t let me hold you back!’
Her tartness drew that black-eyed gaze back to her for one more of those uncomfortably probing stares, a faintly cynical smile playing around Constantine’s firm mouth.
‘To be honest, my dear Grace, I sincerely doubt that anything you could do would ever affect me again.’
Was it possible? Grace asked herself as he strolled away without so much as a backward glance. Could he really feel nothing for her, not even the dark anger she had seen blazing in his face at their last, cataclysmic meeting? Did she now mean so little to him that he could dismiss her from his thoughts in the blink of an eye? What had happened to the love he had once declared so eloquently, the passion he had been
