Kyra went very still. No, she thought, no, it couldn’t be.
Her heart rose into her throat. She watched as her rescuer dusted off his hands and then turned toward her.
“He was, you would say, a pig. So you will understand when I tell you—”
Cristo!
Antonio Rodrigo Cordoba del Rey stared at the woman. No. No, it couldn’t be!
His sapphire eyes turned almost black with shock as he stared at her, at the face he had not managed to forget, despite the weeks that had gone by since he had first seen it.
He saw her throat work convulsively.
“No,” she whispered, “no! I don’t believe it”
Antonio rubbed his hands over his eyes but it didn’t help. When he looked again, she was still standing there in front of him, dressed in a skirt and sandals and a T-shirt instead of in a little slip of black silk, but there was no mistaking her identity.
This was the woman who had reduced him to such foolishness that night in Denver. He had thought of her a dozen times since then, never without his gut knotting with anger, always assuring himself that the only saving grace in the whole damned scenario was that he would never, ever, have to see her again…
Yet, here she was. Por Dios, how could such a thing have happened?
He took a step toward her, his fists knotted as he fought for self-control.
“What in hell are you doing here?” he demanded.
The woman’s head snapped back as if he’d struck her.
“What am I doing here?” she said. Her voice was breathy, as if she’d been running. She moved closer, her head tilted up, her eyes locked on his. “What do you mean, what am I doing here?”
Antonio’s eyes narrowed. “I cannot believe this. What have I done that the gods should drop you into my lap a second time?”
Kyra stared at him. The arrogant, insolent, self-centered jerk…
“My sentiments precisely,” she sputtered. “Suffering through one encounter with you was enough for a lifetime. No woman should have to endure your presence twice!”
A dark flush crept across his face. “You should count yourself fortunate for this second test of your stamina, señorita. Had it not occurred, you would have found yourself involved in a much more interesting adventure with your charming friend!”
“That—that creature was not my friend!”
A chill smile curved over Antonio’s mouth. “You should choose more carefully when you decide to ‘play with the natives’.”
Kyra’s eyes turned from silver to smoke. “I do not have to stand here and listen to these insults!”
“You most certainly do not.”
“Fine.”
She spun away, but the memory of his disdainful little smile, even of the way he was standing, with his arms crossed over his chest, enraged her. All that smug male superiority…how dare he? She took a breath, turned, and faced him again.
“Has anyone ever told you that you are, without question, the most…the most insufferable human being imaginable?”
One midnight black eyebrow rose in lazy amusement.
“And to think that moments ago you were almost on your knees to me with gratitude,” he drawled.
Kyra’s color heightened. “You only wish!”
The smile faded from his lips. “My only wish is that I awaken in a few seconds and find out that you have once again been nothing but a bad dream!”
“Really?” Kyra purred. “Have I been in your dreams, señor?”
Antonio flushed. Dammit, why was he letting her draw him into this ridiculous battle of words? As it was, he had made a stupid slip. He had been dreaming of her ever since that night they’d first encountered each other; incredible, X-rated dreams that were ridiculous when you considered that he was not a man who needed to waste his sexual energies in fantasies and that this tart-tongued, mean-tempered American was the last woman he’d ever want in his bed.
“Well?”
He looked at her. Her head was tilted at a slight angle and she was watching him with catlike intensity.
He took a step toward her. “I see that you are a woman who likes to live dangerously. But I must warn you, señorita, that it would be reckless to push a man like me too far. You might not escape as easily as you did a few moments ago.”
Kyra’s heart kicked against her ribs. He was right. Not about the incident with Gold Teeth but about what was happening now. You didn’t tease a man like this; you didn’t dangle bait and wait to see if he’d snap it up. She remembered all too clearly the way he’d watched her that night, the sexual heat that had smoldered between them.
“Perhaps it is I who should have asked that question of you, señorita.”
She looked up. He had moved closer to her; they were standing barely a whisper apart. She swallowed, then cleared her throat.
“What—what question?”
“About dreams,” he said. His smile was sexy and dangerous. “Have you dreamed of me, señorita?”
Kyra stepped back. “Never,” she said, her chin lifted. “Unless I’m in the middle of a very bad one right now.”
Antonio’s nostrils flared. He reached out and clasped her by the shoulders.
“Do you feel the bite of my fingers? I promise you, what is happening is no dream.”
Yes. Yes, she could feel the bite of his fingers, feel the heat of his touch. She could see that his eyes were the color of sapphires, that there was a small, almost invisible scar angled across his jaw; she could smell his scent, equal parts sun and sea and raw male anger.
He looked down at her, his eyes dark, and then he drew her forward against his hard body.
“We are both here. In the flesh—isn’t that what you Americans say? And just so there’s no further confusion m your mind, I will prove it to you.”
And before Kyra could stop him, he gathered her into his arms and kissed her.
ANTONIO sat behind his desk, his arms crossed over his chest. He’d tilted his leather-and-oak chair back on its legs and now he was scowling at the ceiling instead of at the door, which was what he’d been doing for the last five minutes or for however long it had taken him to count silently to a hundred in Spanish, in English, and finally even in the Indio dialect he’d spent most of his adult life trying to forget.
It hadn’t helped. His patience, never his strongest asset, he had to admit, was wearing thin. But then, why wouldn’t it? His scowl deepened as he leaned forward and let the front legs of his chair bang against the wideplanked teak floor.
How much time could a woman spend in the ladies’ room, for God’s sake?
Antonio rose to his feet, stalked to the window, and turned his scowl on the rain. Damn the weather, anyhow. He’d been away so long he’d almost forgotten the cloudbursts that were so common to the tropics. If only it had started to rain sooner. Maybe then none of this would have happened. Maybe his secretary wouldn’t have looked outside and seen a woman—a turista, she’d saidbeing harassed just outside the door.
“Shall I call the police?” Consuelo