LITMIR.BIZ

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been right all along: the best thing was to concentrate on a career, on being independent.

      She opened her eyes and to her consternation found herself looking directly into Marco’s dark, steady gaze. Immediately she felt the tug of some unfamiliar emotion twisting and turning deep inside her.

      What was that? she wondered angrily. Because it wasn’t desire. Even if he did have the sexiest eyes of any man she had ever met.

      Hastily she looked away from him. Thoughts like that did not help this situation, she told herself angrily.

      They were going through light, swirling clouds now. Then suddenly she could see the vivid sparkle of the Mediterranean beneath her, and ahead the shadowy outlines of the coast.

      There were mountains rising sharply, and large swathes of forest.

      Lower and lower they came, the engines whining softly, until Isobel thought that they might land in the sea. But just as she was starting to panic they skimmed in over a white beach and she saw a runway ahead.

      A few minutes later they had touched down smoothly. And with a roar of the brakes they taxied to a halt.

      ‘We are a bit early, but there should be a car outside to pick us up in five minutes,’ Marco said casually as he unfastened his seat belt and stood up.

      Isobel also got to her feet, and then wished she hadn’t as she suddenly found herself too close to him in the confined space.

      As he reached for his briefcase she sidestepped him so that she could open the overhead compartment and get her bag.

      ‘Wait—I’ll do that for you,’ he offered, glancing around.

      ‘No need. I’ve got it.’ Hurriedly she opened the compartment, but the next moment a case slid out smacking into her shoulder.

      ‘Are you OK?’ Marco caught it before it could do any further damage, and swung it to the floor.

      ‘Yes…’ She grimaced and put a hand to her shoulder. ‘I think so.’

      ‘Let me look at you.’ To her consternation, Marco put a hand on her arm and turned her to face him.

      ‘No, really—I’m fine!’ It was the weirdest thing, but the touch of his hand against her other arm made it throb more violently than her shoulder.

      ‘It’s torn your blouse.’ Marco said as he looked at her. ‘And you’re bleeding.’

      She glanced down and saw that he was right; there was a small crimson stain on the pristine white of her linen blouse. ‘It’s OK—it’s only a scratch. I’ll be fine.’

      ‘It seems to be a bit more than a scratch. Do you want me to look at it for you?’

      The mere suggestion was enough to make her temperature shoot through the roof of the plane. ‘I most certainly do not!’

      Her prim refusal amused him somewhat. ‘Izzy, the cut is just fractionally below your collarbone. You will only have to unfasten the top three buttons of your blouse—it’s hardly a striptease.’

      The words made her skin flare with heat. ‘It’s fine… Really… I…’

      He completely ignored her. ‘Michelle, will you bring the first aid kit, please?’ he called over his shoulder to the woman who had served them their drinks. Immediately she disappeared down to the bottom of the plane to comply. ‘Now, let’s have a look.’ He turned his attention firmly back to her.

      ‘Marco, I said I was fine—’ She froze as he reached for the top button on her blouse and started to undo it.

      Her heart was beating so loudly now that she felt it was filling the whole aircraft.

      ‘Marco, I can do it myself!’

      ‘At least you don’t have any difficulty saying my name any more.’ His dark eyes locked with hers and his lips twisted into a lazily attractive smile. For a panic-stricken moment she thought he was going to move on to the next button, but thankfully he didn’t. He dropped his hands. ‘Go ahead, then… You unfasten the buttons.’

      ‘I’ll do it later.’

      ‘It’s two little buttons, Izzy… Are you scared of me?’ His eyebrow rose mockingly.

      ‘No! Why would I be scared of you?’ Angrily she reached up to comply—she was damned if she was going to let him think she was scared of him!

      He noticed that her hands were trembling. He’d never had this effect on a woman before. He frowned as he saw the shadows in her eyes as she looked up at him… What was she so scared of? he wondered curiously.

      ‘There! Happy?’ She glared at him.

      ‘I wouldn’t go that far.’ He said the words derisively, and noticed how she blushed even more, but this time she looked more humiliated than shy. He frowned and wished for some reason that he hadn’t said that.

      OK, she was a bit of a Plain Jane, and nowhere in the league of the women he usually dated, but there was also something…interesting about her.

      Curiously he reached out and lightly stroked his hand over her collarbone, pushing the blouse back further until he could see the wound.

      She wasn’t prepared for the touch of his fingers against her skin; it sent a dart of sensual pleasure racing through her unlike anything she had ever experienced before. Horrified by her reaction to him, she could only stare up at him in consternation.

      In the stillness of the cabin it was almost as if time stood still.

      Marco smiled as he saw the flare of desire deep in the depths of her green eyes. Now he knew why she looked so scared…she definitely wasn’t as immune to him as she’d been pretending all afternoon. That amused him…and for some strange reason even pleased him.

      He noticed how she moistened her lips nervously, could see her breathing quickening by the rise and fall of her chest.

      He wondered how it would feel to kiss her…

      As soon as the thought crossed his mind he dismissed it. She was a journalist, for heaven’s sake…one of a breed he despised! They were hard-bitten, uncaring, trouble-stirring… He could go on for ever listing the reasons he hated the press.

      His gaze moved away from her lips and back to the cut on her collarbone. ‘It’s not deep—so that’s good.’

      The stewardess arrived with the first aid box and handed it over to him.

      ‘Thanks, Michelle. Are the steps down yet?’

      ‘Yes, sir. We are ready to disembark.’

      Marco found a tube of antiseptic cream and some cotton wool and handed it over to Isobel. ‘That should fix you up until you get to the house.’

      ‘Thanks.’ Isobel was still trying to pull herself together.

      What on earth had just happened? she wondered anxiously. Her heart was pounding as if she had run a long-distance marathon, and she felt shaky and hot inside.

      And the worst thing was that feeling of pleasure that had blazed inside her just from the lightest brush of his fingertips. That had never happened to her before with anyone. And the fact that it had happened so easily, with such a casual touch, with Marco was horrifying.

      That had to be in her imagination…

      Numbly Isobel followed Marco from the plane. They seemed to be in the depths of the countryside. There was a vineyard to her left, and the regimented rows of vines stretched up as far as the purple haze of the mountains. Straight ahead of them there was an aircraft hangar, which was the only building in the vicinity.

      Heat shimmered in a misty, watery illusion—like a stream running across the Tarmac.

      That heat haze was like her attraction to Marco, Isobel told herself firmly. It looked real,

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