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She could feel Finn standing behind her as she opened the kitchen cupboard where she kept her dinner candles. The matches were with them, and as she turned round to hand everything to Finn the discovery that he was standing so close to her that her movement had brought them body to body caused her to shake so much that she dropped the matches.
They both bent down to retrieve them at the same time and Maggie could feel the warmth of Finn’s breath against her face. An aching wanton yearning for him filled her. Fiercely she fought against it.
He might be doing the correct gentlemanly thing now, in insisting on remaining with her, but she was not going to let herself fall into the delusion of thinking that it meant anything—especially the kind of ‘anything’ that might have her telling him about how she had had a change of heart about the absolute necessity of her living in the City, or how she could now see that it would be possible for her to live in the country and still continue to run her business. And she certainly wasn’t going to tell him of the long lonely empty nights she had lived through since her return to London, nor the way that in her darkest hours she would have given anything, everything, just to be with him. Just to be held in his arms close to him. Just to be sharing the intimacy of his bed with him, wrapped in the even more precious intimacy of his arms…his love.
She tensed as she heard the rasp of a match, her eyes widening as she saw Finn’s face briefly outlined in the quick flare before he protected the flame with his hand and lit the candles.
What was it about candlelight that immediately gave even the most mundane of surroundings an aura of sensuality and romance? As they both stood up, Maggie could see the way Finn looked round her kitchen.
‘You’re cooking chilli?’ he questioned her frowningly.
‘Is there any reason why I shouldn’t?’ Maggie responded in immediate self-defence. ‘I happen to like it. Not that it’s any business of yours.’
‘I should hope you do,’ Finn agreed, ignoring the final challenging sentence of her response. ‘There’s enough stuff here to feed a small army. I trust you’ve taught yourself how to cook mince in the last few months?’
His frown deepened, and he stared at her for so long that Maggie felt slightly nervous. ‘You aren’t wearing any shoes,’ Finn told her, and his frown gave way to a look of wondering male amusement as he grinned. ‘You’re tiny.’
‘I am no such thing,’ Maggie denied indignantly.
‘Oh, yes you are.’ Finn contradicted her softly. ‘Tiny and stubborn and…’ Putting the newly lit candles down on the worktop, he moved purposefully towards her.
Immediately Maggie panicked, moving back from him, knocking over the candles as she did so. The small flames were instantly extinguished.
The effect of the darkness on her already sensitive nervous system caused her to cry out, a small choked sound of distress which Finn reacted to, demanding, ‘Maggie, what is it? Are you all right?’
‘No, I’m not all right,’ Maggie burst out. ‘I hate the dark. It makes me feel so afraid.’
In the silence that followed her small outburst, Maggie cursed her reckless tongue. What on earth had she told him that for? He would think she was a complete fool. And yet despite that she still heard herself continuing, in a distinctly wobbly little voice.
‘It frightens me and…’
Before she could finish Finn was saying gruffly, ‘I hate spiders. They terrify me. I have nightmares about them…’
In the darkness Maggie listened to his breathing. The thought of Finn being afraid of anything—and admitting that fear to her—brought a warm rushing flood of protective love washing through her.
‘At least you can do something about the darkness. Spiders are there all the time,’ Finn told her.
Without thinking about what she was doing, Maggie took a step towards him.
‘How about you protecting me from spiders whilst I protect you from the dark?’ Finn suggested.
Finn must have moved too, because now his voice was right against her ear, and his arm was right round her waist, and his lips…
‘Do you think that’s really a good idea?’ Maggie whispered. With Finn’s lips deliberately teasing hers it was almost impossible for her to think, never mind speak.
‘Mmm. And I think that this is an even better idea,’ Finn muttered as his arms wrapped round her and he began to kiss her in earnest.
Maggie could feel her head starting to swim whilst her body melted with the sweet wanton pleasure of being so close to him.
‘Oh, God, Maggie, if you only knew how much I’ve missed you. How much I’ve wanted you,’ she could hear Finn groaning hoarsely to her.
The only response she could make was to wrap her own arms around him and open her mouth to the hot seeking pressure of his tongue. Behind the closed velvet of her eyes the darkness beyond them didn’t matter, because she could see in her mind’s eye all that she wanted to see. And that was Finn. Her fingertips touched his face, tracing its bone structure, and she felt her body thrill with the unexpected sensuality of the tension in his jaw as she stroked his skin.
With an urgency that both shocked and thrilled her Finn was unfastening her clothes, his whole body shuddering sharply when he touched her bare skin.
‘God, you feel so good,’ he moaned against her throat. ‘The scent of you in my bed has been driving me crazy, do you know that? Every time I’ve closed my eyes all I’ve seen is you, all I’ve wanted to touch is you. You are the air I breathe, Maggie, every thought I think…my heart…my soul.’
Maggie gasped and trembled as his hand cupped her naked breast.
