Had she really just told him being married to Chad had been a disaster? ‘Don’t ask.’

‘I just did.’

‘Yes, well, I’d rather not talk about it, if it’s all the same to you.’

He sat staring at her and Aspen wished she knew what to say next. His unexpected question about Chad had completely derailed her.

‘Come here.’

The soft command made her senses leap and she felt her breath quicken with rising panic. He was trying to control her, and she knew she couldn’t let him do that.

She tossed her hair back behind one shoulder. ‘You come here.’

Despite the fact that he hadn’t moved she could sense the tightly coiled tension within him. It radiated outward across the table and stole the breath from her lungs. And for all her dismissive tone she still felt like a puppet on his string—despite her resolve not to be.

He watched her with heavy-lidded eyes and she was totally unprepared for the scrape of his chair on the terracotta tiles as he stood up.

Aspen’s heart jumped as if she’d been startled out of a trance.

Determined to remain neutral—outwardly at least—she didn’t move. Couldn’t, if the truth be told. Her limbs were completely paralysed—by his laconic sensuality as much as her own blinding insecurities.

‘You have amazing hair.’

She snatched in a quick breath to feed her starving lungs. She could feel the heat emanating from his strong thighs beside her shoulders and even though he hadn’t touched her she started to tremble. Her only saving grace was that he couldn’t possibly be aware of her inner turmoil, and she stared straight ahead as she felt him roll a strand of her hair between his fingers as if it were the finest silk.

She couldn’t do this. Already she was freezing up, and to put herself at another man’s mercy was truly frightening.

Chad’s roughness crowded her mind and permeated her soul, and it was as if Cruz ceased to exist in that moment.

‘Dammit, Aspen. What is wrong with you?’

Cruz’s dark, annoyed voice only added fuel to the raging fire of Aspen’s insecurities. Panic enveloped her and galvanised her into action.

Gouging the floor tiles with her chair, she forced it back and moved in the opposite direction from the one Cruz was in. Unfortunately that only brought her to the balustrade. She gripped the iron railing, enjoying the coolness of the metal against her overheated palms, and pretended rapt attention in the glowing lights that outlined the low boards around the darkened polo field.

‘What bothers you the most about this?’ he grated. ‘The money aspect or the fact that it’s me you’ll be sleeping with?’

Aspen knew he stood close behind her—every fibre of her being felt as if it was attuned to every fibre of his—but she didn’t turn around. Honestly, she should have known that when it came to the crunch she would fall at the first hurdle. But of course she needed to do this—her mind was so fogged that she couldn’t comprehend any other way to save her farm.

‘It’s not the money.’ She tilted her gaze to take in the starry sky. She was planning to pay him back every cent he loaned her, plus interest, so she’d reconciled that in her mind before he’d even picked her up. No, it was... ‘It’s—’

‘Me?’ The single word sounded like a pistol-shot.

Interesting, she thought, holding a conversation with someone you couldn’t see. It made her other senses come alive. Her sense of hearing that was so in love with the deep timbre of his voice, the feel of the heat of his body that seemed to reach out like a beckoning light, his smell... Unconsciously she rubbed at the railing and felt the smooth texture of the iron beneath her sensitive fingertips.

‘It’s more the fact that you don’t like me,’ she said on a rush.

She hadn’t realised how true that was until the words left her mouth. A beat passed and then she felt his hands on her shoulders, gently turning her. Embarrassed by the admission, she forced herself to meet his gaze. Because she knew she was right.

He stared at her, not saying anything, his large hands burning into the tops of her shoulders, his thumbs almost absently caressing her collarbones. It was hard to read his expression with only a candle flickering on the table and a crescent moon ducking behind darkened clouds. It was even harder when he lowered his gaze to his hands, his inky lashes shielding them.

He gently slid those large hands up her neck to the line of her jaw, setting off a whole host of sensations in their wake. Aspen stiffened as she felt the pad of one of his thumbs slowly graze her closed mouth. His eyes locked on her lips as he pressed into the soft flesh, making them feel gloriously sensitised.

Tags: Michelle Conder Billionaire Romance
Source: readsnovelonline.net