LITMIR.BIZ

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leisure, for bedding her would enrage Peter Bellamy. Never mind that it would satisfy the savage beast within him as well.

      For a moment he paused at the starboard side and simply soaked in the breathtaking view of the silvery disk of the sun as it slipped into the rippling mocha waters.

      The horizon gleamed like buttered rum. Golden glimmers tinged with red skipped over the waves as if they were ablaze, glimmers of light that matched the highlights in Kira’s long luxurious hair.

      Kira. Why did she bring out such poetic yearnings in him?

      Out here was nothing but the sea, mistress to many of his ancestors. Mistress to him in many ways.

      He shook his head at his own fanciful musings and took the stairs to the fly bridge. A stocky old sailor, wearing cutoff jeans and a tattered T-shirt, manned the helm.

      “How’s she sail, Captain?”

      The old salt flashed him a cunning grin. “I’d ask the same of you if I thought you’d tell me who that tempting gal is that you stowed on board.”

      André scowled. “It’s a long story.”

      The Captain chuckled. “Most interesting ones are.”

      He shrugged. Though their friendship spanned a decade, he was loath to explain his association with Kira.

      “Just keep it steady,” André said. “The lady isn’t accustomed to the sea.”

      “Aye, aye, boss.”

      André gave the horizon one last look, then hit the stairs. Annoyance bobbed within him like a storm-tossed buoy. Thanks to the scandal, every moment away from his desk cost him a fortune.

      He hadn’t intended to make any changes at the Chateau as yet, for he wanted Kira to squirm, to wonder what he planned to do, to get comfortable in her role as his lover. Then he’d swoop in and exert his will over the hotel—and her.

      Oui, he’d not soften toward Kira. He would not make the same mistakes his father had made. No woman would rule him.

      André slammed into the master stateroom and dropped onto a tufted leather chair at his desk, even though he ached to pace the confines like a caged tiger scenting fresh meat. He grabbed the phone and put in a call to his private detective. The man answered on the second ring.

      “Is Bellamy still at the Chateau?” André asked, dispensing with pleasantries.

      “No. He left an hour after you did.”

      “Back to Florida?”

      “To California, to inaugurate a new hotel,” he said. “Do you want me to continue surveillance?”

      “Oui. I want to know every damned thing he does. Who he talks to, who he does business with.”

      “You got it,” the detective said.

      André ended the connection and rocked back in his chair, his mind sifting through this startling news. Why was Bellamy carrying on as if nothing had happened instead of rushing back to his compound in Florida? It didn’t make sense, for Bellamy had seen André leave with Kira. The deception was over.

      Had she simply been Bellamy’s pawn, used to publicly humiliate André? Used as needed and then discarded? Paid off with shares in the Chateau? It was a possibility he’d considered.

      His fight with Edouard had been personal, rife with emotions André deemed crippling. Simple revenge. He was David going up against Goliath.

      His feud with Peter was strictly business. One corporate raider battling another. But over the last six months Bellamy had turned vicious. Personal attacks on André that the media fed on.

      Where Edouard had regarded him as a pest, Peter Bellamy set out to destroy him. And Kira had sided with the enemy to bring about his ruin.

      Yet he desired her.

      Mon Dieu! Sleep deprivation was warping his mind. He rubbed his gritty eyes and winced. His body screamed for rest, yet he couldn’t afford it yet.

      André threw the pen on his desk and stormed from his stateroom. In moments he’d reached the main salon. His gaze sought and found the object of his scorn.

      She lay curled on the sofa, napping, her hair spilling over a pillow in a waterfall of mahogany curls. He wasn’t sure how she managed to look innocent and provocative at the same time. Nor could he understand why he wanted her, knowing she was a calculating liar.

      But his pulse quickened all the same. He longed to run his fingers through her hair as he covered her body with his. Would she welcome his caresses? Melt in his embrace? Sigh as he thrust inside her?

      He undid the knot in his tie and gave it a savage jerk. The silver-gray silk whistled free in the quiet. He’d know soon.

       CHAPTER THREE

      KIRA stirred, awakened by the crushed-velvet voice of her dreams. She understood very little French, but her body recognized the sultry promise his tone evoked.

      She frowned, annoyed. It was always this way—André’s voice rousing her from sleep as if to taunt her about the passion they’d shared once. Passion she’d never had with another man. Passion she missed with a soul-deep ache that never left her.

      As always, she was helpless to stop the desire radiating in her belly, spreading low and leaving her hot and throbbing and so restless she couldn’t lie still. She thrashed and arched in mute supplication for his touch, his kiss.

      His hand glided under her skirt and up her inner thigh, his fingers splaying over her skin, so close to where she wept for his touch. Sensations exploded in her in dizzying colors and she moaned as she was drawn into the kaleidoscope of desire.

      A soft laugh shattered the dream. She froze, knowing before her eyes popped open that the intimate touch was as real as the man. André loomed over her, his eyes dark and his features unreadable, his fingers inches from the juncture of her thighs.

      Her heart careened crazily, for in that second she wanted him to touch her there like he had before. Wanted him to see her as a woman with dreams and hopes, not just as a sexual partner. The knowledge that wouldn’t likely happen snapped her from her sensual haze.

      She slammed her hands against his shoulders. Mistake. Electricity arced into her as his muscles bunched and quivered. Her hands shifted over his chest, and she marveled at the power pulsing beneath her palms that she ached to explore.

      “Stop it,” she said, as much to herself as to him, shoving against him to scoot away, only to have the sofa’s marble-topped divider table stop her. “What do you think you are doing?”

      His lips pulled into a predatory smile that made her shiver with sexual awareness. “That should be obvious.”

      She shook her head, shocked he’d taken advantage of her while she was sleeping, stunned that she’d nearly begged him to take her. Hard. Fast. Deep.

      “I’m not making that mistake again.”

      Something akin to pain flashed in his eyes, a lightning strike of emotion she couldn’t read. “Yet you desire me, oui?”

      “No.”

      “I know when a woman is faking and when she is gripped by passion.”

      One bold hot finger slipped beneath the lace trim of her silky panties and traced the sensitive crease of her leg. She couldn’t stop the tremor that bolted through her, leaving her quivering with need.

      She drew on every ounce of courage she possessed to defy his potent masculinity and preserve what remained of her dignity. “You’re wrong. I don’t want you.”

      André slid his finger from her, depriving her of his touch, giving her false security. He flashed a beautifully masculine smile

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