Penny Jordan Tribute Collection. PENNY JORDAN
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debited to her suite.
As she waited for the waiter to bring her coffee she was suddenly aware of being studied by the occupants of a nearby table—a group of three couples.
The arrival of the waiter with her coffee momentarily distracted her, but as she glanced away from them Petra could have sworn that Blaize gave the tiniest warning shake of his head when one of the men started to get up, as though he was about to come over to their table.
As soon as the waiter had gone, Petra demanded, ‘Who is that…?’
‘Who do you mean?’ Blaize questioned her, frowning slightly.
‘The man you just looked at,’ Petra said. ‘He was about to come over, but you—’
‘I didn’t look at anyone,’ Blaize denied.
‘Yes, you did,’ Petra insisted. ‘I saw you…’
‘You’re imagining things,’ Blaize told her. ‘Which man do you mean? Point him out to me.’
Irately Petra did so, but when Blaize looked deliberately in his direction the man Petra had pointed out looked pointedly through them before averting his gaze.
Giving her an ironic look, Blaize shrugged his shoulders meaningfully whilst Petra’s face burned. She had obviously been wrong after all, but she wasn’t going to give Blaize the satisfaction of admitting it!
‘When you have finished your coffee perhaps you would like to dance,’ Blaize suggested. ‘After all, we are supposed to be lovers, despite that virginal look of yours…’
Petra’s mouth compressed and she put down her coffee cup with a small clatter.
‘That’s it!’ she told him forcefully. ‘From now on every time you so much as mention my… my… the word “virgin” I shall fine you five pounds, and deduct the money from your fee! I am paying you to help me escape from a marriage I don’t want. Not to… to keep on bringing up something which has nothing whatsoever to do with our business arrangement!’
‘No? I beg to differ,’ Blaize informed her softly. ‘I am supposed to create the impression that I am seducing you,’ he reminded her. ‘Who is going to believe that if you insist on looking like a—’
‘Five pounds,’ Petra warned him.
‘Like a woman who does not know what it is to experience a man’s passion,’ Blaize finished silkily.
She had finished her coffee and Blaize had summoned the waiter to ask for the bill.
Immediately Petra reached for her bag to remove her credit card.
‘What are you doing?’ Blaize demanded curtly, when he saw what she was doing.
‘I can’t let my family pay for this. It would be… immoral…’ Petra told him.
‘Immoral… To allow them to pay for a meal? But not apparently immoral to allow them to believe that you are sleeping with me… a man you picked up on the beach…’
‘My body is mine to do with as I wish,’ Petra hissed furiously to him as the waiter arrived with the bill. She already had her credit card in her hand, but to her disbelief before she could place it on the saucer Blaize had picked up the bill.
‘I shall deal with this,’ he told her coolly, ‘You may reimburse me later.’
Turning to the discreetly waiting waiter, he murmured something to him that Petra couldn’t catch, handing the man the bill which he immediately walked away with.
Several minutes later, as they made their way to the separate music room, Petra felt as though everyone else in the restaurant was watching them. She was being over-sensitive, of course. She knew that. No doubt it was only the female diners who were watching Blaize, she told herself wryly.
The music room and its dance floor were very dimly lit, and as she heard the provocative strains of the sensual music that was being played, watched the way the dancers already on the floor were moving, she automatically pulled back. This wasn’t dancing. It was… it was sex on the dance floor—and there was no way she was going to allow Blaize to hold her like that. No way she dared allow him to hold her like that.
Why not? It wasn’t, after all, as though he was her type, she reminded herself robustly, and she knew that no matter how outwardly sensual and romantic he might appear he felt nothing whatsoever for her. They were here for a purpose, and the sooner it was achieved the sooner she would be free to return home.
Squaring her shoulders, she allowed Blaize to guide her towards the dance floor.
Seconds later, held in his arms, her face pressed into his shoulder whilst his hand smoothed its way down her back, coming to rest well below her waist, Petra acknowledged that she had perhaps been over-confident about her ability to control her body’s physical reaction to him.
He was a practised seducer, she told herself in her own defence. A man who had perfected his seduction technique on an unending stream of women…
‘Relax… We’re supposed to be lovers, remember…’
‘I am relaxed,’ Petra told him through gritted teeth.
‘No, you aren’t!’ he corrected her. ‘You’re petrified that I’m going to do something like this to you…’
As he finished speaking he slid his hand into the hair at the nape of her neck, gently tugging her head so that his lips could graze along her throat and then nibble tormentingly against her ear. Just the feel of his breath made her whole body quiver in shocked delight as his thumb tracked the betraying pulse beating increasingly fast at the base of her throat.
‘Have you any idea how very, very much I want you…?’
The throaty words he whispered against her mouth caused Petra’s eyes to widen—until she remembered that he was simply acting… playing the part she was paying him to play.
‘Shall I take you back to your room and show you how much? Remove the clothes from your delectable sexy body and stroke and kiss every inch of it before—’
Petra gasped as he reached for her hand and told her rawly, ‘Feel what you’re doing to me…’
She tried to pull free but it was too late. He was already placing her hand against his body, and she could feel the heavy thud of his heart against her palm.
‘Come closer to me,’ he said, drawing her deeper into his embrace, and then whispering, ‘Closer than that! So close that I can pretend I have you naked in my arms, your silky skin next to mine…’
Petra knew that the heat filling her could not be blamed on the lack of air in the room, but stubbornly she refused to acknowledge what was really causing both it and the shivery, achy, tight pangs of longing that were running riot inside her body, inciting a rebellion she was terrified she might not be able to control.
Somehow she managed to put enough distance between them, to raise her head and tell him huskily, ‘I want to leave.’
‘So soon? It’s only just gone midnight?’
Petra could feel her panic increasing. If he kept her here on the dance floor, holding her the way he was, for very much longer—It was all very well for her brain to know that he was simply acting, but her body seemed to be finding it almost impossible to differentiate between fact and fiction. It was responding to him as though… as though… she… actually wanted him!
‘It’s been a long day, and my aunt will probably be telephoning me early in the morning to update me on my grandfather’s condition!’
‘I thought you weren’t interested in his health.’
‘I’m not,’ Petra denied immediately. ‘It’s just…’
Blaize had released her now, and was standing in front of her searching her face with far too sharp a gaze. Instinctively