Dating the Rebel Tycoon - By Ally Blake Page 0,43

back to earth—the reality of what he’d done and what he’d been about to do.

He laid a gentle kiss on her soft hair as his eyes focussed hard on the perfect precision and crisp, true angles of the floating staircase in the distance, looking for his centre as a builder looks to a spirit level.

But all he could think of was lifting her into his arms, carrying her to his bedroom and making love to her all night long. Hell, once there he knew he’d be happy not to come up for air for days.

This woman was giving him a lesson in the lure of temptation, of the lengths a man might go to in order to satiate the want of the one thing his reason and sense and experience and moral centre told him he shouldn’t want.

That pull of dangerously destructive desire, a dimension he’d always feared he might be genetically predisposed to possess, was ultimately why he tucked a finger beneath her chin and lifted her head, and waited until her soft dilated eyes were focussed on his.

And in a firm voice he said, ‘Might I suggest after tonight we slow things down?’

There, he’d done it, on the back of the kind of kiss that made a guy unable to think sensibly for hours after. That way she’d know it wasn’t as merciless as it had sounded.

Her skin paled and went blotchy all at once. She looked at him as though she’d just been slapped. And the shock in her eyes…

His fingers recoiled guiltily into his palm, then uncurled to touch her face. But she’d already disentangled herself to bolt into the lounge, frantically searching for something in her handbag. Whatever it was he could see by the tension in her neck that it wasn’t coming to the surface quick enough.

‘Rosalind.’

She held out a hand, which as good as told him to shut the hell up.

Ignoring it, he tried reasoning with her, ‘Three dates in three days was pure overindulgence on my part. And you can’t tell me you’re not exhausted. I saw you trying to hide a yawn not ten minutes ago.’

When she lifted her eyes to his, he was fairly sure all she saw was red. She held her mobile phone to her ear and said, ‘Which is why I think now is the perfect time to call a cab.’

‘Don’t be ridiculous. I was always going to take you home.’

‘Really? Was it diarised? Kiss Rosie at nine. Dump her at nine-fifteen. Drive her home by ten. In bed by eleven.’

She turned her back, put in the order for the taxi, then threw the phone into her bag.

‘Rosalind. Come on. Nobody’s dumping anybody. All I’m saying is that we be sensible and look at where we are going here with open eyes.’

She closed her eyes, took a breath and her shoulders relaxed. Somewhat. But that warm, husky voice that he’d become so used to turned as cold as the river at night as she said, ‘You want me to be sensible? Well, you obviously haven’t been paying close enough attention. If I’d been sensible I would never have agreed to go out with the guy I had a crush on through high school. That is obviously one fantasy best left unfulfilled.’

Cameron’s heart slammed hard and fast against his ribs. She’d had a crush on him? And fantasized about him? His voice was deep and dark when he said, ‘Come back, sit down and talk to me.’

She waved a frantic hand across her eyes. ‘Please. You were right. I’m just overtired. I get it; we’ve both monopolised one another’s time so much these past days. You’re busy and I’m busy, and neither of us ever meant for this to be more than it has to this point been. It’s fine.’

In the end all she could do was shrug.

If he wanted out for good, this was the moment. He had no doubt she was just waiting for the word—goodbye. It was a simple enough word. Benign, unambiguous, final.

But he couldn’t do it. He couldn’t be that cool with her. Unlike every other woman he’d ever dated, she’d never been cool with him. She’d given him nothing but the complete truth, and she deserved the same.

‘Rosalind, it’s not you.’

‘Where the hell’s the damn cab?’ She paced to the bottom of the stairs. He followed.

‘Rosalind, I need you to hear me out.’ He knew it was manipulative, but in order for her not to leave feeling hurt and angry he needed