Instinctive Male

Instinctive Male
Cait London

Past experience had taught Mikhail Stepanov to keep his boss's dangerously alluring daughter at arm's length. But once the desperate single mother turned to him, how could he resist? In his embrace, Ellie wasn't the willful heiress he remembered but a fiery temptress he was determined to have and to hold forever….Ellie Lathrop knew the coolly competent businessman who ran her father's hotel empire had the power to help her keep her legally adopted daughter. Yet beneath Mikhail's steely exterior was a powerfully sensual male who, once aroused, could turn her world upside down….

“You’re Crowding Me.”

“There’s always that between us, isn’t there?” Mikhail asked.

“I don’t know what you mean.” He was standing too close, and whatever pulsed hot and alive between them burned Ellie’s skin. Her senses tingled. “If you weren’t so afraid—”

The world stilled around them. “Of what am I afraid?” he asked very slowly.

“You’re afraid to get involved. Anyone can see that.”

“Can they?” he asked darkly, studying her with that close, burning intensity that seemed to make the sand shiver beneath her shoes. The waves seemed to slow and stop, the fog stilling and intimate, and Ellie could only hear the sound of her quickening heartbeat.

Then, with a rough, reluctant sigh, he tugged her to him and took her mouth with enough heat to make her forget everything but taking as he was taking….

Everything that she had sensed hidden beneath Mikhail’s cold exterior was just beneath the surface, hot and real, and it was hers at last.

“So now it has begun,” he whispered.

Dear Reader,

Spring into the new season with six fresh passionate, powerful and provocative love stories from Silhouette Desire.

Experience first love with a young nurse and the arrogant surgeon who stole her innocence, in USA TODAY bestselling author Elizabeth Bevarly’s Taming the Beastly MD (#1501), the latest title in the riveting DYNASTIES: THE BARONES continuity series. Another USA TODAY bestselling author, Cait London, offers a second title in her HEARTBREAKERS miniseries—Instinctive Male (#1502) is the story of a vulnerable heiress who finds love in the arms of an autocratic tycoon.

And don’t miss RITA

Award winner Marie Ferrarella’s A Bachelor and a Baby (#1503), the second book of Silhouette’s crossline series THE MOM SQUAD, featuring single mothers who find true love. In Tycoon for Auction (#1504) by Katherine Garbera, a lady executive wins the services of a commitment-shy bachelor. A playboy falls in love with his secretary in Billionaire Boss (#1505) by Meagan McKinney, the latest MATCHED IN MONTANA title. And a Native American hero’s fling with a summer-school teacher produces unexpected complications in Warrior in Her Bed (#1506) by Cathleen Galitz.

This April, shower yourself with all six of these moving and sensual new love stories from Silhouette Desire.

Enjoy!

Joan Marlow Golan

Senior Editor, Silhouette Desire

Instinctive Male

Cait London

www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)

CAIT LONDON

is an avid reader and an artist who plays with computers and maintains her Web site, http://caitlondon.com. Her books reflect her many interests, including herbs, driving cross-country and photography. A national bestselling and award-winning author of category romance and romantic suspense, Cait has also written historical romances under another pseudonym. Three is her lucky number; she has three daughters, and her life events have been in threes. Cait says, “One of the best perks about this hard work is the thrilling reader response.”

To Joan. Thank you.

Contents

Chapter One

Chapter Two

Chapter Three

Chapter Four

Chapter Five

Chapter Six

Chapter Seven

Chapter Eight

Chapter Nine

Chapter Ten

Epilogue

One

M ikhail Stepanov was the one man Ellie Lathrop did not want to ask for anything.

At eight o’clock on a late February night, fog curled seductively around the Washington State coastal road; it was treacherous with curves and damp with the drizzling rain that had been falling all day. Ellie tightened her hands on the mini-station wagon’s steering wheel and glanced at the sleeping child in the back seat, nestled amid her favorite blanket and toys.

The drive from Albuquerque was draining, requiring stops at rest areas for Tanya to play. A few hours at night were spent sleeping in the well-lit parking lots of restaurants because motels would have taken the last of Ellie’s money. In the last six months, she had spent most of her reserves in traveling from place to place, always moving, keeping Tanya safe. Ellie drove skillfully, carefully, more so than if she had been traveling by herself—because nothing could happen to her legally adopted, precious child.

Her sister’s biological child…and now Hillary wanted Tanya back, to use as a pawn in her marriage game.

Ellie ran her hand through her hair and realized she was shaking, running on coffee, nerves and fear.

Just over four years ago, she had cruised down this same twisting road, determined to irritate stern man of steel Mikhail Stepanov. Ellie’s father owned the chain of Mignon International Resorts, to which Mikhail’s Amoteh Resort belonged; as the boss’s daughter, she often stayed at the various resorts free of charge. She had driven a sleek custom-ordered red sports car then, and fresh from a luxurious European spa, she had been up to battling Mikhail—one of her most enjoyable diversions, pricking at his meticulous businessman exterior, trying to find the man beneath. Back then, she didn’t care what he thought of her, and it was all a game.

One tilt of that arrogant head, one slash of those green eyes, and her instincts told her to cut the Ice Man down a notch. Maybe back then she’d had to make him pay for being so like her father, focused on business, untouchable in his emotions.

Her father’s files were complete—Mikhail Stepanov had been divorced five years ago, refusing his wife’s demand to leave plans for the Amoteh Resort. JoAnna had come to Mignon’s main offices and had told Paul Lathrop everything—including that she’d deliberately aborted Mikhail’s baby. And yet, Mikhail revealed nothing of the emotions that would disturb another man.

Ellie’s taunting games had stopped when she had became a mother to her sister’s biological child. Tanya, just four years old, had to be protected, and Mikhail was the only man who could help. At six-foot three inches, he towered over Ellie’s five-foot-seven frame, and when he was nearby, her instincts as a woman prickled. She refused to be intimidated by those narrowed green eyes, that forbidding scowl of dark brown brows.

Her windshield wipers click-clacked as Ellie thought of Mikhail Stepanov, the man she must face. With a Russian immigrant father and a Texas beauty as his mother, Mikhail was devoted to his family and to the Amoteh Resort. As manager, he moved through the luxurious corridors like a lord cruising his fortress, frighteningly efficient, quiet, dark and dangerous. Always perfectly groomed and dressed in a suit, his dark brown hair neatly clipped, Mikhail was about as approachable as an iceberg. Maybe that was why she had loved taunting him so much—just to see if he was human…to see what ran beneath that steely surface.

Mikhail had the unique ability to challenge her at a level that made her want to taunt him, to bring out the real man. Her senses told her that beneath Mikhail’s perfectly groomed, civilized suit lurked a primitive, sensual male—one she wanted to taste and captivate before moving on….