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Her eyes widened, her expressive features morphing into a look of dismay. ‘Of course not!’ she blurted, her blush turning a deeper shade of pink. ‘I only meant... I meant I wasn’t...’
She bit her lip, which had the dual effect of halting her stammered response and drawing his attention to the lushness of her mouth—which in turn fired a pulse of heat into his groin and hampered his ability to concentrate when she took a deep breath and spoke again.
‘You have a very beautiful home,’ she said, enunciating her words slowly this time, as if selecting each one with care. ‘An amazing home, actually. It’s just that my sense of direction is hopeless and...well, the villa is rather...’
She fluttered her hand in the air, searching, he assumed, for a suitably inoffensive word.
‘Big?’ he supplied helpfully.
She cleared her throat, her cheeks glowing like hot embers now. ‘Yes.’
A crueller man would have let her squirm for a bit longer, but he wasn’t quite that merciless. Plus, he had no idea where this urge to tease and provoke had sprung from—or, more dangerously, where it might lead—so he was better off shutting it down. The fact that she’d already had him lurching from arousal to anger to amusement and back to arousal again in the space of mere minutes, when usually he was so adept at governing his emotions, was disturbing enough.
He motioned her into the room, followed her in and then closed the door and crossed to his desk.
‘I hope you’re not angry with Rosa and Alfonso and Delmar,’ she said.
He turned and looked at her. She stood in the middle of the room, her colour still high, her arms folded tightly over her breasts.
‘Do I have reason to be?’
She frowned at him. ‘I don’t know. Why are you asking me? You’re the one who marched in looking as if you wanted to throttle someone.’
He had wanted to throttle someone. Delmar. An urge for which he could offer no reasonable explanation. All he knew was that he hadn’t liked seeing the younger man’s hands on her. The familiarity between them. What else besides dancing had they got up to over the last twenty-four hours?
Had she encouraged him?
Pain arced through his jaw and he realised his teeth were clenched. Relaxing his expression, he sat against the edge of his desk and crossed his ankles. Good manners would normally dictate that he offer the lady a chair, but he wasn’t feeling especially chivalrous just then.
And he rather liked having her standing there in the centre of his antique Persian rug where he could see her.
All of her.
He could tell it made her uncomfortable and he enjoyed that—perhaps a little too much.
Maybe he was that cruel.
He folded his arms loosely over his chest. ‘I’m not accustomed to finding my house guests fraternising with the staff.’
Her chin came up. ‘Perhaps your staff wouldn’t have had to entertain your house guest if their employer hadn’t been an absentee host. If anything, you should be thanking them. Rosa has been wonderful—and Alfonso. They’ve very generously shown me some of that Catalan hospitality you promised.’
‘And Delmar?’ he couldn’t resist asking.
Just how generous had his hospitality been?
Her brow scrunched. ‘Of course. Delmar, too. They’ve all been exceptionally kind. I hope you know how lucky you are to have them,’ she added, her tone implying that she considered him entirely unworthy of his employees’ services.
Well, well... It seemed his little nurse from Down Under was a zealous defender of others.
Xav stilled.
His little nurse...?
His jaw tightened again.
Jordan Walsh was not his anything.
He unfolded his arms and pushed away from the desk. Time to end this conversation. He’d already derived too much enjoyment from their exchange. There was a reason he wanted her here and it wasn’t for fun.
