One Kiss in... Moscow: Kholodov's Last Mistress / The Man She Shouldn't Crave / Strangers When We Meet. Кейт Хьюит
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it hurt?’
He stared at her, his expression open, more open than she’d ever seen it. He looked at her with both hunger and hope. ‘No.’
She laid her lips to his scar, kissed her way across his body, gently, reverently, as if her touch could heal him. Was that what she wanted? To heal this dark, wounded man?
For this whole encounter had become so much more than she’d ever intended or even wanted it to be. She’d come upstairs with Sergei to satisfy a physical need, and prove to herself that that was all it was. And in doing so she was afraid she might have discovered the opposite.
She stilled for a moment, her lips hovering over him, the unwelcome realisation slamming into her. She didn’t want this to be more than just a night. More than just physical. Not with a man like Sergei, a man who was hardened, cynical, secretive …
A man who had just kissed her almost—almost as if he loved her.
Impossible. It seemed she still was a little more naive than she’d thought.
Sergei must have noticed her hesitation, sensed something of the conflict in her, or perhaps he felt it himself. Suddenly he rolled over, flipping her onto her back, and after quickly protecting himself—and her—he drove into her in a single smooth stroke. Hannah gasped aloud at the exquisite, intense pleasure that rippled through her as her body accepted and enfolded his. All thoughts and fears were obliterated by sensation as he moved inside her, and what had felt like lovemaking became sex: simple, basic and elemental, both of them responding to the pleasure that built with each stroke until finally Hannah cried out, clutching him as she felt herself come apart and then together again in his arms.
Lying there, their bodies joined, their limbs entangled, their hearts beating against one another, Hannah felt a frightening sense of completion, of wholeness and happiness that she knew she couldn’t afford to feel. It wasn’t real. This was just sex. Simple sex, a basic bodily function. Hadn’t Sergei made that clear?
You want me. I want you. Simple.
Except in that moment it didn’t feel simple, not for her. Hannah drew in a shuddering breath, willed the emotions rocketing through her to recede. It would be simple. She would make sure of it, because Sergei wanted simple … and so did she.
Sergei rolled onto his back, his heart pounding and his eyes stinging in the aftermath of what had just happened between them. The memories of Hannah’s lips on his scars made his insides clench and burn; it wasn’t a pleasant feeling. He’d had plenty of reactions to the ravages his body had endured, from the cigarette burns his grandmother inflicted when he’d annoyed her to the knife wound that had been a warning from another gang on the street. Some women had been shocked, some repulsed, some secretly enthralled, thinking they were bedding a bad boy.
He’d never had a woman respond as Hannah had. But then he’d never had a woman like Hannah before. He swallowed, his hands clenching into fists against the sheet. He didn’t want to feel this clench of his emotions; sex should have satisfied that. Instead he only felt more need.
Silently Hannah slid from the bed. Sergei heard the bathroom door click shut and felt a fierce relief. He didn’t want to endure some kind of sentimental pillow talk, and he was glad Hannah seemed to feel the same. Yet as he lay there waiting for his heart rate to slow and Hannah stayed in the bathroom, he started to feel uneasy. Unsure. And he didn’t like that at all.
He quickly disposed of the condom and then stalked to the bathroom, rapping sharply on the door. ‘Are you all right?’
‘I’m fine,’ Hannah retorted. She sounded as annoyed as he felt, and somehow that irritated him all the more.
Refusing to question her further, to care, he swung away from the door and reached for his boxers. A few minutes later Hannah opened the door. Sergei turned, and to his surprise saw that she was dressed. She must have grabbed her clothes on the way into the bathroom. She even had her heels on.
‘Where,’ he asked in a dangerously mild voice, ‘are you going?’
‘Home.’ She turned away from him, reaching for the coat she’d slung on a chair by the fire that had already died to a few flickering embers. That hadn’t lasted long.
Sergei folded his arms. Tried to stare her down, but she wouldn’t look at him. ‘Why?’
Hannah thrust her arms into the sleeves of her coat. Her hair fell forward, obscuring her face. ‘Because. I’m tired, and I want to sleep. I have to work tomorrow.’
All reasonable, all infuriating. Sergei did not want to consider why Hannah’s no-nonsense approach to their night—or, really, few hours—together aggravated him. He was used to being the one who was first. First from the bed, first out of the door. Hannah had beaten him to it—twice.
‘You can sleep here,’ he said, keeping his voice even. ‘I’ll drive you in the morning.’
Hannah stopped buttoning her coat and gave him a long, level look. When he’d first met her, he’d seen so many emotions in those open, guileless eyes. Now he couldn’t tell a thing. ‘I don’t think that’s a good idea.’
He was getting tired of her telling him what to do. He took a step towards her. ‘Well, I think it’s a fine idea. And I have no desire to get dressed and drive you home after midnight.’
‘Fine,’ Hannah said evenly. ‘I’ll call a cab.’
Sergei nearly swore. ‘No.’
Now he saw an emotion in her eyes: exasperation. ‘What is with you, Sergei? We both know what this was. We wanted to finish what was started a year ago, and so we did. Neither of us expected anything more than that.’
Sergei felt a muscle bunch in his jaw. He was practically grinding his teeth. ‘I’m not finished.’ She stared at him, and he saw her eyes darken with what he knew was sorrow or fear or maybe even anger. Something he didn’t want to see there. ‘And I don’t think you’re finished either, milaya moya.’
‘I told you before, don’t call me that.’
‘It means my sweet—’
‘I know what it means. And I know you only say it when you’re trying to show how in control and tough you are, how much I must want you.’ She glared at him, her eyes so dark they looked almost black, fury pulsating in every taut line of her slender body. ‘I’m finished, okay? It was very nice, but I’ve had enough. I want to go home.’
Very nice? Sergei would have been offended if he believed her. And he would have believed her if her voice hadn’t wobbled and her body hadn’t shook as if she were in the grip of a fever, her eyes huge and dark in her pale face. She was lying. Why?
He stepped aside even though it cost him.
‘All right. Go.’
Hannah stared at him in disbelief. Had she actually expected him to insist she stay? Imprison her here? And the fact that he wasn’t sent a sliver of disappointment needling her heart. A ridiculous reaction, and just another reason to get out of here as fast as she could.
‘Fine.’ Maybe he had finished with her after all. She’d become tedious again. She smothered the stab of hurt that thought caused and marched towards the door.
Just as she reached for the handle Sergei moved. He slid into the small space between her and the door, so close she could feel his body against hers, could remember—
‘Don’t—’
‘Please stay, Hannah.’ Gone was the gruff and imperious assassin of a man who called her my sweet, and with just three little words, uttered in such a low, raw voice, Hannah’s determined defiance leaked right out of her.
‘Don’t,’ she said again, softly, because she didn’t have any more strength. It had taken just about all of it to roll from the bed as if she hadn’t a care in the world, to