It was an invitation she knew she shouldn’t accept…
Couldn’t accept.
Not when she had spent the past four days telling herself that her heated response to this man had been just a figment of her imagination. An overreaction to everything else that was going on in her life at the moment.
She’d only had to look at Drakon again to know she had been fooling herself…
This man—the way he looked, the aura of power he wore like a mantle about those broad and muscular shoulders—appealed to Gemini on a level she had never experienced before. He somehow made her feel safe, protected, while at the same time being aware that Drakon himself was the biggest danger of all to her. Physically and possibly emotionally as well…
‘No. I—’ Drakon broke off as a knock sounded on the internal door of the apartment. ‘That’s probably your assistant. I instructed her to let you know when she was ready to lock up for the day.’ He shrugged as Gemini raised her brows.
Yes, Drakon Lyonedes was a man she knew she should beware of—for more reasons than the obvious one of finding him so mouthwateringly attractive. Left unchecked, he was more than capable of taking over her life if he chose to do so—and was certainly arrogant enough.
‘You—’ It was Gemini’s turn to break off as a mobile phone began to ring. It had to be Drakon’s, because the ringtone of hers was one of her favourite songs rather than a normal ringtone like this. ‘That’s probably Markos, checking to see if you arrived here in time to save me from the clutches of my evil stepmother!’ she guessed dryly.
‘This situation is not in the least amusing, Gemini.’ Dark brows lowered over those coal-black eyes as he removed a mobile phone from the breast pocket of his tailored jacket. ‘And I believe my cousin knows me well enough to know I will most certainly have saved you—if indeed you needed saving,’ he declared, before taking the call. ‘Yes, Markos,’ he said, at the same time giving Gemini a small inclination of his head in acknowledgement of her correct guess as to the identity of the caller.
Gemini decided to leave him to the privacy of his call and left the room to answer the door to Jo, reassuring her assistant that she was fine before accompanying her down the stairs to close the blinds and lock the door behind her as she left for the day.
Leaving Gemini completely alone with Drakon…
She lingered downstairs in the shop for several minutes after Jo had gone on her way, restlessly tidying where no tidying was necessary as she thought over Drakon’s invitation to dinner this evening. So that they might discuss the problem of Angela further, he had said. Although quite what that meant she had no idea. It was now more than obvious to her that Angela’s dislike of her wasn’t necessarily personal but was directed towards what Gemini represented. An inborn resentment that she doubted any amount of talking between herself and Drakon would succeed in changing.
Which was reason enough for her to turn down his dinner invitation, surely?
If she wanted to turn it down…
She had total recall of her visit to Lyonedes Tower. Of Drakon’s cool arrogance. His remorseless power. Most telling of all, she clearly remembered what it had felt like to have those chiselled lips and those long elegant hands on her body as he made love to her in the lift.
Which was precisely why she shouldn’t even think about agreeing to have dinner with him again this evening.
‘What are you doing alone down here in the darkness?’
Gemini turned sharply to face Drakon, instantly noting how the width of his shoulders almost filled the doorway leading out to the stairs of her apartment. Immediately she was reminded of just how tautly muscled his chest and shoulders had felt beneath her hands…
Not a good memory to have when she was still debating whether or not it would be sensible, even sane on her part, to spend another evening with him!
‘Just tidying up,’ she said lightly. ‘Are you ready to leave now?’ she added hopefully.
Drakon looked across at her speculatively. The blinds that had been pulled down over the windows shrouded the shop in half-light, making it impossible for him to see her clearly—although he thought he could make out two bright wings of heated colour in those ivory cheeks. She also seemed slightly nervous and she avoided meeting his gaze.
‘You are not recovered enough to go out to dinner this evening,’ he said slowly.
‘I—’
‘Perhaps you would prefer it if we were to remain here and I prepared something for us to eat?’ Drakon suggested swiftly when he sensed she was about to use her earlier indisposition as a way of refusing to have dinner with him. A refusal he had no intention of accepting…
Her eyes widened as she gave a disbelieving huff of laughter. ‘You can cook, too?’
‘Of course.’
Of course he could cook, Gemini chided herself derisively; he was a man who gave the impression that he could do absolutely anything he chose to. ‘Well?’ she asked in a reminder of the conversation they’d had the previous week when she’d asked if he played the piano in his apartment.
‘Passably.’ His mouth curved into a wry smile in acknowledgement of that conversation.
Gemini laughed. ‘In that case you can certainly cook for me some time.’
He quirked dark brows. ‘But not this evening?’
She shrugged. ‘I really don’t see that there would be any point. Angela is—well, Angela.’ She grimaced. ‘And whatever bee she currently has in her bonnet over me will no doubt pass when she gets some other multibillionaire in her matrimonial sights.’
Drakon frowned. ‘Did you really believe earlier that I was involved with her in a personal way?’
Yes, briefly, she had once again believed that. How could she have thought anything else when the other woman had appeared here like an avenging angel and accused Gemini of trying to seduce Drakon?
Gemini shrugged again. ‘It really doesn’t matter what I do or don’t believe on that subject, does it?’
‘Oh, but it does,’ Drakon murmured as he stepped further into the shadows. ‘To me it matters very much.’
Gemini swallowed hard as she watched him approach with lithe, purposeful strides, only coming to a halt when he stood mere inches away from her. ‘I—it’s all been sorted out now, so no real harm done,’ she dismissed nervously.
He raised an eyebrow. ‘Surely that is for me to say, and not you?’
She drew in a deep breath and let it out slowly. ‘Stop making such a big thing out of it, Drakon.’
‘But it is a big thing to have one’s word doubted, is it not?’ he pressed softly.
Gemini gave him an irritated frown. ‘You want me to apologise for ever having doubted you? Is that it?’
Those sculptured lips curved in a smile. ‘That would certainly be a start, yes.’
‘A start?’ she repeated warily, not sure she was comfortable with the way Drakon stood so overpoweringly close to her. Or with the direction this conversation appeared to be going in.
‘A start,’ he echoed huskily as he closed the small distance between them, his hands moving up to lightly grasp the tops of her arms as his head began to lower towards hers.
Yes, their conversation was going in exactly the direction Gemini had thought it might!
CHAPTER EIGHT
SHE swallowed hard. ‘Drakon—’
‘Gemini…’ he murmured throatily, his breath a warm caress across her lips.
She felt trapped, very like a rabbit caught in the glare of the headlights of a car, as she continued to stare up at him in the semi-darkness and felt the unmistakable pull of physical attraction. ‘This isn’t a good idea at all.’
Those dark eyes glittered. ‘I disagree.’
Gemini blinked. ‘You do?’
‘Oh, yes,’ Drakon muttered, and her nearness, the heady seduction of her perfume, took over all of his senses as he finally claimed her lips with his own.
He had thought often of doing this again, he realised as her lips parted, yielded to
his, and he drew her fully into his arms to deepen the kiss. Taking. Possessing. His hands moved restlessly, searchingly over the sweet curves of her back and the smooth roundness of her bottom, pulling her into him and making her fully aware of the hard pulse of his arousal.
Yes, he had thought of this many times these past four days. Yearned for this. Ached for it.
There was no room for other thoughts now except to indulge those senses. No time for gentleness as his tongue plundered the sweetness of her mouth until he knew every warm and delicious inch. The warm swell of her breasts was crushed against the hardness of his chest, her thighs were hot against him, and the air filled with the raggedness of their breathing and their low moans of pleasure.
To Gemini it was as if no time at all had passed since Drakon had last made love to her. The passion was instant—the need, the aching pleasure even more so. She gasped as his fingers touched her skin beneath her blouse seconds before his hand cupped the lace of her bra, groaning in her throat as her nipple rubbed against the heat of his palm.
He moved back slightly to unbutton her blouse and reveal those lace-cupped breasts to his glittering black gaze before he expertly removed the skimpy item of lingerie and let it fall on the floor, along with her blouse.
Gemini slid the jacket from his shoulders and down his arms before dropping it onto the floor to join her discarded clothing, allowing the briefest moment of humour as she imagined the horror of Drakon’s tailor at her cavalier treatment of a jacket that she was sure had cost thousands of dollars.
But it was only the briefest of thoughts before Gemini released the knot of his tie and tossed it aside, unfastening the buttons of the white silk shirt and revealing the muscled perfection of his olive-skinned chest. The shirt met the same fate as his jacket, and her breath caught in her throat as she was finally able to touch the glorious contours of his bared flesh.
Steel encased in velvet…
Gemini could feel the play of muscles beneath that velvet warmth as Drakon’s mouth once again claimed hers, and she moved her arms about his waist to caress the long length of his naked back, down over the tautness of his fabric-covered buttocks and then up along the length of his spine.
He dragged his lips from hers to taste the delicate skin of her throat, the top swell of her breasts, before moving lower, capturing the hard nub of her nipple and drawing it into the heat of his mouth.
She gasped, her bare back against the brick wall as Drakon curled his fingers about her thighs and lifted her up and into him until her legs were about his waist. Her fingers became entangled in the darkness of his hair and pleasure coursed through her as she felt the hard throb of his arousal against her core.
That pleasure pooled between her thighs in a warm rush of moisture as he began to move slowly against her. At the same time his hand moved to cup her other breast, sliding a rhythmic thumb again and again over that second throbbing peak until she wanted to die from the arousing onslaught of his clever lips and hands and fingers.
Gemini could only cling to the dampness of Drakon’s bare shoulders as she felt herself spiralling high, ever higher. He continued pleasuring her breasts at the same time as his throbbing shaft rubbed against that sensitised nub between her thighs. Her breath was coming in short and painful gasps as she hurtled closer and closer towards a release that filled her with a longing to pull Drakon closer at the same time as a fear of completely losing control of her senses urged her to push him away.
Drakon seemed to sense that confusion in her. His eyes were dark and glittering as he slowly released his mouth from her breast and looked up at her. ‘I’m not hurting you, am I?’
‘God, no!’ she choked out, trembling, shaking from the force of her own arousal.
An arousal that he seemed to incite in her at will…
An arousal that was rapidly fading, to be replaced by embarrassment as she realised exactly what they were doing—and where!
‘I just—I’m finding all of this a bit overwhelming, Drakon. Making love for the first time was somehow always more…romantic in my imaginings.’ She made an attempt at humour as she forced her knees to relax their death grip about his waist, her legs feeling slightly shaky as she allowed her feet to slide down to the concrete floor.
He blinked. ‘Sorry?’
‘It’s silly, I know,’ she gabbled. ‘But I’d always thought that the first time I made love it would at least be in a huge feather bed—maybe even a four-poster.’
‘A four-poster bed?’
‘Mmm. With curtains blowing in a gentle breeze,’ Gemini mused as the idea of making love with Drakon in such a romantic setting began to take flight.
‘I beg your pardon?’
‘And maybe rose petals scattered about the room,’ she continued dreamily. ‘Don’t you think that would be romantic, Drakon?’
‘Undoubtedly,’ he rasped.
Gemini snapped out of her romantic musings as she became aware of the wariness in his tone. And not just wariness, but utter disbelief.
And a healthy dose of shock!
No doubt it was a shock for him to realise that the spoilt and pampered daughter of Miles Bartholomew was a twenty-seven-year-old virgin…
What on earth had she been thinking, drivelling on like that in front of a man like him?
Her cheeks burned hotly. ‘What did you imagine, Drakon?’ Her embarrassment deepened as she picked up her blouse and quickly put it on over her bare breasts. ‘Did you think that I make a habit of behaving in this uninhibited way with every man I meet?’
His jaw tightened. ‘Not every man, no.’
‘Just the rich and powerful ones?’
A scowl darkened his brow. ‘Gemini—’
‘If you really thought that, then I’m afraid you have me confused with my stepmother,’ she cut in before he could answer her.
‘I know exactly who and what you are, Gemini,’ he grated.
The rustle of clothing behind her told her that Drakon had probably pulled his shirt back on at least. The shirt she had only minutes ago unbuttoned before throwing on the floor!
What was it about this man in particular that made her behave so completely out of character? Gemini barely recognised the wanton she became every time Drakon took her in his arms.
And a drivelling, romantic idiot too, apparently!
Something a man like him would certainly be repelled by.
Gemini kept her back towards him and moved to the safety of the other side of the shop before turning. Only the whiteness of Drakon’s shirt was visible where he still stood in the shadows. She licked her lips. ‘Don’t misunderstand me, Drakon. I’m really very grateful for the help you gave me earlier in getting rid of Angela, but not grateful enough to—’
‘I strongly advise that you don’t insult me by finishing that sentence,’ he warned, the tone of his voice dangerously soft.
Gemini shivered as she felt the chill of his warning down the length of her spine. A warning she would be insane not to heed! ‘I don’t mean to insult you—’
‘No?’ he rasped as he bent down to pick his jacket and tie up from the floor.
‘No,’ she reiterated wearily. ‘That’s the last thing I want to do when you’ve been so…kind.’ She shrugged. ‘It’s just been one hell of a day. Emotions are running high, and I really think it would be best if you just left now.’
Drakon agreed with the logic of her reasoning. At least he would have agreed with it if he could have thought logically at all. As it was, he was still reeling from the knowledge that, although Gemini was a sophisticated young woman in her late twenties, she was a physically inexperienced one.
How was such a thing possible in this day and age? Especially for a beautiful young woman whose father’s wealth would have ensured she had lived her life in privilege and self-indulgence? When her late teens and early twenties would have been spent socialising with men of wealth and experience? When Gemini’s own stepmother was an acknowledged seductress?
But per
haps Gemini’s contempt for the latter was the very reason she had chosen a completely different path for herself?
Whatever the explanation for her physical innocence, Drakon was stunned by it. Stunned and at the same time wary. He had been sexually active for more than twenty years now, and never in all his thirty-six years had he made love to an innocent. As much as he still wanted and desired Gemini—and it seemed he had only to look at her to want her—he had no intention of complicating his own life or hers by becoming her very first lover.
His movements were measured, deliberate, as he shrugged back into his jacket and then neatly folded his tie and placed it in one of his pockets before looking across at Gemini once more. ‘After witnessing her behaviour earlier, I don’t believe for a moment that you have seen the last of your stepmother,’ he remarked with obvious distaste.
Gemini didn’t think so either; she knew her stepmother far too well to ever believe that. Angela seemed to have set her sights on ensnaring one of the Lyonedes men as her next husband—preferably Drakon—and, as Gemini knew only too well, the older woman wasn’t easily deterred once she had set her mind on making a conquest.
Knowing of Gemini’s acquaintance with both men—these encounters with Drakon were far too physically volatile for her ever to think of them as friends—was surely only guaranteed to make Angela even more determined to capture one of the Lyonedes cousins. If only out of spite towards Gemini.
She shrugged ruefully. ‘As long as you and Markos stay well away from her in future there shouldn’t be a problem.’
Drakon gave a humourless smile. ‘That may be a little difficult when we are in the middle of a business transaction with her.’
Gemini stiffened at this reminder that Lyonedes Enterprises was in the process of purchasing her family home from Angela. ‘I believe you walked yourself into that particular situation,’ she said unsympathetically.
‘Indeed,’ he accepted dryly. ‘And it is a situation I am more than capable of dealing with. But I would advise that you do everything in your power to avoid any further confrontation with her.’
Defying Drakon Page 9