She laughed, a little of the tension leaving her body. It was an incredible relief. She moved into the kitchen, pulling a vase out of the cupboard and filling it with water. She slid the arrangement into it and stood back to admire her handiwork. Ra’if was right there, so that she bumped into his chest. She spun around, a nervous smile on her face.
“They’re beautiful. Thank you.”
“You’re beautiful. Thank you. For agreeing to this.”
Her eyes were enormous and she felt it again. Magic. It seemed to dance in the air, running tangles around them. Melinda had never believed in love at first sight. She had every reason in the world to be cynical! But if she’d thought about it she would have seen that that’s just what she was experiencing.
It was like being driven off the edge of a cliff. She had no control, no volition, she was simply falling – at speed.
“How was your day?” Her voice was a smudge in the night. She was distracted by his proximity. He’d shaved, but he had a five o’clock shadow that added flecks of dark to his chiselled jawline.
“Frustrating. I felt time hardly moved.”
Her stomach twisted and she stepped backwards, fighting the feeling of magic, trying to pull herself back onto dry land. “Some days are like that,” she murmured, reaching into the fridge and grabbing a bottle of sparkling water out. “Drink?”
He lifted his grocery bags. “You sit down, Miss … Do you know, I don’t even know your surname?”
“Oh.” Her cheeks flamed pink. “It’s Higgins.”
He smiled, as though there was a secret in the name. “Melinda Higgins.”
A tingle ran down her spine. “And you?”
Did she imagine the way his eyes momentarily darkened before his beautiful smile glowed at her once more? “I am starving,” he said in a hushed tone.
It was a mark of how utterly spellbound she was by the man that she didn’t hear silent alarm bells. She had him in her apartment, near her child, and she was letting herself be put off with answers that told her nothing.
“Then we should eat.” She moved towards the kitchen but he caught her wrist as she went. She pulled abruptly to a stop, bouncing into his chest. Her gaze jerked to his as feelings and a burgeoning sense of awareness made her body throb all over, especially low down in her abdomen.
His eyes held hers for a long moment and somehow she just knew that he was fighting his own needs and cravings; that his body was urging him forward even when common sense was holding him still. She darted her tongue out and licked her lower lip, tracing the outline, her body weakened by the closeness to him.
He expelled a soft breath, then lifted a hand and tucked a strand of dark hair behind her ear. She breathed in his scent and fluttered her eyes closed. It was a small moment; barely a fissure in the layers of time, but it shifted something between them. Something urgent and undeniable was there in the room, like a boulder at the top of a dam. The water was pushing at it, every second was building pressure, and eventually the rock would drop away, tugged to its fate by the current of need.
Their need.
“I …” Her smile was clumsy. What had she been going to say?
“You are nervous?” His accent was thicker. Darker. Spicier. And so seductive it was toe curling.
She shook her head slowly from side to side. “I’m excited,” she corrected, her spirit of honesty impressing him.
As soon as she’d said it, she wished she could pull the words back. “I just mean … It’s … I’m …”
“Relax,” he murmured, dropping his hand to her hip and bringing his whole body closer to hers. Close enough that she could feel all his hard angles and planes through his clothes.
Her gut clenched.
Desire, unmistakable, was flooding her central nervous system.
“This is just dinner,” he said, his lips hovering so close to hers it was taking every ounce of her willpower not to lift onto her tiptoes and taste his mouth, as she had briefly the night before.
Her smile almost stopped his heart. “It doesn’t feel like it.” She stepped backwards out of a need for self-preservation. Because she’d spoken the truth. A sensuality she had thought non-existent was surging through her. She’d dreamed of him the night before and thought of him all day. It was as though they’d known each other all their lives. She had wondered at the strange sense of familiarity; it was wholly new.
“Who are you?”
His expression was serious, and she wondered if he was struggling to bring himself under control in the same way she was. “Your knight in shining armour
.”