The Platinum Collection: An Australian Conquest: The Incorrigible Playboy / His Most Exquisite Conquest / His Bought Mistress. Emma Darcy

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СКАЧАТЬ him very aware of the lush fullness of her breasts. He wanted to pick her up, carry her over to the nearest day bed and blow her mind with wild, passionate sex.

      The emotional storm eventually came to a shuddering halt but she remained leaning on him, her head resting on his shoulder, her body still, limp, spent of all energy. His hands wanted to wander, travelling down the very female curve of her spine to her even more female bottom—the bottom that swished provocatively every time she’d turned away from him. His fingers itched to curl around it, press her body into a more intimate fit with his, stir the same desire in her that was heating up his blood, arousing the beast.

      He couldn’t stop himself from hardening, didn’t want to anyway. Let her feel what she did to him. Let her know she was desirable even as a limp, tear-soaked rag doll. It might jolt her out of whatever sea of misery she was swimming in. Life was for living, not wallowing in a trough of depression.

      * * *

      Elizabeth didn’t care that it was Harry holding her. It was simply nice to be held in such a secure comforting way, propping her up when she was down, not asking anything of her, just being another body emanating warmth that took the chill of loneliness from her bones.

      She wished she had someone who would always be there for her like this, someone strong who would never let her down. She’d wanted to believe it would be Michael, but it wasn’t. And Harry...oh hell! She could feel him getting hard! No matter that she’d been weeping all over him. He still had sex on his mind.

      A flood of embarrassment poured heat into her face as she jerked her head up from his shoulder. She’d been hanging on to him like a limpet. It took a moment to unglue her hands from his back and try shoving them up his chest to make some space between them.

      ‘Sorry...sorry,’ she gabbled, frantically looking up to beg his understanding that she hadn’t been passively inviting anything!

      ‘Sorry for what?’ he mocked, his eyes glittering a hard challenge at her.

      ‘I didn’t mean to...to use you like that.’

      ‘You needed to...just like I need to do this.’

      He whipped up a hand to hold her chin. Elizabeth didn’t have time to protest, nor time to take any action to stop his mouth from swooping on hers. The impact shocked her. It was not a gentle seductive kiss. It was a full-on sensual assault, his lips working over hers, forcing them open with the strong thrust of his tongue that instantly swept over her palate, causing her whole mouth to tingle as though it had been charged with electricity.

      Instinctively she used her own tongue to fight the invasion of his, angry at his bold aggression. Whether he took this as encouragement or not, she didn’t know, but his hand moved to the back of her head, fingers thrusting into her hair, holding her so there was no escape from his marauding mouth. His tongue was teasing, goading, enticing hers to tangle erotically with it, resulting in an explosion of sensation that tore any sensible thoughts out of her mind.

      The whole physicality of the moment was totally overwhelming. She didn’t care that he pressed her lower body so closely to his that his erection furrowed her stomach. Some primitive part of her revelled in it, revelled in the hot hard wall of his chest squashing her breasts. She was swamped by a tidal wave of chaotic need to feel everything more and more intensely. Her own hands raked down his beautifully muscled back and curled around his taut male butt, exulting in the sense of taking this incredibly sexy man as hers.

      It was wildly exciting, intoxicating—one avid kiss merging into another and another, inciting a fever of passion that possessed her with such power she completely lost herself in it, craving the fierce climactic union they were driving towards, the desire for it sweeping through her like a firestorm, all-consuming.

      The mouth engaging hers suddenly broke the primal connection. ‘Yes...’ hissed into her ear—a sound of exultant triumph. Then the intimate body contact was shifted. Her legs were hoisted up and she was being carried with heart-pounding speed, cool air wafting over her hot face, reducing the fever of urgently demanding desire.

      She was tumbled onto a bed and Harry—Harry!—was leaping onto it to join her there. Her eyes were wide-open now. Her mind crashed into working gear. This was one of the day beds on the deck. She’d wanted the sex that Harry was intent on having with her. Her body was still quivering at a peak of need for it. But it was madness to go on with it—madness to muddy up what should be a clean break away from everything, starting what would inevitably be a messy affair going nowhere and interfering with carrying through this management job.

      He flung one strongly muscled thigh over hers and started lifting her T-shirt as he lowered his head to start kissing her again. She’d lain inert with shock at finding herself so complicit in stirring this situation. It had to be stopped. Now! Already his hand was on her breast, fingers moving under the cup of her bra, tweaking her nipple, and for a moment she was paralysed by a rebellious wish to feel more of his touch. She stared at his mouth coming closer and closer, her mind screaming that another kiss would tip her over into Harry’s world.

      Did she want that?

      Did she?

      Losing control of everything?

      A flash of fear whipped her hand up to Harry’s mouth, covering it just before it made contact with hers. His eyebrows beetled down in a puzzled frown.

      ‘Stop!’ she croaked.

      He jerked his head back from her halting hand, his frown deepening as he shot a disbelieving ‘What?’ at her.

      She swallowed hard to give her voice more strength. ‘I don’t want you to take this any further, Harry.’

      ‘Why not?’ he demanded. ‘You want it as much as I do.’

      She wrenched his hand away from her breast and pulled the T-shirt down. ‘A momentary madness,’ she excused.

      ‘Rubbish! It’s been simmering between us for years,’ he insisted vehemently. ‘It just came to a head and it’s damned dishonest of you to back off now.’

      Anger stirred. She hadn’t really consented to this. He’d started it when she was at her weakest, taking advantage of her vulnerable state. ‘I don’t care what you call it, I don’t choose to go on with it,’ she said fiercely and attempted to roll away from him.

      He scooped her back to face him, his eyes blazing furious frustration. ‘What is the matter with you? We want each other. It’s only natural to...’

      ‘Let me go, Harry. This isn’t right for me.’

      ‘Not right?’ he repeated incredulously. ‘It sure as hell felt right until you suddenly decided it wasn’t, but I’m not into forcing any woman to have sex with me.’ He threw up the arm that had halted her rejection of any more togetherness. ‘If you hadn’t responded as you did...’

      ‘I didn’t mean to,’ she yelled at him, her face flaming at the truth he was flinging at her.

      ‘Oh, yes you did! Just for once you let that steel-trap mind of yours open enough for your instincts to take over and it was dynamite between us. Is that what scares you, Elizabeth?’

      She hated how he could always hit the nail on the head with her. Yes, it scared her but she wasn’t going to admit it. She glared resentment at him. ‘I figure you’re dynamite to a lot of women, Harry, and I don’t СКАЧАТЬ