The Baron and The Bodyguard. Valerie Parv

never seen anyone attack a rehabilitation program so single-mindedly. At thirty-one, he had a superb physique thanks to his passions for climbing and bushwalking, and his fitness stood him in good stead now.

      Watching him work out, she almost wished he looked less imposing. It was all too easy to remember how his strong arms had held her, and to want him to hold her again.

      She stopped the punching bag’s pendulum action, stripped off her gloves, and crossed the room to a state-of-the-art walking machine.

      “How’s the arm?” he asked, grunting as he hefted a set of weights resting against his ankles.

      She fiddled with the settings on the treadmill. “Fine.” The bandage had been replaced by a smaller sticking plaster, the burn itself already fading.

      He lowered the weights and sat up, straddling the bench. “I still have trouble believing that you were in the vicinity of the explosion by pure coincidence.”

      “Coincidence or not, it’s true.” Her guarded tone sounded betraying even to her.

      He heard it, too. “I could pull royal rank and make you tell me more.”

      “You can’t, I’m not a Carramer citizen. All you can do is have me thrown out of the country.”

      “Don’t tempt me,” he growled. “You live here, you have a business here, yet you haven’t taken out citizenship. Don’t you plan on staying?”

      A few months ago her answer would have been an unequivocal yes. Now, she wasn’t sure. Before the explosion, she had been thinking of selling the academy. The woman who helped manage it had expressed an interest. Jacinta could return to her native California and…do what? Martial arts experts were a dime a dozen in the States. So were self-defense classes and personal trainers. She wasn’t guaranteed a good living, and definitely not the exotic surroundings she enjoyed in Perla, the largest city in Valmont Province, where her home and business were located.

      Who was she kidding? She didn’t stay in Carramer because of her work or the tropical scenery, but because Mathiaz was here. She had done the one thing she knew bodyguards weren’t supposed to do, get involved with their clients. Judgment got clouded, mistakes were made. People got hurt.

      Like Mathiaz.

      Never mind that she wasn’t a professional. She was acting as one. If she hadn’t allowed her own fears to drive her away, she would still have been working for him when the explosion happened, and been able to prevent him from being injured. As if it could expiate her guilt, Jacinta wrenched the dial on the treadmill all the way around, giving herself an uphill hike that left her panting within minutes.

      The pressure slackened abruptly as Mathiaz twisted the dial lower. She grabbed the side rails and slowed her pace to match the treadmill’s dwindling speed. “Why did you do that?”

      “You can’t talk when you’re climbing Everest.”

      “Who says I want to talk?”

      “You may not, but I do. Since I got out of the hospital I’ve been treated with kid gloves by everyone but you.”

      She gave him what her Scottish grandmother would have called an old-fashioned look. “Are you complaining?”

      “The opposite. You have my full permission to go on giving me a hard time.”

      A smile tugged at the corners of her mouth. “I don’t recall ever needing your permission. But this is the first time you’ve considered it beneficial. May I ask the reason?”

      “I want to get back to normal as fast as possible. Mollycoddling isn’t going to achieve it.”

      “Whereas being taunted and nagged provides a better incentive,” she guessed. She remembered that he worked best under pressure, setting his own goals and deadlines, and taking satisfaction in exceeding those set by others. She stepped off the treadmill and gestured to a padded floor area in one corner. “It’s a shame you can’t join me in a few falls—in the interests of not mollycoddling you.”

      While guarding him the last time, she had jogged with him, worked out in the gym with him, but never invited him to join her in practicing any of the defense disciplines in which she was trained. The warrior arts created a physical closeness between the combatants that was more than she dared to encourage between herself and Mathiaz, not that resisting had done her much good.

      She wasn’t sure why she wished he could join her now. Telling herself she was complying with his order to push him to his limits might explain his motives, but it didn’t explain hers.

      Mathiaz looked at the mat speculatively. “Might be interesting at that.”

      She had only made the comment because she thought it was impossible. “I’m sure Dr. Pascale’s prescription doesn’t include martial arts,” she said, hoping he would agree and give her a graceful way out of this.

      Mathiaz’s jaw hardened as he compared her small size against his own well-muscled bulk. His stay in the hospital hadn’t done much to even the odds between them. “Pascale gave me the all-clear to do anything I feel up to doing. You should be more worried that I might hurt you.”

      He had already done so in ways he couldn’t imagine. Throwing her over his shoulder a few times couldn’t do much more damage. “In your dreams, Baron,” she said. “Haven’t you heard the saying that size isn’t everything?”

      She regretted starting down that path when she saw his eyes glitter. “All depends on the arena,” he said softly and closed the distance between them.

      She drew a ragged breath, feeling cornered. “Shouldn’t we get changed?”

      “There’s something I want to do first.”

      The air seemed charged, and she had difficulty catching her breath. She knew it had nothing to do with her workout on the treadmill, and everything to do with the man standing so close to her she could see the tiny flecks of gold in his blue eyes.

      He had lost a little weight since the explosion, and the aristocratic angles of his face were more sharply defined than ever, adding to his devastating appeal. Though his ordeal had etched lines of strain around his mouth, renewed energy radiated from him. He stood easily, his injured leg taking his weight almost evenly with his good leg. She let her eyes close, knowing that he meant to kiss her, and knowing equally well that she was going to let him.

      Ten months of self-imposed exile from him had taken a toll. She told herself she wanted to feel his touch for old times’ sake, to give her something to remember him by when this was over, and they went their separate ways again.

      The moment his arms came around her and he pulled her against his chest, she knew she lied.

      Her cheek molded against his shoulder as if by design, and her palms slid up his back. She felt corded muscle and scented dampness from his exertion. The steady sound of his breathing almost completed the sensory package. All that was missing was taste.

      He supplied it by tilting her head up and bringing his mouth down to cover hers, breathing in the sigh she had begun to release. The mingling of her breath with his felt so erotic that her heart picked up speed.

      The effect increased when he flicked the corner of her mouth with his tongue. She opened her mouth in surprise, probably just as he had intended, and he used the advantage to deepen the kiss.

      Her senses spun. Clinging to him to steady herself only intensified the feeling. She had forgotten how well he could play her, like an instrument in which he was a virtuoso.

      Even as logic insisted she should end this, part of her returned his kiss with all the pent-up passion inside her. She had no business allowing herself such an indulgence, but she could no more push him away than she could fly.

      As he lifted his mouth away, she murmured a protest, then sighed again as he rained tiny kisses along her jaw and down the sensitive column of her throat. He cupped her face, looking at her from under heavy lids as if seeing her for the first time.