One Night with Morelli

‘Help… Thief!’

Dozens must have heard her anguished cry but nobody reacted until the tall hooded youth—a stereotype if there ever was one—who was shouldering his way through the crowd clutching her bag hit one pedestrian who did not move aside.

She saw the thief bounce off this immovable object and hit the pavement face down before crowds hid him and her bag from view.

She missed the thief shaking his head as he looked up, a snarl on his thin, acne-marked face aimed at the man at whose feet he lay sprawled. The snarl melted abruptly and was replaced by a flash of fear as he released the bag handle as though it were alight and, lurching to his feet, ran away.

Draco sighed. If he weren’t already very late he might have chased the culprit but he was, so instead he bent to pick up the stolen bag, which immediately opened, disgorging its contents at his feet and all over the pavement.

Draco blinked. In his thirty-three years he’d seen a lot and few things had the power to surprise him any more. In fact, only that very morning he’d asked himself if he was in a rut—the trouble with ruts was you didn’t always recognise you were in one—but standing ankle-deep in ladies’ underwear—wildly sexy lingerie, to be precise—most definitely surprised him.

Now that, he thought, was something that didn’t happen every day of the week—at least not to him.

One dark mobile brow elevated, and with a half-smile tugging his sensually sculpted lips upwards he bent forward and hooked a bra from the top of the silky heap. Silk, and a shocking-pink tartan, it was definitely a statement and, if he was any judge, a D cup.

Under his breath he read the hand-sewn label along one seam.

‘Eve’s Temptation.’ It was catchy and the name rang a faint bell.

Had Rachel had something similar in a more subdued colour? He sighed. While he missed the great sex, if he was honest—and he generally was—he didn’t miss Rachel herself, and he had no regrets about his decision to terminate their short and, he had assumed, mutually satisfactory arrangement.

Only she had crossed the line. It had started with the ‘we’ and ‘us’ comments—we could stop off at my parents’, my sister has offered us her ski lodge as it’ll be empty at New Year. Draco blamed himself for allowing it to pass as long as he had, but in his defence the sex had been very good indeed.

Things had finally come to a head a couple of months ago when she had accidentally bumped into him in the middle of an exclusive department store on one of the rare occasions when he was able to spend some quality time with his daughter.

It wasn’t her appallingly obvious efforts to ingratiate herself with Josie that had stuck in Draco’s mind; it was his daughter’s comment on the way home.

‘Don’t be too brutal will you, Dad, when you dump her?’

The worried expression in her eyes had made him realise that he’d become complacent, he’d allowed the once clearly defined lines between his home life and the other aspects of his life to blur. It was more important to keep that protective wall around his home life now that Josie was getting older than it ever had been.

The day he had looked at his baby and realised that her mother wasn’t coming back he had sworn that this desertion would not affect her; he would protect her, give her security. He had made some inevitable mistakes along the way but at least he hadn’t allowed her to form attachments with the women he had enjoyed fleeting liaisons with over the years and risk being hurt when they too left.

‘Nice,’ he murmured, running his thumb over the fine butter-soft silk.

‘That’s mine.’ Eve’s determined gaze was fixed on the pink tartan bra that she hoped was going to be next season’s best-seller.

‘You’re Eve?’

‘Yes.’ The response was automatic. She could, if she’d wanted, have claimed ownership of, not just the name, but the bra and the brand of which she was justifiably proud, though there was a strong possibility that, as on numerous previous occasions, the information would be received with scepticism.

She understood why: it was all about appearances and she simply didn’t look the part of a successful businesswoman, let alone one who was the founder of a successful underwear company that had based its brand on glamour with a quirky edge that not only looked good but was comfortable to wear.

‘It was very brave of you to stop that thief running away with my bag. I hope he didn’t hurt you.’ Her smile faded dramatically as she looked up into the face of the man who was holding her sample. ‘I’m very…’ She cleared her throat and swallowed, her tongue uncomfortably glued to the roof of her mouth.

There were several other equally disturbing accompanying symptoms, and it was so totally unexpected that it took her a few heart-racing moments to put a name to the frantic heart-pounding, uncontrolled heat rush and visceral clutch that dug into her stomach and tightened like a fist. Even the fine invisible hair on her forearms was tingling in response to what this man exuded, which was—give it a name, Evie, and move on, she told herself sternly—raw sex!

Either that or this was a much less publicised symptom of jet lag!

‘Grateful.’ For small mercies—I didn’t drool, she added silently, refusing to contemplate the mortifying possibility that she had been standing there with her mouth open for more than a few seconds.

Now that she was able to study his face with the objectivity she prided herself on, Eve could see that, though her first impressions were right—he was quite remarkably good–looking; maybe the most good-looking man she’d ever seen up close—it wasn’t his face or athletic body that had caused her nervous system to go into meltdown, it was the aura of raw sexuality that he exuded like a force field.

That made sense, because obvious good looks didn’t do it for her—they never had—and his were very, very obvious! It wasn’t that she had anything against cheekbones you could cut yourself on, classic square firm jawlines, overtly sensual lips or eyelashes that long—actually the crazily long and spiky eyelashes framing deep-set liquid dark eyes were kind of nice—it was just that Eve had always liked a face with character belonging to men who spent less time looking in the mirror than she did. And of course being a man he didn’t have to worry about the thin white scar beside his mouth. It didn’t matter that the likelihood was he’d done it doing something as mundane as falling off his bike as a kid; it added to the air of brooding danger and mystery he exuded.

The thought of being considered a hero for just standing still and letting the thief bump into him drew an ironic smile. ‘I’ll survive.’

Well, his ego would at least—it could obviously withstand a force-ten gale. The uncharacteristically uncharitable thought brought a furrow to her brow but for some reason just looking at him made her skin prickle with antagonism.

Draco gave up the D cup and studied the claimant, a breathless pink-faced female who snatched it from his fingers. The bra couldn’t be hers as she was definitely not a D cup. Actually, he was pretty sure she was not wearing a bra at all, and there was a definite chill in the air—well, this was London; when wasn’t there? His interested glance drifted and lingered on her small but pert breasts heaving dramatically beneath the loose white shirt she wore.

Eve, catching the direction of his stare, felt her colour deepen even though she knew she was being a bit paranoid. Nothing could be less revealing than her shirt; anything tighter rubbed the small scar below her shoulder blade that was still a little tender.

‘Thank you.’ She struggled to inject some warmth into her response and, just to be on the safe side, fastened her jacket, taking care not to put too much pressure on her shoulder. By next week it ought to be healed enough for her to be able to wear a bra again.

‘You’re actually called Eve?’ His curious gaze roamed over her heart-shaped face. If the original Eve had possessed a mouth that lush and inviting he for one would have cut Adam some slack.

‘Let me guess—you’re Adam.’ She sighed as though it was a tired line she’d heard often.

‘No, I’m Draco, but you can call me Adam if you want to.’

‘A lovely offer but I doubt we’ll ever be on first-name terms.’ She thanked him again, crammed the last camisole into the bag and snapped it closed then, after tilting a nod in his direction, hurried away.

He’s not watching, Eve, so why the hip swaying? she berated herself crossly.

He was watching.

* * *

Frazer Campbell, a meticulous man, reached the bottom of the page, readjusted his half-moon specs and began at the top of the page again. Draco’s jaw clenched as he struggled to control his impatience.

‘I am assuming this is an empty threat?’ he asked.

The letter, though sprinkled with pseudo-legal phrases, was written by hand, the writing his ex-wife’s, the wording definitely not… Draco strongly suspected that she had received some help with it, and even without the headed notepaper it didn’t take a genius to figure out who from. His ex-wife’s fiancе, Edward Weston, had got his seat in Parliament on the family value ticket—so it wasn’t hard to see where he was coming from. Selling yourself to the British public as a defender of family values was tough when your future bride had played a very peripheral role in her own daughter’s life.

Draco didn’t personally know the man, though he’d heard him called a joke on more than one occasion and maybe, if the subject he had chosen to poke his nose into had been any other, he might have been laughing—but he wasn’t.

One thing he absolutely did not joke about was his daughter’s welfare.

Frazer, older by several years than the man who was pacing the room restless as a caged panther in the enclosed space, smoothed the paper with the flat of his hand as he laid it back on his desk—it had landed there in an angry, crumpled ball.

‘It’s not really a threat as such, is it?’ Edward Weston came across as pompous but he wasn’t a total idiot and anyone who threatened Draco would have to be; the wealthy London-based Italian entrepreneur was famous for many things but turning the other cheek was not one of them! Frazer counted himself lucky to call Draco friend—you tended to bond pretty quickly with someone you got buried in an avalanche with—but if he hadn’t been, Draco’s reputation alone would have made him someone Frazer would have avoided.

The comment earned him a flash from Draco’s dark eyes.

‘Do you want to hear what I think or what you want to hear?’ Frazer’s shaggy brows twitched into a straight line as he noticed for the first time what his friend was wearing: full morning suit. ‘Your wedding?’ he asked cautiously.

‘Marriage!’ The single word made the speaker’s opinion of that institution quite clear, it dripped with such acid scorn.