A Prize Beyond Jewels

Rafe, on the other hand, now had irritation to add to the blackness of his mood, the worry he had suffered after waking and finding Nina gone obviously completely unnecessary. ‘Why did you leave, Nina?’ he repeated harshly.

Nina frowned as she looked across the room at the stiffness of Rafe’s back, her own anger at his behaviour now still burning low in her stomach. ‘Is that what all this is about?’ she questioned incredulously. ‘Because I dared to leave Rafe D’Angelo’s apartment this morning without his say-so?’

He turned abruptly, a dark scowl on his brow. ‘You didn’t need my permission to leave.’

‘No?’ Nina challenged, hands on her hips. ‘That isn’t the impression I’m getting right now!’

Those golden eyes narrowed. ‘And what impression are you getting right now?’

She gave a scornful smile. ‘That Rafe D’Angelo is usually the one who does the leaving. That it’s all right for him to sneak out of a woman’s apartment the morning after, but damned infuriating for a woman to dare to do the same thing to him!’

That there was some truth in her accusation didn’t help Rafe’s current mood of frustrated anger. Going to bed with a woman, spending part of the night with her in her apartment, had never been a problem for him, but he rarely—in fact, never!—stayed the whole night. He always left before he had to go through the awkwardness of sitting across a breakfast table, trying to make conversation with the woman he had just had sex with.

Nina had been different. Not only was she the first woman he had ever confided in, but she was also the first woman he had taken back to the family-owned apartment. He had actually been looking forward to making her breakfast, to talking and laughing with her as they shared that breakfast, in bed or out of it. Just as he had been anticipating how sexy she would look dressed only in one of his own shirts, before he carried her back to bed and made love with her again.

That he had never wanted that intimacy with another woman only made Nina’s leaving all the more frustrating. Finding her calmly working at Archangel, as if nothing had happened between them last night, certainly hadn’t improved his mood. Nevertheless...

‘I never take women back to my apartment.’

She blinked. ‘You don’t?’

‘No.’

‘And yet you took me there?’

A nerve pulsed in his jaw. ‘Yes.’

‘Why?’

‘At this moment I have absolutely no idea!’ he rasped coldly.

‘Oh.’ Nina eyed him uncertainly.

‘Yes,’ he bit out succinctly.

She rallied determinedly. ‘That’s still no reason for you to have behaved like a Neanderthal downstairs!’

‘A what?’ Rafe prompted incredulously, eyes wide beneath his raised brows.

‘A Neanderthal,’ she repeated. ‘Primitive man. As in “you woman, me man”.’

‘I know what it is, thank you,’ Rafe drawled, some of his anger evaporating, to be replaced by amusement at hearing Nina accuse him of behaving like a caveman.

Which, with hindsight, he could see that he had done, and still was.

Just because Nina had walked out on him this morning? Or something else? Something more?

Nina had certainly got to him in a way no other woman had, but surely that didn’t mean—

‘Then why bother asking?’ Nina snapped impatiently, hands thrust into the back pockets of those tight-fitting denims as she glared across the office at him, thrusting her breasts forward.

And instantly causing Rafe’s body to throb and ache with the desire to make love to her all over again.

What was it about this woman, this woman in particular, that he had told her those things about himself last night? That he became aroused just looking at her flashing green eyes, those lushly full lips, the challenging tilt of that stubborn little chin, and those breasts tipped by hard little points visible against her T-shirt? Damned if Rafe knew, he only knew that he did.

He sighed heavily. ‘Okay, so I might have come on a little strong downstairs.’

‘A little strong?’ Nina echoed scathingly as she began to pace the office like a caged tigress. ‘You not only embarrassed yourself but you embarrassed me too.’ She glared at him. ‘Rich and Andy know exactly where I spent the night, an awkwardness I already have to deal with. I certainly didn’t need you bursting into the gallery just now behaving like some prehistoric—’

‘I think I got that part of the conversation,’ Rafe drawled dryly.

‘Then I suggest you make a note of it for any future relationships you might have,’ she snapped. ‘Because women have moved on a long way since we all lived in caves.’