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What was it about him that always seemed to leave her tongue-tied?

Five minutes later, Caine’s sports car entered the grounds of a walled estate. Terraced gardens dominated by lemon groves and palm trees led down to a white Palladian mansion perched on the cliff top. The turn-of-the-century villa, which had once been owned by Italian nobility, had been refurbished to become the Venus Resort’s hotel hub. It looked ethereal in the moonlight, a throwback to a bygone era, the elegant colonnades and intricate iron balconies illuminated by a series of flaming torches as the other guests arrived for the party.

A phalanx of press photographers stood behind a guide rope flanked by a security detail wearing the distinctive blue jackets of Caine Securities.

The knots in Katie’s stomach yanked tight.

Caine got out of the vehicle and strode round to open the passenger door.

“What’s wrong?” he asked.

She took his hand to step out of the car. “Nothing,” she murmured, schooling her features as best she could, and wishing he wasn’t quite so observant.

Hold it together. It’s not a problem.

Caine’s brows flattened, as if he were going to call her out on the lie. But then a young, heavy-set man wearing the Caine Securities uniform with his hand pressed to his earpiece approached them. “Signore Caine, the press are asking to be let into the venue.”

Katie’s pulse scrambled and Caine’s hand settled on her hip. Could he sense her apprehension? Why did that make her feel more insecure?

“That’s not the protocol for tonight, Marco,” he said to his employee. “Remind them there’s a full press conference tomorrow. Tonight’s event is for the investors.”

Almost as if Caine had sensed her distress, his hand firmed on her hip, forcing her closer to that seductive scent, making her aware of the hard lines of his body as they approached the entrance and the twenty or so photographers.

Flashbulbs fired in Katie’s face and she stumbled. The visceral memory of another time, at her mother’s graveside, and years later on the courthouse steps—when Caine’s men had shielded her from the press once before, during her father’s arraignment hearing—smacked into her like a fist.

Most of the shouts were in Italian, but then she heard a nasally American voice cutting through the noise and slicing through the threads of her composure.

“Hey, if it isn’t the naughty Whittaker sister. What you doing here, Katie? And where you been? We’ve missed you in New York.”

She lifted her head, caught unaware, and saw a face she recognized. Jess Barton. One of the parasites who had trailed her relentlessly in the years after that court appearance, eager for a new scandal to photograph, another dumb stunt to document, so he could sell the evidence of her recklessness and immaturity to the highest bidder.

Clammy sweat dripped down her back, her gaze riveted like that of a deer in the headlights of an oncoming truck. Barton’s eyes sharpened and he lifted his camera. A series of flashes blinded her and she jerked back. The flight instinct kicked in but, as if in a nightmare, her legs turned to mush, her feet caught in quicksand, and she stood frozen in place. Other paparazzi crowded around them, joining the feeding frenzy, as the flash of lights became an inferno of sound and fury.

“Back off.” Jared’s commanding voice boomed

over her head and his arm banded round her midriff to keep her upright.

She swayed as his face—tight with anger—stared down at her. She had only a moment to register the diabolical pulse of heat and humiliation before he gathered her close and directed his men to hold the photographers back.

His muscular body shielded her from the shouts and demands. The blind panic retreated enough for her to draw in a breath as he propelled her up the villa’s wide marble steps and into the huge vaulted entrance hall. She gulped in a lungful of clean laundry detergent and subtle pine soap.

Then she caught his underlying scent—rich, compelling and distinctly masculine—and the giddy wave of relief morphed into something much more disturbing.

Embarrassment scalded her cheeks.

“Please let me go. I’m fine.” Forcing her legs to cooperate, she wrenched herself out of his arms.

She shouldn’t want his support. Certainly shouldn’t need it. She’d never liked the press, but she’d never had such a violent reaction before. Obviously a few months of anonymity had turned her into a wimp.

“Stop struggling,” he growled, one firm hand still clamped on her hip.

Her thighs trembled as her stomach clenched against the disorientating heat.

A callused fingertip tucked under her chin and lifted her face. “Why didn’t you tell me you have a phobia of the press?”

“Because I don’t. I just wasn’t prepared to see Barton here,” she said, scrambling for an excuse, anything that would make her feel less exposed.

“The American?”

Source: www.allfreenovel.com
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