LITMIR.BIZ

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a squeak of horror, she yanked the earphones out of her ears and scrambled off the bed, scattering pages of the script over the floor.

      ‘Get out of here!’ Her scarlet face clashing with the hot pink underwear, she grabbed the dress she’d been wearing earlier and clutched it to her chest, but not before Nathaniel had been treated to a full frontal display of her generous curves.

      ‘Just for the record, you definitely don’t need to suck in your stomach,’ he drawled. ‘And I thoroughly approve of the underwear.’

      ‘Don’t you knock?’

      ‘I knocked. You weren’t listening.’

      ‘I was reading—’

      ‘In your underwear?’

      ‘I was hot.’

      ‘Now, that we can agree on.’ Nathaniel delivered a smile of undiluted masculine approval. ‘Why do you always wear brown on the outside when you’ve got all that lacy pink going on underneath?’

      Her green eyes flashed a warning. If he’d been keen on the safe route he would have left the room, but Nathaniel had always preferred to live dangerously so he strolled towards her, prised the dress from her rigid fingers and studied the smooth perfection of her soft curves. ‘You have an incredible body.’

       ‘Get out of here!’

      He discovered that playing with fire distracted him from all the things he didn’t want to be thinking about. ‘Of all the secrets you’ve spilled in the past twenty-four hours, this one is definitely the best.’ He tumbled her back onto the bed, pinning her arms as she tried to roll.

      ‘What are you doing?’

      ‘You said you wanted to get to know me better. This is the quickest way I know.’ Without thinking he brought his mouth down on hers, capturing her soft lips with his, smothering her moan of shock. Her mouth opened and he tasted the sweetness and then desire slammed into him, the explosion of need consuming him like a fever. Nathaniel locked his hand in her hair and plundered that mouth, turning what had begun as an experiment into a kiss of such erotic intensity that the shock of it exploded right through his body. Sucked under by the sheer impact of raw physical chemistry, he slid his hand under the smooth curve of her bottom, bringing her into contact with the urgent thrust of his arousal. His need for her desperate, he teased her lower lip with his teeth and tongue and then lowered his mouth to her breast. Pink lacy fabric acted as a barrier between them and he dragged it aside with impatient fingers and fastened his mouth around one thrusting peak—and tasted heaven.

      He heard the sudden snatch of her breath and felt her fingers dig hard into his shoulders. When he skimmed her breasts with tongue and fingers, she moaned under him, the sensuous movement of her hips unleashing a ravenous hunger inside him.

      Nathaniel lost all sense of time and place.

      His brain shut down and he responded with pure animal instinct.

      Sliding his hand between her legs, he breached the barrier of her underwear and explored her slick softness with bold, gentle fingers. He felt her stiffen beneath him and then she shoved hard at his chest.

      ‘No.’

      He heard her through a dark mist of ferocious, primal need.

       ‘Nathaniel, no—’

      It was the tone that registered, rather than the words. That and the sharp bite of her nails in his shoulders.

      Lifting his head, he stared into green eyes glazed with the same need that tore through him. He tried to speak but there was only one part of him that seemed to be working. Nathaniel licked his lips, realising that he hadn’t just found distraction, he’d found oblivion.

      Shaken by his own lack of control, he rolled away from her. ‘Sorry,’ he drawled. ‘Blame it on the padding. For the record, it’s in all the right places.’

       What had happened to him?

      Seriously unsettled, he stared up at the canopy that draped the four-poster bed in soft creamy folds. Romance, he thought. The whole damn room was designed for romance and happy endings. And there wasn’t a happy ending within a million miles of him.

      Nathaniel sprang to his feet and strolled towards the door. ‘I came to tell you dinner is served.’

      ‘Nathaniel—’

      Behind him, he could hear the rustle of fabric as she pulled on her dress. He didn’t turn. Because he didn’t know what had happened, he couldn’t be sure it wouldn’t happen again.

      His hand on the door handle, he gave a smile of self-mockery. ‘I’ll see you on the terrace, wardrobe.’

      ‘Nathaniel, for goodness’ sake, wait!’ There was a soft thud as her feet hit the floor. ‘You can’t just—We nearly—Damn it, do you ever talk about anything?’

      Not if he could help it. He turned to look at her and then wished he hadn’t because her hair was mussed and sexy and her mouth was softly bruised from his kisses.

      ‘Do you have to talk about everything?’

      ‘Not everything—’ she looked confused, exasperated ‘—but you just … we just—’

      ‘But we didn’t.’ Nathaniel opened the door. ‘You said no. I stopped. End of conversation.’

      ‘No, it isn’t the end of the conversation!’ She stalked over to him. ‘Why did you kiss me?’

      ‘You were lying semi-naked in provocative underwear on an enormous bed.’

      ‘So your criteria for having sex with someone is that you like their underwear. Don’t you ever want to get to know someone?’

      No, never.

      Nathaniel took advantage of the open door. ‘Dinner,’ he murmured, ‘is definitely served.’

      CHAPTER FIVE

      KATIE felt dizzy and light-headed, as if her body might float off at any moment.

      It didn’t help to tell herself that his job had taught him how to make a kiss hot and seductive and how to make a woman feel irresistible. Nor did it help to remind herself that she’d been half naked, which was sufficient provocation for a red-blooded male like Nathaniel Wolfe.

      In fact, nothing helped.

      She still felt … desirable.

      Sneaking a look at him through the flickering candles that lit the dinner table, she saw that he was staring at a point in the distance, his dark brows locked in a brooding frown.

      Unobserved, Katie looked at his mouth. How many times had she watched him on the big screen and wondered how it would feel to be kissed by him?

      Now she had her answer. It felt incredible.

      She had to remind herself it wasn’t real. If she fooled herself that he’d been carried away by passion, then she’d be forgetting her own theories. He was an actor. He could play any part he chose.

      Awkward with the extended silence, she spoke. ‘I read the play ….’

      ‘Play?’ His blank look made her realise how distracted he was.

      ‘Your play.’

      ‘Right.’ His face cleared. ‘If you were gripped enough to read it in your knickers, presumably you liked it. Any ideas?’

      Determined not to show him how much that one kiss had flustered her, Katie beamed at Ben as he served chargrilled vegetables. ‘Yum. That looks delicious, thanks. You spoil me.’

      Ben returned the smile. ‘I’ll be hovering right here if there’s anything you need, Miss Katie.’

      ‘No,

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