by Lynne Graham
‘Why should there be?’ Drew frowned with annoyance at his sister. ‘Why should there be anything wrong?’
‘You just seem very jumpy and defensive all of a sudden.’
‘You’re imagining things.’
Abbey was unconvinced. ‘Is there anything up with the business?’
‘I’d soon tell you if there was. We could do with some more customers-’
‘You told me business was brilliant-’
‘Our new fancy office premises are swallowing up more of our income than I expected,’ Drew admitted ruefully.
Abbey was proud that she didn’t say, ‘I told you so’. She was very fond of her big brother and she could see that he was under strain. He was pale, there were bags under his eyes and his nails were badly bitten, which was always a sign to the knowledgeable that Drew was stressed. ‘Is there anything I can do to help?’
‘Chat up the Russian billionaire. He might throw some trade our way and he must have amazing connections.’
‘Caroline has already told you about Nikolai Arlov?’
‘It brought some excitement into our suburban lives, didn’t it? A billionaire making a move on my little sister? It doesn’t happen every day.’
Abbey compressed her lips. ‘I didn’t like him.’
‘What mortal man could match up to Jeffrey the Saint?’
‘Don’t call Jeffrey that!’
‘Sorry, but I was never one of the devoted fans. I always thought that Jeffrey took advantage of you. You were only a kid,’ Drew said in a tone of disapproval. ‘If he’d been anyone other than Dad’s colleague and a judge in the making, Dad would have told him to get lost.’
‘Jeffrey would never have taken advantage of me. He loved me,’ Abbey argued with quiet conviction. ‘Look, I’d better get down to some work.’
Caroline, who worked for Support Systems from home, had faxed Abbey her appointments for the day and Abbey devoted her first hour of work to organising a housesitter for a couple going on holiday and booking their car in for a service. She was due to meet a client to chat about the arrangements for a christening party when a knock sounded on the door and heralded the delivery of flowers. Abbey got up to whisk the card out of the glorious basket of old-fashioned white and pink roses. It was not a surprise for her to see Nikolai’s name on the card, but she felt almost threatened by the fact that he included his phone number. With extreme reluctance, as she did not want to encourage him, she texted him a cool, polite thank-you for the roses.
Barely a minute later, he phoned her. ‘Lunch?’ His dark deep voice sent a sensitised shiver down her taut spinal cord.
‘Sorry, I’m too busy.’
‘What do you think I am?’ he riposted.
‘Are you really not going to make a donation to Futures unless I go out with you?’ Abbey heard herself demand without even being aware that she was going to ask that question. It told her how much that concern had been playing on her mind, even though she had told herself that she shouldn’t allow his unfair tactics to weigh on her conscience.
‘I never say what I don’t mean.’
Abbey grimaced at her end of the phone. ‘Now I feel like I’ve deliberately deprived the charity of money that they badly need. How’s that supposed to make me feel?’
‘Hopefully bad enough to change your mind about me and give me a chance to prove what a great guy I can be.’
‘Over lunch?’ Abbey’s conscience was taking a beating and once again she was asking herself if she should be refusing to spend just a couple of hours of her time in his company. Certainly if self-belief was a plus, he was very confident that he could win her approval.
‘Make it dinner. Are you in or out?’ Nikolai prompted.
‘In…What time?’
‘I’ll pick you up at seven-thirty.’
‘My address-’
‘I already have it.’
‘We won’t get on,’ she warned him ruefully.
‘I’ll pledge my donation this afternoon.’ With that assurance Nikolai rang off.
Abbey replaced the receiver and stared at it as if it were an unexploded bomb. She could barely credit that she had agreed to see him again and that she’d allowed his tactics of bribery and pressure to win him what he wanted.
Nikolai was buoyant. He decided that she was a very clever woman. He had been keen, but now he was considerably keener. He was convinced that Abbey Carmichael knew how to play a man to heighten his interest. He instructed Sveta to contact the charity and announce his donation, and he put Olya in pursuit of the blue evening gown that Abby had modelled at the charity fashion show.
Late that afternoon, Caroline phoned Abbey in a flood of happy excitement and informed her that Nikolai had donated half a million pounds to Futures. It was the charity’s largest ever single endowment and Nikolai had even promised to consider becoming a patron for the organisation. Abbey wondered what Caroline would say if she told her how the Russian had used his wealth and the charity’s desperate need for funds to persuade her into seeing him again. But, just then, confessing that truth would have been the ultimate spoiler to Caroline’s rare sense of achievement.
‘I’m dining with Nikolai tonight,’ Abbey said instead.
‘That’s great news. I want to see you having a good time and enjoying the fact that you’re young and single!’ Caroline confided cheerfully. ‘And Drew just sent me flowers. He probably got the idea from Nikolai sending them to you, but who cares what prompted the gesture?’
Abbey smiled, relieved that her brother was making an effort and that Caroline was pleased. Drew’s use of the word suffocating with regard to his marital and working life was still troubling her. She was also wondering why she hadn’t asked him where he headed when he went out while she had had the chance. On the other hand, perhaps she had interfered enough. She was hardly qualified to set herself up as a marriage guidance counsellor, she reasoned ruefully. Fate hadn’t allowed Abbey and Jeffrey to even get as far as a wedding night together.
The fact that they had never had the opportunity to enjoy sexual intimacy was one of Abbey’s biggest sources of regret. In that field she had no precious memories to hang on to, for Jeffrey had insisted that they should wait until they were married to make love. It embarrassed Abbey to acknowledge that she was still a virgin and it was not an admission she had ever made to anyone else. Her face could still burn at the lowering recollection that her eagerness to explore those physical mysteries with the man she loved had seemed to turn him off rather than on. In retrospect she blamed her late husband’s sexual reticence on his respect for her staunchly moral father and on the fact that he had been a good deal older than his bride-to-be. She studied the photo of the blond, green-eyed man with clean-cut features on her desk: Jeffrey had been a very attractive man. It was little wonder that she had fallen so hard for him and it still amazed her that he had chosen to marry a teenage school-leaver rather than one of the more eligible career women whom he met in the course of his work as a successful barrister.
Late afternoon, several impressive boxes were delivered to Abbey with Nikolai Arlov’s compliments. By the time Abbey had finished unwrapping them her desk was a sea of crumpled tissue paper. She could barely credit that he had sent her the blue gown from the show in spite of her clearly stated lack of interest. That he had also thrown in the matching shoes and jewellery shook her even more. The devil was certainly in the detail.
‘The clothes have arrived,’ she texted him. ‘Were you denied a dress-up doll as a child?’
‘I only want to undress you,’ he replied, which sent a wave of heat travelling through her and settling between her thighs in a most disturbing way.
‘There’s no question of that,’ she texted back, shaken by his frankness and unsure of how best to deal with it. But she did not want him to harbour expectations in that line of the evening ahead of them.
She left the office earlier than was her wont and made her way home to the ultra-modern apartment where she lived.
It had originally belonged to Jeffrey and the minimalist design and elegant brown and beige décor owed more to his taste than hers. Nothing she bought ever seemed to fit the sparse interior and trinkets always seemed to take on the aspect of messy clutter. Her doll’s house, which was in the style of a mock stone castle, was perched on the mirrored hall table, where its fairy-tale lines looked least obtrusive. The world of miniatures was her only hobby and the house and its miniature family of inhabitants provided a wonderful outlet for her lively imagination.
Stowing the boxes she planned to return to Nikolai, Abbey leafed through her wardrobe, instinctively searching for something as different from the blue gown as she could find. She was no man’s dress-up doll! If he had an erotic fantasy she wasn’t fulfilling it! She pulled out a scarlet halter-necked knee-length dress that she had bought when she was shopping with Caroline and worn only once at the staff Christmas party. After a quick shower she put on a little light make-up, teased her mane of curls into subjection and got ready. She frowned at the way the thin fabric seemed to cling all too revealingly to the full globes of her breasts and would have changed had not the doorbell buzzed.
Grabbing the boxes and her bag, she headed to the front door. A uniformed chauffeur greeted her and she handed him the boxes, accompanying him down in the lift while studying her reflection in the mirrored half-walls with dissatisfaction. The colour in her cheeks and the sparkle in her eyes implied an excitement that affronted her pride. She was, after all, only dining with Nikolai because Futures would benefit richly from her doing so. The chauffeur put the boxes in the boot of the long gleaming silver limousine and opened the passenger door for her.
Abbey was startled to see that Nikolai was in the car waiting for her.
‘You’re not wearing the dress,’ he commented straight off. ‘But you look almost as beautiful in red.’
Almost? Abbey was infuriated when she experienced a womanly stab of regret at not having worn the blue gown after all. ‘I don’t let anyone buy me clothes. I’m giving them back to you-’
‘I refuse to argue with you.’ Brilliant dark eyes intent, Nikolai surveyed her with raw masculine appreciation. He would not have been surprised had she shown up in jeans. She had a quirky, stroppy edge that he recognised as a challenge. This was not a woman willing to be told what to do. Mentally they were a match made in hell, he acknowledged, for she was as stubborn, individual and confrontational as he was. But at that moment he was less interested in her mind than in her body and his attention dropped to the tantalisingly ripe curve of her wine red tinted lips and the even more inviting lushness of her glorious breasts. ‘I haven’t stopped thinking about you for five minutes since I first saw you, lubimaya,’ he confessed in a husky undertone.
Flattered by that assurance, Abbey was shaken once again by how strong her reaction was to him. He looked absolutely gorgeous in a silver-grey pinstripe shirt and casual jacket that was superbly tailored to his broad shoulders and powerful chest. The atmosphere between them crackled with tension. Her mouth was dry and her pulses were drumming crazily. Wildly exhilarating feelings that had nothing to do with reason were pounding through her. She focused on his lean, hard-boned face with a fascination she had never felt in her life before and she was shattered by that truth, her lashes dipping to conceal her bemused eyes and break that moment.
‘What’s wrong?’ Quick as a flash Nikolai spoke up when she deliberately broke that visual connection with him.
Guilt was engulfing Abbey because her powerful response to Nikolai made her feel cheap and tarty, surpassing as it did anything she had ever felt for Jeffrey, whom she had fallen for at a much more innocent age. Then, she recognised that what she was feeling now was lust, pure, unvarnished lust, prompted by the sensual side of her nature, which she had had little opportunity to explore.
‘Nothing’s wrong,’ she said flatly, fighting not to notice that his eyelashes were spiky black fringed enhancements to his beautiful eyes, that his luxuriant black hair made her fingers tingle with a sense of deprivation, that his hard male mouth filled her with curiosity and shameless longing.
‘The pull between us is amazingly strong,’ Nikolai remarked with an earthy smile that had an amount of charisma that took her equally by surprise. His hand closed over hers, warm and firm as if he somehow sensed her sudden urge to back away and impose some space between them. ‘You have a tiny pulse beating just here…’A long brown finger brushed the fine skin above her delicate collarbone.
That glancing casual touch made Abbey shiver as if she were in a violent gale. He pulled her to him and she didn’t resist. To stay upright she had to brace a hand on a lean, powerful masculine thigh. His muscles flexed beneath her touch and his dark head swooped, his mouth descending to claim hers with a fierce sexual urgency that devastated her. Her fingers smoothed over his cheekbones, delighting in the abrasive feel of his slight masculine stubble, clutched at his hair, loving the silky density of the strands, finally settling on his strong shoulders and closing there. She was struggling to stay steady in a world that was shot through with multi-coloured fireworks of excitement and sensation. Her body was responding like a parched plant to life-giving water. She loved the taste and feel of him and couldn’t get enough of either. The erotic plunge of his tongue made heat and moisture surge between her thighs and stirred an ache there that was so intense it almost hurt. He had awakened a need she had ignored for too long and she pushed against him, hungrily reaching out and greedy for every sensation she could grab.
He undid the halter of her dress and the bra beneath before she could even guess what he was about and took immediate advantage of his access to her sensitive flesh. His hands cupped the weight of her voluptuous breasts and he buried his mouth with an appreciative murmur against a fragrant freckled creamy slope while the pads of his fingers skilfully chafed the swollen jut of her nipples.
‘You are the most amazingly sexy woman,’ he breathed thickly.
It was not how Abbey saw herself and the comment stunned her back into possession of her senses. Suddenly she felt naked and exposed and foolish. She reached down and yanked her clothing back up over her bare skin, struggling with clumsy hands to retie the straps. He dragged her hands out of the way and performed the task for her.
‘I don’t do stuff like this,’ she muttered as if she was excusing herself, but her eager body refused to resist when he tugged her back into his arms.
‘This is different. We’re different. I’ve never been so hot for anyone as I am for you, milaya.’ Long fingers delving into her mass of rippling red curls, Nikolai muttered something else in Russian and pressed her hand against his aching groin with an explicit need that shocked and excited her in equal degrees. That bold invitation fascinated her. With a thrill of awareness she felt the hard thrusting power and shape of his boldly aroused manhood beneath the barrier of his trousers. Light-headed with the strength of her desire, she moaned beneath the marauding ravishment of his hot mouth, her fingers sliding between his shirt and his belt to explore the taut hair-roughened skin of his flat, muscular stomach and trace the aggressive length of his erection. He groaned beneath her inexpert ministrations and that open responsiveness and unashamed hunger of his allowed her to glory in her feminine power for the first time in her life. She felt drunk on the daring of what she was doing.
‘I want you now…I don’t want to wait,’ Nikolai growled thickly.
That uncharacteristic sense of daring that had momentarily fired Abbey shrivelled and died. She whipped her hand away from him, shattered by her total loss of control. ‘This is wrong…this is not me. I hardly know you.’
‘You know everything that matters,’ Nikolai told her harshly as the limousine came to a halt.
Abbey glanced out in confusion at the apartment building in one of London’s most exclusive residential areas. ‘Where are we?’
‘My home.’
‘I assumed we’d be dining out some place,’ Abbey remarked uncomfortably as the passenger door
beside her opened.
‘The paparazzi give me no peace in public places.’
Abbey knew that had to be true. Press interest in his movements, most particularly his love-life, was considerable and she had no wish to see her own name in print next to his. His minders urged her protectively towards the steps and the door already opening for their entrance.
‘Will you need me again this evening, sir?’ his chauffeur enquired.
‘No. I’ll see you in the morning,’ Nikolai responded easily.
Colour flushing her cheeks and dismay and annoyance flaring within at that revealing instruction, Abbey breathed in slow and deep and smoothed down her frock before crossing the elegant foyer to board the waiting lift.
‘Could I have a word with you?’ Abbey asked Nikolai in a civil tone as she passed by the middle-aged manservant on the doorstep of his penthouse apartment.
A moment later, she was in a spectacular high-ceilinged reception room decorated in opulent shades of cream and gold and furnished with polished antiques. Nikolai closed the door and quirked a questioning black brow. ‘What’s the problem?’
‘The problem? I heard what you said to your driver when you told him you wouldn’t need him again this evening. I’m not sleeping with you tonight and how dare you assume that I will!’
Nikolai dealt her a frowning appraisal.
‘You’re not about to persuade me otherwise, so don’t waste your time trying!’ Abbey continued furiously, her temper rising at the uneasy suspicion that her conduct in the limo had given him every reason to hope that she might well share his bed without any further ado…
CHAPTER THREE
‘I WASN’T aware that I had been guilty of making any assumption, so your attack is somewhat premature and excessive,’ Nikolai imparted very drily.
Abbey stabbed the air between them with an emphatic finger. ‘I agreed to dine with you this evening-that’s all! Perhaps you feel that you’re entitled to more for a charitable donation of half a million, but my body was never on the table…’