This was work. This was his revenge. This was precisely how he could exact payment for the years of personal slights and lost opportunities. And worse, the things she made him wonder in the dark. What did it say about him that he could ignore the end and concentrate on the means? That he was enjoying it?
But then, he knew the answer to that, too.
She blew out a shaky sort of breath, as if trying to calm herself, and then she turned toward him and showed him her teeth.
He didn’t mistake it for a smile.
“I dislike you,” she said softly. So very softly that it would have sounded like sweet, whispered love words to anyone standing nearby. She deepened that curve of her mouth. “Intensely.”
“Good,” he said in the same tone as he threw the car into Park, putting his mouth near her ear and drinking in another one of her delicate near-shivers. He could start to crave them, he thought then, and he knew exactly how dangerous that was. “That always looks better on film.”
And then they were surrounded.
Questions flew through the quiet air. Ribald commentary in several languages that Ivan chose to ignore for the sake of everyone’s health, to the tune of all of those cameras flashing and filming, capturing every moment, every touch, every breath. He helped Miranda from her side of the car like the gentleman he wasn’t and kept her close, throwing his arm over her shoulders with casual ease. He felt her tense, but she smiled as he’d commanded and nestled against his side, and for the briefest moment the press of her body against his made him almost forget himself again—made him almost forget that he was acting and she was the kind of woman who had looked down her nose at him from the start. That this was another job, a carefully calculated performance. Nothing more.
Idiot. The derisive voice in his head sounded suspiciously like his brother’s.
Ivan ignored it. He fielded the questions, one after the next, with the ease of all these years he’d spent handling press junkets and intrusive paparazzi. How long had this affair been going on? Who had made the first move? What had made them act out their forbidden love in such a dramatic display in Georgetown? Was this a publicity stunt? Could they look this way, please? Smile? Kiss again?
“Surely the entire world has seen quite enough of us kissing,” Miranda said, defying his order to keep quiet, but with a dry humor that Ivan knew would come across as delightfully self-deprecating. He pulled her closer, then gazed down at her as if he was filled with affection. And loved the tremor he felt snake through her, that immediate, helpless response of hers he was rapidly finding addictive. He wasn’t even sure she knew what signals she was sending him, which made it that much better. Seducing her would be easier than he’d anticipated.
He told himself what snaked through him then was as simple as anticipation.
“That’s it,” he said when he saw Nikolai appear in the entrance to the hotel behind the pack of reporters and nod curtly, indicating the agreed-upon five minutes were up. “We’ll see you all at the movies later this week.”
“What about all the nasty things she’s said about you over the years, Ivan?” one of the more dogged reporters asked, pitching her voice above the rest. “Have you hashed all of that out behind closed doors?”
It was an American reporter, and Ivan recognized her. Give this woman the right sound bite, he knew, and it would dominate the entertainment news. He slid his sunglasses from his face. He looked at Miranda for a long moment, until she flushed again—unaware, he was sure, that it looked as if what had passed between them in that glance was purely sexual. Carnal and burning hot. Then he looked back at the camera.
He knew exactly what he was doing. He did it all the time. It was Jonas Dark at his finest. Enigmatic. Dangerous. And impossibly, explosively sexy.
Ivan smiled. Slowly and knowingly. He dragged it out, knowing his famous smile was the most lethal weapon in this particular arsenal.
“That was just foreplay,” he said.
Miranda hardly saw the cool, achingly lovely lobby of the Grand Hotel, all in elegant whites and frothy creams, with only the faintest hints of blue to beckon in the sea beyond. All she saw was that powerhouse smile of Ivan’s, that he’d turned on so easily for the cameras, so sexy and treacherous. She barely registered the beautifully maintained grounds soaking in the abundant sunshine or the water arrayed before them as if the whole of the glorious Mediterranean Sea had been placed there for the pleasure of the hotel’s guests alone.
She only heard him say that terrible word, over and over again. Foreplay. She managed, somehow, to remain silent and smiling as staff and security buzzed around them, ushering them into the sumptuous private villa set apart from the rest that she assumed only a star of Ivan’s magnitude could command.
She had to bite her tongue to stay quiet. More than once.
And then, finally, they were alone in one of the private villa’s luxuriously appointed rooms, filled with light and graceful arrangements of flowers. The room was done in fine yellows and clear blues, sophisticated creams and the barest hint of lavender, the fresh, crisp, timeless elegance of Provence in every detail.
And more importantly, there were no cameras. No eyes, no reporters, no snide questions polluting the air. No people nearby to hear a single word. At last.
Ivan moved to close the door behind the last of the hotel staff, who had all but performed grand jetés in their rush to serve his every need, and Miranda kept her word and waited until it was shut tight. Until they were finally, finally locked away in private.
“Foreplay?” Her throat felt clogged. Rough and cracked. As if she’d already screamed at him the way she wanted to do, over and over again. She stood in the middle of the room, her hands in fists at her sides, and wondered that she wasn’t screaming now. He turned back to face her, lounging back against the door with his powerful arms crossed, his hard face impassive. “Foreplay?”
“Are you unfamiliar with the term, Dr. Sweet?” His voice was like silk, curling around her, sensual and beguiling, and she hated that, too. His dark eyes mocked her, as ever. “Do you require a demonstration?”
“I would sooner—”
“Careful,” he warned her. Was that amusement she saw move across his fierce face then? Did he find this funny? But, of course, that was why she was so furious. She knew perfectly well that he did. “It is easy to make rash, sweeping statements in emotional moments, only to regret them later. When you are inevitably proved a liar.”
Miranda was shaking again, but this time, she wasn’t afraid of falling apart. This time she was far more worried that she might pick something up and throw it at his head, an urge she understood was deeply, deeply foolish. And counterproductive. But there it was, growing stronger by the second. She clenched her hands even tighter—and did not let herself reach for the nearest assortment of fat, lushly perfumed orchids in their heavy glass vase.
“Is that what this is about?” she asked, fighting to keep her voice even, though there was no pretending she was anything like calm or cool any longer. “Sex? Am I some trophy to you?”
“That would require that being with you is some kind of reward,” he returned, all silken mockery and that razor’s edge beneath.
There was no reason at all for that to sting. Miranda told herself it didn’t—it was just this long, strange day and not nearly enough sleep. Everything stung, there had been far too much touching, and she still hadn’t forgiven herself for the things she’d let him do in that dressing room in Paris. The things she’d felt. And wanted. All of which had been bad enough before he’d called her entire hard-won career foreplay.
“I deserve