Past Passion. Penny Jordan

captor took her down to the underground car park, still holding on to her arm as he unlocked the door to a sleek Jaguar convertible, almost bundling her into it, and then fastening the seatbelt around her and closing the door before going round to the driver’s side and getting in beside her.

      The car smelled luxuriously of leather, and something else—something alien and exciting. It took her several seconds to realise that the smell was him... When she did, she flushed and shivered, causing him to frown at her and demand,

      ‘Look here, you’re not going to be sick are you? Because if you are...’

      She shook her head.

      It was true that she did feel slightly queasy, and that her head did ache dreadfully, but she was most certainly not going to be sick. What she really wanted to do, she acknowledged, as he drove out of the car park and into the dark city streets, was to go to sleep.

      No sooner had the thought formed than she was leaning her head back against the head-rest and closing her eyes.

      ‘Right, now, if you just tell me where you live...’

      Silence. Matt frowned and turned his attention from the road to his passenger, his frown deepening as he recognised that she was deeply and completely asleep. That she was, in fact, sleeping like the child she was. How much had she had to drink? Enough to make her a danger both to herself and to others. If he had had any sense he would have left her where she was. Someone there would have made sure she got home safely; or would they?

      He had an early flight in the morning, and she really was an additional problem he didn’t need. The trouble was, though, that he had an over-developed sense of responsibility. He suspected it came of having three younger sisters.

      Grimacing to himself, he acknowledged that it really was too late to turn the car round and dump her back at the party, especially with a wolf like Jonathon Hendry cruising around. The easiest thing he could do would be to take her home with him, put her to bed in the spare bedroom, and then evict her first thing in the morning before he left for New York, when hopefully she would have sobered up enough to realise how potentially self-destructive her behaviour had been.

      He made one more attempt to wake her up, knowing before he did so that he was wasting his time. It was true, she did open her eyes and focus vaguely on him, but they closed again before he could even say one word, and he could tell from the way her body slumped against him that she was already deeply asleep once again.