The Platinum Collection. Maisey Yates

of herself. It was one thing to love a man, another thing entirely to drop one’s self-esteem in pursuit of him. Her teeth clenched, she moved back to the bed, doused the light and clambered below the sheet with hot tears stinging her eyes. She ignored the tears, determined not to let go of her control, determined not to greet him in the morning with swollen reddened eyes that would destroy her pride.

      Cursing below his breath, Mikhail went for another cold shower. It was sex, that was all, he told himself. It was nothing to do with the fact that the bed felt empty without her and he missed her chatter. It was logical to end it, logical to guard against getting involved. When it came to a woman, he was far too clever and disciplined to give weight to illogical feelings and irrational and undoubtedly sexual promptings.

      After a sleepless night, Kat asked for breakfast in her room, seeing no reason why she should put herself through another nerve-racking meeting with Mikhail. Indeed the less she saw of him before she left, the better, she told herself urgently. She dressed with great care in a smart blue shift dress and cardigan and used more make-up than usual to conceal the shadows below her eyes.

      Lara phoned down to tell her that the helicopter that would take her to the airport for her flight was powering up. There was a note of satisfaction in the glamorous blonde’s voice that even Kat could not have missed. Lara, without a doubt, was glad to see Kat leaving, Kat acknowledged ruefully, marvelling that she had for a while felt quite warm towards the young woman, for it was obvious to her now that Lara could never have honestly returned that friendliness. Had Lara been jealous of Kat’s relationship with her boss? Was Lara in love with Mikhail?

      Her cases having already been collected, Kat climbed the glass staircase for the very last time. She wouldn’t miss the fancy stairs, she thought glumly. They were a colourfully confusing nightmare to use safely at night. From above her she could hear the calls of the crew as they made preparations for the helicopter to take off. As she emerged into the bright sunlight of a beautiful day Mikhail appeared, shocking her, for she had honestly believed that she would not see him again before she left. Sheathed in a lightweight designer beige suit teamed with a silk tie the colour of bronze, he looked incredibly handsome and incredibly assured. Certainly he bore no resemblance to a man who had endured a disturbed night, she conceded unhappily.

      Mikhail stared at her, black diamond eyes narrowed and intense, a tiny muscle pulling taut at the corner of his unsmiling mouth. ‘Kat …’

      ‘Goodbye,’ Kat told him briskly, baring her teeth in a resolute smile

      ‘I don’t want to say goodbye …’ The words might have been physically wrenched from Mikhail because he clamped his handsome mouth shut again as if an involuntary admission had been dragged from him.

      ‘But we must,’ Kat countered with quiet dignity, nodding an acknowledgement at Stas, who was stationed tensely by the rail about ten feet away.

      ‘You’re wrong … there is no must.’

      Kat blinked and frowned and focused her attention on the helicopter and all the fuss taking place around it that suggested that the craft was ready for an imminent departure.

      ‘Stay …’ Mikhail ground out with staggering abruptness.

      Her head swivelled back to him, green eyes wide with disbelief. ‘What on earth are you saying?’

      His face was taut with self-discipline. ‘I want you to stay with me.’

      ‘But it’s all organised that I’m leaving … You organised it, for goodness’ sake!’ she reminded him in angry bewilderment.

      The pilot came to a halt six feet away and informed Mikhail that the helicopter was good to go.

      Mikhail ignored him, but as Kat took a step in the pilot’s direction a hand like an iron vice closed round her forearm to prevent her. ‘Stay!’ he ground out again between visibly clenched even white teeth.

      ‘I can’t!’ Kat gasped strickenly, baffled by his behaviour and appalled to feel a giant wash of tears welling up at the backs of her eyes as if all the stress, all the unhappiness she had undergone over the previous twenty-four hours was finally set to overflow.

      Mikhail closed his free hand over her other forearm, holding her captive in front of him. Thickly lashed black eyes clashed with hers and there was an urgency there that she had never seen before. ‘I need you to stay,’ he muttered hoarsely. ‘I need you to stay because I can’t let you go.’

      And that plea moved her and made her listen and look as nothing else could have done. For the space of an impossibly stressful minute she had thought she was dealing with a male whim voiced on impulse and most probably motivated by sexual desire. But, ‘I need you,’ from a male as incredibly self-sufficient and reserved as Mikhail carried serious weight with her. ‘You’re hurting my arms,’ she framed shakily, because his grip was too tight.

      He gave a muffled curse as his long brown fingers sprang open to free her, and he shot something in Russian at Stas before bending to scoop Kat up into his strong arms and stride back indoors with her again.

      ‘This can’t be happening—this isn’t right!’ Kat protested vehemently.

      ‘It is the first right thing I have done this week,’ Mikhail informed her with immoveable conviction as he carted her into the salon and out to the private deck, where he sank down on a sofa with her still clasped firmly in his arms. ‘You are staying with me, moyo zolotse—’

      Kat was thoroughly bemused by his forceful behaviour. ‘But you can’t simply change your mind like that at the last minute.’

      Shrewd black eyes gazed down in challenge at her. ‘If I recognise a wrong decision, should I not put it right? Kat—have you any idea how rarely I admit to being in the wrong?’

      Kat had an excellent idea, but he had plunged her into turmoil. She had hyped herself up to leave him and it had taken every ounce of her strength to retain her composure in the face of that challenge. His sudden change of heart, however, had steamrollered over her defensive barriers as nothing else could have done. ‘I can’t just stay with you,’ she said again, her voice shaky and lacking its usual energy. ‘I’ve got a life and a family to get back to, Mikhail.’

      Her lips parted again. ‘You were finished with me. It was over … that’s what you wanted—’

      ‘If it was genuinely over, I’d have let you leave. Keeping you was a gut instinct,’ Mikhail confessed harshly.

      A gut instinct? Where did that leave her? One minute he was getting rid of her, the next he was snatching her back from the brink. ‘But what happens now?’ she whispered unsteadily, suddenly cold and shivering even in the protective circle of his arms.

      His powerful chest expanded as he breathed in deep. ‘I take you home with me.’

      Her brows climbed. ‘You take me home with you? Am I a pet all of a sudden?’

      ‘I’m asking you to move in with me. I’ve never asked a woman to do that before,’ Mikhail revealed quietly.

      Kat examined the idea, taken aback by it and then alarmed by how much she liked the images springing to mind. But it was a commitment, far more of a commitment than acting as a man’s companion and lover on board a yacht for a month. Yes, it was definitely a commitment, she registered dizzily, and suddenly her eyes were overflowing with the tears she had held back with such tenacity.

      ‘What’s wrong?’ Mikhail demanded, a long forefinger skimming the glistening trail of moisture marking her cheek.

      ‘Nothing! I’m just leaking!’ Kat gasped defensively, dashing the tears away with an impatient hand. ‘But I can’t just move in with you. I have commitments too—’

      ‘Your sisters? I will look after them as if they were my own flesh and blood,’ Mikhail told her with a sudden expansive smile.

      ‘But I’ve to sort out the farmhouse, make arrangements—’

      ‘You