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It hurt.
It made her feel temporary.
She desperately wanted to feel special to him, more special than any woman he had been with before.
‘Why don’t you ever invite me to your home, David?’ she asked, driven to wring some sign from him that she meant more than a pleasurable convenience and receptacle.
‘It’s easier for you if we stay here. You can do as you please and be answerable to no one,’ he replied, not bothering to look up from tying the laces on his shoes.
Her convenience. That was a nice twist. In effect, she was kept excluded from his home life. Caitlin knew he lived at Lane Cove, not far from his business headquarters at Chatswood. Within the ambit of the northern suburbs of Sydney, it was no further away than her place at Wollstonecraft, but their intimacy was contained to her apartment.
Caitlin was chillingly conscious of how expedient this situation was if David chose to end their affair. No bothersome complications. He could simply walk out and never come back.
Her sense of insecurity with him deepened.
He rose from the stool, fully dressed apart from his tie and suitcoat. They had been discarded in her living-room. He would pick them up on his way out. His gaze skated over the long sprawl of her slender legs, paused at the deep indentation of her waist, skipped to the wild disarray of hair framing her face and shoulders, then fastened directly on her eyes. There was a dark, ruthless glint in his.
‘I hope you find the energy to move yourself in good time to get to the office at nine, Caitlin. I wouldn’t like to think you were taking advantage of your situation.’
It was a warning. Softly spoken, perfectly controlled, no direct threat involved, yet Caitlin’s spine crawled with the sense of having stretched beyond what was acceptable to him. The protective urge to quickly backtrack was shrivelled by a flare of burning resentment.
Did she have no importance in his life apart from being an efficient secretary and a ready source of sexual satisfaction? It was the final insult. She had worked herself to boneless exhaustion for David Hartley.
‘You have the sensitivity of a rhinoceros,’ she muttered darkly, more to herself than to him.
‘I’ll let that remark pass and pretend you never said it,’ he said testily.
‘Big of you,’ she complimented him.
The need to find out what she really meant to him surged through her with passionate intensity. Even if his heart was cold to her, his body wasn’t. She must mean something more than just being a body.
She swung her legs off the bed with a lithe, feline grace that captured his attention. She lifted her arms and flicked back her hair as she stood up and turned to face him, knowing the action tilted the firm fullness of her breasts into greater prominence. Her nipples hardened as the desire to seduce raged with white-hot heat. She rolled her hips, sliding her thighs against each other as she walked towards him, a sensual smile curving her generous mouth.
He couldn’t tear his eyes away from her.
His chest expanded. His shoulders squared with tension. His hands clenched. He was definitely unhappy. He was tempted. His mind warred against the stirring of his desire. He had a schedule to keep. He didn’t allow anything to interfere with that. His face set with resolution but the glitter in his eyes had more to do with lust than determination. His feet stayed rooted to the floor. He didn’t move forward.
‘Is this the last time you want to see me like this?’ Caitlin taunted.
‘No,’ he cried hoarsely.
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‘Stay with me. Hold me and cuddle me.’
‘I’ll be damned if I will.’
‘You’ll be damned if you don’t.’
‘I have the overseas delegation today.’
Caitlin knew she was being unreasonable but her need was great. ‘Defer it until tomorrow.’
His mouth thinned in frustration.
Caitlin moved in on him, playing the age-old role of seductive temptress. She had never done anything like this before, had never felt the need to, but the stakes were high.
All was fair in love and war.
