Highly Unsuitable: Mr and Mischief / The Darkest of Secrets / The Undoing of de Luca

Her palms grew slippery as she clutched her flute of champagne. She wished she’d reapplied her lipstick. She also wished she wasn’t wearing a poufy, too-tight bridesmaid dress in shocking pink satin.

‘Care to dance?’

The words shocked her, brought her back to the last wedding she’d attended with Jason, when he’d asked the same question and held his hand out in just the same way … and she’d been wearing pink satin then too. Some things never changed.

‘Fine,’ she said, realising that sounded a bit ungracious.

Jason, however, just smiled, although Emily saw his eyes didn’t respond. They still held that same hard determination, and Emily wondered at its source.

She placed her hand in his, let his fingers enfold hers as he led her onto the small parquet dance floor. His other hand rested on her waist, warm and large, his fingers splaying across her hip.

The band was playing a low, lazy tune, something you only needed to sway to. Emily kept her gaze focused in the region of Jason’s chin as they moved to the music. They were closer than six inches apart this time, and this was no boring waltz. She could feel the heat from his body, inhaled the tang of his aftershave. He was a good dancer, she realised with some surprise; he swayed well, his movements languorous, even sexy, his sure hands guiding her to his own lazy rhythm.

Emily could not look him in the face. She felt agonisingly aware of him, and also of the memory of dancing with him seven years ago. She’d been so affected and overwhelmed by him then. Clearly nothing had changed.

Jason touched her chin with his finger. ‘Can’t you look at me?’

Reluctantly, Emily forced her gaze upwards. ‘Of course.’ Yet when she took in the blaze of his eyes, the wry twisting of his lips, she wished she hadn’t risen to his challenge. She couldn’t look at him. She couldn’t tell what he felt. Or if he was thinking about their kiss the way she was … with every nerve and muscle of her body.

Involuntarily she’d stiffened, the memories and uncertainties causing her to stop their slow dance, and Jason gently nudged her hip with his hand, forcing her to move again. Sway. Her hip came into gentle contact with his and she felt a lightning shaft of awareness. Bone against bone. She angled her body away from his, which was difficult considering how close he was holding her.

‘Are you acting so skittish because I kissed you?’ he asked in that practical, matter-of-fact way that was so essentially Jason, and at this moment Emily did not know how to respond. All her witty retorts seemed to have evaporated. Banter was beyond her.

‘Ah, yes, that kiss,’ she finally said, her tone sounding cringingly false and even hearty. ‘How could I forget?’

‘It would be a poor reflection on me if you had forgotten,’ Jason observed.

She risked a glance upwards; he was gazing at her with a steady, intense assessment that was more unnerving than any glower or scowl. He looked like he was trying to understand her, and surely she didn’t want that. ‘You mean on your kissing abilities?’ she queried flippantly. Or at least as flippantly as she could.

‘Quite. However,’ Jason continued, pulling her closer again so their hips gently collided once more, sending a shaft of agonising awareness low through her pelvis, ‘I know you didn’t forget, and I’m in no doubt of my own abilities.’

Emily let out a little huffy laugh. ‘That’s a bit arrogant.’

‘Is it?’ Jason touched her chin with his thumb, angling her face upwards. His mouth was a whisper away from hers. ‘You wanted me to kiss you seven years ago, Em. Things haven’t changed that much, have they?’

‘Actually, they have,’ Emily retorted, her words sharpening. She did not want to be reminded of that night, not when Jason’s kiss—and her own humiliating response—was so fresh and raw in her mind. Her heart. Things had changed; she was different. ‘In any case, Jason, if you meant that kiss as some kind of proof, I’m sorry to say it failed.’

‘Proof?’ Jason repeated. He sounded genuinely puzzled. ‘Proof of what?’

‘That Richard’s not boring,’ Emily said impatiently. He’d told her so himself, so why was he looking at her as if she had just said something utterly nonsensical? ‘You said,’ she reminded him. ‘Remember?’

In one quick yet fluid motion, Jason guided her off the dance floor. Emily could barely keep up with him, tripping in her heels, his hand now encircling her wrist, as he led her from the crowded ballroom to a small secluded lounge off the lobby of the hotel. The sudden silence unnerved her, left her defenceless. All she could hear was the ragged tear of her own breathing, and all the words that hadn’t yet been said.

Jason stared at her for a long moment, spots of colour high on his cheekbones although his eyes were assessing and cool. ‘What?’ Emily demanded. ‘You told me yourself, Jason.’

‘I know I did,’ he said, his voice as calm and measured as always despite the colour still flaring in his face, ‘but only because you needed a reason.’ A faint smile flickered over his features. ‘As far as responses to a kiss go, “What was that for?” is fairly insulting.’

‘But logical,’ Emily returned. ‘Why else would you kiss me, Jason?’

Jason’s eyebrows rose. ‘Why else?’

‘You never wanted to before.’

He kept staring at her, his brow furrowed now as if he were figuring out a complicated maths problem … or her. Emily crossed her arms over her chest, the pink satin stretching alarmingly across her breasts. She was really beginning to regret this dress.

‘Is this about the time we danced at Isobel and Jack’s wedding? All those years ago? How I supposedly humiliated you?’

He sounded so disbelieving that Emily knew he didn’t know. Hadn’t seen how she’d bolted from the dance floor in tears. Although it amazed her that he hadn’t noticed; she’d felt so obvious and exposed. ‘It was a long time ago, I know,’ she said stiffly. ‘And of course it hardly matters now—’

‘Of course it does matter,’ Jason cut across her, ‘since we’re having this conversation.’

‘I just felt very rejected,’ Emily said, her words stilted and stiff, each one drawn from her with the utmost reluctance. She had wanted to banish this memory, had convinced herself she had. Yet seeing Jason again—having him mention it after so many years of silence—brought it all rushing back, made her realise afresh how painful that little episode had been. She couldn’t laugh about it now; maybe she never had been able to.

And now she felt as if she were giving Jason more ammunition to tease her, or at least give her one of those coolly mocking looks. She waited for one eyebrow to arch as he gave her some dry rejoinder. If you’re going to offer yourself on a plate, Em …

Instead, he said something else entirely. ‘Emily, I told you then how I wanted to kiss you.’

She stared at him, shocked, totally unprepared for this admission. ‘No, you didn’t—’

‘Yes, I did,’ Jason replied, his words sharp, as if he were angry about the truth of it. As if he hadn’t wanted to want to kiss her. Perhaps he hadn’t. ‘In fact, I remember exactly what I said. You asked if I’d like to kiss you, and I told you I would, rather.’

‘But I won’t,’ Emily finished woodenly.

Jason stared at her for another endless moment before the corner of his mouth quirked upwards. ‘And clearly you only paid attention to the second clause of that sentence.’

‘And clearly you aced grammar,’ Emily threw back at him. She didn’t want to talk about this any more; she didn’t want to remember. ‘Look, it really doesn’t matter. It was seven years ago.’ She let out a long breath that shuddered only slightly. ‘It was just a moment. A silly moment.’ Why had she ever asked him to kiss her? And why hadn’t she been able to forget when he finally had?

‘It wasn’t,’ Jason said quietly, ‘a silly moment for me.’

Emily froze. Forgot to breathe. She could not make sense of his words; they fell into the taut stillness between them and lay there, demanding she do something with them. Ask. ‘What are you talking about?’ she finally whispered.

‘I wanted to kiss you, Emily,’ Jason said. His voice was quiet and yet so very matter-of-fact. ‘I wanted to kiss you very badly, but I didn’t because you were seventeen years old and I doubted you’d ever been kissed before.’

Colour washed her cheekbones. ‘I hadn’t,’ she admitted, her voice still no more than a thread of sound.

‘I was twenty-nine. Older than you are now. And the realisation that I could want to kiss you, want you so much terrified and shamed me. You were too young.’

Emily stared at him as she tested the truth of his words. She remembered how he’d glared at her; he’d looked so angry. ‘But you … you pushed me away like you couldn’t stand the thought of me—or kissing me!’ she finally burst out, amazed that it could hurt even now. For years she’d convinced herself that silly little moment between them had been nothing more than that. Silly. Little. Yet now she knew she couldn’t pretend, not when Jason was being so honest. That silly little moment hadn’t been silly—or little—at all. Not for her, and perhaps not even for Jason.

‘I pushed you away,’ Jason said, his patience clearly starting to fray, ‘because I didn’t want to humiliate myself—or you! There couldn’t be anything between us then, not when you were no more than a teenager.’

Then. He made it sound as if it might be different now. As if something—what?—could happen between them now. The thought was so overwhelming, so alarming and exciting and yet somehow preposterous, that Emily could think of nothing to say. She didn’t even know how she felt, how to untangle this confusing rush of emotions—shock, fear, anxiety, excitement, hope—that raced dizzily through her and left her robbed of speech or even breath, so she could only stare at him, helpless, hopeful, waiting.

Jason watched several different emotions chase themselves across Emily’s features. He’d shocked her, he knew. He’d been honest—more honest than he’d intended—and now she didn’t know what to say. Think. Feel.

And neither did he. His mind and body had been in a ferment for too long. He couldn’t keep himself from Emily, despite every intention to do just that. Time and time again he’d sought her out, been drawn to her in a way he could not resist. The realisation was aggravating. Humbling too. He’d always prided himself on his sense of self-control, his iron resolve—both had crumbled to nothing when he’d finally given into desire and kissed Emily, felt her sweet, yielding response, her lips parting under his, her body curving against

him. He wanted Emily. He’d gone to Africa to escape her, escape the attraction he’d felt, and instead he’d endured days of remembering just how she’d felt and tasted, nights where he’d relived that one kiss in his mind. And imagined a few other things besides.