Hot Summer Flings: A Spanish Awakening / The Italian Next Door... / Interview with the Daredevil. Nicola Marsh

embarrassing moment never going to be allowed to die?

      ‘No, I do not, but I have excellent recall for some things.’ The weekend he had realised that he had been a blind fool had lingered in his mind.

      ‘I didn’t look that bad. Did I?’ She bit her lip, hating the fact she sounded as if she was asking for his approval.

      And you’re not?

      The question made him blink. ‘Bad …?’ Emilio ejaculated hoarsely.

      He shook his head. The rest of the world looked at Megan and saw an incredibly beautiful woman, but what, he wondered grimly, did she see when she looked in the mirror?

      Had that boyfriend of hers been too busy admiring himself in the mirror to make her see she was stunning? His opinion of the man, never high, now zoomed to below zero. As for that family of hers, he brooded darkly, they had a hell of a lot to answer for!

      On his visits to the Armstrong household over the span of several years, Emilio had been forced on numerous occasions to remind himself it was not his business as he watched the attempts of Philip’s little sister, not to win approval or praise from her family, but simply to be noticed.

      Doomed attempts, obviously it went without saying. The Armstrongs were a loud, egocentric bunch too busy with their own lives to show any interest in anything else, especially the new and painfully unsure member of the family.

      ‘There’s no need to yell,’ Megan bellowed, then looked shocked. She was not in the habit of raising her voice, as much as the last hour belied that fact.

      From the expression on his dark face she had the strong feeling that Emilio was equally unaccustomed to being yelled at.

      On another occasion his astounded expression might have amused her, but at that moment she felt as though she might never laugh again.

      Emilio swore under his breath, the muscles along his strong jaw tightening as his scorching dark gaze swept across the features turned up to him. Being furious with her was not reducing the level of his painful arousal. If anything it was feeding the desire that licked through his veins like a forest fire, out of control—did he want to control it?

      Emilio shifted his weight in a futile effort to ease the pain in his groin. This was not a moment for deep analysis. He could barely string a sequence of intelligible words together, let alone indulge in self-analysis of the complex mixture of emotions that he was struggling with.

      Megan, her head tilted to one side, watched through the veil of her lashes as he dragged a shapely brown hand through the ebony strands of his gleaming dark head. Her level of fascination with his fingers, the size, elegance, strength and shape of his hands, was beginning to escape her control.

      What control? asked the ironic inner voice in her head.

      ‘Por Dios, there is every need to shout,’ he contended, studying her flushed face with an air of scowling disbelief as he fought to subdue the protective feelings that surfaced when he saw the reflection of whatever inner battle she was fighting shining in her eyes.

      It was easier to focus on his anger.

      He knew she was feeling the erotic charge that hung heavily in the air between them. How could she not? It almost had a physical presence.

      Why was she fighting it? Why couldn’t she just relax and let it happen? His jaw clenched in frustration. It was as if she couldn’t get past the fact he’d been the one to rescue her from an unpleasant and potentially dangerous situation.

      Was it because he’d seen her vulnerable? Did that not mesh with the cool, controlled image she obviously wanted to project?

      He dragged a hand down his jaw and decided it was useless to try and figure out her reasoning because, quite clearly, there was none.

CHAPTER NINE

      ‘WAS I drunk?’

      The simmering hostility in Emilio’s manner as much as the abrupt question made Megan blink. ‘What? ‘

      His dark eyes flashed. ‘Was I forcing myself on you? Por Dios, no, I was not! ‘

      ‘I never—’

      ‘So at what point did I become the bad guy?’ he demanded, cutting across her.

      ‘I never—’

      ‘The fact is you were lucky I was there, but you’re too stubborn to admit it! You are just as stupid now as you were then!’

      Megan’s chin went up at the insult. Eyes narrowed, she threw back her head, glaring up at him with simmering hostility. ‘And you are just as arrogant and judgemental.’

      A hissing sound of irritation escaped his clenched teeth. ‘Also, do you know,’ he drawled, ‘how incredibly boring this ugly-duckling routine of yours is?’

      Megan’s amber eyes lit up like beacons with anger. ‘Oh, I’m so sorry to bore you.’ If she’d been some long-legged lissom beauty with plastic boobs attached to a skeletal clothes-hanger frame he would no doubt make allowances for an IQ in single figures.

      Emilio’s teeth audibly ground in response to her sarcastic insincerity.

      ‘Of course, if I had known I was expected to entertain you, I’d have made more of an effort—worn a funny nose, perhaps?’ she suggested, pressing the tip of her finger to her small, classically perfect nose.

      He gave a hard laugh and watched as her hand fell, revealing the delicate purity of her features only spoiled from being textbook classical by the generosity of her lips. Emilio, his eyes glued to the full, lush curve, did not think it spoiled anything.

      It took every ounce of his strength not to grab her and crush her mouth under his. He inhaled sharply through flared nostrils and snarled.

      ‘Do not be absurd! ‘

      His dismissive, plain nasty attitude fed her anger and sense of growing resentment. ‘So I’m assuming for “absurd” read anyone who says anything you don’t like?’

      Which couldn’t, she reasoned darkly, be something that happened very often. The problem with Emilio Rios was that people were willing to cross oceans, let alone roads, to avoid antagonising him, and from where she was standing it was easy to see why.

      He had not gained the reputation of being a bad man to get on the wrong side of by accident! And he did look pretty magnificent if you liked your dark and moody with an edge of danger.

      And she, it turned out, did!

      As Megan watched a shaft of sunlight from an angled skylight hit his face. He had no reason to fear the unforgiving light; there were no flaws or shortcomings to be revealed.

      He was perfect.

      A furrow of concentration appeared between Megan’s feathery brows as her rapt gaze lingered on the hard angles and hollows of his patrician face, the strong, sculpted contours emphasised by the dusting of dark hair sprinkled already over his clean-shaven jaw. She wondered how it would feel against her skin and shivered, unable to tear her rapt gaze from his face.

      He was nothing short of breathtaking to look at!

      ‘You make a great deal of effort to be rude to me, querida. I wonder why?’ he mused.

      ‘It’s no effort, believe me, and don’t call me that,’ she snapped, her discomfort increased by the casual endearment.

      Privately she conceded he did have a point. Where was the diplomacy she was famed for? Winding Emilio up was a bit like getting into a tiger’s cage and throwing sticks at it.

      A person had to expect the tiger to leap so the question remained why? A mental image of Emilio falling across her body flashed into Megan’s head, the erotic fantasy so powerful that she could actually feel