‘And there isn’t going to be a night before to regret.’ There wasn’t; she was going to put a stop to this any minute now…any minute…
Well, what harm could another couple of minutes do? she told herself as she felt the pressure of his skilful lips subtly increase. It was just kissing.
Releasing a long, shuddering sigh, she ignored the alarmist voice of caution in her head that was insultingly suggesting she couldn’t stop even if she wanted to, and instead responded to an instinct that impelled her to clutch at him to intensify and prolong the delicious experience. Weaving her fingers into his lush dark hair once she had done so seemed equally instinctual and very satisfying. If this went on for ever it wouldn’t be too long, the dreamy thought drifted through her mind, before she gave herself up totally to the hedonistic pleasure of feeling his hard, rampantly male body pressed up against her.
Natalie hadn’t known that kisses so addictive you couldn’t walk away from them existed. Totally submerged by a tide of longing, she hooked her arms tightly around his neck. Rafe responded by encircling her narrow waist with his hands. With effortless ease he drew her upright, causing the chair he lifted her from to spin backwards until it collided noisily and unobserved into a filing cabinet.
Natalie wasn’t even conscious that her shoes had slipped off as her toes lost contact with the floor.
‘What if someone comes in…?’
Her agonised whisper caused him to pull back slightly. The flicker of cold reason in the passion-darkened eyes that swept over her flushed face brought the stupidity of what she was doing crashing home.
Her cheeks heated with mortification. ‘This is really stupid.’ She shook her head. ‘We shouldn’t be doing this.’
Rafe let his head fall back and she heard him exhale noisily. ‘Sure,’ he agreed, lifting his head and pinning her with a feverish cerulean stare. ‘But think,’ he advised her throatily, ‘of the alternative.’
Natalie blinked in confusion.
‘Not doing it.’
‘Oh!’ Every cell in her body screamed in protest.
‘Precisely.’
Natalie was transfixed by the dark need stamped on his hard features.
‘That would be…?’
His eyes slid to her mouth, then back to her eyes. ‘Unthinkable,’ he completed. Still holding her eyes, he parted her lips once more and with seductive skill slid his tongue between her trembling lips.
‘Yes!’ she whimpered, giving herself up to the craving she could no longer pretend didn’t exist. ‘Oh, yes, please!’
Her fractured sob ached with longing. It was too much for Rafe’s iron self-control, self-control she naïvely hadn’t been aware existed until it was no longer there. A shudder rippled through his lean, powerful body the moment before he claimed her lips. His hungry lips had barely covered hers before his tongue stabbed deep again and again into her mouth.
Natalie was swept up into a maelstrom of pure sensation.
CHAPTER FIVE
NATALIE felt bereft and dizzy when Rafe abruptly put her from him.
‘The phone is ringing.’
There was not a trace of the raw, driven hunger he had been exhibiting moments before in the hard planes and hollows of his face.
Natalie shivered, she suddenly felt very cold. He was going to pretend it hadn’t happened… That was good, that was excellent—well, as excellent anything connected with kissing your boss with all the finesse of a sex-starved bimbo could be!
Just why had kissing him seemed a good idea? When she thought about how she had… Don’t think about it, she instructed herself firmly. It didn’t happen. If it works for him it works for me, she told herself angrily. It’s just easier for him, she thought, sliding a resentful sideways glance at his darkly impassive face.
Rafe intercepted the look and exhaled loudly. ‘This,’ he grated, raking a hand through his hair in an exasperated manner, ‘is exactly what I’ve been trying to avoid. Getting involved emotionally at work is a recipe for disaster.’
Wasn’t that just typical of the man, acting as if he were the innocent victim of her shameless lust when he was the one who had started it? And that in itself was confusing. Why would a man who had spent the previous few minutes pulling all aspects of her appearance and character to shreds want to kiss her? Well, whatever the reason she wasn’t going to accept all the blame.
‘Afraid it wouldn’t be good for your reputation if it got around you’d kissed someone with an inside-leg measurement of less than thirty-four?’
Initially Rafe looked startled by her caustic taunt, but within a matter of seconds an amused glint she didn’t like appeared in his eyes.
‘Or are you worried I’ll play the sexual harassment card? Don’t be!’ she advised, determined he would not be left with the impression she envied in any way those blonde clones. Her small bosom heaved as she sought to control her strong feelings. ‘Do you think I want people to know you kissed me?’ She gave a very expressive little shudder.
‘It’s not my reputation I’m concerned about.’
‘What are you talking about?’
‘Have you any idea what people think about ambitious young women who sleep with their bosses?’ He paused to let his point sink in. ‘It doesn’t matter how talented you happen to be, people will always assume that you slept your way to the top.’
Natalie flushed. ‘Some place I’m not likely to get!’ she gritted.
‘If you stop bleating and start actually being positive, it’s not totally impossible,’ he declared callously.
Natalie glared at him with loathing.
‘The phone is ringing again.’
‘I know the phone is ringing, I don’t need you to tell me,’ she snapped back childishly. ‘Hello!’ she snarled down the line.
‘Is that you, Nat?’ a puzzled voice the other end asked tentatively.
It was hardly surprising, Natalie reflected grimly, that she didn’t sound like herself—she certainly didn’t feel like herself! And as for the way she’d been acting! How could you loathe someone and want to rip their clothes off at the same time? She turned her back on the tall, silent figure but it didn’t stop her being painfully aware of him in every cell of her body.
‘Natalie?’
‘Yes, it’s me,’ Natalie replied, recognising the familiar voice of Ruth the child-minder. Alarm bells began to ring in her head—Ruth never rang her at work unless there had been a disaster of some sort. The last time Rose had been inconsolable because she had lost her favourite teddy.
‘Don’t panic, Nat.’
Nothing, in Natalie’s experience, was less likely to soothe than a telephone conversation that began with these words, but this was especially true if they were closely followed by a horrifying, ‘I’m ringing from the hospital.’
Not a lost teddy this time.
This was the sort of phone call that every parent dreaded getting. An icy fist of frozen fear closed around Natalie’s heart as a dozen scenarios, each one more catastrophic than the one preceding it, chased rapidly through her head. The panic racing through her veins made it hard for her to think straight. Her lips felt stiff and reluctant to form the question she knew she had to ask, but desperately didn’t want to.
‘Is she…?’
There was a gasp the other end. ‘Oh, God, no, Rose is fine!’ The child-minder sounded horrified. ‘Well, not fine, obviously, or we wouldn’t be here, but she will be, they say.’
Natalie’s shoulders sagged. ‘Oh, my God!’ She was not conscious of Rafe retrieving her chair and sliding it behind her knees at the crucial moment they gave way.
A strange numbness spread through her body while in her head she could feel the dull throb of her own heartbeat.
‘After you left Rose seemed a bit feverish,’ Ruth relayed hurriedly. ‘And later when she started wheezing the inhaler didn’t work. I thought the best thing was to get her here first and then ring you.’
‘You did the right thing, Ruth.’ Natalie caught
her trembling lower lip in her teeth. ‘I should have listened to my instincts,’ she gulped. ‘Oh, God, I knew, I just knew I shouldn’t have left her…but the doctor said she was fine this morning, just a cold…’ She stopped, her expression one of grim self-condemnation. She couldn’t pass the buck. Nobody had forced her to come into work; that had been her own decision. Because I have a point to prove—namely that a single parent can be just as good…no, better than everyone else.
And while I was busy proving my point my daughter was… She shook her head in disgust. What sort of parent does that make me?
Ruth’s sensible voice injected a note of practicality into the endless flow of bitter self-recriminations.