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Three

      HE SHOULD NEVER have touched her, Nikos told himself. Never been such a damn fool as to bridge the gap between them, do something as crazy as to put his finger on her face, feel the softness of her skin underneath his.

      He should never have let himself get close enough to her to catch the scent of her skin, the clean softness of her hair.

      Just a couple of steps forward was all it had taken. And, with the electrical sting of response to the moment their hands had touched around the glass still sizzling up his arm, he had already been halfway towards the madness of arousal that she had always been able to spark in him so instantly in the past.

      And still could, damn it, it seemed.

      He had spent the last five years trying to put her part in his life behind him, out of his mind. He had managed to get the taste of her out of his mouth and now it was right back there, sensual, intoxicating, driving him insane.

      He had to be insane. How the hell else could he have let her get to him so far, so fast?

      One touch and he had been right there, back in the maelstrom of searing hunger that tightened his throat, made his heart pound in his chest, made him hot and hard and hungry in the space of a single devastating heartbeat.

      Just the feel of the soft flesh of her cheek under his fingertip had brought a memory, fast and dangerous as a bolt of lightning, of the way it had felt to have her naked, all that softness underneath him, warm and willing, yearning for his touch, his caress…opening to him…

      Thee mou, no! He was not going down that dangerous path again, sensually enticing though it was.

      ‘I repeat,’ he said, injecting every ounce of control he possessed into the ruthless command of his voice, ‘is there anything else that you want to say before you leave?’

      Was there anything?

      Sadie felt as if her head was spinning, reeling as if from the force of a sudden fierce blow.

      Her shocked, numbed brain wouldn’t focus, and all she could think of was the feeling of Nikos’s arms around her, the pressure of his body against hers. Her heart was still thudding ferociously and the taste of him was still on her lips. And deep in her body the yearning hunger that had uncoiled in those few fraught, dangerous moments was still burning, still stinging at her senses and making her feel miserably restless with unfulfilled need.

      The clamour of every aroused cell made her feel as if she was being assailed by some appalling fever. One that had her burning up in one moment and then shivering in wretched cold the next.

      ‘Well?’

      Nikos’s tone was harshly impatient, and damn him if he didn’t flick another glance at that hateful watch, driving home his message without needing to say another word.

      ‘I…’

      Still unable to collect her thoughts, Sadie resorted to desperate measures, giving her head a rough little shake in an attempt to clear it. The movement caught Nikos’s attention, making him frown ominously.

      ‘And what does that mean?’ he questioned sharply. ‘Is it supposed to be no, you have nothing more to say? Or no, you have no plans to leave? Because I can tell you that you may not have plans—but I certainly do. I have another appointment in fifteen minutes, and a business lunch and an afternoon conference call after that. I don’t have time to waste standing here, waiting for you to make up your mind and realise that you’ve had your chance—you made your plea and you lost.’

      ‘Lost?’ Sadie echoed dejectedly, recollection of why she was here coming back to her in full—and leaving her feeling worse than ever at the realisation that Nikos was dismissing her for good, with no chance at all of saving their home for her family.

      ‘There is no way that I am going to sell you Thorn Trees,’ she heard him say now, confirming her worst suspicions. ‘Or rent it to you. My plans for the house remain just as they were when you—’

      ‘Oh, please!’ Sadie broke in on him, the thought of going home and telling her mother that she had failed driving her to one last desperate attempt to get him to show some compassion. ‘Please don’t say that! You have to understand—there has to be something I can do for you.’

      ‘And what makes you think that? What the devil could I want from you? Believe me, there is nothing—’

      ‘But there must be!’

      ‘Nothing.’

      His tone warned her not to argue further. And the way he raked both hands through his hair, pushing it back into its sleek control, spoke of a ruthless determination to be back on track, ready for the next move, that next appointment. This one was over and he was done with her.

      ‘But that—what happened just now—surely…?’

      Her words died as she looked into his face and his expression told her the terrible truth.

      ‘What happened just now?’ Nikos echoed cynically, his burning gaze searing over her from the top of her ruffled dark head to the toes of her black patent shoes.

      The look of dark contempt that filled it made her shiver, feeling as if a much needed protective layer of skin had been stripped from her body, leaving her raw and exposed, frighteningly vulnerable.

      ‘And what makes you think that what just happened had anything to do with anything?’

      ‘But—you…I thought…’

      Her tongue seemed to tangle up on itself, tying itself in knots so that she couldn’t get the words out.

      ‘You thought…?’ Nikos prompted harshly when she fought with herself, trying to speak.

      ‘I thought that that—that when you…’

      When you kissed me. She just couldn’t make herself say it. She knew that she would give herself away if she did. She had thought—had hoped—that the way he had kissed her so passionately meant that he still felt some trace of something for her. That, if nothing else, at least he was still attracted to her. And she had little doubt that that hope, that illusion—because his face made it plain it was an illusion—would show in her voice if she said anything more.

      ‘When I kissed you?’ Nikos drawled mockingly. ‘Is that what you mean? So tell me, my sweet Sadie, just what did you think was happening? What do you think that was?’

      ‘I—’ Sadie tried to begin, but he ignored her stuttering attempt at speech and talked across her quite deliberately.

      ‘Did you think it was warmth? Was that it? Or perhaps affection? Or perhaps…’

      He actually had the nerve to stop, appear to consider, even look suitably surprised, when deep down inside she knew damn well that the brute wasn’t surprised at all but had been aiming for this right from the start.

      ‘Thee mou, you didn’t think it was love, did you?’

      If she’d found it hard to speak before, then now Sadie found it absolutely impossible. She could feel the hot colour flaring in her cheeks and knew that her furiously embarrassed reaction had given her away completely.

      ‘Then I’m sorry—’

      ‘No, you’re not!’ Sadie broke in, finding her voice at last in the strength of the wave of anger that swept over her. ‘You’re not sorry at all. And I know it wasn’t—wasn’t anything like love.’

      It couldn’t have been. There was no way anyone could switch on love like that and then immediately turn it off right away.

      ‘It certainly wasn’t,’ Nikos confirmed coldly.

      ‘So what was it?’

      Cruelty? Deliberate manipulation? Some sort of hateful test?

      ‘Isn’t it obvious?’ Nikos questioned softly. ‘I

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