guest. Her racing pulse, the way her body quickened mindlessly to the warm masculine scent of him, the gentle pressure of his arms as they held her captive told her so, ringing alarm bells in her head. She had thought she was immune to such careless flirtation. Heartbreak was a painful vaccination, but it had served her well over three hard years.
But this man emanated a quite irresistible magnetism and, while her head was behaving rationally, she was only too conscious that her body was not. Her lips were hot and swollen as she imagined his beautiful, passionate mouth plundering them, and there was a trembling about her midriff at the thought of his hands about her waist, drawing her close…
She shivered convulsively. What on earth was happening to her? Sensible, down-to-earth, cold-as-ice Kate, who never let even the most devoted of her admirers within an arm’s length.
Agitated, stalling for time, she reached up to tuck a glossy black strand of hair behind her ear. Her lips parted nervously and she ran a cooling tongue across their surface. For a moment their eyes met and with a jolt like an electric shock she realised that he was angry. With her? For her apparently casual flirtation with Harry Roberts? That was surely ridiculous. Or was it with himself for so eagerly following suit?
Well, she thought, furious at his arrogant assumption that she was prepared to inflate his oversized ego a little further, he needn’t get himself into a bother about it. Her grey eyes turned steely and her naturally warm voice dropped several degrees below zero. ‘I’m afraid you’ll just have to take my word for it that I have absolutely no desire to kiss you, Mr Warwick.’
For a moment he remained perfectly still, the slightest frown creasing his brow. Then with one swift movement his hand slid down her back and he held her against the long, hard length of his body, moulding her breasts, her hips to him, and her body quivered with a surge of longing for something she knew he could give her and in that moment she wanted more than anything in the world.
‘Liar,’ he grated out harshly. Before she could utter a protest, his mouth had staked its claim and it was too late. But in those long, blissful moments she didn’t care. As desire sparked through her like a lightning strike she knew, without the slightest shadow of doubt, that he was the most desirable man she had ever met.
Her response had nothing to do with thought, or common sense. Her lips parted to his coaxing as unthinkingly as she breathed. Her breasts, hard against the broad expanse of his dress shirt, tingled deliciously as heat flickered through her veins and she let herself drown in the sensual pleasure of his tongue, sweet on hers. The kiss seemed to go on forever, her breath rising in tempo to match his, her arms long since having found their way around his neck to draw him down to her.
When finally he held her away from him Kate stared up at him, dazed, every inch of her pulsing with the sort of arousal that until that moment she would have dismissed as the feverish and overworked imagination of the adolescent mind, and a stifled sound came from somewhere deep in her throat.
‘Your word, like any other woman’s, Kate, is worthless.’ The sharp edge to his voice jolted her roughly back to the reality of the kitchen, the edge of the table at her back, the humiliation of having been kissed by a total stranger as if one of them was going to war. And the certain knowledge that it had been a demonstration. Nothing more. The blanked-out expression in his eyes could mean nothing else. And how could she protest? She had told him she didn’t want to kiss him and he had called her a liar. Her lips had betrayed her and proved him right.
‘I said I didn’t want to kiss you, Mr Warwick,’ she said, her voice hoarse from a throat aching with misery. ‘And that was the truth. I didn’t say I wouldn’t enjoy it.’ That was what made it so awful. At least Harry’s fumbling attempt at a pass, horrible though it had been, had had a kind of honesty about it.
Jason Warwick had simply set out to prove a point. Whether he had gained any pleasure from kissing her it was impossible to say. His brown eyes had a natural warmth that disguised the apparent coldness of his soul. Only a vein, beating furiously at his temple, suggested any feeling, any emotion.
For a moment he stared at her, then with a fierce oath he turned away and strode from the kitchen.
‘Mr Warwick,’ she called, a little unsteadily, as he reached the doorway. He paused, but didn’t turn. ‘You’ve forgotten your ice.’
The telephone rang and Kate, deep in concentration adding a row of figures, jumped, lost her place, sighed and lifted the receiver. ‘Kate Thornley,’ she said.
‘Good morning, Miss Thornley.’ Kate returned the greeting, instantly recognising the silvery tones of Lady Maynard, one of her favourite clients, despite the fact that it was Tisha Maynard’s kitchen that had been the scene of the appalling encounter with Jason Warwick.
‘Miss Thornley, I wonder if you would be kind enough to spare me an hour today?’
‘Of course. What kind of party are you planning?’
‘Not a party. I’d rather not discuss it on the telephone.’
Kate stared at the telephone. That sounded ominous. Surely the man hadn’t said anything about finding her in Harry Roberts’ arms? Jason Warwick hadn’t exactly covered himself with glory. ‘I’m free at eleven-thirty. Would that be convenient?’
‘I’ll expect you then.’
Kate replaced the receiver and went into her bedroom to change into something more suitable than jeans for the forthcoming interview. She opened her wardrobe door and stared at her reflection in the mirror.
She had the clear, almost translucent skin that often went with black hair. Only her cheeks were blushed delicately with pink, throwing her full mouth into vivid relief. For days after Jason Warwick had kissed her it had seemed swollen, heated, and she had been unable to bear to look at herself in a mirror. She laid a light finger on her lower lip and the pressure instantly brought his powerful image into sharp focus, and with it the memory of an urgent desire he had jolted free from its cage of ice.
‘Damn him!’ she swore, and reached for her one serious business suit.
It was precisely eleven-thirty when she rang the front doorbell of Lady Maynard’s Belgravia house, and she was immediately shown into the drawing-room.
‘How good of you to come at such short notice, Miss Thornley.’ Lady Maynard, a tall, graceful figure, her fair hair somewhat faded, but her dark eyes still remarkably bright, extended a beringed had. ‘Please sit down.’ Kate perched sedately on the edge of an exquisite sofa and waited. ‘I’ll come straight to the point. I have a business proposition to put to you, Miss Thornley.’
‘A business proposition?’ she repeated faintly. Until that moment she had not realised how tense she had become, convinced that she would have to defend herself in the face of unjust criticism. In freelance catering, where she was invited into homes and offices, reputation was everything. ‘What kind of business proposition?’
‘I would like to engage your professional services exclusively, that is full-time, for the next six months.’ The woman raised a hand to stall Kate’s expected protest. ‘I have no doubt that your business in London is booming. You are a wonderful cook, and, more to the point, a splendid organiser. I can assure you that I have employed enough people who called themselves caterers to appreciate that.’ She paused. ‘Shall I go on? Please tell me if you are booked up so far ahead that I’m wasting my breath.’
Kate, only too aware of the sharp reminder on her desk from the bank manager about the state of her overdraft and the way bookings
