Hotbed of Scandal: Mistress: At What Price? / Red Wine and Her Sexy Ex / Bedded by Blackmail

One large hand rose, tapped a couple of keys. The screensaver disappeared; an image of herself flashed onto the monitor. ‘What do you see?’ said the voice behind her.

She stared at the green unfocused eyes, the slackjawed mouth, and managed to close it. Barely. She saw a woman who’d well and truly lost it.

She saw the glint of fear in the passion-dark depths of her gaze.

‘Not me,’ she whispered, shocked. As she watched the monitor she saw his face join hers as he bent down next to her. ‘That woman is not me…’ She tried to struggle up, but Dane’s gaze was as captivating as any physical restraint.

‘Yes,’ he murmured. ‘It is.’

His eyes smoked with intent as he parted her liquid heat with his fingers, then pushed inside, a long slide to paradise. His jaw chafed the place between shoulder and neck; his breath whispered over her breasts.

He withdrew slowly, circled the throbbing centre, then plunged inside again. Wherever he touched, heat followed. Pleasure. Hot endless waves rippled through her while the computer’s inbuilt camera reflected it back.

Then she saw nothing but the bright sparkle of her climax as it carried her away.

The cheerful tones of Dane’s mobile brought her back to reality with a jolt. The air stirred and his heat dissipated. He moved to the other end of his L-shaped desk to answer it.

‘Hi, Jus,’ she heard him say, as if he’d just been working over a particularly absorbing computer problem rather than her. ‘No, nothing important.’

He chuckled, and her sparkle faded. Had he been referring to what they’d been doing? Biting her lips, she pulled the torn edges of the T-shirt together, clicked off the monitor so she couldn’t see herself.

‘I guess so.’ The easy humour drained from his voice. ‘What’s so urgent?’ He nodded, then a lopsided grin creased his face. ‘In that case, how can I refuse?’

She heard him flicking through papers and stole a glance at him. He jotted something down, then said, ‘Yeah. She’s staying here for now.’ He’d turned away from her as he spoke. He could have been talking about the weather. ‘No…’ His shoulders lifted, one hand fisted on the desk. ‘That’s the official line we’re taking, yeah.’ Silence while Justin spoke, then a low laugh. ‘I don’t think so.’

Did he already regret not being free to pursue whatever lady of the moment took his fancy? A shiver cooled the sparkling warmth she’d been enjoying just minutes ago.

She wanted him to look at her the way he’d been looking at her before. To show some indication that he’d enjoyed what they’d just done, that it wasn’t all onesided.

Her legs had recovered just enough to support her, so she rose and crossed to him, rolling the chair with her. He fumbled the pen as she inveigled her way between his body and the desk, but he managed to catch it mid-fall and jotted something else on his notepad.

His jaw was bristly when she ran her fingertips over it. ‘What?’ she mouthed, capturing his gaze with hers. His pupils swallowed up his irises until only a thin rim of molten silver remained. His confident business persona slipped. Whatever he had started saying to Justin slurred to a stop.

Finally she had his attention. She had Dane where she wanted him. Not Mariel his childhood friend, not Mariel who’d agreed to this arrangement for mutual benefit, but the sexual woman he’d made love to last night.

He shook his head. ‘Can you repeat that, Jus?’

She’d ruffled that smooth exterior, distracted his ordered mind. She’d never felt such rush of feminine power before. It swam through her limbs like the most potent brandy until her head was dizzy with it.

High on the elixir, she smiled and prodded his chest, so that his body tipped back onto the chair. It rolled back a little.

‘I’ll…ah…need you to e-mail me that info tonight.’

On a wave of confidence she shrugged out of the tattered T-shirt and stood before him in nothing but her lace panties.

‘When do we…um…when…?’His voice trailed away.

She slid her palms down her hips, stepped out of the last remnant of clothing, flung it over her shoulder. It landed on his desk with a quiet plop.

His eyes glazed over. ‘No. Everything’s fine. Just fine,’ he choked out as she worked deft fingers over the front of his shorts.

Without breaking eye contact, Mariel took the phone from his hand—as easy as taking candy from a baby. ‘Goodbye, Justin,’ she said, and disconnected. She straddled Dane, satisfied she’d achieved her intended outcome. Oh, yes, she saw desperation and desire, both sharp as a sword and glittering in those grey depths.

‘Right now…’ she tugged down the zip, grasping his throbbing length with both hands ‘…I’ve a craving for more than ice-cream.’

Dane’s brief chuckle turned ragged. His blood hammered through his groin, his ears, and every place between. ‘So I noticed,’ he muttered, before she crushed her lips to his and possessed him with fast, greedy bites. Long, luscious licks on fevered skin that cooled in the air as she feasted on his jaw, his neck, a shoulder.

She took him inside her with a cry that bounced off the walls and echoed like the thunder of horses’ hooves in his ears. Conquest, triumph, victory. He saw it in the emerald fire in her eyes. He took her mouth and tasted it on her lips.

In turn, he possessed her with restless hands and frantic touches. Gave her what she wanted, took what she offered. Urgent, reckless, primitive.

There was no gentleness, no finesse. Just the frenzied race to the finish. And when it was over, and she collapsed against him, still it wasn’t enough. He wanted more. He wanted to burrow beneath her skin, steal inside her mind. All. One.

Dangerous—this insatiable appetite. This all-consuming need. He enjoyed sex. But this sudden craziness was like an addiction that knew no limit. Which made him wonder: what the hell was it?

For one insane moment a couple of years back he’d even thought himself in love, but it hadn’t lasted. It never lasted. The ability to love simply wasn’t in his genes.

He drifted a hand over her hair, breathed her scent of sex and warm skin. He squeezed her nape so that she looked up at him with over-bright eyes.

‘Wow,’ she breathed. ‘I’m good. I mean, I’m really, really good.’

The laugh that bubbled up from his throat was a mix of amusement and affection. ‘Here I was, thinking it was me.’

Amusement and affection. He should have known with Mariel it would be that simple.

And that complicated.

His humour faded. ‘I have to go in to work tomorrow.’ He smoothed a thumb over Mariel’s jaw.

‘I thought you were on leave?’

‘I was. But there’s a problem with a computer system we installed a few weeks ago. Which means a quick trip to Mount Gambier.’

A day trip. ‘And Justin can’t go?’

‘Jus and Cass are busy trying to make a baby, and it’s Cass’s fertile time, apparently. According to Cass’s calculations tomorrow morning’s the charm.’

Her eyes widened, incredulous. ‘She’s pinpointed it down to the hour? Are you for real?’

‘That’s what Jus told me.’ The thought made him smile. ‘What could I say?’

She grinned, too. ‘Nothing but yes, I guess.’ Her mouth softened, her eyes took on a sparkle, dew on spring leaves. ‘Making a baby…’

Without warning the cunning image stole through his mind. Mariel, round with a child. With his child. He clenched his jaw against an unfamiliar crushing sensation in his upper chest.

He shook his head to clear the unsettling thoughts that struck too close, too deep, and somehow messed with his perception that he had this situation with Mariel under control.

‘That’s convenient, then,’ she went on, as if she hadn’t noticed his silence. ‘I want to work on some ideas, sketch a few designs. Acquire a tailor…I might even get some work done with you out of harm’s way and unable to distract me.’