only had to look into that hard, classically handsome face to know that he had—then so had she.
She watched him take Arthur’s swivel chair behind the desk, her heart thumping at the base of her throat. He still moved with the same inborn grace and she couldn’t help remembering how she had adored watching him.
Lisa took the chair opposite and sat, her hands loosely clasped together in her lap. Seeking the defence of outward composure, her voice commendably calm, she asked, ‘So you now work for Trading International?’ reining back the snide comment that it was a big step up for a humble waiter. For everyone’s sake she couldn’t afford to rub him up the wrong way, even though she still longed to wring his neck for what he had done to her!
‘Since my father’s retirement, I am Trading International.’ He placed his elbows on the arm rests of the chair he was using, steepling his fingers, the tips lightly touching his wide, sensual mouth, narrowed eyes watching the disbelief and then the obvious shock flicker across her face.
The face of an angel. The smile of a siren. And the sensitivity and morals of an alley cat!
She was more beautiful than he remembered, the delicate perfectly formed body still unbelievably sexy.
Five years ago he could have taken that body, it had been his for the asking. He narrowed his eyes, black gleaming through the enigmatic, heavy sweep of his lashes. Five years ago he had denied himself the sensual pleasure of the ultimate possession of the bewitching temptation of her. Now, one way or another, he was going to have her. Take what he wanted for as long as he wanted it, learn the secrets of her delectable body then toss her back where she belonged.
Dropping his hands, he leaned further back in the chair, idly pondering the pleasure of removing the clasp that maintained the sophisticated upsweep of her hair and seeing the silvery silky mass tumble down to the creamy skin of her naked shoulders and the gentle, inviting curve of her breasts.
His accent was slightly more pronounced than was usual, his tone smooth as cream, he imparted, ‘I have a proposition to put to you, Miss Pennington…’
CHAPTER THREE
‘YOU can’t mean that!’
It was appalling, utterly crazy! As propositions went it was totally unbelievable—she must have misheard. Either that or Diego Raffacani had gone stark staring mad!
Her wildly churning emotions swept away the last fragile pretence of composure and Lisa pushed herself to her feet, then wholeheartedly wished she hadn’t. Her body was trembling so badly she was swaying on her kitten heels. Her breath shortened and her inky-blue eyes widened, darkening to black as she watched him get to his own feet and move around the desk to stand beside her.
Her nostrils flared as she inhaled the scent of him, the heat of his body. Her mouth ran dry and her heart began to pound as she stared up into the lean powerful face, watched the sinfully sensual line of his mouth as he asserted, ‘I meant every word,’ and dropped back into the chair she had vacated as her knees finally buckled beneath her.
‘Why?’ Her voice croaked as her mind skittered back and forth over everything he’d said. It was impossible to keep a sensible or decisive thought in her head for more than a nanosecond.
‘Because you owe me.’ His teeth glinted white. ‘Five years ago you were more than willing. But out of respect for your youth and what I then believed to be your inexperience I held back. You proved yourself unworthy of any man’s respect.’ His hard, beautiful face was rigid with contempt. ‘I loved you but you threw it back in my face—that was my reward for my unselfish consideration. It is now time to pay your debt to me. Six months, or maybe even three, should be enough to get you out of my system.’ There was a glint in his eyes, a twist to his mouth that sent a waterfall of ice skittering down her backbone as he drawled, ‘If you prick a Spaniard’s pride then you sit back and wait for the inevitable vengeance.’
Lisa shuddered as a knot of something tight and hot claimed her stomach. She raised her shaky hands to cover her mouth, fighting to come to terms with what he was demanding of her. Grappling to make some sense of the situation, she seized on one solid fact and accused, ‘You said you were just a waiter. And all the time you were rotten rich! You lied!’
His mouth flat he turned away from her. ‘I didn’t lie to you. You simply made your own interpretation. You were happy to amuse yourself with what you saw as a no-account stud. You were at a loose end and looking for a cheap holiday romance. You wanted sex. I didn’t oblige so you eased your frustration by sleeping with the man I now know to be Ben Clayton.’
‘For pity’s sake!’ Hot colour swept her face. ‘I was only dancing—how dare you?’
Resuming his seat on the opposite side of the desk, he slashed his hand imperiously, cutting off any further words of self-justification. ‘You were crawling all over him, kissing him. And if you don’t recall what you said to me, I do.’
Lisa cringed away from the savage glitter of his midnight eyes. Of course she remembered. She remembered every word they had ever said to each other. And, as for the last vile words she had ever spoken to him… Well, she had no defence, certainly none that he would listen to. Prick a Spaniard’s pride…
‘The offer’s on the table,’ he said with a snap in his voice that made Lisa feel as if she’d just been pronounced terminally ill. ‘You live with me, lie with me, pleasure me until you bore me. In return I will not cancel my company’s advertising and use one of your competitors. I will even buy in, bring in new blood to gloss up Lifestyle’s dull image, bring it back to success. If you refuse, as is your right, of course, then—’ With a slight shrug of those impressive shoulders he allowed the threat to hang in the air—air that now seemed to be suffocatingly thick and heavy.
Lisa couldn’t breathe. Her brain wasn’t functioning as it should. She could only hear the words that had burned themselves into her mind—‘lie with me, pleasure me’—and only wonder with helpless self-loathing at the way the responsive heat pooled between her thighs and a piercing awareness made her whole body tremble. After all this time he could still reach her. How many times had she told herself that he wasn’t worth wasting a single thought on? Millions! And yet she only had to be near him—
‘I’ve only just got engaged,’ she pushed out between suddenly unbearably sensitised lips, knowing that he would regard the statement as irrelevant.
‘Break it.’
He got to his feet, large, lean and intimidating. But so utterly gorgeous her mouth went dry as she looked at him, searching for the man he had been, the man she had fallen so helplessly in love with.
‘I’ll call on you tomorrow morning. Early. For your decision.’
Diego strode out of the room, closing the door behind him with an emphatic snap. Lisa shuddered, wrapping her arms around a frame that seemed about to shake itself to pieces. Bereft of his presence, the room felt cold and hollow. But then, she thought shakily, he had always generated an atmosphere so vital the air around him was charged with stinging sexual energy. Unfortunately nothing had changed in that respect.
She felt sick with nervous tension. What Diego had asked—demanded—of her was impossible! Quelling the uncomfortable knowledge that he need only have used a kind word, confessed, with regret, that he had been two-timing her all those years ago, then the impossible would have turned into the opposite, she gave herself a savage mental shake.
Like the arrogant swine he obviously was he was accusing her of being in the wrong. True, she had behaved atrociously. But she had been too young to cope with his betrayal with any dignity at all. She’d had too much to drink, been borderline hysterical…
‘So, how did it go?’
Lisa nearly leapt out of her skin. She’d been drowning in her own tortured thoughts and hadn’t heard Ben enter. He placed a hand on her shoulder. ‘I saw Señor Raffacani leave—now, why does that name ring a bell?’ He hunched his shoulders, dismissing it as unimportant. ‘Don’t suppose you talked