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She wasn’t the sort of woman to simply allow a relationship to be superficial.
Even now, floating in the pool, she appeared to be thinking. And then she opened her eyes and saw him. ‘Am I late for dinner?’ She swam across to him. ‘Is it time to get out?’ The late-evening sunshine bathed her body in a warm glow and the water clung to her hair like tiny beads of crystal.
Consumed by an attack of sexual hunger so intense that his body was ablaze with it, Rafael instantly redrafted his personal rules about women.
So she talked too much and was far too interested in what made him tick. So what?
He just needed to distract her and teach her that superficial could be good.
‘It gets dark quickly in the jungle and the paths can be confusing. And the animals sometimes come and drink from the pool.’ Until that moment he hadn’t believed he could be so unsubtle. What was he hoping? That she’d leap screaming out of the pool and dive into his arms for protection?
Well, yes, actually. It would save her the bother of dressing just so that he could undress her again. And he was going to undress her. He’d made his decision. ‘You never quite know what might be lurking in the pool. Piranha, anaconda, alligators …’ He lingered over the words but she simply looked at him.
‘Nothing more dangerous than that?’ Her tone was weary and he was left with the distinct impression that she would have welcomed the arrival of something dangerous and deadly to distract her from her problems. Not only was she still in the pool, but she was positively luxuriating in the water as if she was indulging in some sort of private fantasy that she had no wish to abandon.
He frowned and worked a little harder. ‘The occasional jaguar—’
‘I like cats.’
He frowned. ‘You’re not going to get out?’
She gave a humourless laugh. ‘What for? So that you can simmer and boil and intimidate me?’
‘I don’t simmer and boil and intimidate.’
‘Yes, you do. But I don’t blame you. I’d probably do the same in your position. It’s nice to know that you care about something.’
Rafae
l gritted his teeth. She was doing it again. Worming her way into his mind when the only place he wanted her was flat on her back in his bed. ‘You know nothing about me.’
‘Well, that’s true.’ She floated on her back and her eyes drifted shut. ‘You keep yourself shut away. Presumably you’re afraid that someone might discover that you’re actually a good person and that would damage your bad, dangerous image.’
‘You talk too much,’ he informed her in a driven tone and she opened her eyes.
‘And you don’t talk enough.’ There was a faint smile on her lips. ‘You know, if you just learned not to judge on appearances, you’d be almost human.’ The dimple was back, he noticed, just above her mouth on the left-hand side. He stared at it, transfixed, and then decided that the conversation had gone far enough.
‘Aren’t you going to get out of the water?’
‘I suppose so.’ She pulled herself out of the pool, scooping her wet hair away from her face as she reached for her towel. ‘Are you trying to frighten me with all this talk of animals, Rafael? Because you’re wasting your time.’
He’d noticed. She’d tramped through the rainforest, fallen in rivers and walked past spiders the size of her hand, all without a word of complaint.
‘You need to stay alert in the rainforest. There are plenty of hazards.’
‘A bit like working in the commercial world, then,’ she quipped, rubbing the towel over her limbs. ‘Drop your guard for a moment and someone is waiting to eat you up in a mouthful and swallow your dreams whole.’
He found himself watching her every movement, the flow of her arms as smooth and graceful as a dancer’s. The red swimming costume was moulded to every curve and the vivid colour seemed almost to be part of her, as if she were a jungle creature every bit as exotic as those that surrounded her. He might have thought she was relaxed and carefree if he hadn’t seen the shadows in her eyes and the tension in her narrow shoulders.
Not so relaxed.
‘Did you make your calls?’
‘Yes.’ She kept her smile bright as she swung the towel over her shoulders, concealing her high, firm breasts from his view. ‘It seems that no one is in when the conversation topic is fraud. At least being in the jungle should give me a crash course in dealing with predators. Obviously, I need it.’
There was self-mockery in her tone, which he didn’t understand. So she’d been found out? What was the problem? Weary of the act and wishing she’d just admit guilt so that they could get down to the important things in life, Rafael gritted his teeth.
‘Who were you hoping to talk to?’
