He felt his groin harden. Not just a kind of idea. It had been more like a full-blown Technicolor fantasy, and in that she’d actually been wearing very little. His breath caught in his throat as images of Cristina spilled again in his head—her long auburn hair tumbling in disarray over a crumpled pillow, her fingers tugging at buttons and zips—
Flattening down the ache of desire rising inside him, he cleared his throat. ‘I wasn’t sure about what colour to choose, and the general consensus seemed to be that black would be the safest option.’
Her face creased, but her honey-coloured gaze was steady on his as she said slowly, ‘So you chose a green dress because…?’
He studied her face, seeing both curiosity, and vulnerability in her eyes. ‘I suppose I don’t think of you as the safe option,’ he said softly. His eyes rested on her face and the air seemed to shimmer between them. ‘Black is boring and sensible and unobtrusive, and the little black dress is a cliché. You’re an original, cariño, and you deserve to be noticed.’
Cristina stared at him, his words tugging at the armour she had built around herself. For so long she had craved attention, but most of her life she had got it for the wrong reasons. And now Luis was telling her that she was an ‘original’—not only that, she knew he meant it.
‘Thank you.’ Swallowing the emotion that was filling her chest, she lifted her chin. ‘It’s nice to know I’m not invisible to you any more.’
His eyes gleamed, the grey almost black beneath the restaurant’s low-key lighting. ‘You were never invisible to me, cariño.’
‘You didn’t notice me at the club. Or are you saying you walked into me on purpose?’
He smiled then—a long, slow, masculine smile that made her feel as though she’d drunk an entire bottle of champagne on her own.
‘If you hadn’t been wearing those shorts I might have been concentrating on where I was going.’
It was the first time he’d admitted what had really happened in the club, but it was more than just an admission of guilt. It was an olive branch.
Her heart began to thump jerkily against her ribs. ‘So…are you concentrating now?’
His gaze flicked intently over her bare shoulders and down to the slight V of her cleavage and the curve of her waist.
‘Of course I am.’
Watching his jaw tighten, she felt a jolt of heat punch her in the stomach.
‘You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever seen,’ he said hoarsely.
Not as beautiful as you, she thought, her breath suddenly too light.
And she wasn’t the only one to think so. Across the restaurant, other female diners kept oh-so-casually glancing in his direction. But it wasn’t only the women who were aware of him. When they’d followed the maître d’ to their table there had been a sudden alertness among the men in the room, a recognition that they were in the presence of someone who commanded not just attention but respect. Why else would they all twist towards him like heliotropic flowers turning to face the sun?
She could feel herself doing it too, feel her body pulling towards him, beyond any kind of conscious control.
Their eyes met.
‘You look—’ she began, and then she frowned. ‘You’re not wearing a shirt and tie.’
Glancing down at his black polo shirt, he shrugged. ‘I felt like a change.’
This sudden switch from smart to casual was disorientating—or it would have been had Luis not chosen that moment to take her hand under the table. As she felt his fingers weave through hers it suddenly didn’t seem to matter what he was wearing.
Dry-mouthed, she stared at him mutely as Sofia and Agusto sat back down—
‘Excuse me, señorita. Would you like sparkling or still water?’
Startled, she looked up at the waiter and smiled mechanically. ‘Still, please. Just a drop,’ she added as he also went to fill up her champagne glass. ‘Are you not drinking?’ she asked Luis. She’d noticed that he was once again sticking to soft drinks.
He shrugged. ‘I’ve got a couple of conference calls tomorrow, so I need to keep a clear head.’
She nodded, intrigued. Surely his mother’s sixtieth birthday was a special enough occasion to have a glass of champagne?
His mother smiled. ‘Champagne used to give me such a headache when I was younger. Do you remember, Agusto, those cocktails your parents used to love so much?’
Taking his wife’s hand, Agusto laughed. ‘Not really, cariño, but I think that was the point.’ Turning to Cristina he said, ‘They used to mix champagne with sherry. It was absolutely lethal.’ His eyes gleamed. ‘Wouldn’t you agree, Luis?’