She wondered what had caused the fleetingly judgemental look which had hardened his face into a stern mask. She snapped out of her reverie to deliver a few home truths.
‘I’ve heard that you have something of a reputation where women are concerned,’ she told him crisply.
‘A reputation?’ It sounded too close to unaccustomed criticism for Khalim not to experience a sudden flicker of irritation. ‘Do elaborate, Rose.’
‘Do I need to? You like women, don’t you?’
His smile grew cynical. ‘And is it wrong to enjoy the many pleasures which the opposite sex can offer?’
His words were accompanied by the splaying of his fingers over her back, and Rose found herself wondering what it would be like if her skin were bare. And his…She swallowed. ‘You make women sound like an amusement arcade!’
He smiled. ‘It is an interesting analogy,’ he remarked, and resisted the urge to move his fingertips to lie just below the jut of her breasts. He wanted her, and he never had to try very hard, not where women were concerned. There had only ever been one woman who had turned him down, and that had been Sabrina.
He moved his head slightly as the bride and groom passed by, and saw Sabrina gazing up into the face of her new husband. Khalim had instantly forgiven and understood her rejection, because she had been in love with his best friend.
Resisting the urge to explore Rose’s breasts, he kept his hands right where they were. For while his seduction of Rose Thomas was a certainty, he suspected that he would have to take things slowly…
‘So,’ he said huskily. ‘You are at an advantage, are you not? Since you know something of me, while I know nothing of you, Rose—other than the fact that you are the most beautiful woman in the room.’
‘So you said earlier,’ answered Rose sweetly, pleased to see the fleeting look of irritation which hardened the dark face. She teased him a little more—just for the hell of it. ‘I can’t see why women fall for your charms if you keep coming out with the same old compliment!’
‘Oh, can’t you?’ he questioned silkily, and with a fluid movement of grace caught her closer still, so that their bodies melded together with shocking intimacy. He noted with satisfaction the instant darkening of her eyes, the two high spots of colour to her cheeks. Through the thin layers of silk which covered him, and her, he could feel the tiny tight buds of her breasts as they flowered against his chest and he felt another sharp pull of desire.
‘D-don’t,’ protested Rose weakly, shaken by a sweet flood of need, stronger and more powerful than anything she had ever experienced before.
Triumphantly, Khalim felt her tremble against him and pressed his lips close to where the bright, flaxen hair gleamed against her ear. ‘Don’t what?’ he whispered.
‘Don’t.’ But her voice shook so that the word was unrecognisable and she had to try again. ‘Don’t stand so close to me.’
With the instinctive mastery of the conqueror, he did exactly as she asked, moving a little away from her, and he heard her unmistakable little of gasp of protest. ‘Is that better?’ he questioned silkily.
Better? Rose felt as bereft as if someone had just shorn off her long hair and left her neck bare and cold. She found herself wanting to beg him to pull her back into that warm, enticing circle, until common sense began to reassert itself. She was not the kind of woman to beg a man to do anything. ‘Much better,’ she agreed levelly.
He didn’t believe her for a moment. Khalim smiled, acknowledging what he knew to be a universal truth—that the chase was often the most exciting part of the conquest. ‘So why don’t you tell me something about yourself?’ he murmured.
She turned her face upwards, her eyes sparking a challenge. ‘What would you like to know?’
‘Everything. Absolutely everything.’
Rose’s mouth curved into a smile. ‘You’ll have to be a little more specific than that, I’m afraid!’
He wondered what she would say if he told her the only thing he really wanted to know was what her naked body would look like. Stretched out in rapturous abandon on the slippery-soft sheets of his enormous bed. ‘So tell me what you do,’ he murmured.
‘You mean, work-wise?’
He nodded, thinking that she had no need at all to work. She could easily be a rich man’s mistress, he thought. His. Why had he never met her before? ‘Or shall I guess what kind of work you do, Rose?’
‘You can try!’
‘Simple. A model?’ he mused.
‘I’m not tall enough,’ she objected, hating herself for the warm glow which his compliment produced. ‘Or thin enough.’
Irresistibly, his eyes were drawn to the luscious swell of breast and hip. ‘You are perfect,’ he said huskily. ‘Quite perfect.’
Within the circle of his arms, Rose shivered. She wasn’t used to men saying things like that, and certainly not within minutes of meeting her! Mostly, she mixed with lofty intellectuals who might occasionally pay her a clever-clever compliment. Not men who made no attempt to hide a primitive and compelling kind of desire. ‘That’s outrageous flattery!’ she protested.
‘Flattery, yes. Outrageous, no!’ He turned her round in time with the music, admiring her natural and subtle grace.