‘I…I’ve got no idea what you’re talking about,’ she lied, her mind furiously backtracking over her words, wondering what she’d done to give herself away, and wondering what she could do to make up for the gaffe.
‘You mean Richard’s never told you that you talk in your sleep?’
The waitress hovered nearby uncertainly, looking to make a move for his empty plate, and Mackenzi knew it was way past time to take this discussion out of a public restaurant and to somewhere much more private.
‘If you’ve finished your breakfast, Mr Carrazzo, I think it’s time we concluded this discussion in my office.’
‘Alternatively, there’s always my suite,’ he suggested, cold civility in his tone and damnation in his eyes. ‘You seemed to feel quite at home there last night.’
‘That’s enough!’ she snapped, doing her best to ignore the shocked expression on the waitress’s face, and the turning heads of curious patrons. She headed off purposefully through the tables on her way to the exit, leaving him to follow in her wake, half-hoping he wouldn’t.
She’d taken his offer of redundancy thinking it would protect her identity. But now he knew she’d been the woman in his bed, the woman he’d decided to have sex with before she’d even been awake, the woman who had failed to turn him down even when she had finally opened her eyes.
Where did that leave her now?
‘You didn’t have to say those things,’ Mackenzi asserted, rounding on him the moment he’d entered her office and closed the door behind him.
‘And you didn’t have to be in my bed.’
‘I never said I was.’
‘You didn’t have to. Your reaction to the Richard word was confirmation enough.’
She looked away. ‘That proves nothing. I was merely shocked at what you said.’
‘Then why did you practically flee from the restaurant?’
‘With you making accusations like that? Why do you think?’
‘I think you’re avoiding the truth.’
Dante paused, regarding her curiously for a few moments, before his hand went to the door once again, turning the key in the lock.
‘What are you doing?’ she protested, feeling a sudden surge of panic.
‘You wanted privacy. I’m ensuring we get it.’ Then he stepped closer, and all of a sudden she was regretting the move to her office. She’d wanted to get things less public, but suddenly the air in the room seemed to have been sucked out, the space shrinking to miniscule proportions now they were both locked inside it.
Shrinking until there was nothing in her office but Mackenzi Keogh and Dante Carrazzo, and the heavy weight of what had transpired between them in the early hours of the morning.
And the heavier weight of whatever was to come.
‘So what did you really think you were going to achieve by pulling that little stunt last night?’
She backed away, trying to put the desk between them, but he only followed her, trapping her once again, her back to a filing cabinet in the space between desk and window. She crossed her arms defensively while he stood broad- shouldered in front of her. One arm was stretched across to the windowsill, the other hand planted on the desk, a human barricade. She had to hand it to him—this man made intimidation an art form. Even so, she was aware of the ever-present heat she felt in this man’s presence steadily building up steam once again.
‘I really don’t see the point of continuing this line of conversation. Not when you’ve already decided on your course of action for the hotel and terminated my services. I’d rather you turned your mind to how you’re going to inform the staff, and I’ll get on with cleaning out my office.’
‘Why not talk about it—because your little ploy didn’t work?’ His hand left the windowsill to reach out to her, stroking the line of her shirt’s shoulder-seam. She flinched at his touch, his fingers scorching her flesh through her shirt, leaving a trail of fire in their wake. How was that possible? Sure, he’d made her feel good last night— amazing, in fact—but how could he still affect her when she hated the man? Because there was no way she couldn’t hate him now with what he had planned for Ashton House.
Mackenzi stiffened her spine, determined not to let him see how his touch affected her, determined to deny everything. His assumption that everyone, including her, would be falling all over themselves to please him was enough to get her back up. ‘What ploy?’
‘To soften up my attitude. To make me feel more generous about the fate of the hotel. I must say, you do an impressive job of going above and beyond the call of duty.’
She shook her head as his hand moved down her arm, his thumb tracking perilously close to the swell of her breast. She could unfold her arms, but then she’d feel too exposed, too open to him, and he’d surely hear her heart thumping crazily. ‘And I must say you have a very fertile imagination. Now, would you please leave me alone?’
‘You didn’t mind me touching you last night, as I recall. In fact, you seemed to enjoy it—a lot.’
She didn’t want to hear it. Those feelings she’d experienced last night, the feelings she was having now when he merely brushed her arm or came close to her breasts, she didn’t understand them. They were all too new, too unfamiliar. She didn’t understand why this man, of all men, would be the one who would so comprehensively mess with her thermostat.
Frustrated, she unfolded her arms in a rush to fend him off as she tried to push past. ‘You’re mad. Let me out of here.’
But he just smiled and moved the same way so that their bodies collided. She bounced back from the contact, short of breath, only to have what breath was left in her throat wrenched away deftly as he removed her glasses, letting them fall gently onto the desk blotter beside them.
‘Hey!’
His smile widened. ‘You have the most amazing eyes,’ he told her. ‘They’re the most brilliant shade of green—almost like emeralds. I knew I’d seen them somewhere before.’
She looked away. ‘Lots of people have green eyes,’ she said, only to feel his hand working at something behind her head. Before she could protest, she felt her hair slip free from its clasp, weight pulling it tumbling down over her shoulders and beyond, helped on its way with a comb of his fingers. Her scalp tingled, but it was her entire body that trembled. ‘There, isn’t that better?’
‘Not really, no.’
He lifted a coil of her hair and snaked it around his fingers, dipping his head and inhaling deeply. ‘I woke this morning with the scent of your hair on my pillow. Why did you leave so soon?’
‘I still don’t know what you’re talking about.’
‘You can’t still pretend it wasn’t you in my bed?’
‘I told you, it was probably a dream.’
He tugged on her hair, drawing her closer. ‘Oh, it was better than a dream. Much better.’ His voice was a warm, silk ribbon that curled around her as his eyes held her prisoner. ‘And so much more satisfying.’
He was too close. So close she could breathe in his own personal scent, between the shower freshness and breakfast coffee—a scent that flung her back, more than anything, to where she’d been just a few short hours ago. A scent that filled her lungs and was pumped around her bloodstream, reminding every last part of her of what they’d shared, and just how amazing he’d felt inside her. How he’d stretched her so deliciously. How he’d fitted her so completely.
She shook her head. She couldn’t afford to