Her hand reached up to grasp the drapes, fingers tightening on the fabric like a claw, as if she needed to steady herself.
So she felt it too, that preternatural awareness. He’d been trying to deny its existence ever since he’d walked into the security block to see her and his heart had slammed to a halt in his chest.
It was something she hadn’t feigned. Nor had she been able to hide it. Especially after today when she’d flagrantly invited his caress with her luscious, lying mouth and her tempting body, her sham air of vulnerability.
He strode on, determined not to let her read his reaction, the weakness thrumming through his bloodstream.
But all the time his mind revolved around the fact that he’d found a chink in Tessa Marlowe’s armour.
Her weakness for him, her body’s undeniably sensual response to his proximity, gave him a weapon to use against her, if he chose.
CHAPTER FIVE
TESSA slid through the crystal water, revelling in the wonderful sense of freedom it gave her. It had been years since she’d swum. A lifetime it seemed since she’d learned to float in the public pool of the small country town where she and her mother had lived for a few years. Their longest sojourn in any one place.
They’d stayed there long enough for Tessa to make friends, for the teachers to know her name. Even to teach herself to swim on those baking summer afternoons when the kindly woman at the gate had turned a blind eye to a scrap of a girl who didn’t have the entrance fee.
Life had seemed promising then. As if maybe this time they’d make a go of it. Settle down and be just like the other families.
Of course, it hadn’t lasted. But it had given Tessa a tantalising taste of what she wanted most: a home; a sense of belonging; friends who cared; maybe even a real family, who supported one another, loved one another.
Her mum had loved her, but in her own way. It wasn’t till they’d settled in Gundagai for those two years that Tessa realised not all mothers were like hers: flighty, emotional, wonderful when she was taking her medication, but unpredictable and unreliable.
Then four years ago it seemed that fate had finally dealt Tessa a good hand. After her disrupted schooling and years of poorly paid casual work, she’d saved enough to begin her social-work course in the next semester.
Her friend Sally had won tickets to Mexico and invited her along. It had seemed the adventure of a lifetime. That was before Sally fell in love with a tall Canadian and decided not to make the overland trek south that she’d planned with Tessa. Before Tessa had stepped off a bus, alone, in San Miguel and straight into disaster.
Tessa reached the pool’s end, her hand slapping the smooth tiles. For a moment she sank under the surface. When she bobbed up again she blinked to clear her eyes and flicked her hair back from her face, wishing she could shake away the regrets so easily. On a surge of energy she heaved herself out of the water, to kneel dripping and out of breath on the sun-warmed terracotta tiles.
She froze as she registered what was before her: a pair of kidskin loafers—large, elegant, probably worth more money than she’d ever seen in one place at a time; dark trousers, surely made-to-measure, for the man who wore them was tall, towering above her. The stylish cut couldn’t conceal the solid masculine potency of those powerful thighs.
Tessa swallowed, watching large hands, dusted with a sprinkling of silky black hair, flex in front of her.
He probably wanted to wring her neck. A few days ago, when she’d arrived, she’d actually wondered if Stavros might act on such a violent impulse. That was before she’d discovered the sort of man he was. Impatient, decisive, outrageous in his determination to get his own way no matter what the repercussions. Yet controlled. So controlled. Even his white-hot fury had been leashed after that first confrontation. He’d been incandescent with anger but it had morphed into a cool condescension. His superior air told her she hadn’t a hope of convincing him to believe her.
Her breath sawed in her constricting throat as she gathered her strength to meet his gaze.
One hand thrust towards her.
‘Here.’ His rumbling voice was brusque to the point of rudeness. She felt like telling him she needed his help to stand about as much as she needed his absurd house arrest. But she guessed that if she didn’t take his proffered assistance, he’d just reach out and grab her.
And she didn’t want those hands on her body.
Electricity sparked, zapping through her as his hand closed on hers. For a shocked instant she paused, wondering if he experienced it too. Then she breathed deeply and got to her feet, letting him pull her up.
He didn’t release her, even when they stood toe to toe.