By Request Collection April-June 2016. Оливия Гейтс

Not necessarily in that order.

      For just one moment he thought he’d noted those precise details in a face before, but the snatch of memory was fleeting, if in fact it was memory at all, and flittered away before he could pin it down to a place or time. No matter. Nothing mattered right now but that she was there and that he had a good feeling about tonight. His lips curved into a smile. A very good feeling.

      ‘Not yet. Dinner is set for eight in the presidential suite.’

      She glanced at the sparkly evening watch on her wrist and then over her shoulder, edging ever so slightly towards the door, and as much as he found her agitation gratifying, he knew he had to sort this out. ‘Maybe I should check with the staff that everything’s good with the dinner,’ she suggested. ‘Just remind them that it’s for a party of six now…’

      He shook his head benevolently, imagining this was how gamekeepers felt when they soothed nervous animals. ‘Evelyn, it’s all under control. Besides, there’s something more important you should be doing right now.’ He touched the pad of his middle finger, just one finger, to her shoulder and she jumped and shrank back.

      ‘And what might that be?’ she asked, breathless and trembling and trying to mask it by feigning interest in the closest photographic print on the wall. A picture of the riverbank, he noticed with a glance, of trees and park benches and some old man sitting in the middle of the bench, gazing out at the river. That wouldn’t hold her attention for long. Not when he did this…

      ‘You’re perfect,’ he said, lifting his hand to a stray tendril of hair that had come loose and feeling her shudder as his fingertips caressed her neck. ‘I couldn’t have asked for a better pretend fiancée.’

      Her eyelids fluttered as he swore she swayed into his touch until she seemed to snap herself awake and shift the other way. ‘I sense a “but” coming.’

      ‘No buts,’ he said, pretending to focus on the print on the wall before them. ‘We just have to get our stories straight, in case someone asks us how we met. I was thinking it would make sense to keep things as close to the truth as possible. That you were working as my PA and one thing led to another.’

      ‘I guess.’

      ‘And we’ve been together now, what, two years? Except we don’t see each other that often as I’m always on the move and you live in Australia.’

      ‘That makes sense.’

      ‘That makes perfect sense. And explains why we want to wait before making that final commitment.’

      ‘Marriage.’ She nodded. ‘We’re taking our time.’

      ‘Exactly,’ he said, slipping a tentative arm around her shoulders, feeling her shudder at the contact. ‘We want to be absolutely sure, which is hard when we only get to see each other a few snatched times a year.’

      ‘Okay. I’ve got that.’

      ‘Excellent.’ He turned towards her. Put a finger under her chin and lifted it so that she had no choice but to look into his eyes. ‘But there’s one thing you don’t get.’

      ‘I knew there was a but coming,’ she said, and he would have laughed, but she was so nervous, so on edge, and he didn’t want to spook her. Not when she was so important to him tonight.

      ‘This one’s simple,’ he said. ‘All you have to do is relax with me.’

      ‘I’m perfectly relaxed,’ she said stiffly, sounding more like a prim librarian than any kind of lover.

      ‘Are you, when my slightest touch…’ he ran a fingertip down her arm and she shivered and shied away ‘…clearly makes you uncomfortable.’

      ‘It’s a dinner,’ she said, defensively. ‘Why should you need to touch me?’

      ‘Because any red-blooded man, especially one intending to marry you and who doesn’t get the chance to see you that often, would want to touch you every possible moment of every day.’

      ‘Oh.’

      ‘Oh, indeed. You see my problem.’

      ‘So what do you suggest?’

      Her eyes were wide and luminous and up close he could see they were neither simply green nor blue but all the myriad colours of the sea mixed together, the vibrant green where the shallow water kissed the sand, the sapphire blue of the deep water, and everything in between. And even though she was supposed to be off limits, he found himself wondering what they’d look like when she came.

      ‘I find practice usually makes perfect.’

      She swallowed, and he followed the movement down her slender throat. ‘You want to practise touching me?’

      Fascinated, his thumb found the place where the movement had disappeared, his fingers tracing her collarbone and feeling her trembling response, before sliding around her neck, drawing her closer as his eyes settled on her too-wide lips, deciding they weren’t too wide at all, but as close to perfect as they could get.

      ‘And I want you to practise not jumping every time I do.’

      ‘I…I’ll try,’ she said, a mist rolling in over her eyes, and he doubted she even realised she was already swaying into his touch.

      He smiled as he tilted her chin with his other hand, his thumb stroking along the line of her jaw. ‘You see, it’s not that hard.’

      She blinked, looking confused. ‘I understand. I…I’ll be fine.’

      But he had no intention of ending the lesson yet.

      Not when he had such a willing and biddable pupil. ‘Excellent,’ he said, tilting her chin higher, ‘and now there’s just one more thing.’

      ‘There is?’ she breathed.

      ‘Of course,’ he said, once again drawing her closer, his eyes once again on her lips. ‘We just need to get that awkward first kiss out of the way.’

       CHAPTER FOUR

      SHE barely had time to gasp, barely had time to think before his lips brushed hers, so feather-light in their touch, so devastating in their impact that she trembled against him, thankful for both his solidity and his strength.

      More thankful when his lips returned, this time to linger, to play about her mouth, teasing and coaxing and stealing the air from her lungs.

      She heard a sound—a mewl of pleasure—and realised it had emanated from the depths of her own desperate need.

      Realised she was clinging to him, her fingers anchored in his firm-fleshed shoulders.

      Realised that either or both of these things had triggered something in Leo, for suddenly his kiss deepened, his mouth more punishing, and she was swept away on a wave of sensation like she’d only ever experienced once before. He was everywhere, his taste in her mouth, his hot breath on her cheek, his scent filling the air she breathed.

      And the feel of his steel-like arms around her, his hard body plastered against her, was almost too much to comprehend, too much to absorb.

      It was too much to think. It was enough to kiss and be kissed, to feel the probing exploration of his tongue, the invitation to tangle and dance, and accept that intimate invitation.

      How many nights had she remembered the power of this kiss, remembered what it felt like to be held in Leo’s arms? It had been her secret fantasy, fuelled by one heated encounter with a stranger, but even she had not recalled this utter madness, this sheer frantic expression of need.

      It was everything she’d ever dreamed of and more, that chance to recapture these feelings. And then he shifted to drop his mouth to her throat and she felt him, rock hard against her belly, and she shuddered hard