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“Never do this?” he asked, stepping so close that every breath she took pressed her breasts against his chest. “Never touch you?” He brushed his knuckles against her jaw, then slid them down, until his open hand rested on her collarbone, his fingers splayed gently against her neck. “Never kiss you?” Her skin was soft and warm against his lips as he kissed a line from her temple to her cheek to the corner of her mouth.
Then he pressed his mouth to hers, pulled her lower lip between his teeth and bit down gently.
Isa’s hands slid up his back to tangle in his hair as she made low, urgent sounds deep in her throat. Her lips parted on a shallow exhale as her body arched against him. It was all he could do not to groan. Not to take her right there against the iron railing of the balcony.
“Never want you?” His hand was on her waist, and he slid it down to mold her behind, to press her hips against his while his other hand slid down to cup her breast through the thin, silky fabric of her dress. “Because, I have to say, I think the ship has sailed on that. For both of us.”
“Marc.” His name was a broken breath on her lips—a prayer, a curse, an absolution, a condemnation. He didn’t know which—nor did he care, he assured himself. All that mattered was having her again. He’d spent the past six years thinking about touching her, dreaming about taking her over and over until his mind was calm and his body was finally sated.
Maybe then he could find some peace.
“Let me have you,” he whispered in her ear even as he rolled her nipple between his thumb and forefinger. “I’ll take care of you, make you feel so good—”
Isa shoved against him, hard. She was a little thing, slender, with tiny bones—but she was a lot stronger than she looked.
“Marc, no!” She twisted her face to the side and shoved again. “Stop.”
No. Stop. He hated those two words, almost as much as he hated being told what to do. But they were nonnegotiable, the words and the sentiment behind them not open for discussion when they fell from a woman’s lips. And so he stepped back, letting his hands fall away from her lush, inviting curves.
“I know what you’re doing,” she said. Her eyes were wild, her voice shaky.
“Do you?” he murmured. “Do you really?”
“You’re trying to embarrass me at work. You’re trying to ruin everything and I’m not going to have it.”
He didn’t even try to hide his insult. “Embarrass you? Kissing me embarrasses you?”
She must have sensed the danger in his voice, because she ran a nervous hand over her hair while the fingers of her other hand played with her locket. “Don’t get all macho and insulted on me,” she told him, exasperated.
“I don’t do macho,” he said, disdain in every syllable.
She snorted. “You don’t have to ‘do’ it. Every cell in your body is alpha and controlling and if you don’t know that, you’re even more deluded than I thought you were. But, be that as it may, I’m not going to stand out here and be your toy for one second longer. This is a work function for me and, unlike you, I don’t have a trust fund and a diamond company to fall back on if I lose my job for inappropriate conduct. This career is all I have and I’m not going to let you ruin it, the way you ruined—”
She broke off before she finished the sentence, moving around him in a quick and desperate attempt to get to the door.
He grabbed her elbow, but it was his will much more than his gentle grip that kept her in place. “The way I ruined our relationship?” he asked silkily. “Because the way I remember it, you did that all on your own.”
“I have no doubt that’s exactly how you remember it.” She glanced pointedly at his hold on her, then pulled her elbow out of his grasp before he could say another word. “Which is how I know you’re doing this just to mess with me, to get me in trouble. But I’m not having it. I don’t ever want you to touch me again. Go back to whatever you were doing before you decided that humiliating me was your best bet. Or better yet, go to hell.”
She moved past him then, disappearing back into the party in a swirl of purple silk, Chanel No. 5 and righteous indignation.
He wasn’t sure what it said about him that it was the latter that turned him on the most.
* * *
She was insane. Or in the middle of a psychotic break. Or having a stroke. She didn’t know which of the three she was suffering from, but it was definitely one of them. There was no other explanation for what had happened on that balcony. No other explanation for why she had fallen into Marc’s arms—and onto his lips—as if it had been six minutes since they’d last been together and not six years. Or as if he hadn’t sent her packing in the cruelest manner possible.
She understood sexual attraction—when they’d been together, she and Marc could barely keep their hands off each other. But shouldn’t that attraction be grounded in respect or love or something other than the intense dislike and distrust they now had for each other?
And still she’d let him kiss her. She’d let him touch her and stroke her and bring her way too close to orgasm. It was ridiculous. Worse, it was self-destructive. She was ashamed of herself. Ashamed of her body for responding so readily to him after everything he’d done to hurt her. After everything she’d done to hurt him, too.
As she walked through the party back to Gideon, Isa could feel Marc’s eyes following her. She didn’t need to look to know he was running his gaze over her back, her backside, her legs—and then up again. The weight of his stare was a physical touch—like an electric shock all over her body.
By the time she got to Gideon, she was shaking with reaction and self-recrimination. Though she knew the smart thing for her career was to stay at the party, drinking champagne and waiting for her turn to chat up the president of the Gem Institute, the truth was she didn’t have it in her to be in this room for one more minute. She had to escape, now, before she freaked out in front of all these people. Or before she threw herself at Marc and begged him to take her right here, in the middle of the crowded gallery.
Just the thought that such a thing was possible had her all but running the last few feet to Gideon. Had her putting her hand on his arm and leaning in so that her lips were only inches from his, so he could hear her in the loud, crowded room. Had her begging off the rest of the night, telling him she’d catch a cab home because she wasn’t
feeling well. She was pretty sure her sickly pallor and trembling hands lent credence to the assertion.
