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‘So not coffee, then?’
‘No!’
It was not the offer of coffee or any other drink he was referring to. He couldn’t stand the way that she was walking away from him. Not looking at him. Not even addressing him face on, but tossing the remarks back over her shoulder as if she didn’t care whether he heard her or not.
‘No!’
He moved after her, anger charging his strides, making them long, swift, furious. His hand came out, clamped over her upper arm, jolting her to a halt, whirling her round.
‘Joaquin!’
But he ignored her protest; heedless of whether he had caused it by the way his hard fingers were digging into the white flesh exposed by the sleeveless turquoise sundress. Burning dark eyes searched her face once more, wanting to probe deep into her mind, her soul, see what was hidden there.
‘No!’ he said again, though even he couldn’t have said with regard to what. He only knew that he didn’t like the way he was feeling. The way he had been feeling for too long.
The way she made him feel.
And the way he had never, ever felt in his life before.
He wanted his old way of life back. Wanted that feeling of being in control, of knowing where he was heading—what he wanted! He hated this sensation of being adrift in a rudderless boat—and all because of this woman.
‘All right, no coffee. Just what is the matter with you today?’
But he wasn’t ready to answer that.
‘Nothing. Nothing’s the matter.’
‘Then stop behaving like a bear with a sore head. I want a drink even if you don’t, so…’
Her gaze dropped to the strong, tanned fingers still clenched around her arm, then back up to his face, the reproach in them so strong that he instinctively released her, taking a step back.
‘Perdón.’
‘Okay.’
She flashed that meaningless smile once again. Dios, but he truly hated the insincerity of it! But then almost immediately her expression changed.
‘No, actually, it’s not okay! Not at all! There’s nothing okay about it. What do you think you’re doing—manhandling me like that?’
‘Manhandling?’
In his indignation, his accent and pronunciation mangled the word so that it was almost incomprehensible.
‘Manhandling? You call that manhandling? What has happened to you, my Cassie? You never used to be like this. You always used to like my touch…’
A rush of cold anger at her rejection, the words she had used, pushed him forward, eyes fixed on her face, noting the suddenly watchful expression, the flicker of something new and uncertain deep in those blue eyes.
‘Loved it…’
‘Well not the way you got hold of me just then! I didn’t like that! And I certainly didn’t love it!’
‘I hurt you? If I did I’m sorry—’
‘You didn’t hurt me! At least, not in the way you think!’
The defiant tilt to her chin was pure provocation; an extra spark in the brilliance of her eyes created an answering fire in the most primitively masculine parts of his body. His heart gave a sharp kick, making his blood pound heavily through his system.
And suddenly he knew that he had to touch her. Really touch her. And not in the way that she had accused him of, manhandling her. He wanted to hold her close, kiss away the blaze of rejection in her eyes…
‘And you can perdón till you’re blue in the face and it won’t do a blind bit of good!’ she flung at him furiously. ‘You’re not going to treat me like this and get away with it!’
The sting of the words made him check himself. Think.
He didn’t like the direction his thoughts led him in.
Joaquin drew his brows together sharply, not knowing in the mixture of disbelief, incomprehension and anger that was suddenly bubbling inside him exactly which emotion was uppermost. His frown revealed them all.
‘Treat you in what way, precisely, querida? Cassandra, you’re really not making sense. And just what brought on this mood in the first place?’
‘You did!’
She was treading on dangerous ground here, Cassie admitted to herself. If she wasn’t prepared to tell him the real truth, then she was taking a risk even hinting at it. She had vowed that until Joaquin himself raised the topic of their year together then she wouldn’t say a word. Wouldn’t even hint at the way it was making her feel.
But an accusation like that last one came too close to what was really tearing her up inside.
‘And you can keep your hands off me!’
‘Oh, no, my lovely…’
He shook his dark head slowly but so emphatically, his voice a predatory purr.
‘That I cannot do. It is impossible. I cannot be with you, near you, and not touch you. I only have to look at you to want you, and you know that. Even now, when you are in this wild, crazy mood, my fingers itch to touch…’
He suited action to the words, reaching out and hooking one hand very gently around the back of her neck, the warmth of his palm along the soft skin of her throat, his thumb brushing her cheek.
‘To caress you.’
That strong, broad thumb moved against her flesh, stroking delicate, erotic circles that woke every nerve, bringing their endings rushing to the surface.
‘To hold you.’
His other hand trailed softly up the right side of her neck, silky touch moving over satin and raising cold prickles of awareness all over her body as it did so, making her shiver in uncontrollable response. A moment later her face was cupped in both his hands, being drawn slowly and irresistibly towards him.
‘Kiss you…’ he murmured, his breath warm against her lips.
No! It was a cry of protest in her mind as panic set in at the thought of just how easily he could do this. How casually, how often he used the fierce, blazing, physical passion between them to avoid anything truly emotional. To dodge talking about anything that mattered.
Like their future. If they had one.
She tried to shake her head, to break away, but he held her too firmly for that.
‘Cassandra, querida, you know what you do to me.’
And what he did to her. And it was happening right now, no matter how hard she struggled against it.
His kiss was pure Joaquin. Pure enticement; pure seduction in a caress. It snatched her thoughts from her brain, reduced what was left to nothing but mush, and left her adrift on a sea of sensation, floating, melting, not knowing where she had been going or why.
‘Joaquin…’
His name was a sigh against his mouth, drawn from her by the pressure of his lips on hers.
‘So now, mi belleza, how am I doing now?’
She could hear the smile in his voice though she couldn’t actually see it on his face.
‘How am I touching you?’
Warm arms slid round her, closing tight across her shoulders, drawing her to him with soft but irresistible strength.
‘How am I holding you? Am I manhandling you now?’
‘N-No…’
‘Should I take my hands off you?’
‘No!’
It was a cry of protest when the pressure of his arms eased slightly, and it seemed he would have drawn away.
‘No—not now…’
In her heart, even that faint lessening of his hold felt like a little death, like the loss of something most precious to her, and something she would do all she could to keep.
But at the same time, unwanted and unwelcome, a tiny, lingering voice of common sense was whispering at the back of what was left of her mind, underneath all the sensual onslaught.
No, no, no, no… it was saying, over and over. And in a very different tone from the one she had used.
It was like being in the middle of an emotional civil war where one part of her yearned to surrender to the sexual appeal of Joaquin’s touch, the heat that his kiss triggered all through her body. But at the same time that warning voice was demanding to know why she was making this so easy for him. Why she was going under without a struggle.
Because she didn’t want to fight. She didn’t want to struggle against her own feelings, her own desire to meet his kiss with her kiss, his caress with her own gentle touch. Even after just that one kiss, the feel of his arms around her, her whole body ached with a need that she could hardly control. She yearned to crush herself closer to him, to feel the heat and masculine power of his body against her own.
‘Not now…’ Joaquin echoed.
His mouth was on her throat now, making a slow, seductive journey from her shoulder to her jaw, kissing his way along. And Cassie would never have thought that there could be such variety in the simple sensation of a kiss.
But now it seemed that a kiss could be both hard and soft, light and then forceful against her neck. It could be oh, so tender and enticing, so that she felt she would almost weep at the gentleness of it. And then again it could be sharply, faintly cruel when his teeth grazed her skin, occasionally nipping lightly so that she gasped in shock.
‘Not now,’ he repeated, the words forming against her jaw-line in the warmth of his breath. ‘Now I am not manhandling you, but treating you as a woman should be treated. As a man should touch his woman—as I want to touch my woman.’
My woman.
The words were like a slap in the face, forcing her out of the heated daze into which she had fallen and making her look reality right in the eye.
My woman.
The darkly possessive tone revealed more of Joaquin than anything else could.
‘So, mi belleza, perhaps we should continue this somewhere more comfortable, hmm?’
Mi belleza. My woman.
Always, to Joaquin, it was what he owned, what he controlled, what he had power over that mattered. He ran his life with a ruthless, almost brutal discipline. Everything was as he wanted it and nothing happened without his approval.
It was what had brought him his success and what kept him right where he was. Always at the top of his game, always on the peak of the mountain.
Always having things on his own terms, and only his terms.
She had come into his life on his terms, lived with him on his terms. And would she be expected to leave on his terms too? To walk out the door when he said it was time, whether she wanted to or not?
Was she only ever going to let him dictate things to her?
‘Querida?’
Joaquin had noticed her sudden silence, the withdrawal that had taken her away from him, mentally if not physically.
‘What is it?’
Cassie opened her mouth to reply, found that her throat was too dry and tight to form any words, and had to clear it harshly before she could manage to speak.
‘I thought you came home to work. And I really need that coffee.’
At least her voice was croaky and raw enough to make it believable. She sounded as if she had a ton of sand roughening her throat and she had to lick at her lips nervously to stop them from drying out. The way his eyes followed the betraying movement had a hawklike intensity that made her shiver deep inside.
‘I’m parched.’
His stillness betrayed the way he was feeling, the anger he was holding in check. Joaquin Alcolar wasn’t a man who gave in to rages and blazing tempers. The fury he felt was cold, hard as ice, bitter as a cruel winter wind, but it was no less savage for that.
And it was always preceded by one of these sudden silences. The freezing of his long frame into the total stillness of a hunting predator who had spotted his prey and had every muscle tense and bunched, waiting for just the right moment to pounce.
‘You’re thirsty?’
His tone made it plain how ridiculous he thought it. How impossible it seemed to him that anyone could want to choose the simple practical need for a drink over the sensual banquet he had obviously intended enjoying.
‘Yes.’
It was all she could manage. That and the brief, uncomfortable ducking of her head, carefully avoiding his burning gaze. If she looked into his eyes she would see the anger there that wasn’t in his voice and she knew it would destroy her nerve to go on.
‘I said I was thirsty when I came down. I’m still thirsty now. I was on my way to make a coffee…’
