put her unfamiliar libido back in the dusty box where it had come from. She had no right to be disappointed. She hadn’t wanted anything to happen really. It was the sunset and the colour and the heart-stopping beauty of an island the gods had blessed with unimaginable riches to compensate for locating it over an active volcano.
‘That was spectacular,’ she said, turning her back to the balustrade now the show was over. ‘Thank you for sharing it with me, and for a wonderful dinner. I should probably be heading off now.’
‘You don’t want to stay for coffee?’
She shook her head. She felt foolish now. Carried away by the romance of the island. Reading too much into a simple invitation. If it was any lighter here on the balcony, he would surely see her face glowing red.
She crossed back towards the table where she’d left her bag, searching for a lightness she didn’t feel. ‘I have a confession to make.’
‘You do?’
‘I actually thought—I mean—just for a while there, when you took off chasing the thief, well, I’m sorry to admit that I half wondered if you hadn’t been working together, and that I’d never see you, or my bag, again.’
He shook his head, his dark eyes glinting with amusement. ‘You honestly believed me capable of behaving in such a despicable manner?’
She cast her eyes downwards. ‘I’m so sorry. I was strung out. I don’t know why else I would have thought such a thing.’
His dark eyes narrowed. His lips turned up on one side. ‘But then, you thought I was some kind of gigolo too.’
‘God, don’t remind me. I’m sorry about that too.’
He leaned an arm up onto the wall beside her and she was struck by the poetry in the slow but sure movement of his muscled limbs. ‘You thought I was going to seduce you.’
‘To be fair, I didn’t know what to think. I was alone and you were very charming. Are very charming. What was a woman on her own to think? But you’ve proved me wrong and I’ve had the most wonderful evening, thank you.’ She put out a hand to shake his.
He stared down at it, a crease tugging dark brows together. ‘Are you disappointed?’
‘What?’
‘That I didn’t try to seduce you?’
She shook her head. ‘I don’t... I’m not sure...’
His eyes met hers, and in their dark depths she saw an insecurity and wavering that mirrored her own, an insecurity she would never have expected to see in this man’s, not when he otherwise appeared so confident and assured. An insecurity she instinctively wanted to smooth away and reassure.
‘Because you must know,’ he said, ‘I wanted to kiss you.’
Her mouth went dry. ‘You did?’
‘When the sun was setting before us and it was like we were part of it, rather than just watching, and I could see the look of wonder on your face—in that moment I ached to reach out a hand and touch you.’
‘You did?’ She tossed her head back, trying to inject no more than a casual interest in his revelation. Trying to sound as if they were discussing something academic. ‘Why didn’t you?’
‘Because I was afraid you might run. That it would confirm your worst thoughts about me. So I held back. Let me tell you, removing my hand from your back was one of the hardest things I have ever done.’ His dark eyes trained on hers. ‘Would you have run?’
Her bag suddenly felt heavy in her hands, her limbs felt boneless and it was all she could do to remember to breathe.
‘Would you?’
The air between them seemed to shimmer with expectation. This was no game they were playing. No innocent question and answer session. This felt dangerous.
Reckless.
Athena didn’t do reckless.
Not normally. But tonight was far from normal.
And this time that voice inside her head demanded to quash any resistance and to be heard, and this time, she was only too prepared to listen.
‘No.’ Her answer was a bare whisper, and yet more than a whisper. A confession.
He closed the distance between them and put the pads of his thumb to her cheek, the fingers of his other hand tracing the line of her lips. ‘You are more beautiful than any sunset I have ever witnessed. I have wanted you since the moment we first met.’
His warm breath, scented with the cognac they’d shared, caressed her skin, and like the waves upon the sea his words rippled into her soul. Her cheek leaned into his touch, her lips parting, seeking more, tasting him.
‘If you ask me to kiss you,’ he said, ‘there is no way I could refuse.’
Her heart skipped a beat. And she knew with a woman’s sense that this was bigger than any kiss. The heat pooling in her belly, the pulse beating at her very core told her this wouldn’t stop with a kiss. But he was giving her the choice—stop now or go on.
In the end, it was no choice at all. ‘So kiss me,’ she said.
And he made a sound, guttural and deep, a sound of triumph mixed with need that rumbled straight to her veins and turned her blood to bubbles as he pulled her close and his lips met hers. Warm lips. Surprisingly soft and yet firm. Engaged in a sensual dance with hers. Slow. Gentle. Teasing. Deeper. Repeat.
Her knees turned weak. She reached for him, needing an anchor to steady herself, finding a rock as her hands tangled in the folds of his shirt and found his hard body beneath. Her fingers embraced his sculpted torso and she heard a sound like a whimper and realised it had come from her.
But he was glorious. Muscled and hard beneath her seeking fingers. Thirsty fingers, drinking in the ridges of bone and tight bunches of muscle as his mouth made magic on hers. While his long-fingered hands scooped down the sides of her head, to her shoulders, leaving trails that felt like sparks under her skin and that scorched a path all the way down via peaking nipples, to where an aching heat pulsed between her thighs.
And even as she pressed her body closer to his, closer into his kiss, she knew this was all kinds of reckless, because she knew there was no way this was stopping with a mere kiss.
And she wanted it.
She wanted it all.
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