A Kiss To Remember

Angie blushed fiercely as her head jerked up and their eyes met. ‘You...you shouldn’t say things like that,’ she said, shaken by his calling her his darling, and very shaken by the images his other words had catapulted into her mind. A wicked heat started firing her blood and flushing her skin. Desire quickly became a throbbing pulse in her veins.

His smile was vaguely triumphant. ‘Perhaps not,’ he drawled. ‘But I simply couldn’t resist. I’ve never been with a female before who would react as you just did. It’s enchanting. But then you are enchanting, sweet Angie. In every way...’

‘I... I asked you not to call me that,’ she said, trying to sound stern, but failing miserably.

‘But why, when it suits you?’

He smiled, and she couldn’t help it. She smiled back. ‘You’re a wicked man, Lance Sterling.’

‘Well, you can’t have everything, darling. Rich and good just don’t go together.’

A fact which she’d already realised. Angie wondered if he was paving the way to turning her into his mistress. Perhaps he was already corrupting her, getting her used to things she could never afford but which he could continue to give to her provided she continued to give him what she would give him tonight.

‘I’m not going to become your mistress, Lance,’ she said, hoping that saying the words out loud would prevent the reality happening.

He seemed taken aback. ‘Is that what you think this is?’ And he waved down her expensively clad body with his free hand.

‘Would I be wrong?’ she challenged.

‘You would,’ he said sharply, but did not elaborate.

Angie’s surprise quickly turned to bewilderment. ‘Then, what is it?’

‘It’s fun, Angie.’ He smiled an engaging though enigmatic smile. ‘What you said you wanted today.’

‘Fun,’ she repeated blankly, till the penny suddenly dropped. Yes, of course! How silly of her! Nothing so serious and semi-permanent as making her his mistress.

Tonight, for all Lance’s softly seductive words, was really just a one-night stand, dressed up to look like something else. His arrogant claim that he would spoil her for any other man was just that. An arrogant claim. It contained no promise of tomorrows. It contained nothing but the promise of a night she would never forget.

But oh, dear heaven, how she was looking forward to that night. Even now, as she gazed down at the handsome man draped elegantly over the chair before her, she wanted to beg him to stop this fiasco, to take her back to that honeymoon suite immediately. She did not want to waste another moment of her short time with him being dressed up like some Barbie doll, or eating a stupid lunch she had no stomach for.

‘What if I told you I’m not finding this much fun?’ she choked out. ‘What if I told you that I’d much rather we... That I’d prefer to... That I want you to...to...’ Her voice trailed away as she simply could not confess the desire now running rampant through her. But she must have still conveyed the shameful truth to him by her flushed cheeks and glittering eyes, by the way her lips stayed softly apart to allow the shallow panting caused by her rapidly beating heart to escape.

He stared up at her over the rim of the cup, holding her captive with his eyes and thrilling her with the sudden passion which blazed away in their brilliant blue depths. It was as though her bumbling confession had stripped away the cavalier facade he’d been wearing all day, and suddenly she saw what making love to her meant to him. She was both incredibly moved and incredibly turned on.

‘Lance,’ she breathed shakily, everything around him going out of focus, as it had the previous evening.

‘Yes,’ he rasped back. ‘I know.’ The cup clattered back into the saucer once more, and he seemed to have to drag his eyes away from her before rising slowly to his feet. ‘The lady will take the outfit she has on,’ he told the hovering saleslady in a brusquely commanding voice. ‘She won’t be changing back into her other clothes. Wrap her orange dress up with the black one. Here’s my credit card.’

When he turned back to Angie she was actually trembling. A mixture of nerves and excitement had taken hold of her, making her feel sick with anticipation of what was to come. There was something incredibly thrilling about the unknown. Yet also something incredibly frightening.