smoothed a situation more than some humour.
* * *
Ellie struggled to hide her breathlessness. Shock still had her lungs in a tight grip, but so did desire—she was seconds from orgasm and, frankly, that doubled her shock.
She stared at the complete stranger only a couple of feet from her. The stranger that she now knew so intimately. And just looking at him sent her heart rate through the ceiling.
‘You’re okay?’ The soft query delivered between dangerously curved lips. That gorgeous smile was as natural to him as the stripes were to the tiger. Oh, yeah, he’d been blessed with beautiful lips, upturned at the ends so he looked as if he was always in good humour. Which, given all his other assets, he probably was.
She clutched the sheet closer. Only her action dragged the sheet completely off him and, yeah, this was definitely not Nathan. And his natural assets were...sizable.
‘I’m so sorry this happened,’ she said again, determined to ignore the savage desire rippling through her like some internal beast that refused to be tamed. What kind of depraved animal had she turned into?
‘I’m not.’
She hardly heard him as she apologised another ten times, interspersing the phrase with a few more choice words beneath her breath. Clutching the sheet to her with one hand, she put her now freezing hand to her face.
He sat up, resting his weight on one hand behind him, and spoke more forcefully. ‘You didn’t do anything I didn’t want you to.’
That silenced her for all of a second. ‘You didn’t have much choice.’ She looked across the bed at him. ‘I seduced you.’ The guy had been sound asleep and she’d been stroking him all over. Like everywhere.
His smile burst forth again. ‘Yeah, well, it wasn’t like I said no.’ He chuckled. ‘And it wasn’t like I was a virgin.’
Well, no, he hadn’t been that. Ellie bit her lips to stop from smiling. He’d had all the moves. And he executed another now—a languorous stretch that drew her attention once more to his completely fit length.
Hell, she had to move away before she did something stupid again. So she stood, taking the sheet with her. She didn’t care about leaving him exposed, he didn’t seem to be bothered by it. Whereas all she wanted to do was hide. She tried to wind the sheet around herself, glanced up to see him watching close—with undisguised amusement—and arousal. Man, was he aroused.
‘You’re free to take advantage of me any time you like,’ he said softly, lying back down again. ‘Or, you can come back to bed and let me take advantage of you this time.’
Oh, she so nearly had already and they both knew it. She felt her blush deepen. ‘I really am sorry.’
‘Sweetheart,’ he drawled, but with an underlying hint of seriousness. ‘I could have stopped you if I’d wanted to.’
And there was the question. She looked up from her twisted toga attempt—facing his gaze direct. ‘Why didn’t you want to?’
He roared with laughter, his whole body clenched into an expression of enjoyment. Her gaze skittered south all of its own accord. Built for enjoyment—his clearly defined muscles spelled strength and stamina and gloriously good reproductive genes. And his reaction proved he was such a man. An all-about-fun man. She’d been a sexual toy for the night—as of course he had been for her. A really good toy.
Ellie tried to get her thoughts back on track—berating herself with worst-case scenarios. Imagine if he’d been married. What if he hadn’t been alone in the room? She didn’t know which would be worse. All she knew was that his utterly relaxed acceptance of her mistake was astounding.
‘What were you thinking going along with it? Do women leap on you all the time?’ Actually, looking at him? They probably did.
‘I was asleep. At first I thought it was just an amazing dream.’
‘A 4D dream,’ she said sceptically.
‘Yeah, hot and wet,’ he half groaned, movement rippling down his muscles. ‘You’re sure you don’t want to come back to bed?’
‘Quite sure.’ She clipped out the lie, all of a sudden desperate to get out of there before she threw caution to the wind and went for a repeat of last night’s decadence.
‘Honey, relax. I’m single, you’re...’ He paused, his voice lifting in question, his eyes unwaveringly focused on hers.
‘Single,’ she confirmed.
He paused as his expression seemed to sharpen. ‘So tell me about Nathan.’
‘He’s no one.’ She so didn’t want to go there.
‘He’s not your boyfriend or your benefits guy or whatever?’
‘No.’ She squeaked out an answer from her strangled-feeling throat. She supposed she did owe the guy some kind of explanation but it was just so mortifying. ‘We’re colleagues. He’d been flirting and I... For once I just felt like...’ She trailed off, her toes curling into the plush carpet. Now she wanted to disappear into the sheet completely.
‘Nothing wrong with feeling like it.’ Her naked lover shrugged his shoulders. ‘So it wasn’t because you’re secretly in love with the guy and want to have his babies?’
‘No babies,’ she answered faintly. ‘Don’t worry.’ She inhaled a hit of oxygen for courage. ‘What we did was... It was safe.’
He sat up slowly. ‘I remember.’ His gaze lingered on her mouth. ‘So no babies but you’re not in love with him either?’
She shook her head. ‘I just thought I’d say yes for once. Take the bull by the horns, so to speak.’
‘You like rodeo?’ His irrepressible smile quirked.
‘Actually I don’t think it’s really for me,’ she muttered, all but dying.
‘But you ride so beautifully. Great seat, great rhythm. You’re a natural,’ he teased, chuckling at her baleful look. ‘So you don’t often do random seductions?’
The idea of her being some vixen seductress was so far off the mark it was hysterical. But she wasn’t going to get hysterical herself. No, she took a calming breath and reckoned she could manage to get into the tease zone too. That was the way to handle this. ‘Only on full moons.’
‘Oh, you’re a were-woman?’
She flicked her brows and then dropped the pretence. ‘Honestly, the location helped.’ She fiddled with the sheet and couldn’t look at him. She knew this guy of all guys wasn’t going to get hung up on double standards, but she was still embarrassed.
‘The chateau?’
‘It’s so luxurious.’ She nodded, truly meaning it. ‘All the fabric, the furnishings. It’s beautiful.’
‘Yeah,’ he said slowly. ‘But I’ve never thought of it as an erotic destination. It’s not like there are mirrors on the ceiling, tie-me-down bed ends, or twenty types of massage oil in the bathroom cabinet.’ He glanced around the utterly tasteful room with a perplexed look.
Ellie was smoking-hot over his list of essentials for an erotic destination. She’d never thought she’d be into anything more than vanilla but the man had said ‘tie-me-down’ and she was ready to hunt out the ropes. She banished the image but couldn’t help smiling as she tried to explain it more. ‘It has this kind of discreet decadence. And it was a warm night. I’d had the most amazing shower.’ She put her hand to her head because this so wasn’t enough. ‘And they serve French champagne.’
‘Ah-h-h.’ He nodded as if that explained it all. ‘French champagne.’
She shrugged and gave up at that. She truly hadn’t been tipsy. She’d just been bewitched and decided to please herself.