Bedding His Virgin Mistress

The grand slam of his raw sensuality had sliced through her defenses, leaving an alarming trail of male awareness in its wake. Her jeans, normally a comfortable easy it, suddenly seemed to be uncomfortably tight, clinging to her flesh in a way she could only men tally describe as erotic, as though somehow she were being caressed by the lean, powerful male hands she couldn't resist looking towards.

She could feel the heat expanding inside her, dangerous little languorous curls of it thrusting against her sensitive flesh. She crossed her legs and then uncrossed them. Her arm accidentally brushed against her own breast and immediately she was aware of the hot pulsing of her nipples.

This was crazy. It felt as though somehow or other an unfamiliar and certainly unwanted very sexual alter ego had been released inside her. And, what was more, it seemed to be attempting to take her over! Or had it always been there and it had simply taken meeting Ricardo Salvatore to make her aware of it, just as her own senses were making her aware of him?

This was definitely crazy.

She realized with relief that they had reached the airport. The car slowed down and turned into an entrance marked 'Strictly Private'.

A uniformed customs officer stepped out of a nearby office and came over to the car.

'Your passport, please,' Ricardo demanded, turning to Carly.

Foolishly, she had not been ready for this formality, and it took her several seconds to open her bag, find her passport, and then hand it over to Ricardo.

As he took it from her, her open bag slipped from her hand, showering the immaculate leather and the car's floor with coins, her lipstick, her purse and several other small personal items.

Her face hot, she undid her seatbelt and tried to pick them up as fast as she could, but the lipstick rolled away out of her reach with the movement of the car as the driver set it in motion again.

To her dismay the lipstick had rolled along the leather and come to rest right next to Ricardo's thigh.

She couldn't retrieve it without touching him.

She moistened her lips with the tip of her tongue.

'Could I have my lipstick, please? It's... You're sit ting on it,' she told Ricardo.

'What?'

The look he gave her was totally male and uncomprehending.

'My lipstick!' Carly repeated. 'It fell out of my bag and now it's...'

She looked meaningfully at the leather seat, somehow managing at the same time to keep her gaze off his thigh.

His sigh was definitely exasperated as he reached down and picked up the small slim tube.

It was a relief to release her own pent-up breath as he handed the lipstick to her. She reached out for it, too focused on what she was doing to be aware of a deep pothole in the tarmac, which the driver couldn't avoid because of an oncoming vehicle.

The violent movement of the car lung her bodily against Ricardo, sending her slamming into his side. The air was driven out of her lungs by the force of the impact, leaving her half lying against him, her face buried in his tee shirt, her hand ignominiously clutching at his arm.

A shock of unfamiliar sensation hit her all at once, like a hail of sharp-pointed arrows. His personal man scent, the texture of his tee shirt, the hardness of his chest beneath her cheek, the softness of something that she realized must be his body hair. The slow, heavy thud of his heartbeat...

Somewhere inside her head unwanted images were forming. A man—Ricardo—carrying her in his arms, his torso bare, his flesh warm beneath her fingertips. She could feel the heat of her own desire for him. Her fingers tightened automatically on his arm, her nails digging into his flesh.

Abruptly Carly snapped back to reality, and to the humiliating awareness of what she was doing. Her face burning, she released Ricardo's arm and pulled away for him, refusing to look at him.

As she retreated to her side of the car Ricardo shifted his own position and turned away from her, to conceal the telltale thick ridge of flesh pressing against the fabric of his trousers.

He was beginning to realize that he had badly underestimated the effect Carly was going to have on him. It was one thing for him to acknowledge to himself that he was happy to have sex with her, but it was quite another to have to admit that his desire for her was far more urgent than he had planned for—and, even worse, that it was threatening to overwhelm his self-control. He simply did not want this fierce, thrusting surge of need, this urgent, compelling hunger to take hold of her and fill himself with the scent and the feel of her; the taste of her, to fill her with himself and to...

The ache in his body was intensifying instead of fading, and he had to resort to the subterfuge of opening his newspaper and busying himself re-reading it in order to conceal that fact.

'Thank you, Charles.'

Carly had no time to do more than smile her own gratitude at Ricardo's chauffeur before a smartly uniformed light steward was escorting her up the steps to the waiting private jet, whilst Ricardo paused to speak with its captain—his captain, Carly realized.

She had often heard Lucy marvelling about the luxury of travelling in the private jets owned by some of their more wealthy clients, but this would be the first time she had experienced it for herself.

The interior of the jet had more resemblance to a modern apartment than to any aeroplane Carly had flown in. A colour scheme of off-white and cool grey set off the black leather upholstery of the sofas, and the steward discreetly indicated to her that both a bedroom and a separate shower room lay to the rear of the sitting area.

'The galley is behind the cockpit, and there is another lavatory there as well—' He broke off from his explanations, to say formally, 'Good morning, sir.'

Carly turned round to see Ricardo standing in the open doorway.

'Morning, Eddie. How are Sally and the new baby?'

There was a genuine warmth in his voice that touched a painful nerve within Carly's heart.

'They're both fine. Sally was over the moon that you flew her folks here for the birth. She was resigned to them not being able to be there.'

Ricardo shrugged, and changed the subject. 'Phil says that we're going to have a good light, both to Nice and on to New York.' He turned to Carly. 'I've got some work I need to attend to, but feel free to ask Eddie for anything you need.'

'If you would like to sit down here, madam, until we've taken off?' Eddie suggested politely to her, indicating a space on one of the sofas.

Obediently, Carly went and sat down.

'Perhaps I could get you a glass of champagne?' the steward said, once he had shown Carly how to use her seatbelt, and explained to her how to access the power and telephone lines for her laptop should she wish to use it. 'We've got a very nice Cristal.'

Carly couldn't help it. She gave a small shudder. 'Water will be fine,' she told him emphatically.

From his own seat at a desk on the other side of the cabin, Ricardo frowned. Why had she refused champagne? She certainly hadn't been having any qualms about drinking it the night he had seen her in CoralPink.

Thanking Eddie for her water, Carly unzipped her own laptop. Ricardo wasn't the only one who had work to do. Five minutes later, as the jet taxied down the runway, Carly was deeply engrossed in reading her e-mails—but not so deeply that she wasn't acutely aware of Ricardo's presence.

She couldn't forget the disturbing effect those fleeting seconds of physical intimacy in the car had had on her. Her stomach muscles clenched immediately, as though in rejection of the response she had felt, her mouth going dry.

Eddie had said the jet had a fully equipped bed room... The ache inside her sharpened and tightened and then started to spread.

The jet lifted off the tarmac and Carly held her breath, willing herself not to think about Ricardo.

'I'd like to ask you a few questions about certain aspects of the way Prêt a Party's business works.'

Dutifully Carly put aside the list she was studying. Ricardo was, after all, a potential client.

'Were I to commiss

ion Prêt à Party to organize an event for me, who would be responsible for establishing the cost of everything involved?'

'I would,' Carly answered him promptly.