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‘No,’ she repeated decisively.
He raised one dark brow. ‘Why not?’
She breathed her impatience. ‘Well, for one thing you aren’t nearly old enough to be the self-made zillionaire Lucien Steele.’ She estimated this man was aged somewhere in his early to mid-thirties, ten or twelve years older than her own twenty-three, and she knew from the things Jonathan had told her about this evening’s guest of honour that Lucien Steele had not only been the richest man in New York for the last ten years, but was also the most powerful.
He gave an unconcerned shrug of those impossibly wide shoulders. ‘What can I say? My parents were wealthy to begin with, and I’d made my own first million by the time I was twenty-one.’
‘Also,’ Thia continued, determined, ‘I saw Mr Steele when he arrived.’
It had been impossible to miss the awed reaction of the other guests. Those incredibly rich and beautiful people had all, without exception, fallen absolutely silent the moment Lucien Steele had appeared in the doorway. And Felix Carew, a powerful man in his own right, had become almost unctuous as he moved swiftly across the room to greet his guest.
Thia gave a rueful shake of her head. ‘Lucien Steele is in his early forties, several inches shorter than you are, and stocky, with a shaved head.’ In fact on first glance she had thought the man more resembled a thug rather than the richest and most powerful man in New York!
‘That would be Dex.’
‘Dex...?’ she echoed doubtfully.
‘Mmm.’ The man beside her nodded unconcernedly. ‘He takes his duties as my bodyguard very seriously—to the point that he always insists upon entering a room before I do. I’m not sure why,’ he mused. ‘Perhaps he expects there to be an assassin on the other side of every door...’
Thia felt a sinking sensation in the pit of her stomach as she heard the amused dismissal in this man’s—in Lucien Steele’s?—voice. Moistening her lips with the tip of tongue before speaking, she said, ‘And where is Dex now...?’
‘Probably standing guard on the other side of those French doors.’ He nodded down the balcony to the same doorway Thia had escaped through minutes ago.
And was Dex making sure that no one came outside, or was he ensuring that Thia couldn’t return inside until this man wished her to...?
She gave another frown as she looked up searchingly at the man now standing so near to her she could feel the heat emanating from his body on the bareness of her shoulders and arms. Once again she took note of that inborn air of power, arrogance, she had sensed in him from the first.
For all the world as if he was used to people licking his highly polished handmade Italian leather shoes...
* * *
Lucien continued to hold Cyn’s now trembling hand and waited in silence for her to gather her breath as she looked up at him between long and silky lashes with eyes a dark and mysterious cobalt blue.
Those eyes became shadowed with apprehension as she gave another nervous flick of her little pink tongue over the moist fullness of her perfectly shaped lips. ‘The same Lucien Steele who owns Steele Technology, Steele Media, Steele Atlantic Airline and Steele Industries, as well as all those other Steele Something-or-Others?’ she murmured faintly.
He shrugged. ‘It seemed like a good idea to diversify.’
She determinedly pulled her hand from his grasp before tightly gripping the top of the balustrade. ‘The same Lucien Steele who’s a zillionaire?’
‘I believe you said that already...’ Lucien nodded.
She drew in a deep breath, obviously completely unaware of how it tightened the material of her dress across her breasts and succeeded in outlining the fullness of those—aroused?—nipples. Nipples that were a delicate pink or a succulent rose? Whatever their colour, he was sure they would taste delicious. Sweet and juicy, and oh so ripe and responsive as he licked and suckled them.
He had noticed the woman he now knew to be Cynthia Hammond the moment he’d entered Felix and Simone Carew’s penthouse apartment a short time ago. It had been impossible not to as she’d stood alone at the back of the opulent room, her hair a sleek and glossy unadorned black as it fell silkily to just below her shoulders, her eyes that deep cobalt blue in the beautiful pale delicacy of her face.
She wore a strapless ankle-length gown of that same deep blue, leaving the tops of her breasts, shoulders and arms completely bare. The smoothness of her skin was a beautiful pearly white unlike any other Lucien had ever seen: a pale ivory tinted lightly pink, luminescent. Smoothly delicate and pearly skin his fingers itched to touch and caress.
The simple style of that silky blue gown allowed it to cling to every curvaceous inch of her full breasts, slender waist and gently flaring hips, so much so that Lucien had questioned whether or not she wore anything beneath it.
He still questioned it...
But what had really made him take notice of her, even more than her natural beauty or the pearly perfection of her skin, was the fact that instead of moving towards him, as every other person in the room had done, this pale and delicately beautiful woman had instead taken advantage of his arrival to slip quietly from the room and go outside onto the balcony.
Nor had she returned by the time Lucien had finally managed to extract himself from the—what had she called it a few moments ago? The licking of his ‘highly polished handmade Italian leather shoes’. His curiosity piqued—and very little piqued his jaded palate nowadays!—Lucien hadn’t been able to resist coming out onto the balcony to look for her the moment he had managed to escape all that cloying attention.
She drew in another deep breath now before speaking, causing the fullness of her breasts to once again swell deliciously over the bodice of that clinging blue gown.
‘I really do apologise for my rudeness, Mr Steele. It’s no excuse, but I’m really not having a good evening—and my rudeness to you means that it has just got so much worse!’ she conceded with another pained wince. ‘But that is really no reason for me to have been rude about you—or to you.’
He quirked one dark brow. ‘I don’t think you know me well enough as yet to speak with any authority on whether or not I deserve for you to be rude to me or about me,’ he drawled mockingly.
‘Well...no...’ She was obviously slightly unnerved by his emphasis on the words ‘as yet’... ‘But—’ She gave a shake of her head, causing that silky and completely straight black hair to glide across the bareness of her shoulders and caress tantalisingly across the tops of her breasts. ‘I still shouldn’t have been so outspoken about someone I only know about from the media.’
‘Especially when we all know how inaccurate the media can be?’ he drawled wryly.
‘Exactly!’ She nodded enthusiastically before just as quickly pausing to eye him uncertainly. ‘Don’t you own something like ninety per cent of the worldwide media?’
‘That would be contrary to monopoly regulations,’ he drawled dismissively.
‘Do zillionaires bother with little things like regulations?’ she teased.
He chuckled huskily. ‘They do if they don’t want their zillionaire butts to end up in court!’
Thia felt what was becoming a familiar quiver down the length of her spine at the sound of this man’s throaty laughter. As she also acknowledged that, for all this man unnerved her, she was actually enjoying herself—possibly for the first time since arriving in New York.
‘Are you cold?’
Thia had no chance to confirm or deny that she was before Lucien Steele removed his evening jacket and placed it about the bareness of her shoulders. It reached almost down to her knees and smelt of the freshness of those lemons as his warmth surrounded her, and of the more insidious and earthy smell of the man himself.
‘No, really—’
‘Leave it.’ Both his hands came down onto the shoulders of the jacket as she would have reached up and removed it.
Thia shivered anew as she felt the warmth of those long and elegant hands even through the material of his jacket. A shiver entirely due to the presence of this overwhelming man—also the reason for her earlier shiver—rather than any chill in the warm evening air...
His hands left her shoulders reluctantly as he moved to stand beside her once again, that pale gaze—silver?—once again intent on her face. The snug fit of his evening shirt revealed that his shoulders really were that wide, his chest muscled, his waist slender above lean hips and long legs; obviously Lucien Steele didn’t spend all of his days sitting in boardrooms and adding to his billions.
‘Why aren’t you having a good evening?’ he prompted softly.
Why? Because this visit to New York hadn’t turned out to be anything like Thia had imagined it would be. Because she had once again been brought to a party and then quickly abandoned by—well, Jonathan certainly wasn’t her boyfriend, but she had certainly thought of him as a friend. A friend who had disappeared with their hostess within minutes of their arrival, leaving her to the untender mercies of New York’s finest.
Latterly she wasn’t having a good evening because she was far too aware of the man standing beside her—of the way the warmth and seductive smell of Lucien Steele’s tailored jacket made her feel as if she was surrounded by the man himself.
And lastly because Thia had no idea how to deal with the unprecedented arousal now coursing through her body!
She gave a shrug. ‘I don’t enjoy parties like this one.’
‘Why not?’
She grimaced, taking care not to insult this man for a second time this evening. ‘It’s just a personal choice.’
He nodded. ‘And where do you fit in with this crowd? Are you an actress?’
‘Heavens, no!’
‘A wannabe?’
‘I beg your pardon...?’
He shrugged those impossibly wide shoulders. ‘Do you wannabe an actress?’
‘Oh, I see.’ Thia gave a rueful smile. ‘No, I have no interest in becoming an actress, either.’
‘A model?’
She snorted. ‘Hardly, when I’m only five feet two inches in my bare feet!’
‘You aren’t being very helpful, Cyn.’ There was an underlying impatience in that amused tone. Thia had seen far too much of the reaction of New York’s elite these past four days not to know they had absolutely no interest in cultivating the company of a student and a waitress. Lucien Steele would have no further interest in her, either, once he knew. Which might not be a bad thing...
Her chin rose determinedly. ‘I’m just a nobody on a visit to New York.’
Lucien totally disagreed with at least part of that statement. Cynthia Hammond was certainly somebody. Somebody—a woman—whose beauty and conversation he found just as intriguing as he had hoped he might...
She quirked dark brows. ‘I believe that’s your cue to politely excuse yourself?’
His eyes narrowed. ‘And why would I wish to do that?’
She shrugged her shoulders beneath his jacket. ‘It’s what everyone else I’ve met in New York has done once they realise I’m of use to them.’
Yes, Lucien could imagine, knowing New York society as well as he did, that its members would have felt no hesitation whatsoever in making their lack of interest known. ‘I believe I’ve already stated that I prefer not to be like everyone else.’
‘Ain’t that the truth? I mean—’ A delicious blush now coloured those pale ivory cheeks as she briefly closed her eyes before looking up at him apologetically. ‘I apologise once again. I’m really not having a good evening!’ She sighed.
He nodded. ‘Would you like to leave? We could go somewhere quiet and have a drink together?’
Cyn blinked those long lashes. ‘I beg your pardon...?’
Lucien gave a hard, humourless smile. ‘I hate parties like this one too.’
‘But you’re the guest of honour!’
He grimaced. ‘I especially hate parties where I’m the guest of honour.’
Thia looked up at him searchingly, not sure whether or not Lucien Steele was playing with her. Not sure why he was bothering, if that should be the case!
The steady regard of those pale eyes and the grimness of his expression told her that this was a man who rarely, if ever, played.
He was seriously asking her to leave the Carews’ party with him...
CHAPTER TWO
THIA GAVE A rueful shake of her head as she smiled. ‘That really wouldn’t be a good idea.’
‘Why not?’
‘Are you always this persistent?’ She frowned.
He seemed to give the idea some thought before answering. ‘When I want something badly enough, yes,’ he finally murmured, without apology.
The intensity in that silver gaze as he looked down at Thia told her all too clearly that right now Lucien Steele wanted her.
Badly.
Wickedly!
She repressed another shiver of awareness just at the thought of how those chiselled lips and strong hands might feel as they sought out all the secret dips and hollows of her body.
‘I really think it’s time I went back inside.’ She was slightly flustered as she slipped his jacket from about her shoulders and held it out to him. ‘Please take it,’ she urged when he made no effort to do so.
He looked down at her searchingly for several seconds before slowly taking the jacket and placing it dismissively over the balustrade in front of him—as if it hadn’t cost as much as Thia might earn in a year as a waitress including tips!
‘Cyn...’
He wasn’t even touching her, and yet he managed to hold her mesmerised just by the way he murmured his own unique name for her in that deeply seductive voice, sending more rivulets of awareness down Thia’s spine and causing a return of that tingling sensation in her breasts, accompanied by an unaccustomed warmth between her thighs.
‘Yes...?’ she answered breathlessly.
‘I really want you to leave with me.’
‘I can’t.’ She groaned in protest at the compulsion in the huskiness of his voice, sure that this man—a man who was not only sinfully handsome but rich as Creosus—rarely, if ever, asked for anything from anyone. He just took.
‘Why not?’
‘I just— What colour are your eyes, exactly...?’ Whatever colour they were, they held Thia captive by their sheer intensity!
He blinked at the unexpectedness of the question. ‘My eyes...?’
‘Yes.’
His mouth twisted in a rueful smile. ‘I believe it says grey on my passport.’
Thia gave a shake of her head. ‘They’re silver,’ she corrected, barely able to breathe now, even knowing this was madness—that she was so totally aware of Lucien Steele, her skin so sensitised by the intensity of that glittering silver gaze fixed on her so intently, that she could feel the brush of each individual strand of her hair as it caressed lightly, silkily, across her shoulders and the tops of her breasts.
A totally unexpected and unprecedented reaction. To any man. Goodness knew Jonathan was handsome enough, with his overlong blond hair, laughing blue eyes and lean masculinity, but for some reason she had just never found him attractive in that way. Just looking at Lucien Steele, knowing she was aware of everything about him, of all that underlying and leashed power, she knew that she never would be attracted to Jonathan—that Lucien Steele was so overpowering he ruined a woman’s appreciation for any other man.
‘Grey...silver...they can be whatever the hell colour you want them to be if you’ll only leave with me now,’ Lucien Steele urged again, with that same intensity.
She was tempted—Lord, was Thia tempted!—but it wouldn’t do. No matter how distracted and inattentive Jonathan might choose to be, she couldn’t arrive at a party with him and then leave with another man. Especially a man she found as disturbing as she did Lucien Steele!
