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A feast? A rampant seduction? ‘A passionate clinch.’
‘You kissed me, Lara. What did you expect me to do?’ He released her and took a step back, his attention caught by something on the floor. ‘What the hell is that?’ He stared at the squashed mess on the floor and she gave a strangled laugh.
‘I think it’s what’s left of the mistletoe. You must have trampled on it.’
‘Why is there mistletoe on my floor?’
‘I must have dropped it when you kissed me.’
‘Let’s get this straight.’ His eyes burned into hers. ‘You kissed me.’
‘Yes, all right. I kissed you. I don’t think it really matters who started it. But I think the mistletoe is beyond help. Oh, dear. I was planning to kiss you under the mistletoe, not on top of it.’ She looked at the remains of the mistletoe. ‘That’s not good. Fran’s going to kill me. That bunch of berries had sole responsibility for departmental excitement this Christmas. I’m not sure that mistletoe purée has the same effect on people’s libido.’ Her attempt at humour did nothing to defuse the tension in the atmosphere and his eyes drifted back to her mouth.
‘There’s masses of mistletoe growing on the apple trees in my garden. Help yourself.’
She didn’t want to feel this way. ‘Having just seen what a small bunch can do,’ she croaked, ‘I don’t think we’d better risk it, do you?’
His gaze lifted to hers. ‘So what was the problem? When you came into my office you said there was a problem.’
‘The chemistry between us is proving to be a bit of a problem,’ she whispered. ‘I thought kissing you would solve everything. It’s the quickest way I know to expose a flaw.’
‘So now what happens, Lara? Perhaps I’m being a little slow, but so far I haven’t spotted a flaw.’ His voice was soft and she gave a whimper of frustration and backed away.
‘I don’t know what happens now. It wasn’t supposed to be like this. It’s all your fault!’
‘My fault?’ He raised an eyebrow. ‘You’re the one that came in here, carrying mistletoe.’
‘Yes.’ She glared at him. ‘But you did it all wrong! The kiss, I mean.’
‘What was wrong with it?’
‘Nothing. That’s what I mean. It was perfect. And it wasn’t supposed to be. It was supposed to be revolting or at the very least boring.’
He studied her carefully. ‘You’ve obviously had a wonderful experience of kissing.’
‘Well, usually there’s something wrong.’ She licked her lips and tried to concentrate. ‘You know, too wet and dribbly, seriously fumbly, garlic breath—the list is endless.’
‘I think I’m finally starting to understand why your record is three dates.’ He turned away from her and walked back to his desk. ‘I suggest we both forget that this happened. And don’t bring plants with berries into my office again.’
She stared at his back. Her whole body was humming with awareness. ‘But what do we do now? The kiss didn’t work.’
‘We forget it.’
‘Right. We forget it.’ Her voice croaked as she repeated his words. ‘You think that’s the best approach? You don’t think we could just—’
‘No.’ His voice was terse and his shoulders rigid. ‘We couldn’t.’
His self-discipline was admirable, she thought miserably. ‘Right. So we’re going to forget it. I’ll just go and write that out a hundred times just in case I forget that I’m supposed to forget.’
* * *
Lara tried to forget. She tried really, really hard.
Over the next few days, she threw herself into work but she found it impossible to wipe Christian from her thoughts.
It was as if that one kiss had awakened her body and suddenly it refused to behave. She thought about him. She dreamt about him.
And to make the situation all the more frustrating, it was obvious that he wasn’t suffering the same degree of emotional and physical torment.
