LITMIR.BIZ

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he said silkily, ‘that you were the one so determined to score that notch in the first place? We both know that if I hadn’t stopped when I still could I would have taken your innocence on the rug in front of that fire…’

      Those softly spoken words smashed through the last vestiges of Kate’s dignity and defence. She looked up at him and beseeched with everything in her. ‘Please. Get out of my way, Tiarnan.’

      He shook his head. ‘I’m walking you to your room.’

      ‘I’m perfectly capable of walking myself, and have been for some time now.’

      His voice had steel running through it. ‘Nevertheless, I’ll walk you to your room—or do you want me to make a spectacle of both of us and carry you out of here?’

      One jet-black brow was arched. Kate didn’t doubt him for a second. Tiarnan had never been one to give a damn about what people thought.

      She felt unbelievably prim as she bit out, ‘That won’t be necessary. You can escort me to my room if you insist.’

      He finally moved aside to let her pass, and Kate stalked towards the entrance of the bar feeling stiff all over, her shoulders so straight and tense that she felt as if she’d crack if someone even touched her. She pressed the button for the lift and looked resolutely up at the display above the door as she waited. Tiarnan stood beside her, a huge, impossibly immovable force. Heat and electricity crackled between them. There was such tension in the air that Kate wanted to scream.

      No one reduced her to this. No one. She was dignified, calm, collected. She knew she had a reputation for being cool and it hurt her—she was the least cold of people. She could turn it on when it suited her, but it wasn’t really her. Cold histrionics and dramatics had been the territory of her mother. Kate had learnt at an early age to be a pretty, placid foil for her mother’s effervescent beauty.

      The lift arrived and the bell pinged, making Kate jump and then curse silently. She hadn’t thought about her mother like that for a long time; Tiarnan’s disturbing presence and even more disturbing assertions were effortlessly hurtling her back in time.

      He stepped into the lift with her, and the space contracted around them when the doors closed. Kate pressed the button for her floor and looked at Tiarnan irritably when he didn’t make a move to do the same. ‘Which floor?’

      Tiarnan looked at her glaring up at him. She was so beautiful. All fire and brimstone underneath that icy façade. Her eyes were flashing, her cheeks were pink and her breasts rose and fell enticingly under the bodice of her dress. She was rattled, seriously rattled, and he had to admit he was surprised at what was so close to the surface.

      In truth he’d imagined this happening much more easily. He’d imagined a sophisticated woman embarking on a wellworn groove, both of them knowing and acting out their parts. But right now he was rattled too. She was resisting him. He couldn’t think. All he wanted was to stop the lift, drag her into his arms and plunder her soft mouth. It had been too long since he’d tasted that inner sweetness, and the brief all too chaste kiss earlier had only proved to make his desire even more pronounced. But he knew he couldn’t. He had to tread carefully or he might lose Kate for ever—and he didn’t like the panicky feeling that generated. He didn’t do panic.

      Kate turned and folded her arms crossly, inadvertently giving Tiarnan an even more enticing view of her cleavage. She was sending out desperate silent vibes: Get away from me! Leave me alone! And as the lift climbed the floors with excruciating slowness that was exactly what he did. He actually moved further away. Back towards the wall. And when Kate sent him a suspicious glance she saw that he was leaning back, hands in his pockets, looking at the ceiling. He was even whistling softly.

      The lift finally came to a smooth halt and Kate all but ran out through the doors, taking her door key from her purse as she did so. She expected him to be right behind her. She’d seen a new side to him tonight: implacable, ruthless. Determined. It intimidated her. It excited her. She got to her door and slid the key into the slot, her hands barely steady after that revelation.

      But if he thought for a second that she was going to meekly turn around now and invite him in—Kate turned and pasted on a bright smile, words trembling on her lips…only to find the corridor empty. For a split second she had the bizarre and terrifying notion that she’d imagined the whole thing. Dreamt it all up.

      But then she saw him. Leaning against the open lift door nonchalantly, one foot stopping it from closing, his huge shoulders blocking the light inside. That was why she hadn’t seen him straight away. He inclined his head,

      ‘Goodnight, Kate, it was good to see you again. Sweet dreams.’

      And with that he stepped back in and the doors closed with a swish. Kate’s mouth dropped open. All she could see in her mind’s eye was that nonchalance and the bright dangerous glitter of blue eyes under dark brows. All her pent-up fury dissolved and she literally sagged like a spent balloon. She stepped inside her door and closed it, stood with her back against it in the dark for a long moment. Her heart beat fast, her skin tingled and her lips still felt sensitive. And yet more than all this was the ache of desire. She felt raw, as if a wound had been reopened.

      Damn Tiarnan Quinn. He was playing her—playing with her. She didn’t believe for a second that he was going to meekly walk away. No more than she would have meekly let him into her room. He was undoubtedly the most Alpha male she’d ever known. He always had been. He’d been born Alpha. And she’d set him a challenge with her refusal to acknowledge what had happened between them. There was no sense of excitement in knowing this, no sense of anticipation. She’d been too badly hurt in the past. She’d spent too long disguising her feelings, pretending to herself that she didn’t want him. Hiding it from others, even from Sorcha.

      She couldn’t help but feel—knowing his reputation, which was legendary albeit discreet—that she was posing a challenge to him in large part because he’d let her get away. Was this the banal satisfaction of some long-forgotten curiosity? Kate knew well that there would be a very small number on Tiarnan Quinn’s list of women who had resisted his charms, for whatever reason. She had the uncanny prescience that hers might be the only name. And yet that night it had been he who had stopped proceedings, not her. He was absolutely right; if she’d had any say that night ten years ago they would have made love on that rug in front of the fire.

      For whatever reason, he’d obviously decided that he wanted to carry on from where they’d left off. And Kate knew with every bone in her body that if she didn’t resist him she would be the biggest fool on this earth. The one shred of dignity she’d clung onto all these years was the very fact that they hadn’t slept together.

      Tiarnan stood at the window of the sitting room in his luxurious suite. The best in the hotel. He felt hot and frustrated, hands deep in the pockets of his trousers as he looked out at the view, not seeing a bit of it.

      All he could see was his own reflection in the window and the slightly tortured look on his face—tortured because Kate Lancaster was lying in bed some floors below him in the very same hotel, and right now Tiarnan would have gladly given over half his fortune to be in that bed with her. She’d emerged from the mists of memory to assume a place that no other woman had ever assumed.

      He could smell Kate’s light floral scent even now. And yet she’d walked away, resisted him. Tiarnan couldn’t remember a time when any woman he’d wanted had resisted him. From the moment the divorced wife of one of his father’s friends had seduced him as a teenager he’d seen the manipulative side to women and had been initiated into their ways.

      His mother had dealt him his first lesson. Cold and martyred. He’d seen how she’d made life hell for his father. Not happy to have been brought to inclement Ireland from her native Spain, she’d subjected his father and him to the frost of her discontent, eventually driving his father into the arms of another woman who’d been only too happy to accommodate him. Tiarnan could remember his father’s secretary, how she would cajole and plead with him to marry her. He’d witnessed those scenes as he’d played outside his father’s office, listening

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