Married for the Tycoon's Empire

He kept her hand firmly in his and faced her fully, his free arm snaking around her waist and pulling her close. She went on fire when she felt his burgeoning erection between them. His eyes gleamed when he saw her reaction. Lia was acutely aware of the audience around them, and cursed herself for not waiting to confront him until they were somewhere more private.

‘You asked me a question.’

Lia frowned. ‘What question?’

‘In that kind note you left, you said—and I quote—"This was never going to go beyond the weekend, was it?”’

Lia flushed hotter. ‘That was a rhetorical question.’

Ben shook his head. ‘Not any more—because I believe I’ve just answered it.’

‘How?’

He moved against her subtly, explicitly, leaving her in no doubt as to what he meant. Then he said throatily, ‘I suggest you come with me right now—unless you want to treat your peers to the kind of show they’d prefer to watch in private or on pay per view.’

Some emotion Lia didn’t want to name surged through her as the knowledge sank in—she wasn’t dreaming. He was here and he still wanted her. And, heaven help her, she wanted him too... She’d run scared in Brazil, but right now she couldn’t exactly recall why it had been so imperative to get away from him.

Displaying his uncanny ability to read her mind, Ben was making the most of her hesitation and continuing on his journey out of the room, leading her into the hushed lobby of the very exclusive London hotel.

A lift door opened nearby and Ben diverted suddenly, pulling her in with him just as the doors closed again, almost catching Lia’s dress. The lift started to ascend. And suddenly in the confined space, with Ben taking up most of the room with his big body, the panic returned. He really was here. And now she really had nowhere to hide.

‘This is crazy, Ben! You can’t just remove me to wherever you like, whenever you like.’

She watched as he hit a button with the palm of his hand and the lift shuddered to a halt. Between floors. He finally let her hand go, and caged her in with a hand on either side of her head.

‘I have issues with your note,’ he said, in a low, deep drawl that impacted Lia right between her legs.

The panic was draining away, to be replaced by something hot and illicit in her blood. And, more dangerously, the memories she’d been repressing all week were starting to break free of their moorings, flooding her brain with images and rising desire.

‘Primarily,’ he continued, oblivious to her inner turmoil, ‘the bit where you assumed that our...liaison wouldn’t last beyond the weekend.’

Lia was feeling breathless. Was it her imagination or were the mirrors in the elevator starting to steam up? She struggled to recall what he’d just said, and then asked, ‘Is that what it was? A liaison?’

Again, as if she hadn’t spoken, Ben said, ‘Do you really think I spent all that money just to get you into my bed?’

Lia wanted to squirm. Of course she didn’t. Not any more. But that was where the danger lay...in thinking about what he wanted from her outside of this insane heat. Or, worse, what she wanted. When she’d protected herself for so long—even going so far as to agree to a marriage of convenience.

She shook her head now. ‘No, I don’t think that.’

A slow, sexy grin spread across Ben’s face and Lia’s legs immediately felt weak. The tension thickened between them. He wasn’t going anywhere.

The giddy recklessness she’d felt in New York came back. Maybe he was here to finish what they’d started in Brazil. One more night? Two? And then he’d go back to his own life. After all, she reminded herself through the gathering heat in her brain, Ben didn’t do relationships, did he?

And neither did she. She shouldn’t have panicked in Brazil—it could have burnt out there. But she had. And now he was here. So maybe it would be okay to just...let it burn out. Here, as opposed to there. Did the geographics matter?

The fevered circling thoughts all led to one conclusion: Lia giving herself permission to stop fighting the inevitable. Resistance melted and she dived into the fever growing in her blood.

‘Kiss me, Ben.’

Stop the chatter in my head, a small voice begged.

He smiled, wickedly accepting her capitulation—again—and then he cupped her face in his hands, tilted it up to his, and kissed her, stroking his tongue into her mouth, deep. Reminding her of the exquisite pleasure he’d given her, and the gift of the knowledge that she wasn’t cold inside.

That alone made emotion surge again, and Lia wrapped her arms tight around his neck as if that would contain it. He’d flown all the way across the world to kiss her like this, deep and hot and wicked. And she would take it—because this was finite.

She arched her body into his, her blood throbbing in time with her heart when she felt the very masculine evidence of his arousal against her. His hands moved down her sides to her buttocks, where he cupped her through the slippery material of the dress.

He pulled back long enough to speak as he lifted her up, instructing, ‘Wrap your legs around my hips.’