She was seeking to draw him back, folding her hands around him, murmuring, and he could hear the breathless moans in her throat as she sought him.
‘Wait—a moment only...’
It was almost impossible for him to speak. His arousal was absolute...his body was in meltdown. He had to have her—he had to possess her. Had to complete what he had wanted to do from the very first moment of laying eyes upon her lush, alluring body, since he had first felt the response in those emerald eyes...
Oh, she might be as mercenary as he feared, as manipulative as he suspected, but none of that mattered. Only this moment mattered—this urgency, this absolute overriding desire for her that was possessing him.
A moment later he was ready, and triumph surged through him. At last he could take what he wanted—possess her, this woman who would belong to no one else but him...
She was drawing him down on her, her thighs enclosing his as her body opened to him, and with a relief that flooded through him he fused his body deep, deep within her own...
Immediately, like a firestorm, sensation exploded within him and he was swept away on burning flames that consumed him in a furnace of pleasure. For an instant so brief he was scarcely conscious of it, he felt dismay that he had not waited for her. But then, with a reeling sense of amazed wonder, he realised that she had come with him into the burning flames...that she was clinging to him and crying out even as he was, and that their bodies were wreathed in a mutual consummation that was going on and on and on...
Never before had he experienced such a consummation. Never in all his wide and varied experience had the intensity been like this. It was as if his whole mind and body and being had ignited into one incredible, endless sensation—as if their bodies were melding together, fusing like molten metal into each other.
When did it change? When it did it start to ebb, to take him back down to the plane of reality, of consciousness? He didn’t know—couldn’t say. Could only feel his body shaking as it returned slowly, throbbingly, to earth. His lungs were seizing and he could feel his heart still pounding, hear his voice shaking as he lifted himself slightly from her, aware that his full weight was crushing her.
He said something, but he did not know what.
She was looking at him—gazing up with an expression in her eyes that mirrored what he knew was in his own. A kind of shock. She was stunned by what had happened.
For one long moment they seemed just to stare at each other disbelievingly. Then, with a ragged intake of breath, Bastiaan managed to smile. Nothing more than that. And he saw her eyes flutter closed, as if he had released her. A huge lassitude swept over him, and with a kind of sigh he lowered himself again, settling her sideways against him, pulling her into his warm, exhausted body.
Holding her so close against him was wonderful, reassuring, and all that he wanted. His hands spread across her silken flanks, securing her against him, and he heard her give a little sigh of relaxation, felt one of her hands close over his, winding her fingers into his, and then, with a final settling of her body, she was still, her breathing quietening as she slipped into sleep.
In his final moment of remaining consciousness Bastiaan reached back to haul the coverlet over them both and then, when they were cocooned beneath, he wrapped his arm around her once more and gave himself to sleep, exhausted, replete, and in that moment possessing all that he wanted to possess on earth.
* * *
Something woke her—she wasn’t sure what. Whatever it was, it had roused her from the deep slumber into which she’d fallen...a slumber deeper and sweeter than she had ever known.
‘Good morning.’
Bastiaan, clad in a towelling robe, was looking down at her. His dark eyes were drinking her in. She did not answer. Could not. Could only hear in her head the words that had forced their way in.
What have I done? Oh, God, what have I done?
But she didn’t need to ask—the evidence was in her naked body, in her lying in the bed of Bastiaan Karavalas.
Memory burned like a meteor, scorching through the sky. Awareness made her jack-knife. ‘Oh, God—what time is it?’ She stared at him, horror-struck.
His face pulled into a frown. ‘Of what significance is that?’ he demanded.
But she did not answer him—did not do anything except leap from the bed, not caring that she was naked. Not caring about anything except snatching, from wherever she could see them, her clothes from the previous night.
Dismay and horror convulsed her. She pushed into the bathroom, caught sight of herself in the huge mirror, and gave a gasping groan. Three minutes later she stumbled out—looking ludicrous, she knew, with her tangled hair tumbling over her shoulders, her evening dress from the night before crumpled and idiotic on her. But she didn’t care—couldn’t care. Couldn’t afford to care.
She might be wearing Sabine’s clothes, left over from the night before, but Sabine herself was gone. Sarah was back—and she was panicking as she had never panicked before.
‘What the hell...?’ Bastiaan was staring at her.
‘I have to go.’
‘What? Don’t be absurd.’
She ignored him. Pushed right past him out into the reception room and stared desperately around, looking for her bag. Dimly she remembered that her day clothes were in a plastic bag that must, she thought urgently, still be in the footwell of Bastiaan’s car. But there was no time for that now. No time for anything except to get out of here and find a bus stop...
Oh, God, it will take for ever to get back. I’ll be late—so late. Max will be furious!