Her Tycoon Lover. Lee Wilkinson

feeling the shock ripple through her slender frame. He cupped her breast in his hand, his groin hardening imperiously.

      “Katrin,” he whispered, “I want you so much.”

      She was trembling very lightly. “I want you, too,” she whispered. “But I don’t do this, Luke…I never have affairs with the guests. It’s nothing to do with the resort, it’s one of my own rules.”

      “You think I don’t know that?” Trying to banish the strain from her face, he added, “Those glasses you insist on wearing, and your hair pulled back tight as a halyard in a hurricane…they’re not exactly a come-on.”

      She smiled weakly. “Self-defense.”

      “Very effective,” he replied; and knew now was the time to be as truthful to her as she’d been with him. Feeling as though he were tossing dice with no idea how they’d fall, Luke said, “I should make something clear to you—I’m not into any kind of commitment. If we make love tonight, that would be that. I fly to New York the day after tomorrow, and I won’t be back.”

      She said in a strange voice, “That’s okay…I wouldn’t want commitment. It’s not a word in my vocabulary, either.”

      “Why not?” he flashed.

      She stared down at the fingers, intertwined in her lap. “To be blunt, Luke, if we go to bed together it’ll have nothing to do with making love. I want you out of my system—I’m sorry if that sounds crude, but that’s the way it is. For some reason you get past every one of my defenses. I can’t explain that, and I’m not going to try. But I need to get on with my life…and I don’t need a man in it. It’s time I left Askja. Past time, and for reasons that are nothing to do with you. So if you have conditions, so do I—no confidences and no questions. And no—to use your word—commitment.”

      Luke sat back in his seat. He didn’t like having his own words thrown back at him. Didn’t like it all. Because he wasn’t used to it? Was it that simple?

      A couple of women in the past had taken his usual spiel about commitment as a challenge, figuring they could change his mind. Katrin, obviously, wouldn’t be like that. Katrin didn’t want commitment any more than he did.

      Nevertheless, didn’t her stance suit his purposes admirably? He could make love with her and leave.

      She’d be out of his system, too.

      Precisely what he wanted.

      He said flatly, “I accept.” Quickly he put the car in gear, turned around in the clearing and drove up the hill toward the woods.

      The road needed all his attention because the heavy rain had turned some sections to a glutinous mud, and dug deep channels into the ditches. Keeping his eyes straight ahead, Luke said, “At least tell me how old you are.”

      “Twenty-seven. And you?”

      “Six years older. Were you born here?”

      “I said no questions, Luke.”

      “Secrets in your past?” he said lazily.

      “Of course not!”

      All his senses on high alert, he heard the tension in her voice, noticed the tightening of her hands in her lap, her sudden wariness. So she did have secrets. He said without inflection, “I have secrets, too. Don’t we all?”

      “I wouldn’t know.”

      End of that conversation, thought Luke, and found he was intensely curious to know what secrets in Katrin’s past would prevent her from even telling him where she was born. None of your business, he told himself; then found himself wondering if it could have anything to do with that elusive sense of recognition he’d had for a while, as though somewhere he’d seen her before. He said out loud, “Good, there’s the main road.”

      Katrin said nothing. He flicked a glance at her. She was staring out the window at the wet trees and gleaming pavement, just as though he didn’t exist. He felt a quiver of pure rage, and forced it down. What was he complaining about? Once again he’d found a woman who was willing to warm his bed—or in this case, her bed—on his terms. Nothing wrong with that, and everything right.

      He drove on, in a silence that seemed to thicken with every minute. After he passed the lane to the resort, he had to navigate all the turns and twists of the road to the village. The church loomed out of the dusk, followed by a weathered clapboard house and then a small bungalow painted pale pink with white trim. Luke turned in the driveway and parked level with the back door.

      “Let’s go in,” he said, striving to sound matter-of-fact. “If you’ve got a drier, maybe I could put my jeans and shirt in it for a few minutes.”

      “Luke, I can’t do this,” Katrin said in a strangled voice.

      “It’s perfectly normal to be nervous, Katrin. I’ll use protection, and I’ll be as good to you as I can be, I promise you that.”

      “Protection?” she snapped, glaring at him. “You mean you walk around with it all the time?”

      He said, an ugly note in his voice, “I’ve already told you I’m not in the habit of picking up women at conferences…and I have a clean bill of health. But the last thing I ever want to do is start an unwanted child. There are enough of those already in the world.”

      “Were you one?” she said.

      “Lay off!”

      “I hit a nerve there, didn’t I?” She gazed at him thoughtfully. “You mean you never want to have children?”

      “You said no questions and no confidences. That works both ways.”

      “Okay, okay. But whether or not we’ve got protection is beside the point.” She looked right at him. “I’ve changed my mind. I’m sorry, but I can’t go to bed with you—no matter what kind of dreams I’ve been having.”

      A cold lump had settled in the pit of Luke’s stomach. He said nastily, “Do you do this often—lead a guy on, then say no at the last minute?”

      “No! I never do!”

      “You could have fooled me.”

      “Are you one of those men who think a woman isn’t allowed to say no?”

      “Katrin, I know you want me and you know I want you. So what’s the big deal if we go to bed together? We’re not talking marriage and three kids.”

      “No,” she said, her voice unreadable, “we’re talking a one-night stand.”

      “That’s right. Which suits both of us just fine.”

      “Down on the wharf, and then in the car, I thought it would suit me. So that I’d get you out of my system, isn’t that what I said? But now I’ve realized the absolute last thing I need is a one-night stand. With you or anyone else. I’ve never gone to bed with anyone casually, as if sex were in the same league as a game of Frisbee or an afternoon sail on the lake. And I’m not going to start now.”

      Luke looked over at her. Her lower lip was set mutinously, her wet ponytail was trailing down her neck, and her bulky sweater almost completely hid the fact that she had breasts. She was as different from his usual women as a woman could be, he thought with uncomfortable honesty. No makeup, no fancy hairdo, no designer clothes. No sophistication. Quite possibly, very little experience. Because if there was one thing he’d stake his fortune on, it was that Katrin Sigurdson was speaking the truth.

      She didn’t deal in fancy footwork. In coyness or manipulation. Just the truth, no matter whether he wanted to hear it or not. Keeping her promise that she wouldn’t lie to him again.

      He said harshly, “I’m not sure casual is the right word for what happens when we kiss each other. For me, it’s like the combination of an earthquake and a volcanic eruption…you wouldn’t exactly call those casual.” Then he gave an exasperated sigh. “I had