The Mistresses Collection. Оливия Гейтс

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СКАЧАТЬ on the heat. She stood in the shower for ages, refusing to worry that James might need to use the room too. She was hoping he’d have left the apartment by the time she deigned to leave the shower.

      When she did finally open the bathroom door and peer out, she saw the bed was now neatly made and—joy of joys—her small suitcase sitting on the lower corner. The airline lady hadn’t been kidding when she’d said they’d already sent it right over.

      She grabbed the case and darted back into the bathroom, changing into one of her favourite floral dresses. Nice-fitting clothes were as good as iron armour. She brushed her hair and lifted her chin at her reflection. She could face him and not flush. No problem.

      But he wasn’t in the bedroom when she walked out into it. She went downstairs, listening hard but hearing nothing. She sniffed, slightly miffed that he’d gone. Then she sniffed again. She could smell something amazing. She got to the lower floor and stopped and stared. He’d set up some kind of camp kitchen down in the stripped-back, barren room? And even better, he’d cooked up something mouth-watering—that he was now eating.

      He glanced at her and swallowed his mouthful with a muffled choking sound. ‘I like those clothes much better.’ He breathed in deep.

      ‘I’m supposed to be flattered?’ She locked into safe sarcastic mode.

      ‘If you want my delicious breakfast, yes.’ He retaliated by zooming back to flirt zone. And smiling.

      Which was so brutally unfair of him.

      ‘Then I’m flattered.’ She bestowed a saccharine smile on him. ‘Thank you, kind sir.’ It wasn’t a total lie; she was a little pleased—this dress had been one of the first she’d designed herself when she’d been playing about. But she wasn’t letting him win any real points.

      He continued to smile right back at her—his gaze warm and lingering. She clamped down on the warmth working its way through her. Did he really think he could charm them through this embarrassment?

      ‘I’m sorry about before,’ he said easily, clearly thinking exactly that. ‘Maybe it was inevitable with two single people staying in such close quarters. It needed to happen. But now we’ve broken that tension, right?’

      Oh, it so hadn’t needed to happen. And as for breaking the tension? It had left her yearning for more. Hell, her nerves were screaming at her to jump him this second. As far as she was concerned, the tension was way worse. ‘Yeah, well, guess we’re just two little animals who can’t resist basic instinct.’

      ‘But we can. We just have.’

      And they’d continue to? No giving in to the searing temptation? ‘Of course,’ she replied through gritted teeth.

      James turned back to the small grill and took another pace away from her to get some very necessary space for the gas ring. And himself. But she stepped after him again, wide-eyed at the prep work he’d done yesterday before she’d got home.

      ‘You didn’t want to go to your diner?’ she muttered.

      He gave her a feeble grin. He’d go to the diner in a heartbeat. But he knew she wouldn’t. A coffee wasn’t enough. It was economics—he’d already known it before her confession of last night. He cracked an egg into the pan. ‘I like a home-cooked breakfast.’

      Hard boiled, over easy, sunny side up, runny yolk... He liked it all ways. Lots of ways. Just lots of it. Ugh. He winced at himself and the deep, single, smutty groove his mind was stuck in.

      Treat her like the sister he’d never had. That was the only way to get through. He’d think of her as a sister. Put her firmly in the ‘untouchable’ basket. She needed a break away and apparently had nowhere else to go. George had said she’d had a hard time. She might make herself out to be a tough nut, but James wasn’t messing round with her. And he did only ever mess about.

      Except she’d gotten him so hot he’d almost come without even penetrating her. It was pathetic. No way could he have lasted even a few seconds more. He’d been rough, ready to slam inside her the second he’d touched her, and would have come the next second if they’d kept kissing. Worse than a youth fumbling through his first time. He wasn’t doing that to her or any woman.

      He blanked out the tiny voice telling him that she’d liked it. That she’d wanted it. That she’d been close to coming herself given the way she’d been riding him. And that he’d have gotten hard again in record time.

      He burned inside. There was no getting away from it. He wanted sex. Couldn’t stop thinking about it. These last few months were the longest he’d gone without all his adult life. It wasn’t that he was a player, but he had flings. One nighters here and there. Until the last few months when he’d been back-to-back working.

      He’d fixated on Caitlin because of her proximity, right? So there was the scene, the bars and clubs. Plenty of places to find another woman with come-hither eyes and soft lips who’d let him lose himself for a few hours. Except there was no losing ‘James Wolfe’. His face had been plastered over the cover of the world’s leading current affairs magazine. That image was everywhere over the Internet.

      And way more crucially, there was only the one image in his mind now—Caitlin’s blonde hair draping over the pillow, over him the way it had before. Caitlin’s lips, Caitlin’s eyes, Caitlin’s curvy body. The desire for her had taken root and he couldn’t get rid of it. He ached to pull her beneath him and pin her to the bed. He wanted to take advantage and tame that subversive spirit, that spark within her. He’d tussle and torment her until she was silenced and sated and looking at him with nothing but appreciative pleasure in her eyes.

      He wanted her to look at him as if he were her sex-god hero. How tragic was that? Given he hated anyone else looking at him that way.

      But the way she’d kissed him—hungry, passionate, raw—had heated him alarmingly quickly. Too quickly. He snorted as he flipped her eggs. He’d hardly been a sex god this morning.

      George’s warning rang again in his ears. If she’d had a rough time then she didn’t need him complicating things for her. He shouldn’t ask. Shouldn’t delve. She just wanted her little sightseeing holiday.

      So what he should do was pack his bag and leave before temptation grew too great. He served up the eggs together with the mushrooms and tomatoes he’d cooked onto one of his camp plates. Holding it, he turned to offer it to her.

      One last look into those blue eyes?

      He was doomed.

       FIVE

      Leaning against the wall, Caitlin took the plate James offered with a cautious smile. He looked uncomfortably intense. He didn’t resume eating his own meal, leaving his plate to the side of the small camp cooker—next to his iPad. But he didn’t look at that either. He only looked at her.

      ‘Tell me,’ he said.

      She paused, her fork partway lifted, her mind still on the electronic gadget. Had he been searching? ‘Tell you what?’

      ‘Everything. Why are you here? What is it you’ve run from? Why did my brother say you could stay here? How do you even know him?’

      She СКАЧАТЬ