One Kiss in... Moscow: Kholodov's Last Mistress / The Man She Shouldn't Crave / Strangers When We Meet

Why did this woman—this irritatingly optimistic Pollyanna of a woman—make him feel so much? Need so much? Remember?

His hands slid under her bottom and he pressed her against the door, pulling her legs around his waist, his hands rucking up her skirt. Needing to feel skin against skin. Forgetting that this was just meant to be a way to make her push him away.

Her arms locked around his neck, her head thrown back, her lips parted as her heart thundered against his. His breath came in harsh, tearing gasps, and his fingers brushed the lace of her underwear. ‘Sergei,’ she said, his name a ragged whisper, and the desire and anger that had been rushing through him in a molten river of emotion so he couldn’t tell one from the other froze to an icy stream of lucidity.

She was a virgin.

And he was mauling her against a door, her mouth swollen and maybe even bruised from his kisses.

What was he doing? What had he done? He’d meant to scare her off with a kiss, but this … willing or not, she still didn’t know what she was doing.

He did.

He pushed away from her, half stumbling, a self-loathing so deep and consuming it felt like acid corroding the soul he’d thought he’d lost long ago.

‘Sergei,’ she said again, and this time he knew it was a question, one he couldn’t answer.

He ran his hands through his hair, dragged a breath into his lungs and then let it out in a long, slow shudder. Hannah straightened, fixed her dress. Her hands trembled.

Sergei looked away. It was better this way, he knew. Better to end something he never should have begun … for both their sakes.

It wasn’t supposed to go like this. She might be a virgin, innocent and optimistic as Sergei had said, but even with the most positive outlook possible Hannah knew this wasn’t good. Sergei wasn’t even looking at her. And after his mouth—and his hands—the places they’d been on her body, the way they’d made her feel—

Until now. Now she felt pretty close to wretched. She swallowed, her throat dry and aching. ‘I guess I’m more of an idiot than I thought,’ she finally said, trying to sound wry although her voice was little more than a croak. Still she tried to smile. She didn’t know what else to do.

‘Yes, you are,’ Sergei returned, his voice a savage hiss. Hannah jerked back at the fury in his tone. Even though he’d just pushed her away from him, she hadn’t expected it. Yet as she stood there, conscious of her tousled hair and swollen lips and rearranged clothing, her mind started to catch up to where her body had been blazing ahead. And she wondered what would have happened if Sergei hadn’t stopped … and if she would have regretted it.

Even now with her clothes in disarray, her body aching, the only sound their still-ragged breathing, she didn’t think she would have.

‘Sergei, why—?’

‘Don’t.’ He raked a hand through his hair once more, then dropped it to his side. ‘Go to your room,’ he told her, as if she were a naughty child. ‘Grigori will deal with you tomorrow.’

‘Deal with me?’

‘Your passport. Your flight.’ His lips curved in a grim smile. ‘You can be out of this country this time tomorrow night, milaya moya.’

She recognised the Russian. My sweet. And Sergei had never sounded more cynical than when he said the endearment. ‘Why did you push me away?’ she asked quietly.

Sergei’s nostrils flared, lips thinned. He looked so angry, yet minutes ago he’d been kissing her. Touching her. His hands—

‘Don’t, Hannah.’

‘Don’t what?’

‘Don’t be so bloody naive!’ He took a step towards her, his eyes blazing. ‘You want to know why I pushed you away? Because I don’t do virgins, milaya moya, especially not ones who barely know how to kiss.’

Ouch. Hannah blinked, swallowed again, and lifted a chin. ‘I don’t believe—’

Sergei let out a sharp bark of laughter. ‘Believe it.’

‘You’re just saying that,’ she insisted, because Sergei was too angry to have pushed her away out of boredom or even disgust.

His mouth twisted in a sneer. ‘There’s optimistic and then there’s deluded. You’re leaning towards the latter.’

Hannah folded her arms. Sergei’s sudden rejection didn’t make sense. She knew she was inexperienced, he’d known that, but she wasn’t so naive that she hadn’t felt the evidence of his desire. She’d felt it in his kiss too, in the way he’d reached for her. She’d felt the answer in herself. ‘I’m not deluded.’

He arched an eyebrow, so coldly in control. ‘Really?’

‘Really.’ Although she was starting to feel that maybe she was. She was so out of her element, beyond her experience, yet she still felt instinctively that Sergei wasn’t telling the truth. He hadn’t pushed her away because he’d stopped wanting her, so why?

Because he didn’t want to hurt her.

The thought popped into her mind like a translucent bubble, shining and perfect. Fragile too. For if that wasn’t a deluded thought …

Sergei was surely the coldest, most cynical man she’d ever met.

Cynical about himself.

‘I don’t believe you,’ she said slowly.

He let out a harsh laugh. ‘You really are some kind of Pollyanna, always wanting to believe the best of everyone. Well, don’t believe it about me—’

‘You’ve been kind—’ Hannah insisted, because she knew, deep down, it was true.

‘There is no such thing as kind,’ Sergei cut across her. His eyes blazed into hers, icy and hot at the same time, and full of fury. ‘I said everyone has a motive, remember? And usually not a very nice one.’ He took a step towards her, the action menacing. Threatening. Hannah held her ground. ‘You know what my motive has been, milaya moya?’

‘Don’t call me that—’

‘But you are very sweet.’ He touched her cheek, lightly, and Hannah flinched. There was something ugly about his actions, his words, and she knew he was ruining it all on purpose, even if she didn’t understand why. ‘My motive,’ he continued softly, still stroking her cheek, ‘has been to get you into my bed. Why do you think I intervened with those raggedy little pickpockets? You’re very beautiful, in an artless sort of way.’

Hannah swallowed. ‘Your seduction technique needs a little work, then,’ she told him. ‘When we first met you were positively unpleasant.’

His fingers stilled for a second, no more. Then he smiled. Hannah didn’t like this smile, this cruel curving of those mobile lips that was meant to convey just how coldly calculating he truly was.

‘Ah, but it did work, didn’t it? Taken as a whole. For I could have had you right here, against the door.’ His smile widened and his eyes glittered. ‘So I must have been doing something right.’

Hannah lifted her chin, ignored the lightning streak of pain his words caused to blaze through her. ‘Then why did you stop?’

‘Isn’t it obvious?’ He dropped his hand and stepped away. ‘I stopped wanting you.’

Boldly, she let her gaze drop down to where the evidence of just how much he’d wanted her had pressed against her. ‘Did you?’ she challenged. ‘I may be a virgin, Sergei, but I’m not that innocent.’

Sergei’s gaze flared and narrowed. ‘Admittedly, milaya moya, I could have taken my pleasure right here, but I am a man of more sophisticated tastes than I’m sure you’ve ever experienced. And frankly the effort wasn’t worth the reward. Virgins are so tedious, and tend to get all emotional afterwards. I really didn’t want to have to deal with your tears.’

Each word was a hammer blow, or perhaps a dagger wound, for the pain was sharp and cutting. Maybe she was deluded after all, Hannah thought numbly.

She looked up, saw Sergei watching her closely. Saw how tense he was, his body rigid, thrumming with suppressed emotion. And suddenly she knew she wasn’t deluded after all. If he’d been bored by her, he’d have turned away already. Dismissed her with a drawl. He wouldn’t be here, as cagey as a crouched tiger, watching, waiting.