LITMIR.BIZ

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when you had a father like Charles Armstrong? A man who had never really grasped the fact that a father’s duty to his children was to protect and shield.

      Armstrong used anyone, including members of his own family, if it gave him an advantage.

      ‘Just how nice does he expect you to be to me?’

      Megan responded to the comment as if it had been a slap, catching her breath and drawing back. The subsequent blast of fury that sizzled along her nerve endings blinded Megan to the sympathy in Emilio’s dark eyes.

      She lifted her chin and glared up at him. ‘My father does not ask me to have sex with men who can be useful to him.’

      ‘Though he’d not be likely to kick up a fuss if you decided to.’

      ‘I have sex with men because I want to.’

      So far she had not wanted to, but Megan saw no reason to share this information with Emilio Rios; even if she had, she doubted he would have believed her.

      Ironic, really—the world thought she was a bit of an iceberg, a reputation she found it comfortable to hide behind, but Emilio Rios thought she was some sort of sex-mad tart.

      Two years ago her initial gratitude at being rescued from a situation that had escalated dangerously out of control had changed to wretched misery when he had looked at her with contempt and treated her to a blighting lecture on the dangers of leading men on.

      Acting as though she were some sort of sexual predator!

       Sexual predator!

      At that point Megan hadn’t even had a real boyfriend. The man Emilio had rescued her from had not been her date. He was a lecturer, quite old to her mind, and she had treated his kind offer of a lift home from the graduation party, when the boy who had promised her an early lift home had become drunk and incapable, as just that—kind.

      How was she meant to have known that he had been drinking too? She hadn’t had a clue until he had put his foot down through the village, then, after making her extremely uncomfortable with comments loaded with sexual innuendo, instead of taking her to the house where her father was hosting a party for his business partner—all the family were under orders to attend—he’d pulled up on the long tree-lined drive leading up to the house and tried to kiss her.

      During the rather undignified tussle that had followed Megan had tried to remain calm, but she had been close to panic when the door had been dragged open to reveal Emilio.

      Her relief had been short-lived.

      ‘So how about me?’

      She looked at him blankly as she pushed away the memory of that night. ‘How about you what? ‘

      Emilio arched a sardonic brow. ‘Do you want to have sex with me?’

      Heat flashed through Megan. She was insulted, she told herself, not excited. She hung on to her temper with difficulty and pretended to consider his insolent question. ‘You got a spare million?’ Word was he had several.

      His brows lifted. ‘You value yourself highly.’

      Megan flicked the ponytail that lay against her neck and responded with a cool assurance she was about a million miles from feeling. ‘I’m worth it.’

      ‘Then maybe we could work something out. I’m not averse to paying for quality,’ he drawled.

      The sexual tension soared as they stared at one another, neither willing to back down. But before this absurd negotiation went any further a voice cut across the seething silence.

      ‘Emilio?’

      CHAPTER THREE

      MEGAN turned her head. The woman standing there was tiny, barely an inch above five feet. The last time she had seen the petite brunette the older woman had been wearing a ring; today her hand was bare, but nothing else, it seemed, had changed.

      Rosanna Rios was still the most beautiful woman she had ever met. Never a hair out of place, she looked like a porcelain ornament with big brown eyes, a rosebud mouth and delicate nose. She had the sort of delicate fragility that aroused the protective instincts in men.

      ‘I did call, but you were.’ she raised a darkened brow and lifted her enquiring gaze to Emilio as she teased ‘… occupied.’

      Megan felt her stomach muscles tighten as she watched Emilio brush the smooth cheek offered him with his lips.

      ‘I had no idea at all.’ Rosanna turned to smile at Megan, adding with a smile tinged with relief as she turned back to Emilio, ‘I’m glad things are finally working out for you.’

      Megan, puzzling over the soft-voiced aside, waited for Emilio to set the record straight. Instead she heard him ask his ex-wife if she was being met.

      ‘I was.’ Rosanna scanned the crowds, a delicate frown furrowing her smooth brow. ‘But he appears to have been held up.’

      ‘Can we offer you a lift? ‘

      Megan, frowning at the we and the misleading message it sent, watched as Rosanna shook her head. ‘I’ll wait.’

      Emilio shrugged and placed a hand lightly between Megan’s shoulder blades, acting as if he hadn’t noticed when she flinched. ‘If you’re sure?’

      Megan flashed him a ‘what the hell are you up to?’ look, which he responded to by dropping his head to whisper softly in her ear, ‘I’ll meet your price.’

      The mortified colour flew to Megan’s cheeks as she blurted loudly, ‘I wasn’t serious and you know it.’

      ‘You really shouldn’t make offers you don’t intend to follow through with,’ he chided, adding, ‘Sorry, Rosanna, we’re being rude.’

      ‘You’re being rude,’ Megan gritted.

      Rude, and extremely manipulative.

      ‘No apologies necessary. Are you two arriving? Or were you planning a romantic trip?’

      ‘We are not together,’ Megan protested in a belated attempt to set the record straight. The breathlessness of her delivery, due in part to the fingers that had begun to massage the tight area at the back of her neck, did not add weight to her claim.

      The casual intimacy of his action sent a quiver of raw sexual awareness through her body.

      Emilio hooked a thumb under her chin. ‘You’re tense, querida.’ He disapproved with a frown that left his dark eyes warm with concern.

      ‘I can’t imagine why,’ she retorted.

      The ironic retort drew a laugh from Emilio, who allowed the hand that lay against her waist to slide lower to the firm curve of her bottom. ‘Megan was planning to fly home, but it looks like I have her here for a little longer.’

      Rosanna gave a sympathetic grimace. ‘Bad luck.’

      ‘Good luck for me.’

      ‘I was lucky. I arrived on an early flight.’

      ‘How long have you two been …?’

      Megan, aware of Emilio’s eyes on her face, struggled to manufacture an amused smile for the other woman. ‘No, we’re not, that is. He’s joking.’

      Emilio came to her rescue. ‘We are just good friends,’ he said with an ‘if you believe that you’ll believe anything’ smile.

      Rosanna smiled. ‘Of course.’

      ‘No, really we’re …’

      Emilio placed a finger to her lips.

      The contact made her pupils dilate.

      ‘Relax, Megan.’ His deep voice, huskily suggestive of unspoken intimacies, shivered across her oversensitive nerve endings. ‘Rosanna understands, and she is not going to report back

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