Modern Romance October 2015 Books 1-4. Annie West

matter.’

      ‘It does,’ he contradicted.

      ‘Because you say so?’

      He smiled. ‘Precisely.’

      She began to play with the ends of her hair. ‘You’re the only man I’ve ever had sex with.’

      A sudden silence fell between them. Her answer was so unexpected that it took a moment for him to process it.

      ‘Why?’ he said, at last.

      ‘Why do you think?’ Her words came out in a rush, as if she had been bottling them up for a long time. ‘First I was pregnant and then I had a tiny baby who wasn’t very fond of sleeping, which meant I kept dozing off at various points during the day and forgetting to wash my hair and my tops always seemed to be stained with milk. That’s never really a good look. And then the baby grew into a demanding toddler who was into everything, so that I felt like some kind of maternal health and safety expert trying to keep him out of trouble. I was helping my sister with the café and trying to keep our heads above water and I...’ Her words faded away and a shuttered look came over her face, as if she’d said too much and only just realised it. ‘There was never really time for men.’

      ‘So if I was your first lover—’

      ‘You knew that?’

      He gave a faint smile. ‘Of course I knew it. I may have often been accused of a lack of sensitivity towards women—but never when it comes to sex.’

      Her green eyes looked confused. ‘But you didn’t...you didn’t mention it at the time.’

      ‘And neither did you.’ He shrugged. ‘That night was supposed to be about pleasure—not an anatomical discussion about why your hymen was still intact.’

      Her green eyes spat fire as she pulled the coverlet up over her breasts. ‘How callous you can be, Dimitri!’

      ‘You think so?’ He narrowed his eyes as he looked at her. ‘Don’t you think that after everything which has happened between us, we now deserve the truth?’

      ‘Even if the truth hurts?’

      ‘But being hurt is a part of life. A big part of it—as is regret,’ he said. ‘And if you must know, I was angry with myself for having sex with you that night.’

      ‘Angry?’ She sounded bewildered. ‘Why?’

      ‘Because you were an employee and I liked you that way. I had crossed a line I never intended to cross. And because it is a responsibility when a man takes a woman’s virginity.’

      ‘Responsibility?’ She repeated the word in horror.

      ‘Of course it is,’ he said. ‘I didn’t want you fixating on me, or clinging to me or deciding that I was the man who was going to make you happy. And I just couldn’t work out how it had happened, that was the most frustrating thing. How years of a perfectly satisfying platonic relationship had suddenly erupted into something which was so unbelievably X-rated. So tell me, Erin—since we’re being truthful—did you choose me because you were aware of my reputation as a lover and considered me the most suitable candidate to take your virginity? Because you knew that I was the man most likely to give you pleasure?’

      She didn’t answer straight away and when she did, her voice was shaking. ‘You flatter yourself,’ she said. ‘As well as misjudging me, if you think I could have been that cold-blooded about it. I didn’t choose you. It just happened.’

      ‘You just happened to bring a totally unnecessary batch of paperwork round to my apartment when it could have waited until morning?’

      ‘I was worried about you,’ she said. ‘Worried sick, if you must know. You seemed to have a permanent hangover and to exist on no sleep. Your bodyguard told me you were living like a vampire. And then he resigned and there was all that trouble in Paris and I didn’t trust your new bodyguard one bit. Every time the phone rang I thought it was going to be the hospital telling me you’d been admitted. Or the morgue telling me you were lying on a slab...’

      ‘So you thought a little creature comfort might bring me to my senses?’ he mocked as her words tailed off. ‘That a taste of the pure and innocent Erin Turner might be enough to make me see the error of my ways?’

      ‘You are hateful, Dimitri.’

      ‘Maybe I am. But I’ve never pretended to be anything else,’ he said, steeling himself against the hurt which was clouding her green eyes and telling himself it was better this way. Because although she’d told him she didn’t believe in love, he wasn’t sure he believed her. Women were programmed to believe in it, weren’t they? Better she didn’t start thinking he was someone who was capable of providing her with happiness. Especially not domestic happiness. ‘Didn’t anyone ever teach you that it’s a bad idea to go to a man’s apartment late at night, looking so unbelievably sexy?’

      ‘I was wearing my navy work suit and a white shirt!’ she protested. ‘It was hardly what you’d call provocative.’

      ‘Not intentionally, no.’ His voice deepened. ‘But you were. I’ll never forget the sight of you standing there, all wide-eyed and soaking wet.’

      ‘I didn’t know it was going to rain!’

      ‘And I wasn’t expecting my secretary to ring the doorbell looking as if she’d just taken part in a wet T-shirt competition.’

      He hadn’t been planning to kiss her, either. It had been a combination of factors which had made something inside him snap. Her wide-eyed look of concern, which had contrasted with the erotic spectacle of that forbidding suit clinging to her slim body. Her complete obliviousness as to how sexy she looked had sealed her fate. He had been existing in such a dark place for so long and in that moment Erin had looked like a beacon of light. He’d given in to impulse and kissed her. And hadn’t the way she’d responded driven him wild? He remembered being taken aback that his unassuming secretary should suddenly morph into a little wildcat when he’d taken her in his arms. He remembered telling himself he would stop. Just one more kiss and he would definitely stop...

      But he hadn’t stopped, had he? He had been unable to prevent himself from plunging into her tight, wet warmth and being the first man ever to possess her. He remembered that he had never come quite so many times in one night. That he seemed to have a permanent hard-on whenever he looked at her. Yet his conscience had troubled him afterwards and that in itself was unusual, for he had been brought up to believe that conscience was a waste of time. Had he known on some subliminal level before he’d even kissed her that she was innocent—and didn’t that make his subsequent self-contempt seem a little hypocritical?

      The only honourable thing he’d done was to make sure he’d used contraception—even if it had subsequently failed. And then he had left the country.

      Had he been afraid that desire would overcome him again? That he would become one of those clichéd men who slept with their secretary and she’d end up knowing everything about him, instead of just the lion’s share? Or was he just afraid that he would hurt her very badly—and someone like Erin did not deserve to be hurt.

      But it seemed that he had been regarding her through rose-tinted spectacles and that she had been perfectly capable of her own brand of deception and lies. Her own brand of hurt.

      An uneasy silence had fallen again and he didn’t object when she climbed off the divan and bent down to pick up her discarded clothes. He felt more in control when she was away from him and control was vital. Especially now. Because nothing had changed, he reminded himself grimly. She had kept their son hidden from him. She was no friend to him.

      The armful of clothes was concealing her naked breasts, but her neck was flushed pink and the dark triangle of hair at the fork of her thighs made his body flood with another powerful wave of lust.

      And it wasn’t going to happen, he told himself grimly. There was going to be no more