her head. “Not exactly.” She looked behind her once again, knew that Royston was waiting anxiously for whatever she was going to say next and she wasn’t going to let him down. “No, I actually hated him at first.”
Wyndi snorted with laughter. “That’s definitely not the reaction I remember him having on the women in high school. I was pretty young, but I recall several of them falling all over themselves to get his attention.”
Another snort, but this time it was from her husband. Wyndi looked over at the man and smiled gently. “It’s true. My big brother was a real heartbreaker.” She turned back to Miranda. “So when was the first time you realized you were in love with him?” she asked, her eyes wide with excitement.
Miranda actually laughed, unable to stop the humor. She didn’t even look up at Royston as she said, “Love him?” she teased. “I’m only marrying him for his money.”
While Wyndi laughed and her husband chuckled on the other side of the room, Miranda could actually feel Royston as he approached. She clenched her hands together, her finger rubbing nervously against the diamond on her finger. She’d thought she’d nailed the exact right mood but when she glanced up at the man, she knew that she’d made a severe miscalculation. The gleam in his eyes told her without words that she was in serious trouble.
The smile never slipped from her face as she watched him, confident that he couldn’t retaliate in front of his sister.
She was wrong!
As soon as he reached her, he grabbed both of her hands and pulled her up directly into his arms. Miranda didn’t have a chance to say a word before his mouth covered hers, kissing her in the most erotically demanding manner she’d ever experienced. She knew from the moment his hands touched hers that this was a punishment kiss, but nothing felt farther from a punishment. His lips were hot, moving over hers, demanding a response. When his teeth nipped at her lower lip, she opened her mouth and his tongue invaded. And that was the end of her amusement. There was nothing funny about this kiss. In fact, there was no way to even think, to try to avoid his hands or the press of his body against her softness.
Miranda wasn’t even aware of her hands as they crept up, wrapping around his neck, her own body pressing against his in a sudden, urgent and impossible-to-deny need to touch him and feel all of him against her. When he deepened the kiss, she was in full compliance, not sure if she could stop him, even if she wanted him to. Which she definitely didn’t.
It took several minutes before she realized that he’d lifted his head. She was still clutching his shoulders, her hands fisting his jacket as she clung to him, blinking up into his eyes as she tried to figure out what just happened.
“Still going to try and convince my sister that you’re marrying me for my money?” he growled to her, his hands sliding up her back, pressing her against him even more firmly.
Miranda couldn’t speak, could only shake her head. She licked her lips, still clinging to him and trying to get her knees to stiffen enough to hold her weight. “Um…probably not,” she whispered back. She vaguely heard someone laugh behind her but still couldn’t focus on anything other than the man holding her in his arms.
He smacked her bottom, just hard enough to get her attention. “Behave,” he grumbled.
He moved back, but didn’t release her. Royston kept his arm around her waist as he turned back to his sister. “So tell me what you’ve been doing,” he urged, sitting down on the sofa across from Wyndi, pulling Miranda right down next to him.
Miranda didn’t hear a single word for possibly the next five minutes, but it might have been a full hour. She was still trying to deal with the double impact of that kiss along with sitting next to this extremely large, overly muscular man. The heat emanating from the side of his body was intense and she tried to wiggle away from him as inconspicuously as possible, but he just shifted so that they were once again touching along the entire length of her side.
“Dinner is ready,” someone said from behind them.
Royston turned and nodded to what Miranda suspected might be his housekeeper but she’d already disappeared by the time Royston stood up and pulled her along beside him,