The Playboy's Proposal. Amanda Browning

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СКАЧАТЬ yes. However, the appetite you arouse will settle for nothing less than your presence in my bed.’

      It was heady stuff on an empty stomach, and she groaned silently, aware that her body responded to every soft word with a will of its own. Still, she had made her decision and would stick to it.

      ‘If you check with the management, I think you’ll find I’m not on the menu,’ she returned smoothly, watching the way his eyes crinkled at the corners when his smile deepened.

      He bent towards her confidingly. ‘Could you really watch me starve?’ he taunted softly, and she raised an eyebrow quizzically.

      ‘Somehow, I don’t think you’d starve for long,’ she quipped, and strangely enough it hurt to say it, which was odd, for she had always known she was not important to him. She was no more than a passing fancy because she was here.

      ‘Ah, but sometimes hunger can only be satisfied by one thing—or one woman,’ Joel insisted softly.

      Kathryn took a steadying sip of her drink, fearing he was right. He had come out with all guns blazing this evening, and the attack on her defences were definitely weakening them. She needed the drink to strengthen her resolve.

      ‘But hunger is such a contrary thing. Now it wants one thing; next time it wants something completely different,’ she countered, but he shook his head.

      ‘Not always. Sometimes it takes a very long time for hunger to be satisfied.’

      ‘Just not for ever,’ Kathryn shot back pointedly, and he acknowledged the hit with an inclination of his head.

      ‘No, not for ever. Everything diminishes in time,’ Joel agreed as he wandered over to the drinks tray and poured himself a small whisky. Sipping it, he looked at her over the glass.

      ‘There is an exception, though I hesitate to mention it, knowing your opinion of love,’ Kathryn reminded him, and he lowered the glass.

      ‘Do you really think this love you believe in lasts for ever?’ he asked curiously.

      ‘It can do, but it has to be worked at. You can’t ever take it for granted, but the more you feed it the more it grows,’ she said with utter conviction, and that brought a tiny frown to his forehead.

      ‘You can say that, even though your own grandparents’ marriage failed?’

      She sighed. He had to pick on the one failure to illustrate his case, but his argument was based on a false premise. ‘The marriage failed because there was only love on one side. My mother has told me many times that my grandmother loved my grandfather; she just couldn’t live with his coldness.’ Left alone with her father, it hadn’t been easy for her mother either. In the end it had driven Lucy Makepeace to find a place of her own to live as soon as she was old enough.

      ‘What happened to your grandmother?’ Joel asked conversationally, sliding one hand casually into the pocket of his trousers.

      The question caught her off-guard, allowing the old sadness to show in her eyes as she frowned. ‘I really don’t know. There was a messy divorce and a bitter custody battle, which my grandfather won, and that was the last anyone ever saw of her,’ she revealed with a faint shrug of her shoulders.

      ‘You miss her?’ Joel asked curiously, and Kathryn sighed heavily, because her feelings concerning the situation were more complex than a simple answer could convey.

      ‘It’s hard to miss someone you never knew. What I miss is not having known her. The person she was. There is so much about her I want to know,’ she said honestly, and her smile was deprecating. ‘I guess I want to ask her why she never came to see my mother. I can’t ask my grandfather because he never speaks of her. It’s a mystery I don’t know how to solve.’

      ‘Have you never tried to trace her?’

      Kathryn shook her head. ‘I wouldn’t know where to start,’ she declared wistfully, then, because thinking of her grandmother always left her dissatisfied, she made a determined effort to lift her spirits. ‘What about you? Are both your parents living?’

      ‘Oh, yes. They’re still going strong, and seem younger than ever, even though they celebrated their golden wedding last year. At present they’re in Canada, visiting relatives. Then they’re off to Hawaii,’ Joel confirmed, and she tipped her head to one side thoughtfully.

      ‘So they weren’t the ones who made you so cynical about love. That means it has to be a woman,’ she mused, watching him carefully. But, as she was coming to expect, he gave nothing away.

      Instead one eyebrow lifted lazily. ‘You think so?’

      Kathryn laughed softly. ‘It has to be, and you haven’t denied it. What did she do? Leave you for another man?’

      Joel shook his head. ‘She couldn’t, as she’s nothing but a figment of your imagination.’

      Her eyes narrowed as she tossed that around in her mind. ‘Hmm, I see. That’s very interesting. If it wasn’t one woman, then it has to be all women. What do we fail to do that convinces you love doesn’t exist?’ She posed the question to herself, and almost immediately saw the answer. ‘We don’t see you as just a man, do we? All we see is a bank balance. An unending source of spending money. That’s it, isn’t it?’ she charged him, convinced she was right.

      In response, Joel drained his glass and set it aside. When he looked at her again, there was a dangerous glitter in his eyes. ‘You’re very perceptive.’

      ‘That’s because I have a similar problem. My father is a very wealthy man, and I’m his only daughter. Which makes me an heiress set to inherit a fortune, and a prime target. There are a lot of men out there who would like to get their hands on the money they think I’ll get one day,’ Kathryn returned with a grimace of distaste.

      ‘And yet you still believe in fairy stories,’ Joel remarked scornfully, and she tilted her chin upwards defiantly.

      ‘That’s because I know all men are not the same. Neither are all women.’

      He came to her then, his hand reaching out to cup her chin. ‘That hasn’t been my experience. I prefer to believe in what I know exists: desire. Love is a fallacy; sexual attraction is real. You feel it. Right now your heart is beating just a little bit faster, isn’t it? I can see that delicious pulse throbbing in your throat. It’s urging me to kiss it. To know the feel and taste of you,’ he whispered huskily, his eyes glowing with a fierce heat as they looked into hers.

      Kathryn’s heart lurched in response to the siren call of his desire. She wanted him to do it, too. Her flesh seemed to scream out for it, and it was incredibly painful to step back away from him, forcing his hand to drop to his side.

      ‘I hardly think this is the time or the place for what you have in mind,’ she told him sardonically, and he smiled faintly.

      ‘Nevertheless, you felt it. You felt the hunger.’

      Oh, boy, had she! Her whole body was still pulsating with it. ‘Maybe I did, but right now I have a more urgent hunger that needs satisfying. I haven’t eaten all day,’ she protested, seeking to bring some order to the sensual chaos she felt whenever he was near.

      Joel laughed wryly. ‘Then we must deal with that one first. The СКАЧАТЬ