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He snagged two towels and handed her one. Briskly he dried himself, then snapped a fresh towel around his waist. ‘You still want a tour of the château?’
Bemused, she nodded.
His smile was grim. ‘Bien sûr. We’ll start with the dungeons. There’s a perfectly cosy male girdle there I suspect I’ll need.’
Her stunned laugh only made his smile grimmer as he all but frogmarched her back to her suite.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
BEING NOBLE SUCKED.
Damion gritted his teeth as he took another cold shower at dawn.
His body had attained a life of its own. It craved Reiko Kagawa, and nothing, not even the punishing effects of the treadmill he’d pounded for the past two hours, eased the need.
Standing under sharp needles of freezing water was the only solution.
Not the only solution.
No. He couldn’t take the path he so desperately wanted to. Reiko needed time.
It didn’t take a genius to work out that her accident had affected her more than just physically. It wasn’t surprising that she flinched every time he went too far with her.
His time in Arizona with Isadora had taught him the complexity of the human psyche. He’d returned with a grudging understanding of what had made his father and grandfather react the way they had. And it had made him even more determined never to fall into the same trap.
Isadora’s self-esteem had been battered by one failed relationship by the time he’d met her. His confronting her about her failure as a mother had sent her over the edge.
If he pushed too hard with Reiko, she’d bolt. His body tensed in rejection of that idea. Standing under the freezing water, it occurred to Damion that this needn’t be the case. There were other, less traumatising ways of bedding a woman.
He shoved a hand through his soaking hair.
That was just it. Every woman he could think of suddenly appeared … less.
The memory of Reiko exploding in his arms replayed in his mind. His body immediately reacted, like to the pull of a siren’s song.
With a stiff curse, he wrenched the tap shut. It was no use trying to unwrap the enigma of why he wanted Reiko. Five years ago his lust had had no rhyme or reason. It certainly didn’t now, and he was damned if he would spend another moment freezing his balls off trying to wrestle meaning into why he felt the way he did.
Surely once he’d bedded her she’d lose her allure?
Returning to his bedroom, he squashed the mocking voice that told him he shouldn’t be so sure.
‘So what exactly is this job you have in mind for me?’ Reiko asked Damion over breakfast.
‘We’ll get to that in a moment. How did you sleep?’ he asked, his eyes raking her face in a frank, intimate scrutiny that immediately threw her back to last night and what had happened between them at the pool.
Heat rushed into her face. ‘You can’t do that! ’
One brow shot up. ‘I can’t ask you how you slept?’
‘You’re looking at me knowingly.’
‘That is because I’ve known you, ma fleur.’
She blew an exasperated breath and tried to keep her leaping pulse under control. Truth be told, she’d woken this morning to the sound of trilling birds, bright sunshine and the sinking feeling that keeping Damion at arm’s length would prove harder than she’d imagined.
Even the thought of him seeing her, seeing her body so different from the one he’d known in the past, hadn’t filled her with as much horror as she’d imagined it would.
She swallowed. ‘I slept soundly. You?’
