Innocent 'til Proven Otherwise

There was something about his smile. Ali had got the impression from the beginning that he didn’t smile much. Or certainly hadn’t had much reason to since his marriage had crashed and burned. And God knew she got that. The slightly wounded air about him had loaned him a tragic edge that had tugged at her heartstrings back in the bar.

But right now his smile was tugging in other places and she couldn’t deny they’d made a connection tonight, no matter how reluctantly.

Their proximity and the glow from the internal light gave her a close-up she hadn’t had as yet. She noticed for the first time his brown hair was lightly streaked with grey. It gave him a bucketload more virility and in that hazy half-world between sleep and arousal it seemed only natural to move her hand up to stroke his matching stubble.

And natural too, to follow with her mouth, pressing it briefly against his. And even though his lips didn’t react she felt the thunder in his chest beneath her hand and saw his pupils dilate.

Max shut his eyes and felt all his earlier resolve disappear. ‘Do you want to come up?’

Ali nodded.

Hell, yes!

CHAPTER THREE

BETWEEN the taxi, the lift and his apartment door, Ali was having second thoughts. ‘I don’t usually do this.’

Max paused, the key in his hand hovering near the lock. He could hear the tremor in her voice, see the way she wasn’t quite meeting his eye. It was curiously touching.

He dropped his hand. ‘If it’s any consolation, I don’t either.’

Ali glanced at him, surprised at the genuine note of sincerity in his voice.

‘There’s been no one since my wife left.’ He grimaced and corrected himself. ‘My ex-wife.’

Their eyes locked and held. She caught a glimpse of his unhappiness again, a swirl of misery in his open honest gaze.

‘We don’t have to do this,’ he murmured. ‘We can get in my car and I can take you home.’

His voice stroked her skin in all the right places and she could feel her nipples tighten. She could go home—he was obviously a gentleman. Or she could go through his door.

And feel like a woman again. Attractive, wanted, desired.

She pulled her bottom lip between her teeth. ‘Does it make me a bad person if I want to stay?’

Max smiled. She was very, very cute—all puzzled and indecisive. Wanting to and yet not. They were close, so close and the mix of her perfume and almost maidenly hesitancy was a potent combination.

She was staring at his top button. He placed a finger beneath her chin and lifted her face until she was looking straight at him.

‘It makes you even more desirable,’ he said, his voice husky. And he followed it up with a swift hard kiss, catching her sigh as he pulled away.

Ali stumbled against him slightly, reaching for him as she reeled from his cataclysmic five-second, closed-mouthed lip-lock. How on earth would she survive anything more lingering?

Desirable. He’d said desirable.

She looked up at him shyly, heart hammering, aware suddenly that her hand had bunched up his shirt. She smoothed it automatically as he looked at her expectantly.

Waiting.

She cleared her throat, afraid he might well have kissed her voice away. ‘Wow.’

Max gave a half-smile. ‘Indeed.’ Her bow mouth was parted and she had a kind of stunned look on her face and he had to admit to wanting to see that look again.

Preferably with her clothes off.

‘There’s more where that came from,’ he murmured.

Ali responded to the gentle tease in his tone and his weary smile. It made her want to soothe his brow and let him get lost in her body at the same time.

She held her breath and jumped in. ‘Better open the door then.’

It might be crazy but maybe, tonight, crazy was just what she needed.

Max inclined his head before turning to put the key in the lock. He twisted it and shoved the door open. He glanced back at her and gestured for her to precede him.

Oh God, oh God, oh God.

This was really going to happen. Her pulse thrummed a little faster, her breath hitched a little higher. She took a step and faltered, her mind racing ahead, mentally preparing.

‘Wait.’

Max dropped his hand and raised an eyebrow. ‘Yes?’

‘What about … do you have condoms?’

She might be practically vibrating with sexual need but having already interrogated Kat it would be hypocritical to not take charge of her own situation. The doctor in her had seen too many women duped into having unprotected sex by men who were prepared to lie to them to get it.

She knew it was a lot harder to say no when you were almost at the point of no return.

Max blinked at the unexpected question. Did he? They hadn’t used condoms in their marriage … Wait, yes, he did. Pete had bought him a box shortly after Tori had left and shoved it in Max’s bedside-table drawer but not before he’d slipped two into Max’s wallet.

Neither supply had been touched.

Max leaned against the doorjamb and grinned at her suddenly fierce-looking face. ‘Yes. An entire box.’

Ali ignored the light teasing note in his voice. ‘Sexual health is no laughing matter.’

Max attempted a sombre nod. ‘I agree.’

Ali couldn’t stop the smile that tugged at her mouth. ‘I suppose you think I’m being ridiculous?’

Max shook his head. He pushed away from the doorjamb and held out his hand. ‘I think you’re cute. Very cute.’

‘Great, more with the cute,’ she grumbled.

But her pulse skipped madly and she didn’t hesitate a moment longer. The tingle as his fingers folded over hers streaked heat up her arm, confirming the rightness of it all.

Max stepped backwards, tugging her gently forward, over the threshold of his apartment. Then inside. Shutting the door with a careless shove, he shrugged out of his jacket and pulled off his tie, his gaze firmly fixed to her softly parted lips.