But her confidence took a severe nosedive ten minutes later when she padded barefoot back into the sitting room of the suite. Jake was fully dressed in a white shirt and dark blue pleated trousers, and somehow she felt at a disadvan­tage wearing the same sweater and trousers she had worn all day. He was seated on one of the two sofas with the dinner trolley set between them and he did not acknowledge her at all. It was only when she sat down on the sofa op­posite him that he deigned to glance at her.

'This is probably not so hot now,' he said, but he might have been talking to a stranger, 'if you don't mind waiting, I can order something else before you leave.'

Leave. Her heart sank. But she told herself not to be so foolish. Think of the embarrassment if she did stay all night and had to walk through the hotel in the morning. Everyone would know what she had been doing. No, Jake was simply being a gentleman. But then she saw his dark eyes, which held no warmth or tenderness, none of the passion they had recently shared, only a cool reserve.

She shivered. 'This will do fine.' She gestured to the trol­ley, and wondered why she should suddenly feel such a chill. 'I'm not very hungry.'

'Good, but you must eat something.' He lifted the covers and portioned some kind of meat casserole and vegetables onto a plate and handed it to her. His mouth smiled but his eyes did not. 'Enjoy.'

Feeling worse by the minute, Charlie took the plate and stared down at it, sure it would choke her. But she forced herself to eat her mind searching for a reason for his cool behaviour. Perhaps he was just naturally subdued after mak­ing love, she tried to tell herself, but without much convic­tion as she recalled how several times over dinner last night he had behaved in much the same way, a certain remoteness in his dark gaze effectively masking his expression.

'You're very quiet,' she offered.

'I'm eating,' Jake said with a sardonic arch of an ebony brow in her direction, and she watched as he dug into the casserole with apparent enjoyment.

Turning back to her own plate, she swallowed a few more mouthfuls. But it tasted like sawdust in her mouth, and she placed it back on the trolley. It must be her fault Jake was so reserved, but what had she done wrong? Perhaps Jake had seen through her attempt to be sophisticated and was disappointed at her performance in bed. She had read men put great store on a woman's abilities in bed, and Jake was no boy; he must have slept with a lot of women.

'How old are you?' she blurted, and bit her lip wishing she could take the question back. But at least it got his full attention.

'Thirty-eight.Probably old enough to be your father.' His voice held a sharp edge of contempt that she could not fail to recognize.

Suddenly everything became clear and her heart lifted. Jake, her sophisticated, powerful Jake, was feeling guilty about the age difference between them. Impulsively she jumped to her feet and sat on the sofa beside him, resting her hand on his thigh, determined to reassure him. 'Not unless you started before you were a teenager," she said, glancing up at his superb profile. 'I'm twenty-six, hardly a girl-'

Jake turned his head and looked down at the small hand on his thigh and then up into her smiling face. 'You think there is nothing wrong in an older man taking a much younger woman for a lover?' he asked with such bitterness in his voice that she was shocked.

'Not if he..." She was going to say loves her but stopped. 'Not if he really wants her and the feeling is mutual. No,' she said carefully, not confident enough to imply Jake loved her. But she did want to convince him his age didn't matter.

'You honestly believe that.'

'Yes, of course.' she said firmly.

'Probably only because you had to put up with a father who had quite a few young lovers. Does it never occur to you other people may not share your views?' he queried with a cynical drawl.

'No, not really. And as for my father, he was a law unto himself, and I never had to put up with his lovers. I only ever met one,' Charlie said honestly. 'But we're not talking about him, but you.' She found it incredible to believe a man as stunning as Jake should feel vulnerable about his age and yet it endeared him to her all the more.

'Are we?' Jake said with a sardonic arch of an eyebrow. Charlotte had just confirmed what Anna had told him. She never had to put up with her father's lovers. She was the selfish bitch after all. But as he looked down into her earnest sapphire eyes, and with her hand on his thigh, somehow confronting her with what he knew didn't seem important. Instead he imagined her slender hand gliding up his thigh. Fighting down the sudden jerk of excitement in his groin, he backtracked swiftly. 'If you say so.'

The veiled statement confused her. 'Well, why else would you mention the age difference?'

Jake flung her a dazzling smile and put his arm around her shoulders. 'No reason at all, Charlotte, cara. You're right, what is twelve years between friends?' But, looking into his dark eyes, she had the uneasy feeling he was not telling the truth, but simply placating her. Then he tilted her chin with one finger and brushed his lips lightly against hers.

Charlie exhaled a relieved sigh at the touch of his mouth and eagerly parted her lips and Jake took full advantage, probing the moist depths with a leisurely expertise that squashed all her irrational doubts about him.

'If I don't get you out of here soon,' Jake groaned against her ear, 'I'll take you on the sofa.'

CHAPTER FIVE

THE image Jake conjured up in

Charlie'S head was explicitly erotic, and sent her pulse rate rocketing. Heat curled in her belly and her slender fingers involuntarily flexed and stroked up his muscular thigh.

Dark eyes flaring, Jake drew in a harsh breath and leapt to his feet, his square jaw set at a determined angle. 'It is time I sent you home.'

Blinded by lust, he had already taken her in the shower without thought of the consequences, and, looking into her sultry blue eyes, he had very nearly slid into her hot little body yet again. A warning voice in his head told him he had to regain control of his suddenly overactive libido around Charlotte or he was in danger of making another mistake. 'I'll call you a cab," he said curtly, and surprised himself by trying to soften the abrupt dismissal with the lame excuse, 'I have to work tomorrow.'

Charlie slumped back against the sofa and looked up at him with wide, puzzled eyes. A moment ago he had been looking at her as if he could eat her alive, but now his eyes were shuttered, and she could sense the disapproval in the firm set of his jaw. What was it he had said, something about working? 'But tomorrow is Sunday,' she murmured inanely.

A black brow elevated. 'So?'

Tags: Jacqueline Baird Billionaire Romance
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