A Contract for His Runaway Bride

CHAPTER FOUR

THECELEBRATORYDINNERwas not something Lincoln was particularly looking forward to, but he was immensely glad of the distraction. Acting the devoted husband was going to be a stretch, but he preferred it to the alternative. Going home to be alone with Elodie until they flew to Spain the following day was too tempting to think about.

Their kiss at the wedding ceremony had stirred up a host of erotic memories he had tried for years to suppress. The hands-off paper marriage he was insisting on was not going to last long if he didn’t pull himself into line. He needed to prove to himself that he could resist her this time around. But resisting her would be so much easier if he could ignore the way she lit up a room as soon as she entered it.

It wasn’t just her natural beauty—it was her vibrant energy that spoke to him on a cellular level. He had never met a more exciting lover, and the thought of revisiting their passion was a persistent background hum in his body. A hum he was finding it increasingly difficult to ignore.

Lincoln led the way inside his house and then shrugged off his jacket and hung it over one of the velvet wing chairs in the foyer. ‘We have a couple of hours before our guests arrive. I have some emails to deal with in my office. I’ll leave you to re-familiarise yourself with the house. Morag has put you in the guest room next to mine.’

Elodie raised her neat eyebrows, her eyes alight with mischief. ‘The one with the connecting door?’

Lincoln flattened his mouth into a firm line. ‘The door will remain locked.’

She raised her chin, her eyes still glinting. ‘Which side is the key on?’

He had to force himself not to stare at the perfect curve of her mouth. That pillow-soft mouth he could still taste on his lips. ‘My side.’

She made a moue with her lips. ‘Shouldn’t there be one on my side too? I mean, fair’s fair and all that.’

‘I can’t imagine any circumstances in which you would need to enter my room.’

Elodie’s eyes danced as they held his in a challenging look. ‘Oh, can’t you?’

A hot shiver ran down his spine and set spot fires in his groin. He reached up to his neck to loosen his tie, which right then was all but strangling him. ‘I’ll see you later.’

He began to walk away, but one of her slim hands landed on his forearm in a light but electrifying hold. Another shiver shimmied down his spine and hot, hard heat filled his pelvis.

‘Don’t you think we should rehearse how we’re going to behave in front of our guests tonight?’

‘Rehearse?’

She moved closer, sliding her hand down his arm, her fingers ever so lightly brushing over the back of his hand. His skin tingled and his pulse quickened. He could smell the exotic notes of her signature scent—a mix of musk, tuberose and something that was unique to her.

‘We’ll need to look comfortable touching each other like lovers do.’

Her smile had a sultry tilt that made the heat in his groin smoulder to boiling point.

‘Right now, you look tense and uncomfortable.’

Tense was right. He had never felt so hard in his life. He placed his hands on her wrists, intending to put her away from him, but somehow, he found himself doing the opposite. The magnetic pull of her body called out to the humming need in his. He brought her flush against him, not caring that she could feel every throbbing beat of his blood against her lower body.

‘Is this the sort of thing you mean? Getting up close and personal?’ He kept his tone cynical, but his mind was whirling with the possibility of tweaking the rules.

Elodie moved against him, her yielding softness against his hardness sending a torrent of lust through him. She eased her wrists out of his hold and wound her arms around his neck, her cinnamon-scented breath teasing his senses into overdrive.

‘You want me so bad...’

Her voice had a throaty quality to it that only did more lethal damage to his self-control. Lincoln put his hands on her slim hips, holding her to the jutting ridge of his arousal. The feel of her against him sent his senses spinning. She was impossible to resist in this playfully seductive mood. But resist he must.

‘We’ll embarrass our guests if we don’t show some restraint.’ His gaze lowered to her mouth and his heart rate spiked. ‘Kissing is fine, holding hands, hugging...but that’s all.’

Elodie stepped on tiptoe and planted a soft-as-air kiss to his lips. She pulled away so slowly her lips clung to his like silk catching on something rough.

She sent the tip of her tongue over her lips and smiled at him, her eyes still twinkling. ‘Is that chaste enough for you, baby?’

Her purring tone was almost his undoing. Almost. He knew she was toying with him and he wasn’t going to be so easily manipulated—even though every male hormone in his body was begging him to give in to the temptation she was dangling before him. No one could turn him on like Elodie Campbell. Smart, sassy, sophisticated, sexy—all the things her brand defined her as were catnip to him. But he had to resist her for as long as he could. To prove to himself she no longer had the power over him she’d once had.

Lincoln took her by the upper arms and put her from him, keeping his expression impassive. ‘You’re playing a dangerous game, sweetheart. And you won’t win it.’

Elodie gave a carefree laugh and reached up and pulled her long hair out of its updo, letting the silken tresses fall about her shoulders in fragrant bouncing waves. ‘Don’t bet on it.’

She blew him a kiss and turned on her sky-high heels and walked away, leaving him burning, burning, burning with rabid lust.

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