A Breathless Bride. Fiona Brand

and scalding humiliation.

      Oh, no, no way. She would not feel this.

      Face burning, Sienna jerked free, her purse flying. Shoving wet hair out of her face, she bent to retrieve her purse and the few items that had scattered—lip gloss, compact, car keys.

      Her keys. Great idea, because she was leaving now.

      If Constantine wanted a conversation he would have to reschedule. There was no way she was staying around for more of the same media humiliation she’d suffered two years ago.

      “Damn. Sienna …”

      Was that a hint of softness in his eyes? His voice?

      No. Couldn’t be.

      When Constantine crouched down to help gather her things, she hurriedly shoveled the items into her bag. The rain had started up again, an annoying steamy drizzle, although that fact was now inconsequential because every part of her was soaked. Wet hair trailed down her cheeks, her dress felt like it had been glued on and there were puddles in her shoes.

      Constantine hadn’t fared any better. His gray suit jacket was plastered to his shoulders, his white shirt transparent enough that the bronze color of his skin showed through.

      She dragged her gaze from the mesmerizing sight. “Uh-uh. Sorry.” She shot to her feet. She was so not talking now. His transparent shirt had reminded her about her dress. It was black, so it wouldn’t reveal as much as white fabric when wet, but silk was silk and it was thin. “Your conversation will have to wait. As you can see, I’m wet.”

      She spun on her heel, looking for an avenue of escape that didn’t contain reporters with microphones and cameras.

      His arm snaked around her waist, pulling her back against the furnace heat of his body. “After four days of unreturned calls,” he growled into her ear, sending a hot shiver down her spine, “if you think I’m going to cool my heels for one more second, you can think again.”

       Two

      Infuriated by the intimacy of his hold and the torrent of unwanted sensation, Sienna pried at Constantine’s fingers. “Let. Me. Go.”

      “No.” His gaze slid past hers.

      Movement flickered at the periphery of Sienna’s vision, she heard a car door slam.

      Constantine muttered something curt beneath his breath. Now that the torrential downpour was over, the media were emerging from their vehicles.

      He spun her around in his arms. “I wasn’t going to do this. You deserve what’s coming.”

      Her head jerked up, catching his jaw and sending a hot flash of pain through her skull, which infuriated her even more. “Like I did last time? Oh, very cool, Constantine. As if I’m some kind of hardened criminal just because I care about my family—”

      Something infinitely more dangerous than the threat of unwanted media exposure stirred in his eyes. “Is that what you call it? Interesting concept.”

      His level tone burned, more than the edgy heat that had invaded her body, or the castigating guilt that had eaten at her for the past two years. That maybe their split had been all her fault, and not just a convenient quick exit for a wealthy bachelor who had developed cold feet. That maybe she had committed a crime in not revealing how dysfunctional and debt-ridden her family was.

      Her jaw tightened. “What did I ever do to truly hurt you, Constantine?”

      Grim amusement curved his mouth. “If you’re looking for a declaration, you’re wasting your breath.”

      “Don’t I know it.” She planted her palms on his chest and pushed.

      He muttered a low, rough Medinian phrase. “Stay still.”

      The Medinian language—an Italian dialect with Greek and Arabic influences—growled out in that deep velvet tone, sent a shock of awareness through her along with another hot tingling shiver.

      Darn, darn, darn. Why did she have to like that?

      Incensed that some crazy part of her was actually turned on by this, she kept up the pressure, her palms flattened against the solid muscle of his chest, maintaining the bare inch of space that existed between them.

      An inch that wasn’t nearly enough given that explosive contact.

      Maybe, just maybe, the press would construe this little tussle as Constantine comforting her instead of an undignified scuffle. “Who called the press?” She stabbed an icy glare at him. “You?”

      He gave a short bark of laughter. “Cara, I pay people to keep them off.”

      She warded off another one of those hot little jabs of response. “Don’t call me—”

      “What?” he said. “Darling? Babe? Sweetheart?”

      His long, lean fingers gripped her jaw, trapping her. He bent close enough that anyone watching would assume their embrace was intimate, that he was about to kiss her.

      A bittersweet pang went through her. She could see the crystalline depths of his eyes, the tiny beads of water clinging to his long, black lashes, the red mark on his jaw where her head had caught him, and a potent recollection spun her back to the first time they had met, two years ago.

      It had been dark but, just like now, it had been raining. Her forward vision impeded by an umbrella, she had jogged from a taxi to the front door of a restaurant when they had collided. That time she had ended up on the wet pavement. Her all-purpose little black dress had been shorter, tighter. Consequently the sexy little side split had torn and her umbrella and one shoe had gone missing in action.

      Constantine had apologized and asked if anything was broken. Riveted by the low, sexy timbre of his voice as he had crouched down and fitted the shoe back on her foot, she’d had the dizzying conviction that when she had fallen she had landed in the middle of her favorite fairy tale and Prince Charming had never looked so good. She had replied, “No, of course not.”

      Although, she had whimsically decided, when he left her heart could be broken.

      The pressure of Constantine’s grip on her arms zapped her back to the present. A muscle pulsed along the side of his jaw and she was made abruptly aware that, his mystifying anger aside, Constantine was just as disturbed as she.

      “Basta,” he growled. Enough.

      Constantine jerked back from the soft curve of Sienna’s mouth and the heady desire that, despite all of his efforts, he had never been able to eradicate. “You’re wearing the same dress.”

      “No,” she snapped back, informing him that in the confusion of the collision she had been as caught up by the past as he. “That was a cocktail dress.”

      “It feels the same.” Wet and sleek and almost as sensual as her skin.

      “Take your hands off me and you won’t have to feel a thing.”

      Her voice was clipped and as cool as chipped ice, but the husky catch in her throat, her inability to entirely meet his gaze, told a different story.

      He should let her go. She was clearly shaken. Lucas had been right—on the day of her father’s funeral he should show compassion. But despite the demands of common decency, Constantine was unwilling to allow her any leeway at all.

      Two years ago Sienna Ambrosi had achieved what no other woman had done. She had fooled him utterly. Touching her now should be repugnant to him. Instead, he was riveted by the fierce challenge in her dark eyes and the soft, utterly feminine shape of her body pressed against his. And drawn to find out exactly how vulnerable she was toward him. “Not until I have what I came for.”

      Her pupils dilated with shock, and any lingering uncertainty he might have entertained about her involvement in her father’s scam evaporated. She was in this up to her elegant neck. The confirmation was unexpectedly depressing.