A Kiss At Midnight. Kate Hardy

      He stayed still, ice curling through him as she looked at the livid scars on his legs, the constant reminder that he didn’t deserve happiness after he’d taken it from Paulo’s family with his selfish desire to win.

      The silence stretched between them. She was shocked. He could see it in her eyes. Damn it, she couldn’t even find the words to voice her disgust, but after what she’d just given him he owed this much to her.

      Slowly she knelt up and trailed her fingertips down his thigh, over the ugly and gnarled skin. He held his breath as she moved below his knee where the pins held him together.

      Anger surged through him. He was no longer in control. He was now the vulnerable one. ‘Those scars are nothing compared to the fact that I lived and another man died—and it was my fault.’

      Her hand froze and slowly she looked at him, shock in her eyes, in the lift of her delicate brows and those soft sensual lips. The disbelieving whisper of her words told him all he needed to know. ‘Your fault?’

      ‘I wanted to win—at any cost,’ he said, and scowled at the memories, wanting to shock her, punish her for seeing him like this. ‘It’s my fault. Paulo died because of me, because of my selfish need to be number one. I killed my friend.’

      ‘No.’ She pulled her hand away from him and sat back against the sofa, clutching one of the throws against her nakedness.

      ‘It’s not just my injuries that mean I can no longer race. It’s the guilt that another man will never be on the track again.’

      She didn’t say anything else, just looked at him, and he knew what they’d shared so briefly was over. Reality had already crept in.

      ‘As you started the race, did you plan to crash?’ Her tone was serious and strong.

      He flung up his hands in exasperation. ‘Dio mio, of course I didn’t.’

      ‘Then it was an accident. Tragic, yes, but an accident.’ She moved towards him with purpose, pity in her eyes. She reached up and touched his face, the caress too gentle, too caring.

      ‘No.’ He grabbed her wrist firmly, shock making her gasp.

      He couldn’t shake off the past that easily. What if she hated him after this? What if she stayed here with him simply because she didn’t want to be alone in the dark and unfamiliar house?

      ‘It’s not your fault,’ she whispered. ‘Tonight it’s as if we’ve stepped into another world, away from everyone and everything. Let’s stay there, make the most of it and forget everything. Everything, Xavier.’

      She lowered herself over him, kissing him, kissing his scars and smothering the guilt their conversation had evoked. At first he couldn’t move, but fear of her rejection was gradually being replaced by hot desire. As she moved up his body to his chest, he caught her face between his hands and kissed her as if his life depended on it.

      As the kiss continued, he closed his eyes against the demons from the accident, desperate to recapture the magic he and Tilly had shared just a few hours ago. Slowly her fingers trailed down his chest, tantalising and teasing, and reality slipped away.