The Man She Shouldn't Crave

‘This beautiful dress.’ Rose held out her hem, giving it a sinuous shake.

‘The woman wearing it,’ said Plato, as if this was a fact that couldn’t be questioned.

‘You look very handsome yourself,’ she said primly as she took his arm and dropped her chin to avoid the flash of the cameras as he led her rapidly into the building.

And he did. Plato and urban style got along very well.

For a boy from a small Urals town he sure knew how to dress—tonight in a mixture of central Asian design, even down to the tiniest detail of the way his blue shalwar trousers angled over the front of his very fine handmade shoes. He wore a sherwani—a long coat-style jacket—in midnight-blue, with satin inlays that just seemed to enhance how very masculine he was.

He smelt good too, of lovely exotic aftershave and clean male skin. He also had traces of her perfume on him from the car, which didn’t hurt.

There were a lot of beautiful women converging on the club.

Everyone seemed to know him.

It was like being on the arm of the Prince of the Underworld. This was where the beautiful people of Moscow came to play with him. And she was his date.

Rose held onto his hand as he led her through the well-heeled young crowd, past golden barred cages with go-go dancers, under crystal chandeliers that should have seemed incongruous, to a black and shiny seating area that was clearly exclusive given the four giant-size bouncers at the two entrances. They were on a mezzanine, high above the two dance floors, with deep sofas and ottomans and an Arabian Nights-esque feel that sent her sprawling against him as she tried to daintily take her seat.

Plato took prime position and seemed to take it for granted that she would just splay herself across him, as if he were some Oriental potentate from another century and she was his harem girl. No, his much respected first wife, she corrected with a little smile as the heat from his big, hard body spread through hers. Rose tried not to enjoy it too much.

Other men gathered—business associates who did that European thing of kissing her fingers—and beautiful women, lots of women, who eyed her speculatively, summing up her dress, her hair, her jewellery, and then went back to watching Plato.

Plato made introductions, put a cocktail in her hands, and although the conversation began in English in deference to her it quickly lapsed into Russian.

Rose didn’t mind. She watched the dance floor for a while, her body moving slightly to the pounding bass line. A guy sitting opposite leaned across and made the timeless gesture of an invitation to dance. Rose was about to agree when Plato’s large body suddenly blocked her vision, forcing her to slide back as he leaned forward to say a few direct words to the other man. The guy was on his feet and moving away within moments. Plato eased back, sliding an arm around her shoulders, and then continued on with his conversation as if nothing had happened.

When Rose tried to get up his arm grew heavy around her.

‘What is it, detka? What is it you want?’

She looked directly into his eyes. ‘I’d like to dance.’

He placed a kiss in the curve of her throat and said in her ear, ‘Later.’

Rose wasn’t sure she liked the public kiss, coming as it did after the he-man tactics with the other guy and the possessive circle of his arm. It was all right for him to socialise, but she had to sit there with no one to talk to and nothing to do.

An accessory. After the fact of Plato.

That ‘later’ was not a winner either.

‘Plato?’ She made sure her smile was all big and shiny, telling him she was making an effort. ‘I’ll be dancing now, if you don’t mind.’ She took his arm and plucked it away from her shoulder, leaning forward to lift herself off the couch. ‘If you’re busy with your friends I can dance by myself.’

He moved so fast she was barely on her feet when his hand was around her waist. ‘One dance,’ he said.

* * *

He couldn’t take his eyes off her.

It was a grounding realisation that at twenty-eight, having thought until now that he had seen it all, experienced it all, couldn’t be shocked by much any longer, a blue-eyed Texan girl had taken his number.

He’d brought her to this party to neutralise her effect on him, to distance himself from what he had revealed about himself to her, and he’d only succeeded in intensifying it.

Rose danced with the same sensual abandon she’d brought to their bed. Her hips swayed, her arms moved sinuously over her head, her breasts grazed his chest—but she was locked in her own little world, special and private, as if there was a velvet rope between them and she wasn’t going to invite him in. He wanted to take hold of it, rip it away, invade all that female mystery and…what?

He pulled her in close to him. Her eyes were shining as she looked up into his. It was impossible to be heard so he didn’t bother with words. He just caught her mouth with his, taking what she would give so freely to him but needing to take it all the same. Needing her to know she was his, but he wasn’t hers.

Rose emerged from the spell of the music and the rhythm to clutch at his steel-hard biceps as he ground his mouth into hers. He was bruising her lips, and it should have been awful, but a hot little spark darted through her and caught light and she writhed against him.