With her heart trying to batter its way through her ribcage, her eyes travelled in an upward sweep over the long, lean length of his body, clad this evening in a beautifully cut dark grey suit, underneath which was a pale blue shirt open at the neck to reveal the tanned brown skin of his throat, and fine enough to suggest the musculature of his chest and torso. The expensive tailoring didn’t do anything to lessen the aura of raw, head-spinning masculinity he projected.
‘No, I didn’t come here for—’ She blinked and stopped. What had she come here for?
Exactly what he thinks you did, the voice in her head responded.
He took a step forward and held out his hand. ‘I’m Roman Bardales.’
After the faintest hesitation she reached out, a shock of electricity of a lethal voltage running through her body as his warm brown fingers closed around her hand and didn’t move, and she saw his polished brown eyes widen as though he too had felt the same stinging shock.
‘Marisa Rayner.’ She pulled her hand away.
‘I’m glad you came.’
‘I... I didn’t...’ One darkly delineated brow lifted to a sardonic angle and she rushed on. ‘Well, I am here.’
‘So I see.’ The comprehensive sweep of his brown eyes as they slid over her body made her shiver. ‘And now?’
‘Now?’ She had to force the word past the ache in her dry throat.
‘Are you coming up?’ The slight jerk of his head was directed at the lift behind him.
He didn’t say for a coffee, or a nightcap, because they both knew that wasn’t why she was there.
‘I... I don’t do things like this.’
‘OK,’ he said slowly in acknowledgment, and then he did nothing else to influence her decision besides standing there looking gorgeous enough to melt her bones.
Marisa had known deep down that she was just going through the motions pretending to delay. The decision had already been made as soon as she had made her way to the hotel this evening. Her struggle now was for appearances—her own, not his.
His impressive shoulders lifted in the faintest of shrugs. ‘We could go for a walk instead?’
She shook her head. ‘No, I’ll...’ She expelled a deep breath and started to move towards the lifts.