Untouched by His Diamonds

Cheeks pink, breathing shallow, she put her head in at the en suite bathroom door.

‘Now, that is one big tub.’

‘Would you like to make use of it, Clementine?’ he said from behind her.

‘Not right now.’ She was astonished at how steady her voice was.

She felt his body only centimetres from her own, and she tensed. She had to be smart about this.

She heard her zip start to slide down and suddenly knew she couldn’t do it. It came over her in a panic, most unlike her, and she pulled away.

A few days ago she’d wondered if she could handle him. She was fast discovering her answer was no. A resounding no.

Jerking around, she put a hand up as if she were stopping traffic. ‘Hang on a minute, Slugger, we’ve only just got here.’ Her voice sounded ridiculously girlish. ‘How about dinner and a movie first?’

She could feel the heat coming off his body, the slam of his breathing as his chest rose and fell just inches from hers. He slid one big hand around her waist, pulling her towards him, smiling that wicked smile of his, and she realised he wasn’t taking her seriously at all.

‘Hey.’ She shoved at his chest with one hand and pulled on his arm with the other. ‘I’m not playing, mister. Hands to yourself.’

She couldn’t be serious? He frowned. By all that was holy, she was serious. Serge released her slowly, but Clementine backed up so fast she hit the doorframe of the en suite bathroom, banging her head.

Bringing up her hand to rub the offended spot, she blinked at him warily. ‘I said dinner and a movie,’ she repeated mulishly, not liking feeling this way—a little foolish and on the back foot.

She kept her eyes on his, daring him to argue her down.

She wasn’t a newbie at this, but Serge Marinov was something beyond her experience. She just didn’t feel ready to be that out of control, and that kiss in the lift had rung some pretty significant bells. This man could very well annihilate all her inhibitions, and she really, really didn’t want to wake up tomorrow morning to a note on the pillow telling her thanks, he’d be in touch.

She wasn’t naive. She got the impression Serge saw her as a lot more sophisticated than she actually was, and she probably needed to talk to him about that. Which made dinner an excellent idea.

‘Dinner and a movie?’ he echoed. ‘They’re your terms, kisa?’

Clementine wanted to flap her lashes and tell him yes, but she’d been shaken up by what had just happened and it wasn’t fair to Serge to keep up the flirting when she so clearly wasn’t going to follow through.

‘Not terms. I just thought it would be nice,’ she offered. ‘Normal.’

Nice. Normal. Serge was trying to get his head around what had just happened. One minute he was being lured by a siren into the bedroom, and the next he was shipwrecked on the rocks—an uncouth oaf who had come on too strong and not taken no for an answer.

He was thrown back to that café in Petersburg, feeling like a thug for upsetting Clementine. She was either playing a very clever game or he had got this all very wrong. If he had it wrong, and this less than sure of herself Clementine who kept appearing at inopportune times was the real deal, the traditional Russian male that lurked not far below his modern sensibility was going to have a field-day. And he needed to keep that firmly in check.

He knew which way that led.

Either way, he wouldn’t rush her. It would do both of them a disservice. Especially if what was between them turned out to be as incendiary as he suspected it would.

Clementine decanted her clothes into one of the guest bedrooms, wondering what on earth she thought she was doing. Serge had got changed and told her he was going down to use the gym for a couple of hours. He would return to take her to dinner at seven.

She had hoped to spend a little time in his company beforehand, but given her actions this afternoon she hadn’t felt in a position to try and dissuade him. He’d said something about having some excess energy to work off, which she might have interpreted as flattering. Instead it had just fallen flat.

Folding the last of her T-shirts away, she plopped down on the guest bed and smoothed one hand over the gold satin quilt. She was definitely in luxury land, with a man she didn’t know nearly enough about, but there was a huge part of her that was singing out squeee as she threw herself down the rocky, rushing ravine she just knew this week with Serge would be. He’d almost pulled her over into the rapids with him this afternoon, but she’d balked at the last minute.

Cautious Clementine. She grimaced at Luke’s nickname for her and checked her watch. Serge had been gone barely an hour. Smiling to herself, she began peeling off her clothes.