‘No.’ His smile died. ‘Why is that, Rachel?’ he enquired. ‘Why was there no portrait of me in any of your books?’
He’d searched through them all? She hesitated over her reply, then told the truth. It was time for the truth, she accepted suddenly. The full truth. ‘They all love me,’ she explained, nodding towards the three faces of their children. ‘I didn’t think you did any more. I tried to draw you,’ she added quickly, before he could say anything to that, ‘but the features kept distorting so I gave up in the end…’
‘Did Callum see these?’
‘What?’ The harshness of his tone threw her for a moment, and she had to think who Callum was. Then, ‘Oh, no,’ she replied. ‘Nobody saw these other than you.’
‘How serious did things get between you two?’
‘It didn’t get serious at all.’ She shrugged Zac Callum off as though he were unimportant.
But Daniel wasn’t ready to dismiss the other man. ‘You kissed him!’ he muttered. ‘I saw you!’
‘One hasty kiss in the front seat of a car?’ she mocked his jealousy, then added softly, ‘That’s all it was—that’s all!’
But he wasn’t convinced. His fingers came to clench on her shoulders as he frowned darkly down on her. Rachel sighed, noting that he had managed to do it again and turn the tables on her so that she was having to defend herself against something that she had not even done! Then she smiled at the absolute ridiculousness of it all.
‘You look like that devil again.’ Her eyes twinkled at him. ‘You know, the one who takes showers in vats of fire!’
‘I’m going to kiss you,’ he growled.
‘What—here in your very office?’ she mocked. ‘Wrong setting, darling. I belong in your other world, remember?’
He kissed her, angrily and passionately. He kissed her until she swayed in his arms. He kissed her until her hands crept round his neck and hung on, fingers curling into the silken dark hair at his nape. He kissed her until her tongue linked sensually with his, and her breasts began to respond, and his own body pulsed urgently against the firm swelling wall of her stomach. He kissed her until she was breathless, gasping, eager, hungry and totally, utterly lost in him.
Then, ‘I love you, Rachel,’ he whispered urgently.
‘I know.’ Softly, she pressed her lips to his taut throat. ‘I think I can let myself believe you again.’
He sighed then in gruff relief, and took her mouth again, kissing her long and slow and deeply.
One of his telephones took that moment to start ringing. Daniel turned to glare at it, then took hold of her hand and drew her with him over to his desk. ‘Don’t move,’ he said as he let go of her so that he could reach out for the phone, then hitched one lean hip on the edge of the desk and barked out his name.
It was amazing how smoothly he switched from passionate lover to cool, collected businessman, she noted, hearing nothing of what he was saying as she curiously studied his face. He looked leaner somehow, more finely honed, as if his features had actually taken on a physical alteration to suit the man he was being now: sharp, shrewd, assertive. His eyes were cool—even though they never lost contact with her own. And his mouth was thinner, losing all that beautiful sensuality her kisses had given it.
She smiled ruefully, and he frowned an enquiry at her without faltering in the discussion he was having with his caller. And some little devil in her made her want to crack the tycoon armour, making her reach out to stroke a caressing hand along his thigh.
He almost choked on an inward gasp, his own hand coming to clamp fiercely on top of hers. The eyes flashed, the voice faltered, and Rachel laughed.
‘I’ll call you back,’ he ground out, and slammed down the phone. ‘That was an important client!’ he accused, pulling her towards him. ‘You did that on purpose!’
‘I love you, Daniel,’ she told him softly.
He went pale, swallowing. ‘Say that again,’ he ordered thickly.
Rachel reached up and pressed a kiss to his mouth. ‘I love you,’ she repeated, finding it easier now that she’d let herself say it.
Daniel inhaled deeply, his nostrils flaring as though he was savouring the very scent of the words. ‘I’ve missed you telling me that,’ he said as he exhaled again. ‘I’ve missed having the light on your face when you say it.’ He lifted a hand to her cheek, cupping it gently where the afternoon sunlight caressed her skin.
‘I loved you when I was a child of seventeen,’ she told him softly. ‘And I’ve never actually stopped loving you since. It just got—bruised badly, that’s all.’
‘So you hid it all away and made our nights into torments of pure hell.’ His chest lifted and fell on a heavy sigh. ‘All those terrible silent lovings, Rachel. And the darkness.’ He sighed at the pain of it all. ‘Now there was a punishment. Those dark silent lovings.’
‘Let’s go home,’ she murmured, wanting to hold him close, hold him against her, naked and gleaming in the light. ‘Can you leave here just like that?’ she then asked anxiously, remembering that all of this was, after all, his responsibility.
‘I can do anything I like!’ he claimed haughtily, straightening from the desk. ‘I’m the boss. I own this lot!’
‘Mmm,’ she murmured. ‘I’d forgotten that