Response. PENNY JORDAN

hour before Alexis was due to arrive. Incredible to think that this was actually her and that tonight she would sleep in Alexis’ arms, his body next to hers. As always when she thought about touching him, about him making love to her, she was overwhelmed by her reaction to her thoughts. And she wasn’t going to allow herself to think beyond the weekend to the empty weeks when he would be in New York, and she would be here, or about how she was going to endure their separation.

      ‘We’ll soon be stopping for lunch. Are you hungry?’ Only for him, Sienna thought nervously, turning in her seat to give him a brief smile and shaking her head. Why this sense of nervousness and anxiety now when this was what she had wanted from the very moment she first saw him, for them to be together?

      They were almost in the New Forest; their destination, so Alexis had informed her when he picked her up. He had rented a small cottage for them for the weekend, but first they were to have lunch at a hotel which had been recommended to him.

      ‘It used to be a private house,’ he told her as he turned into the driveway. They specialise in Nouvelle Cuisine.’

      She might as well have been served with the unappetising stodge she remembered from school lunches, Sienna thought guiltily an hour and half later, watching Alexis cut himself a wedge of Stilton. She could watch his hands for ever, they were so very beautiful in a totally male way, lean and brown, his fingers long and filbert-nailed, every movement they made deft and precise and yet somehow sensual, as though they knew secrets which were as yet unknown to her. She had refused a sweet, too full of the tension which had been with her ever since they set out. She was being ridiculous, she chided herself mentally, acting like a teenager who didn’t know the first thing about sex, her movements jerky, her whole body betraying her apprehension, and yet this was what she wanted. If Alexis were to announce that he had changed his mind and they were going back to London she would be bitterly, achingly disappointed.

      She glanced quickly up at him. His features were impassive, relaxed, and yet she was aware of something elemental that sent shivers of alarm tingling along her spine. Was it because of her innocence that she felt like this, her ignorance and naïveté, or was it because of his male aura, because of the hunter she sensed lurking beneath the svelte layers of civilisation? This was a man whose heritage was Greek; a man born of a country that put a high price on its women’s virtue, a country where a man could and still did expect to marry a virgin bride. Would she be devaluing herself in his eyes by giving herself to him like this, would he in spite of his claims to love her despise her afterwards?

      Where had such dark thoughts sprung from? Hadn’t she always despised women who bartered their bodies for the security of a wedding ring? She loved Alexis, and he loved her, he had told her so. So where had this feeling of insecurity come from? Perhaps the fact that he must leave her? But he would return, he had told her so, he had talked about their future together….

      ‘Having second thoughts?’ How easily he read her mind, startling her by voicing thoughts she had believed to be secret.

      ‘Sort of.’ Her eyes pleaded with him for reassurance.

      ‘And you want me to persuade you into bed with me?’ He stood up, shaking his head, his breath brushing her ear as he leaned forward and murmured softly, ‘No, Sienna, I won’t do it. You must come to me of your own free will. You must give of yourself freely, or not at all.’ He moved back and she could see how his eyes had changed from light to dark with the intensity of his feelings. Tears clogged in her throat. How could she have doubted him? How could she have harboured such thoughts about a man who said openly that he would not put any pressure on her?

      ‘Well?’ He was guiding her out of the hotel, to where his car waited. ‘Have you changed your mind? Do you want to return to London and your virginal bed?’

      The warmth of his arm felt so right against her waist, his hip hard against her softness, and she raised her face to him shaking her head. ‘No.’ Her voice was husky, tremulous with all that she felt and could not say. ‘No, Alexis, I want to go on.’

      He smiled and in that smile she saw all his male triumph, all his pleasure in her admission, and yet she could not begrudge it to him. As he opened her car door for her he bent towards her, brushing the softness of her lips with the hardness of his own. ‘You can’t know how much it means to me to hear you say that, Sienna… but later… tonight, I will show you.’

      The cottage was perfect, remote, surrounded by the sounds of the forest, intimate and cosily furnished so that she felt at home the moment she stepped down into the small living room and felt its warmth enclose her.

      There was a kitchen, beautifully fitted out with warm oak units, a meal had been left prepared for them and merely needed heating up. Although the cottage was centrally heated it was cool enough for her to be tempted when Alexis offered to light the open fire in the living room. The ceiling of the room was so low that when he stood upright his head barely scraped under the ancient beams.

      ‘I’ll see to the fire while you unpack,’ he told her, getting down on his knees, his back to her. She was sure he had done it deliberately, sensing the panic that had been building up inside her at the thought of going up those narrow stairs with him behind her. The cottage only possessed one bedroom, prettily decorated by someone with a liking for Laura Ashley, and the bathroom adjacent was decorated to match. The room felt warm and homely, so much more intimate than a hotel would have been.

      The perfect place for a honeymoon, Sienna thought yearningly, then caught back the thought. She was being so silly behaving like this as though she were the victim of some seduction plan and about to be transformed into a scarlet woman! She was free to leave even now if she wanted to. She was here with Alexis because she wanted to be. She dawdled over unpacking what little she had brought with her. There was no need for her to change, the suit she had travelled down in was a soft heather tweed and was perfectly suitable for spending the evening in.

      ‘Fire’s lit. Do you fancy a drink?’ Alexis’ voice, so calm, calmed her frenzied nerves, his mundane question taking her to the head of the stairs to give an assent. ‘While you’re up there will you unpack for me?’

      Ridiculous to feel so embarrassed about touching his clothes. How many times had she packed for Rob or her father and never given it another thought, but these things belonged to the man who would soon be her lover, and it was different. She noticed that he hadn’t packed any pyjamas, and felt her skin flush even though there was no one there to see it, or to witness the way her eyes darkened at the thought of his body against hers. She felt as though she knew him already, but she didn’t and she hurried over her task, anxious to return downstairs and reassure herself that the whole thing wasn’t just a dream.

      ‘Tired?’

      The Beethoven had come to a close, and there was really nothing to keep them downstairs any longer. The fire had burned down and Alexis’ glass was empty. They had finished dinner three hours ago, and now as she listened to the dying crackle of the last apple log Sienna lifted her head from his shoulder.

      ‘Mmm… a little….’ She felt the laughter shake his body and tensed, feeling childishly hurt. He must have done this so many times before, while she….

      ‘Ah, no, you are wrong.’ Again he had read her mind and he turned to her in the light from the fire, cupping her face with his hands, his eyes sombre, brooding almost, reminding her of that ancient heritage she had seen in him earlier. ‘There have been other times, but none before like this… none that have meant as much to me as this does. I shall ask you again, Sienna, do you come to me willingly? Do you?’

      ‘Yes… yes!’ She said it fiercely, pushing back all her doubts and fears, willing him to help her to sweep them away with the magic of his touch. His mouth brushed hers, gently, slowly, his thumb probing the softness of her lips until they parted and his tongue ran lightly over the fullness of her lower one. Her breath caught in the back of her throat, the faintest sound, but he heard it and responded to it, his hand sliding along her throat, tangling in the thickness of her hair, bending her head back against his arm, the hunger building in him as his mouth closed on hers.

      She was melting, dissolving, turning into