‘I see you’ve been making the most of my hospitality.’ His voice was like liquid mercury: heavy, silky smooth and deadly.
Tessa didn’t answer. What was there to say? Instinctively she knew that any response would only goad his temper.
Her gaze skittered from the taut curve of his bicep, flexed as he leaned against the door jamb, to the grim line of his mouth and up to the deep glitter of his eyes. They all proclaimed one thing: threat.
Slowly, almost idly, he slid his arm down from the door and straightened, stretching his shoulders back as if to relieve some unseen tightness there.
Tessa felt her eyes grow huge as she watched him.
He was the ultimate predator.
And yet…to her horror she felt a trickle of purely feminine appreciation of the ultra-masculine picture he made.
‘Don’t think you can take advantage of my father.’ This time there was no silk in his tone. It grated, harsh and uncompromising.
‘I didn’t try to—’
‘And don’t make the mistake of believing I’m not awake to your games.’
He took a single stride into the room as he spoke, filling it with his alarming presence.
‘I never even—’
‘This is between you and me. Just the two of us. No one else.’ He closed the distance between them so she had to lift her chin to meet his look.
‘Is that understood?’
She nodded once, jerkily, not trusting her voice now she was close enough to see what was in his eyes.
Her pulse leapt up into her throat, drumming a tattoo so fast and urgent that her breathing clogged. She opened her mouth and sucked in a laboured breath and saw his gaze drop to her lips.
Instantly heat flared deep in the pit of her belly. Her chest felt impossibly tight as those gleaming eyes watched her draw another shuddering breath.
She had to get out of here. She was claustrophobic with him so close. Somehow he was stealing her air, making it impossible to breathe.
She took a shuffling step to one side, and was rewarded by the sight of his long arm reaching out in front of her, his hand splaying against the mirrored wall beside her, blocking her exit.
‘Please.’ Reluctantly she lifted her eyes again to his, facing that searing intensity with barely a flinch. ‘Let me go.’
Silence pounded between them. A silence filled with the ponderous thud of her out-of-kilter pulse and the rasp of her uneven breathing.
‘Of course I’ll let you go, Tessa.’ His lips tilted in the slightest of smiles. The effect was a carnivorous baring of strong white teeth that sent fear coiling tight round her lungs.
‘It will give me the utmost pleasure to be rid of you,’ he murmured. ‘But not…quite…yet.’
Mesmerised, she stared as those fierce eyes grew closer. His hot breath seared her cheeks. His lips eased back from their feral snarl.
She knew she had to push him away. Force herself into action.
Instead she waited, breathless, as his mouth dropped to cover hers. The heat of his body surrounded her and she gave in to the inevitable.
CHAPTER SEVEN
HIS mouth was hard, demanding, devouring.
Exciting.
In a single possessive movement he hauled her close, one arm wrapped round her waist, pulling her into his body, his other hand buried in her hair, holding her still while he angled his face over hers.
She was utterly defenceless against his strength and erotic expertise.
He kissed as if this was war, as if he were some conquering general, intent on total subjugation. His lips dominated her until, with a muffled protest, she opened her mouth for him.
Dazedly she realised that was a mistake. On a surge of triumphant power his tongue took possession of her, demanding submission.
In that moment she was lost.
Stavros filled her every sense. The smoky musk scent of his skin rose in her nostrils, like heady temptation. His throaty low growl of satisfaction as she yielded echoed in her ears. The sensations of his hard body were all round her, crowding closer as if he could meld them into one. His hand cradled her skull, fingers rhythmically caressing her hair. The taste of him, so addictive, filled her mouth and left her craving more.
Her hands were trapped against his solid chest, the thin silk of his shirt no barrier to the scorching heat of his torso. She felt his heart thud strongly, rapidly, beneath her palm. She wished she could feel his flesh bare against her hand.
Desire surged through her, igniting a fire that licked at her from the inside. This was insane, self-destructive, and utterly unstoppable. She’d dreamed of his possession for so long. Somehow, it seemed, her body and her mind had already accepted his ownership, and colluded to short-circuit the urgings of common sense.
Darts of sensation plunged through her sensitised body. A swirling coil of need circled in her abdomen. It seemed as if her breasts swelled against the hard muscle of his upper body and her nipples tingled.