His eyes were dark and smouldering, while she was most certainly not looking her best after the busiest of evenings. Was he mocking her? It wouldn’t be the first time. They’d mocked each other constantly when she was younger. ‘Me dance with you?’ she queried suspiciously.
Luc’s black stare swept the ballroom. ‘Do you see anyone else asking?’
‘This had better not be a pity dance,’ she warned.
‘A pity dance?’ he queried.
‘Yes, you know, when Niahl used to dance with me whenever I attended those balls you two used to rip up together?’
‘The cattle markets?’ Lucas frowned as he thumbed his stubble.
‘That’s what you called them back then,’ Stacey agreed.
‘What would you call groups of hopefuls with one end in sight?’
‘Sheep to the slaughter’
He laughed. ‘Of course you would.’
‘I was a poor little wallflower,’ she insisted, pulling a tragic face. ‘No one ever asked me to dance.’
‘I wouldn’t call you a wallflower. You were more of a thistle. No one wanted to dance with you because you scowled all the time. People want happy partners to have fun with.’
‘The type of fun it’s better to avoid,’ she suggested.
Lucas didn’t answer but his expression said that was a matter of opinion.
‘Anyway, I didn’t scowl,’ she insisted, ‘and if I had smiled as you suggest, Niahl would have gone ballistic. He never let anyone near me.’
‘Quite right,’ Lucas agreed, pretending to be stern while the corner of his mouth was twitching. ‘Your brother never liked to see you sitting at a loss, so he danced with you. I don’t see anything wrong with that.’
Stacey rolled her eyes. ‘Every girl’s dream is to dance with her brother, while he scans the room looking for someone he really wants to be with.’
‘You’re not at a loss now,’ Lucas said as he drew her to her feet.
‘It appears not,’ Stacey answered. She was amazed by how calm she could sound while her senses were rioting from Lucas’s firm grip alone. And now their faces were very close. She turned away. ‘I’m sure there must be something I should be doing instead of dancing.’
‘Yes,’ Lucas agreed. His wicked black eyes smiled a challenge deep into hers. ‘I plan to discuss that as we dance.’
SHE WOULD DANCE and keep a sensible distance.
Lucas was so big, was that even possible?
Even his mouth was sexy, and, like a magnet, was drawing her in. And then there was his scent: warm, clean man, laced with citrus and sandalwood. Damn him for making her feel as if anything he had to say or do was fine by her. She should have stayed until she’d checked every table for lost items, made sure the staff had all gone to bed, and then departed for her room, too tired to think about Lucas.
Where she would continue her lonely existence? She’d made lots of friends since leaving home, but they had their own lives, and carving a village out of a city as big and diverse as London wasn’t easy. She had achieved her goal in maintaining her independence and progressing her career, but there was a price to pay for everything, and romance had passed her by. It would have been safer not to dance with Lucas, but he was an anchor who reminded her of good things in her past. Teasing and tormenting him, laughing with him, caring for the animals they loved side by side, had bred an intimacy between them went beyond sex. There was a time when she’d rather have had Lucas tell her that he admired her horsemanship than her breasts, and that was still partly true today. In her fantasies, being held safe in his arms was always the best option, but this wasn’t safe. His hands on her body as they danced and his breath on her cheek couldn’t remotely be called safe. It was a particular type of torture that made her want more.
Thankfully, she was stronger than that. ‘So we’ve danced,’ she declared as if her body wasn’t shouting hallelujah, while her sensible mind begged her to leave. ‘It’s time for me to go to bed.’
‘No,’ he argued flatly. ‘You can’t leave now. It would be rude to the musician. He might think we don’t like his music.’
She glanced at the guitarist, who was absorbed in his own world. ‘Do you think he’d notice?’
Luc’s lips pressed down as he followed her gaze. ‘I’m sure he would. Do you want to risk it?’
‘No,’ Stacey admitted. The man had played non-stop during the banquet. Who could deny him his downtime?
‘Good,’ Lucas murmured, bringing her close.
He’d turned her insides to molten honey with nothing more than an intimate tone in his voice, and the lightest touch of his hands. The sultry Spanish music clawed at her soul, forcing her to relax, and, as so often happened when she relaxed, she thought about the mother she’d lost before even knowing her, and those long, lonely nights of uncertainty when she was a child, asking herself what her mother would have advised Stacey to do to please everyone the following day. She’d failed so miserably on that front, and had begun to wonder if she would ever get it right.
‘You’re crying.’ Drawing his head back, Lucas stared at her with surprise. ‘Have I upset you?’
‘No. Of course you haven’t.’ Blinking hard, she shook her head and pasted on a smile.
He captured a tear from her cheek and stared at it as if he’d never seen one before. ‘Perhaps you hate dancing with me,’ he suggested in what was an obvious attempt to lighten the mood.
‘I don’t hate it at all,’ she said quickly, wishing her mouth would stop trembling. This wasn’t like her. She always had her deepest feelings well under control.
‘Then what is the matter, Stacey?’
When Lucas talked to her with compassion in his tone he made things worse. She badly wanted to sob out loud now, give vent to all those tears she’d held back as a child. ‘I really need to go to bed,’ she said, sounding tetchy, which was infinitely better than sounding pathetic. ‘I’m tired.’
‘You really need to dance,’ Lucas argued, tightening his grip around her waist. ‘You know what they say about all work and no play?’
‘Success?’ she suggested with bite.
He refused to be drawn into an argument and huffed a laugh. ‘Even I take time out from work, and so should you.’
Perhaps he was right, she conceded. Being in his arms was so different from what she’d expected that the urge to make the moment last was stronger than ever. She’d been waiting for this all her adult life, and even if the guitarist was doing his best to make her cry, perhaps
