“Okay. We made a mistake. Let’s leave it at that.”
“That’s what I’ve been saying.” Something in his eyes—contempt, perhaps, or a suggestion of it—stirred Jessie’s anger. “And if you want to be specific, Mr. Malone, we didn’t make a mistake. You did. I’m not the one who—who…”
“Do us both a favor, okay? Let’s not waste time lying.” His mouth twisted. “You and I both know what’s going on here. You looked at me last night exactly the way you did a couple of minutes ago.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.” Jessie gathered up the skirt of her bridal gown. “And I have better things to do than stand here and talk nonsense.”
“Yeah,” Liam said coldly. “You have to step up to a judge, take Bill’s hand and promise to love, honor and cherish till death—”
“I know the vows I’m going to take, Mr. Malone.”
Liam’s eyes narrowed until there was just the barest flash of green. “I thought you were all wrong for him. Now I know it.”
“Is that what this—this little episode was all about? The Liam Malone quality control test?” Jessie said, trying to keep her tone as cold and even as his.
“Bill deserves better than you. A man deserves a woman who loves him without reservation.”
“And that’s just the way I love William,” she said heatedly. “He knows that.”
“Right.” Liam smiled tightly and rocked back on his heels. “I’m sure he’d agree that the last few minutes prove it.”
“You can’t tell him! You’d break his heart!”
“I know that. No, I won’t tell him. Neither will you. You’re right. Nothing happened.” He paused, and a seductive softness crept into his voice. “But it could have.”
Jessie knew what he was thinking. How it would have been, if they’d kissed. The mingling of breath. The taste. The feel of his arms around her, the heat of their bodies pressed together.
“This is a pointless conversation,” she said, and some small part of her mind gave a brisk nod of approval that she could sound so calm when she was shaking inside. “William is waiting. The wedding—”
Liam caught her wrist as she began to turn away. “Why didn’t you slap me?”
“Mr. Malone. Liam. I thought we just agreed—”
“It’s a simple question. You knew what I was about to do. How come you didn’t haul off and slug me?”
“Is that how the women you come on to generally react?” She smiled sweetly before her lips hardened into a thin, accusing line. “I don’t understand how William can think of you as his best friend. You’re not like him at all.”
“No,” Liam said softly, “I’m not.”
He took a step toward her; she retreated, but the bench was behind her and she was trapped. Her heart pounded. She’d been right about Liam Malone. He was sexy as sin and gorgeous as the devil. Why hadn’t she realized he’d be as dangerous as the devil, too?
“Keep away from me!”
He smiled, a quick glint of white teeth against his tanned face. “Maybe that’s what appeals to you, Jessie.” Lazily he ran a finger over her cheek. “Maybe you know there’s no way you could wrap me around your little finger, or buy me off with a smile and a promise.”
“You’re right. I should have slapped you. You’re a horrible man.”
“I must be,” he whispered, his fingers curling around the back of her neck, “because I’m going to finish what I started a few minutes ago. What you want, despite all your self-righteous protests.”
He watched her face as he drew her to him and told himself he was only doing this because she was twisting things, making it sound as if he were the only one who’d wanted the kiss. One whisper of dissent, just one, and he’d back off. But when she looked up at him, he saw that her eyes had gone from blue to the color of the sky just before sunrise in the mountains, and not all her protests or his excuses could keep those eyes from telling him everything he needed to know.
“Jessie,” he said softly, and she sighed, tilted her head back and met his descending mouth with hers.
It was a gentle kiss, only the brush of his lips over hers. It was the kiss a man gives a woman when he knows he can never claim the taste of her again. And because the kiss was gentle, because Jessie knew that there would only be this once between them, because she could no more have stopped the rotation of the earth than rid herself of the need for it, she let it happen. She let him draw her closer, and when he did, she laid her palms flat against his chest, rose on her toes and parted her lips to his, let him slip his tongue into her mouth.
A wave of white-hot flame consumed her. She moaned, curled her fingers into the lapels of Liam’s morning coat and let everything she’d spent the night dreaming about happen. His kiss was all the poets said a kiss could be. It was more. It was turning her inside out, dissolving her flesh, melting her bones. It was…
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