‘Now what could have inspired this change of attitude?’ he queried, his brilliant dark eyes deriding any attempt at evasion. ‘Was it the proof that my relationship with Veronique is over?’
‘That…that does help,’ she choked out, realising that the break-up arrangement had contributed a great deal to her thinking. Though it didn’t excuse it. No, it was desperation driving this deal and Emily was suddenly afraid Zageo would find that offensive.
He moved around behind her, lifting her long hair back over her shoulder to purr in her ear, ‘So…you are now ready to take this journey with me. You want to take it. You want to feel my touch on your skin.’ He ran soft fingertips down the curve of her spine. ‘You want me to taste all of you.’ He trailed his mouth down her throat, pressing hot sensual kisses. ‘Let me hear you say that, Emily.’
Her hands had fallen to her sides. They were clenching and unclenching as waves of tension rolled through her. She sucked in a quick breath and started pushing out the necessary words. ‘You can do…you can do…whatever you like with me—’
‘No, no, that sounds far too passive,’ he cut in before she could complete spelling out the deal. ‘Though now that you have given me permission…’
He unclipped the bra and slid the straps off her shoulders. As the beaded garment started to fall from her breasts, the sheer shock of being so swiftly bared, jolted Emily into defensive action. Her hands whipped up, catching the cups and plastering them back into place.
‘Did you mean to tease me, Emily? Have I spoilt your game?’ he asked in the silky dangerous tone that shot fearful quivers through her heart. Even as he spoke, his hands glided up from around her waist and covered her own, his fingers extending further than the bra cups to fan the upper swell of her breasts. ‘No matter,’ he assured her. ‘I’m on fire for you anyway.’
‘Stop,’ she finally found voice enough to gasp out. ‘Please…stop.’
‘This does not please you?’
‘No…yes…no…I mean…’
‘What do you mean, Emily?’
His voice was now like a sharp-edged knife, slicing into her. Tears of confusion welled into her eyes. This scene was going—had gone—all wrong. She simply wasn’t sophisticated enough to bring off the subtle sexual bartering that went on in his world.
‘I’ll take this journey with you if you’ll help my sister,’ she blurted out in wild desperation.
‘And you will withhold yourself if I do not agree? You will push me away, refasten your bra, and scorn my desire for you?’ The whiplike edge to his voice gathered more intensity as he added, ‘Not to mention your desire for me.’
It sounded horrible. Everything decent in Emily recoiled from using sex as a bargaining tool. It eliminated any good feelings that might have eventuated from being intimate with this man. She shook her head in hopeless shame and humiliation.
‘I’m sorry…sorry…I didn’t know what else to do.’
‘Little fool,’ he growled. ‘Playing a game that is not in your nature.’
His hands dropped to her waist and spun her around to face him. He cupped her face, his fingers gently sweeping the trickle of tears from her cheeks. The tender gesture was in perverse contrast to the glittering anger in his eyes.
‘Did you imagine I was not aware of your distress over your sister and her family?’
‘They are nothing to you,’ she choked out in a ragged plea for his understanding.
‘You are not nothing to me, Emily.’
‘I was counting on that,’ she confessed.
‘Yet you did not credit me with caring enough to do whatever I could to ease your distress?’
His words seethed with deep offence. Emily frantically seized on what she thought were mitigating circumstances. ‘I don’t know you,’ she pleaded. ‘All I know is you’ve kept me here to…to play with me.’
‘Play with you,’ he repeated in a scoffing tone that stirred Emily’s blood, triggering a flood of volatile feelings that instantly threatened to burst out of control.
She wrenched her head out of his hold, stepping back to let fly at him with her own tirade of deep offence. ‘You’ve had me jumping through hoops ever since I was forced into your company. First, you play the grand inquisitor, deliberately choosing not to believe a word I said. After which, you left me no alternative but to dress up as a belly-dancer for you…’
‘Which you have no problem doing tonight,’ he sliced at her.
‘Because you made it your game, Zageo,’ she asserted vehemently. ‘I was only trying to fit into it.’
‘Fine! Then fit!’
Before Emily could even draw breath to utter another word, he swooped on her, swept her off her feet, and in a dizzying whirl of movement, carried her through the sitting room and beyond it to another lamp-lit room where he tipped her onto a pile of exotic silk and satin cushions spread across a massive, four-poster bed. Her arms flew out to stop herself from rolling. The bra became dislodged again and Zageo whipped it off, leaving her naked from head to hips.
‘No backtracking now, Emily,’ he fired at her. ‘We have a deal. In return for my services in rescuing your family, you’ve agreed to let me do whatever I like with you. Right?’
The violence of his feelings made her pulse beat faster, increasing the wild agitation racing through her. ‘How do I know you’ll help?’ she cried, alarmed by the thought he would just do what he wanted anyway.
‘Because I am a man of honour who always delivers on a deal,’ he stated savagely.
He was shedding his robe, hurling it away. She scrambled to sit up, acutely aware of her full breasts swinging as she did so and realising her nipples had tightened in some instinctive response to the raking heat in his eyes.
‘Are you a woman of your word, Emily?’ he challenged, discarding his tunic and underpants with swift and arrogant carelessness while fiercely warning her, ‘Leave that bed and you leave with nothing from me.’
She sat utterly still, staring at him, not because of the threat but because he looked so stunningly magnificent. She had seen many almost naked men, especially guys who excelled in water sports, and they invariably had well-honed physiques—broad shoulders, flat stomachs, lean hips, powerfully muscled thighs. Zageo had all that but somehow his body was far more pleasingly proportioned.