“Isabella,” Alexander said. “I would call it a pleasure but we both know I don’t have your talent for acting. So let me get straight to the point. What the hell are you doing here?”
The silence that followed sounded like a deafening drumbeat to Liv’s ears.
Isabella smiled, not betraying her reaction even by the flicker of an eyelid. But then, the woman hadn’t won an Oscar for nothing. “We are married again.”
Alexander’s fingers dug into Liv’s flesh as his grip tightened on her shoulders. If he had been angry before, Liv didn’t even have a name for the blistering emotion pouring out of him now. “And you thought I would want to celebrate the good news with you?”
He turned Olivia with him, half dragging her toward the exit.
“No,” his mother said behind them. “I want to see Emily. And I won’t let you stop me anymore.”
It was only because she was flushed so close to him, in tune to his every breath, to every nuance in his face, that Liv felt the imperceptible shudder that ran through him. And it sent a pang of ache shooting through her.
But he didn’t turn around. Only halted long enough to utter, “No.”
And just like that, they walked out, Olivia still reeling with shock.
CHAPTER SIX
OLIVIA THREW HER metallic clutch onto the coffee table and followed Alexander into his bedroom, teetering on the heels. The ride back in the limousine had been filled with nerve-racking silence, punctured only by Alexander’s numerous calls on his cell phone. He hadn’t given her a chance to interject a word.
The sound of a shower running in the bathroom halted her footsteps at the entrance to his bedroom. He didn’t want her there. She knew that as surely as the tingle she still felt in her lips. But she didn’t care. Something had happened and she had no idea what. And she wasn’t going to leave the room until she had some answers.
She undid the winding straps of her sandals. The lush carpet felt heavenly against her bare feet. Moving to the French windows, she pulled the dark curtains away. The king-size bed, complete with black silk sheets, drew her gaze, robbing her mind of everything else. She swallowed hard, wanting to run her hands over the silk, the scent of him rapidly drugging her senses. And that’s how Alexander found her.
Staring at his bed like a sex-crazed twit.
A black towel tied low on his hips, he ran a hand through his hair. “Leave, Olivia.”
Her gaze drank him in, her breath stuck in her throat. He wasn’t overtly muscular, yet there was definition to every muscle in his chest. His hair, still wet, clung to his scalp. Rivulets of water slithered down his chest, tugging her gaze to his washboard stomach and disappeared into the towel. She scrunched her brows as if she could telekinesis the towel to drop.
She knew she heard him, because she felt the responding signal from her own brain. Move. Run. Yet it seemed her muscles were incapable of following up. Her skin tingled all over. She licked her lips, rubbed her fingers absently over her nape. Dampness pooled at her sex and yet the man hadn’t even touched her. The sound of his towel hitting the floor, denim sliding over his skin, every cell in her was attuned to each sound he made.
And then he was right in front of her, his bronzed chest rippling with muscles, unzipped black jeans hanging over his hips. Her stomach dipped and dived. “Olivia?”
Her gaze hitched on the strong column of his throat, the corded muscles in his neck. “Hmm?”
“Stop staring and Get. The. Hell. Out.” Her gaze flew to his. His gaze devoured her, the naked hunger in it stripping all rational thought from her. “Or God help me, I won’t be responsible for my actions.”
She shook her head, ignoring the free-falling in her stomach. “I’m not leaving until you tell me what tonight was about.” He took a deep breath and his impressive chest fell and rose with it. “When was the last time you saw them, Alexander?”
“It’s really none of your business.”
She steeled herself against his anger, against the onslaught of sexual tension spiraling around them.
“We crossed that line when you dragged me here.” She turned the diamond ring on her finger, its cold, unfamiliar touch never far from her thoughts, the thought that it would be only this particular one she would ever wear in her life a painful reminder. “Think of it this way, the sooner you answer my questions, the sooner you will be rid of me.”