LITMIR.BIZ

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joy-rider had mown down her mother on her way home from work, carrying the toy dog she’d bought for her daughter’s birthday. Lucky she hadn’t had to go into a foster home or some scary institution. But knowing something didn’t always change the way you felt inside. And it didn’t change the reality of being made to feel like an imposition. Of constantly having to be grateful for having been given a home, when it was clear you weren’t really wanted. Trying to ignore all the snide little barbs because Keira had been better looking than her cousin Shelley. It had been the reason she’d cut off all her hair one day and kept it short. Anything for a quiet life. ‘Because Christmas is a time for families and they’re the only one I have,’ she said.

      ‘You don’t have parents?’

      ‘No.’ And then, because he seemed to have left a gap for her to fill, she found herself doing exactly that. ‘I didn’t know my father and my aunt brought me up after my mother died, so I owe her a lot.’

      ‘But you don’t like her?’

      ‘I didn’t say that.’

      ‘You didn’t have to. It isn’t a crime to admit it. You don’t have to like someone, just because they were kind to you, Keira, even if they’re a relative.’

      ‘She did her best and it can’t have been easy. There wasn’t a lot of money sloshing around,’ she said. ‘And now my uncle has died, there’s only the two of them and I think she’s lonely, in a funny kind of way. So I shall be sitting round a table with her and my cousin, pulling Christmas crackers and pretending to enjoy dry turkey. Just like most people, I guess.’

      There was a pause so long that for a moment Keira wondered if he had fallen asleep, so that when he spoke again it startled her.

      ‘So what would you do over Christmas?’ he questioned softly. ‘If money were no object and you didn’t have to spend time with your aunt?’

      Keira pulled the duvet up to her chin. ‘How much money are we talking about? Enough to charter a private jet and fly to the Caribbean?’

      ‘If that’s what turns you on.’

      ‘Not particularly.’ Keira looked at the faint gleam of a photo frame glowing in the darkness on the other side of the room. It was a long time since she’d played make-believe. A long time since she’d dared. ‘I’d book myself into the most luxurious hotel I could find,’ she said slowly, ‘and I’d watch TV. You know, one of those TVs which are big enough to fill a wall—big as a cinema screen. I’ve never had a TV in the bedroom before and it would be showing every cheesy Christmas film ever made. So I’d lie there and order up ice cream and popcorn and eat myself stupid and try not to blub too much.’

      Beneath the thin duvet, Matteo’s body tensed and not just because of the wistfulness in her voice. It had been a long time since he’d received such an uncomplicated answer from anyone. And wasn’t her simple candour refreshing? As refreshing as her lean young body and eyes which were profundo blu if you looked at them closely—the colour of the deep, dark sea. The beat of his heart had accelerated and he felt the renewed throb of an erection, heavy against his belly. And suddenly the darkness represented danger because it was cloaking him with anonymity. Making him forget who he was and who she was. Tempting him with things he shouldn’t even be thinking about. Because without light they were simply two bodies lying side by side, at the mercy of their senses—and right then his senses were going into overdrive.

      Reaching out his arm, he snapped on the light, so that the small bedroom was flooded with a soft glow, and Keira lay there with the duvet right up to her chin, blinking her eyes at him.

      ‘What did you do that for?’

      ‘Because I’m finding the darkness...distracting.’

      ‘I don’t understand.’

      He raised his eyebrows. ‘Don’t you?’

      There was a pause. Matteo could see wariness in her eyes as she shook her head, but he could see the flicker of something else, something which made his heart pound even harder. Fraternising with the workforce was a bad idea—everyone knew that. But knowing something didn’t always change the way you felt. It didn’t stop your body from becoming so tight with lust that it felt like a taut bow, just before the arrow was fired.

      No,’ she said at last. ‘I don’t.’

      ‘I think I’d better go and sleep in that damned armchair after all,’ he said. ‘Because if I stay here any longer I’m going to start kissing you.’

      Keira met his mocking black gaze in astonishment. Had Matteo Valenti just said he wanted to kiss her? For a moment she just lay there, revelling in the sensation of being the object of attraction to such a gorgeous man, while common sense pitched a fierce battle with her senses.

      She realised that despite talking about the armchair he hadn’t moved and that an unspoken question seemed to be hovering in the air. Somewhere in a distant part of the house she heard a clock chiming and, though it wasn’t midnight, it felt like the witching hour. As if magic could happen if she only let it. If she listened to what she wanted rather than the voice of caution which had been a constant presence in her life ever since she could remember. She’d learnt the hard way what happened to women who fell for the wrong kind of man—and Matteo Valenti had wrong written on every pore of his body. He was dangerous and sexy and he was a billionaire who was way out of her league. Shouldn’t she be turning away from him and telling him yes, to please take the armchair?

      Yet she wasn’t doing any of those things. Instead of her eyes closing, the tip of her tongue was sliding over her bottom lip and she was finding it impossible to drag her gaze away from him. She could feel a molten heat low in her belly, which was making her ache in a way which was shockingly exciting. She thought about the holidays ahead. The stilted Christmas lunch with her aunt beaming at Shelley and talking proudly of her daughter’s job as a beautician, while wondering how her only niece had ended up as a car mechanic.

      Briefly Keira closed her eyes. She’d spent her whole life trying to be good and where had it got her? You didn’t get medals for being good. She’d made the best of her dyslexia and capitalised on the fact that she was talented with her hands and could take engines apart, then put them back together. She’d found a job in a man’s world which was just about making ends meet, but she’d never had a long-term relationship. She’d never even had sex—and if she wasn’t careful she might end up old and wistful, remembering a snowy night on Dartmoor when Matteo Valenti had wanted to kiss her.

      She stared at him. ‘Go on, then,’ she whispered. ‘Kiss me.’

      If she thought he might hesitate, she was wrong. There was no follow-up question about whether she was sure. He framed her face in his hands and the moment he lowered his lips to hers, that was it. The deal was done and there was no going back. He kissed her until she was dizzy with pleasure and molten with need. Until she began to move in his arms—restlessly seeking the next stage, terrified that any second now he would guess how laughingly inexperienced she was and push her away. She heard him laugh softly as he slid his fingers beneath the sweater to encounter the bra which curved over her breasts.

      ‘Too much clothing,’ he murmured, slipping his hand round her back to snap open the offending article and shake it free.

      She remembered thinking he must have done this lots of times before and maybe she should confess how innocent she was. But by then he’d started circling her nipples with the light caress of his thumb and the moment passed. Desire pooled like honey in her groin and Keira gave a little cry as sensation threatened to overwhelm her.

      ‘Sta’ zitto,’ he urged softly as he pulled the sweater over her head and tossed it aside, the movement quickly followed by the efficient disposal of his own T-shirt and boxers. ‘Stay quiet. We don’t want to disturb the rest of the house, do we?’

      Keira shook her head, unable to answer because now he was sliding her panties down and a wild flame of hunger was spreading through her body. ‘Matteo,’ she gasped as his fingers moved down over her belly and began to explore

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