‘No,’ he said. ‘It’s not that sort of relationship.’
‘What if she falls in love with you?’ Miranda said. ‘What then?’
‘Nicole knows the rules.’
‘How often do you see her?’ Miranda didn’t really want to know. ‘Weekly? Monthly?’
‘When it’s convenient.’
She could feel her lip curling and her insides tightening as if an invisible hand was gripping her intestines. ‘So, how often is it convenient? Once a week? Twice a month? Every couple of months?’
‘I don’t keep a tally, if that’s what you’re asking,’ he said. ‘It’s not an exclusive relationship.’
Miranda couldn’t believe he was living his life in such a shallow manner. He was worth far more than a quick phone call to hook up. Didn’t he realise how much he was short-changing himself? Didn’t he want more for his life? More emotional intimacy? A deeper connection other than the physical? A casual fling every now and again might have been fine while he was young, but what about as he got older? He was thirty-three years old. Did he really want to spend the rest of his life alone? What about the women he dated? Didn’t they want more? How could they not want more when he embodied everything most women wanted?
‘Don’t you have any idea of how attractive you are to women?’ Miranda said.
His dark eyes were unreadable. ‘Am I attractive to you?’
She took a hitching breath, not quite able to hold his gaze. ‘I—I don’t think of you that way. You’re like...like a brother to me.’
He brought her chin up so she had to meet his gaze. ‘I’m not feeling like a brother right now. And I have a feeling you’re not feeling anything like a sister.’
Miranda swallowed. Was she that transparent? Could he see how much of a struggle it was to keep her gaze away from the temptation of his mouth? Could he sense how hard it was keeping her commitment to Mark secure when he looked at her like that? With that smouldering gaze burning through every layer of her resolve like a blowtorch on glacial ice? She sent her tongue out to moisten her sandstone-dry lips and saw his gaze hone in on its passage, as if pulled by a magnet.
She watched spellbound as his mouth lowered towards hers as if in slow motion. There was plenty of time for her to draw back, plenty of time to put some distance between them, but somehow she couldn’t get the message through to her addled brain.
She gave a breathless, almost soundless sigh as his lips touched hers. A touch down as soft as fairy feet sent a hot wave of need through her entire body until she felt a shudder go through her from head to toe and back again. She made another helpless noise at the back of her throat as she wound her arms up around his neck, pressing closer, pressing to get more of his firm mouth before it got too far away.
His lips came down harder this time, moving over hers in a possessive manner that made her knees weaken and her spine buckle. His tongue stroked the seam of her mouth, commanding she open to him, and with another little gasp she welcomed him inside. He came in search of her tongue, exploring every corner of her mouth with shockingly intimate, breath-taking expertise. She felt the scrape of his stubble against her chin as he shifted position. Felt the potent stirring of his body against her belly. Felt her own blood racing as desire swept through her like a runaway fire.
Miranda had felt desire as a teenager but it had been nothing like this. That had been a trickle. This was a flood. A tidal wave. A tsunami. This was adult desire. A rampant, clawing need that refused to be assuaged with anything but full possession. She could feel the urgent pleas of her body: the restless ache deep in her core, the tingling of her breasts where they were pressed up hard against his chest.
Kissing in a dark lane wasn’t enough. No way was it enough. She wanted to put her hands on his flesh—his gloriously adult, male healthy flesh—to feel his body moving over hers with passionate intent. To feel him deep inside her where she ached the most.
But suddenly he pulled away from her.
Miranda felt momentarily off-balance without his arms and body to support her. What was she doing, kissing him like some sex-starved desperado? Her whole body was shaking with the rush of pleasure his mouth had evoked—hot sparks of pleasure that reverberated in the lower regions of her body. Pulsing, throbbing sparks of forbidden, traitorous pleasure. How could she have let it happen? Why had she let it happen? But, rather than show how undone she was, she took refuge in defensive pride. ‘Happy now?’ she said. ‘Proved your point?’
He stood a couple of feet away, one of his hands pushing back through the thick pelt of his hair. It should have come as some small compensation to her that he looked as shell-shocked as she felt but somehow it didn’t.