Annie's Secret. Carole Mortimer

world-renowned Luca de Salvatore!

      ‘Where are you taking me?’ Annie demanded as Luc made no effort to come to a halt once they were outside the conference room, but instead continued to stride purposefully along the hallway to the lifts, punching in a code and then stepping into the lift when the doors immediately opened.

      ‘We are going to my hotel suite. Do not attempt to fight me, Anna,’ he warned as she immediately tried to extricate her wrist from his grasp as he pulled her into the lift with him. ‘You will only succeed in bruising yourself,’ he advised.

      ‘Really?’ she challenged. ‘Are you sure about that?’

      Luc’s gaze remained steadily fixed on the flushed beauty of her face as he considered her challenge. Annie was about five feet six inches tall, but still six or seven inches shorter than he even in her two-inch-heel shoes, and her build, whilst lean and toned, was no match for his superior strength. ‘Very sure,’ he finally answered drily.

      ‘Mistake!’ Annie announced even as Luc felt the turning of her hand in his as she took a firm grip of his wrist and proceeded to turn him and twist his arm up behind him. Her knee was placed in the curve of his back as she attempted to push him down onto the lift floor.

      At least, that was what she had obviously intended to do. Unfortunately for Annie, Luc had spent part of his rebellious youth wandering the back streets of Rome looking for mischief. An occupation which his father had warned would be the death of him if he didn’t learn some self-defence. Luc had learned his lessons diligently and well.

      Annie had absolutely no idea how it was she came to be the one lying on her back on the carpeted floor of the lift, both her hands firmly grasped in one of Luc’s. She stared up at him dazedly as he pinned her there by straddling her hips with strong muscled thighs, and black eyes gleamed down at her with satisfaction.

      Luc tutted mockingly. ‘I do not remember you expressing a preference for rough foreplay four years ago, but perhaps your tastes have become more—’

      ‘Earlier you didn’t even remember me from four years ago!’ Annie gasped accusingly, her efforts to shake him off only succeeding in pressing the hardness of his thighs into her more intimately.

      More intimately? The man was already so aroused she could see the fullness of that arousal bulging against the expensive material of his trousers!

      And she could feel the heat of her own arousal in the flush of her cheeks and the shallowness of her breathing. The telltale tingling of her breasts. The warmth between her thighs.

      ‘And now I do,’ he murmured throatily, that black gaze fixed on the fullness of Annie’s slightly parted lips, raising her captured hands above her head as he leant forward slightly, as if he were going to kiss her. As if he were going to thoroughly enjoy kissing her!

      Annie eyes flashed deeply blue. ‘Too late, I’m afraid,’ she taunted, refusing to give in without a fight. ‘We Balfour girls aren’t known for giving a man a second chance.’

      Luc’s mouth tightened even as he quirked one dark mocking brow. ‘No?’

      ‘No,’ she said defiantly.

      ‘Perhaps we should put that to the test?’ Luc mused huskily, his lips only centimetres away from hers now as those dark eyes held Annie’s captive.

      The warmth of his breath moved softly, seductively, over Annie’s parted lips, an insidious, erotic invasion that robbed her completely of her own breath as she lay beneath the press of Luc’s warm, highly aroused body. Then he moved slightly and his lips instead began to explore the sensitive column of her throat. A throat that arched instinctively into those searching, pleasuregiving lips—

      No, she couldn’t do this. She couldn’t allow this! ‘We’re in a lift, for goodness’ sake!’ Even as Annie made the protest she was aware that her tone lacked conviction. That her breasts were aching inside her bra, the nipples already erect. That the warmth Luc must feel as he rubbed the hardness of his arousal against her must betray her heated response…

      Luc lifted his head to look at her, eyes gleaming with laughter. ‘Fear of discovery only heightens the pleasure, surely?’ He deliberately removed the slide from her hair before releasing it loosely onto her shoulders.

      ‘Not for me it doesn’t!’ Annie snapped.

      Luc allowed the darkness of his gaze to move slowly from Annie’s fevered eyes to her flushed cheeks and swollen lips. Before moving lower to where her breasts were full and firm against her blouse, the nipples clearly outlined. ‘Yes, I can see that,’ he taunted softly.