In Need of a Wife

Elizabeth was watching, she told herself, and that was justification enough to act with a certain amount of uninhibited élan

. She wriggled a little closer. Nathan’s hands slid to her hips, swaying her into a seductive rhythm that was definitely dirty. It aroused more than a simmer of excitement.

‘Stop it,’ she hissed.

He bent his head, his warm breath tingling her ear as he whispered. ‘I want to, but I can’t. Do you know how erotic you feel in this dress?’

She had known all along that she shouldn’t have worn it.

‘It’s so sensual,’ he murmured huskily. ‘So hot, so vivid, so you.’

‘Dance me out to the patio.’

‘Great idea!’

‘It’s cooler out there,’ Sasha suggested, acutely aware of her own heated response to the hardness pressing into her stomach.

‘Let’s leave. I don’t want to be with anyone else but you.’

‘Nathan...’ Her voice quivered and died. She was suddenly breathless, confused by the strength of her own desire to have him to herself. Before she could make up her mind whether to stay in the safety of numbers or go with him, he whirled her down to the end of the ballroom, his legs imprisoning hers in a rhythm that was too intensely exciting to break.

He scythed through the crowd with purposeful haste, scooping Sasha along with him, stopping for no one, only pausing at the front door to ask someone to order his car to be brought immediately. Then they were outside, and in the intoxication of the moment Nathan swept Sasha up in his arms and carried her down the steps to the driveway. There he let her slide to her feet, moulding the pliant softness of her body to his rampant virility as he kissed her with a devouring passion that Sasha was powerless to resist.

She didn’t hear the car pull up beside them. She didn’t hear its doors being opened. Her heart thundered in her ears, her head swam with dizzying sensations, her body revelled in the wild pulse of desire that beat from him to her in throbbing waves. She had never known anything like it.

Nathan lifted her into the passenger seat. He fastened the seatbelt for her. His lips roved over hers, reluctant to break the thrall of sensuality. She heard his sharp intake of breath as he pulled back. Her door was shut. She watched in a daze as he strode quickly to the driver’s side. Then he was beside her, revving the engine, accelerating them on their way, and his hand took possession of hers, fingers interlacing, gripping, wanting so much more.

A voice in the back of Sasha’s mind told her she’d better think about this and think fast.

But she didn’t want to think.

This was a time for doing.

CHAPTER TWELVE

IT WAS going up the stairs that dispelled Sasha’s pleasurable haze of anticipation for what would happen next. If Nathan had carried her, she might still have clung to feeling swept away from any thought of tomorrow. The mechanical act of placing one foot after another beat home the knowledge that each step took her closer to Nathan’s bedroom, and there was no commitment to anything other than satisfying the need burning through both of them.

He was still gripping her hand.

As they reached the top of the stairs she halted, turning to him with wary, accusing eyes. ‘It’s the dress, isn’t it? I shouldn’t have worn it.’

He touched her cheek with tenderness. ‘It’s not the dress. It’s the woman inside it.’

‘But...’

‘We’ll soon get rid of the dress. Then you can see for yourself.’

He headed for the nanny’s quarters, drawing her after him, making any protest about proceeding with him untenable. He was leading her to her door.

‘You’re going to marry another woman,’ she said, but even to her own ears her voice failed to carry much conviction.

‘I’m not married yet.’

‘How can you possibly get out of the contract?’

He looked sternly into her eyes. ‘Suicide is always a good last alternative.’

It was no alternative as far as Sasha was concerned. Nathan was so vital, so...attractive in every way. The thought of him dead put a queasy hollowness in her stomach. She wanted him, wanted him for herself, and the prospect of never having him suddenly made a wasteland of her future life.