“So you left without telling him you were going.”
“I told no one about applying for this job or getting it. Once I was notified I had it, I packed up my possessions, handed in my resignation and walked out of the Sydney Regent the same day. To all intents and purposes, I disappeared.”
“Drastic action,” he mused, as though measuring all it meant.
Sensing some criticism of her decisions, and discomforted by it, Miranda broke out of his hold and paced around the two armchairs that faced the television set before turning to confront him again, her hands gesticulating the urgency she’d felt to escape any rebound effect from walking out on Bobby Hewson.
“I wanted a clean break. King’s Eden offered me that. It was out of his reach, not connected to people or places he knew. I thought he couldn’t get at me here or do me any damage by bad-mouthing me because this was outside the normal hotel trade.”
“Get at you?” Nathan picked up sharply, his eyes searing hers with questions.
She flushed, hating the admission she had to make. Her arms instinctively hugged her midriff, holding in the awful vulnerability she felt. “We were together for three years. You don’t just forget all that intimate knowledge, Nathan. And he’ll use it. I know he will.”
The muscles in his face tightened. A wave of disapproval seemed to come at her and it instantly struck a fierce well of resentment. What about him and his two years with Susan? At least she had thought of marriage with Bobby.
“Do you still want him?” he shot at her.
“No!” she flared, throwing out her hands in exasperated denial. “What do you think this is all about? I don’t want anything more to do with him. Can’t you see that?”
“I see how upset you are by his coming, which suggests to me the relationship is not dead for you. If it were dead, he couldn’t get at you, Miranda,” he argued tersely.
“You miss the point,” she fiercely retorted. “It’s not dead for him. And if you think he’s going to leave it alone on my say-so…” She shook her head. “My exit from his life told him I wanted out and he’s ignoring it. He’s deliberately pursuing me, breaking the other plans he’d made the moment he heard where I was. I didn’t invite him.”
“No, but that doesn’t mean you won’t want him when he’s with you again.”
“He’s with his wife!”
“Miranda, you can say no in your mind.” He walked slowly towards her, his eyes boring into hers. “You said it to me. And you can mean it in your mind, bolstering the no with any number of reasons. I’m not questioning that.”
“Then what are you questioning?” she gabbled, feeling the strong male force of him increase as he stepped closer and closer, encompassing her, sending her nerves haywire, stirring all the wild desires she had nursed in the darkness of the nights. It was Nathan she wanted. Not Bobby. And her heart wept that he should think otherwise.
“I think you’re worried about what you’ll feel when he’s here…when you’re faced with him. Feelings aren’t something we can easily govern. What if he draws you into his arms…”
He followed the words with the action, slowly gathering Miranda close to him, but behind the seemingly controlled deliberation in his eyes, she saw the flicker of something that wasn’t controlled at all, and it ignited a wild, wanton recklessness in her. Or perhaps the pressure of his body did, the sexuality that seemed to brood from it and clutch at her.
“When you kissed me back, that morning beside the helicopter…were you missing him, Miranda?”
“No. I wasn’t thinking of anything. I just…”
“Responded to me.”
“Yes.” It was barely a hiss of sound. His head was bending to hers and she wanted him to kiss her now, to completely blot Bobby Hewson out of anything be-tween them.
“Then keep remembering this when he comes, Miranda.” A harshness in his voice now, scraped with raw emotion. “Remember how you feel with me.”
Then he did kiss her, and it was no exploratory dip to measure her response, no trial for any special element in their tasting of each other. It was full-scale plunder, a kiss of such driving, demanding passion, Miranda was instantly consumed by the explosion of need it ignited. The hot fusion of their mouths was not enough, nowhere near enough, though as they greedily fed on every possible sensation they could find and savour…intoxicating themselves with kiss after kiss, their hands followed their own instinctive path.
Impossible to remember afterwards whether she tore at his clothes or he tore at hers. The undressing was jerky, erratic, urgent, frantic, the compulsion to be rid of everything that came between them almost violent—no stopping it—no wish to pause or think or do anything other than revel in the impact of their bodies fully touching, bare flesh meeting bare flesh, the hot exciting friction of skin against skin, his hands skimming, squeezing her soft curves, her fingers raking the taut musculature that seemed to bristle with masculinity.
She remembered thinking he was a magnificent bull of a man and she wanted to be mated with him, wanted it more than anything she’d wanted in her life, to have the strength of him inside her, to feel him moving with her…this man who called so deeply to the woman she was, whatever else either of them were.
He propelled them to the bed, hauled her onto it, took the dominant position over her, and she automatically arched her body to meet his as he sought entry. His eyes connected with hers…a fierce blaze of desire…fiercely returned…both of them throbbed with an urgency that could not brook any denial.
Her whole body quivered with elation as she felt him push forward, sheathing himself with her moist heat, her inner muscles convulsing around him in bliss, the hard fullness of him opening a passage that pulsed with wild anticipation, wanting all he could give her. She wrapped her legs around him, pressing him on, and the plunge that followed was exquisitely fulfilling, so incredibly deep it felt as though he had entered her womb, an eerie, intimate sensation that spread out in concentric circles, totally captivating in its intensity.
From that moment on, Miranda’s whole being was totally focused on the rhythmic ripples set in constant motion by Nathan’s powerful thrusting. She was acutely aware of their strengthening infiltration of every cell of her body, the aching sweetness accompanying their invasion, the sense of their building towards a shattering peak, of pleasure becoming too intense to sustain within the space of her being. A time came when she seemed poised on the edge of it and a cry of anguish broke from her throat.
In the very next instant all the torturous tension exploded into a sunburst of glorious ecstasy, and she was floating in some heavenly space, and the man who had brought her there was sharing it with her, cradling her in a hug that kept them bound together as he rolled to one side, removing his weight, yet still enveloping her in a cocoon of strength, caring, protective, possessive.
Their breathing slowed. The thunder of their heartbeats dropped to a barely discernible pulse. The languor that stole over them was seductive…warm, peaceful, enticing a prolonged stay of judgement on what they’d done. It couldn’t be examined with words. It had gone beyond words.
Miranda was acutely aware she had never experienced anything like this before…such primitive, com-pelling passion…yet somehow instinctively right with this man…and being held by him now felt right, too, as though she belonged with him. While it made no rational sense, her mind stood in awe of these feelings, and the longer he held her, the more immersed she became in the blind conviction that they were meant to come together and this was how a man and woman should feel when they did, and she wished she had always known this. Then she could never have been fooled about what it was supposed to be.
Eventually Nathan spoke. He was trailing strands of her hair through his fingers as she lay with her head on his chest. She felt his intake of breath and the words he said were soft but very, very decisive.