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‘You have these photographs?’
‘The Hendersons found them at the flat and passed them on to me.’ Her mouth twisted. ‘My sole Trewint legacy.’
‘Not quite,’ he said. ‘You have that amazing hair, like some beautiful dark red cloud. That’s an inheritance to treasure.’
Which was altogether too personal, Rhianna decided. She finished her coffee and rose.
She said politely, ‘If you’ll excuse me? I think I’ll take your advice and get some sleep.’ And turned away, only to find him beside her at the companionway.
She said crisply, ‘I know my own way, thanks.’
‘Of course,’ Diaz said, and smiled at her. ‘But you seem to have forgotten you promised me a kiss.’
Her heart thudded. ‘When we said goodbye,’ she returned. ‘That was my understanding of the agreement.’
‘But there’s always such hassle at airports,’ he said softly as they reached her door. ‘Let’s make it goodnight instead.’
She hesitated uneasily. ‘Well—if you insist.’
It’s a kiss. That’s all. Don’t make a big deal about it, or let him see it matters. Just get it over with.
‘Well, yes,’ he said, faint amusement in his voice. ‘I think I do.’ He reached for the handle and opened her door.
She gave him a startled glance. ‘But there’s no necessity for that. Right here and now will be fine.’
‘Except that I prefer privacy,’ he said. He picked her up and carried her into the stateroom, kicking the door shut behind him. ‘And comfort,’ he added, putting her down on the bed and coming to lie beside her.
‘You said a kiss,’ she reminded him, her voice shaking.
‘Did I specify a number?’ He drew her to him. ‘I don’t think so.’ He lifted a strand of scented hair and carried it to his mouth. He said gently, ‘You are loveliness itself.’
He began to kiss her without haste, his mouth touching her forehead, her eyes, her cheekbones, the soft vulnerability below her ears, and the trembling corners of her mouth.
His lips were warm as they parted hers, and infinitely beguiling. His tongue began a lingering silken quest of the inner contours of her mouth, and her breath sighed with his. He gathered her closer, holding her against the hard length of his body, letting the kiss deepen slowly, endlessly.
When she could speak, she whispered brokenly, ‘Diaz—this isn’t fair.’
‘I’ll spare us both the obvious cliché.’ He put his mouth against her throat as his fingers began to release the long row of buttons at the front of her dress. ‘If this is all I’m to have of you, Rhianna, then I intend to make the most of it. And I’m still only kissing you,’ he added huskily. ‘Even if it’s not how—or where—you expected.’
As the edges of her unfastened dress fell apart, Diaz looked down at her for a long moment, then bent, his lips brushing the creamy swell of her breasts as they rose from their lacy confinement.
Lifting her slightly, he freed her from her dress, tossing it to the end of the bed, then dealt with the hook of her bra, taking the tiny garment from her body and sending it to follow her dress.
He began to kiss her breasts, circling her nipples with the tip of his tongue, bringing them to hot, aching life, before taking each soft, scented mound into his mouth and laving their tumescent peaks with slow, voluptuous strokes that made her moan aloud.
His lips moved down her body, leaving a trail of fire over her ribcage and the flat plane of her stomach, his tongue teasing the whorls of her navel, while his hands deftly removed her remaining covering of silk and lace as if brushing aside a cobweb.
It was only then that Rhianna realised where this downward path was leading, and as his mouth reached the silky triangle at junction of her thighs she stiffened in panic, her fingers tangling in his hair as she tried to push his head away.
‘No!’ She choked the word. ‘God—no…’
Effortlessly Diaz captured her wrists, holding them at either side of her shocked body, before he bent to her again, kissing the smooth length of her thighs, and their soft inner flesh, every brush of his lips a silent enticement, coaxing them to part for him, until she could resist no longer and sank, sighing, into the promise of this new and startling intimacy.
His mouth took possession of her with a gentleness that was almost reverent, kissing the secret woman’s flesh she had yielded to him, then slowly and sensuously deepening the caress into explicit exploration.
His tongue was a quiet flame flickering against her, at one moment probing delicately into her innermost self, at the next seeking out her tiny hidden bud and urging it to swollen, delicious arousal.
