Living the Charade(12)

Gently, he scooped her up off the floor and carried her to the bed. She  stirred and shifted in his arms, the curtain of her hair trailing down  his naked arm and her orange blossom shampoo tickling his nose. His body  tightened at the allure of that clean smell and he almost tumbled her  onto the bed in his haste to put her down. As soon as he did she mumbled  something unintelligible and sighed deeply as she curled into the soft  mattress.

Tino quickly pulled the comforter up over her near naked limbs before he could change his mind about being chivalrous.

His eyes drifted to the other side of the king-sized bed. It looked  vast and empty with her only taking up one quarter of it. Tiredness  invaded his body, and although he had fully intended to sleep on the  floor he realised he probably didn't have to. The bed was nearly as big  as the infinity pool downstairs and he was an early riser. If the gods  were on his side he'd be up and running along the beach before she even  knew it was a new day.

Still, he laid a row of pillows down the centre of the bed. No point in tempting fate.

* * *

'Oh, yes,' Miller moaned softly as she felt the weight of a hair  roughened thigh slip between her legs while a warm, callused hand palmed  her breast. Her body buzzed and her nipples tightened, forcing her to  arch more firmly into that warm caress. The hand squeezed her gently and  somewhere above her head she heard a rough masculine sound of  appreciation. Another hand was sliding confidently over her hip toward-                       
       
           



       

Holy hell!

Miller's eyes flew open and she stared straight into Valentino  Ventura's sleeping face. Within seconds her brain assimilated the fact  that she was no longer on the floor, but in bed and that Valentino had  one of his hands on her breast and the other curved around her bottom.

Miller yelped and pushed against his impossibly hard chest, glad when  he gave a grunt of discomfort, his jet-black lashes parting to reveal  slate-grey eyes still glazed with sleep.

Miller pushed at his hands and scrambled backwards, her legs colliding  with one of his knees as she roughly slid her leg out from between his.

Tino let out a rough expletive and moved his legs out of the way. 'Watch the knee.'

'Watch the...?' Miller had a vague recollection of the men questioning  Valentino about some racing injury but she didn't care about that right  now. 'Get your hands off me, you great oaf.'

She shoved harder at his immovable arm and sucked in her tummy muscles as his steely forearm slid across her bare stomach.

Finally, fully awake, he acquiesced.

'No need to sound the alarm, I was just sleeping.'

Miller gripped the duvet up to her chin. 'You were groping me.'

'Was I? I thought you'd just ruined a pleasant dream. Sorry about that.'

'Yes, I just bet you're sorry.' She saw his eyes sharpen on hers. 'How did I end up in bed with you anyway?'

Valentino casually slid his hands beneath his head and Miller swept her  angry gaze over those powerful arms and that muscular chest. She felt  her breath catch and her heartbeat speed up and berated her instant  reaction.

'I don't know, Sunshine,' he answered. 'Are you prone to sleepwalking?'

Miller narrowed her gaze, her mind flashing back to last night. A vague  memory of being lifted floated to the surface of her mind. 'You carried  me.'

Valentino yawned and pushed up until he was leaning against the  headboard. The sheet dropped down to his waist, and the morning sun fell  over part of his bronzed chest and corrugated abdomen as if lighting  him up for a photo shoot.

He scratched his chest and her eyes soaked him up. God, the man really did look airbrushed!

'Damn. Maybe I'm prone to sleepwalking,' he said.

Miller hugged the duvet closer and felt her nipples throb with  awareness as her hands accidentally grazed over them. Heat immediately  bloomed in her face at the memory of why her breasts felt so heavy and  sensitive.

'This isn't funny. That's sexual harassment.'

The great oaf just rolled his eyes. 'As I recall it, it was you who cuddled up to me in your sleep-not the other way around.'

'I did not.'

'Suit yourself. But last night I put a row of pillows between us, and I  know it wasn't me who knocked them aside. Anyway, I disengaged my hand  as soon as you asked.' He raised and lowered his knee gingerly beneath  the blanket and she hoped that she had hurt him.

'Remind me not to do you a good deed again,' he said.

'Ha. Good deed, my foot. You wanted to...to...'

'Have my wicked way with you?' His eyes glinted. 'If that was what I wanted that's what we'd be doing.'

'You wish.'

'A challenge, Miller?'

She didn't deign to respond. Why would she? Of course it wasn't a  challenge-especially when she had liked the feel of him against her a  little too much.

Her breathless response reminded her of the time she'd been secretly  trapped in the girls' toilets at the hideous school she'd attended while  the main bullies had loitered, giggling vacuously over some boy or  another.

By the time they had hit fifteen, boys had been all they could talk  about. Miller had wanted to yell, What about when it all goes wrong? But  of course she hadn't. She hadn't wanted to look more like a freak than  they already thought she was. All of them had seemed content to live in  the moment in a way she never could after her parents had divorced.

'There was no way I was letting you sleep on the floor. Get over it.' Valentino's gruff voice jolted her back to the present.

'Turn the other way,' she demanded, letting her painful memories slip away.

When he complied without argument she shot out of bed and snatched up  her robe. Ignoring him, she grabbed her running clothes and stalked  towards the bathroom.

'Just so we're clear.' She stopped in the doorway. 'This arrangement  does not extend to sex, and even if it did you would be the last man I  would choose to sleep with.'

He looked at her as if he could see right through her. 'So you keep saying.'

His intense eyes never left hers and Miller found it hard to swallow.  He looked irresistible and dangerous with his untidy dark hair and  overnight stubble. By contrast she was sure she looked a fright, and all  of sudden it seemed imperative that she get away from him. She couldn't  remember ever feeling so vulnerable.                       
       
           



       

She shook her head. 'You're too used to getting your own way. That's your problem.'

Valentino threw back the covers and stood up. He was only wearing  low-riding hipster briefs and Miller quickly averted her eyes. She felt  irrationally angry when he laughed. He stalked towards her and Miller  deliberately held his gaze, refusing to let him see how affected she was  by his potent masculinity.

He shook his head. 'Lady, you are one overwound broad. Yes, my hand was  on your breast-but that little moan you exhaled before your uptight  brain kicked into gear let me know that you liked it. More than liked  it.'

'Well, my uptight little brain rules my body, and what you felt back  there was just a physiological reaction.' Miller felt irrationally stung  by his assessment, even though she had insulted him first. She couldn't  help it; he just made her feel so...so...emotional!

'You're telling me you'd get turned on if you woke up with TJ's hand on your breast?'

Miller clamped her lips together. That was a no-win question and they  both knew it. 'There's no way to answer that without stroking your  mountainous ego, so I won't bother.'

'You just did.'

Oh! Miller swivelled and slammed the bathroom door in his laughing face. He was so arrogant and so full of himself.

Impossible. The most impossible and most gorgeous man she had ever come across.

She leant back against the door and sighed. No wonder he had women  lining up outside his hotel rooms to get a glimpse of him. The man was  sex on legs and he knew it.

Miller made a frustrated noise through her teeth and her breasts  tingled with remembered pleasure as she pulled on her shorts, sports bra  and top. A strenuous run would help her forget this morning before her  meeting with Dexter and TJ.

Taking a fortifying breath, she decided to ignore Valentino-but that  plan instantly unravelled when she opened the bathroom door and noticed  him sitting on the side of the bed, tying his shoelaces and dressed as  she was.

'Please tell me you're not going for a run?'

Valentino looked up. 'Is there a law against it?'

His eyes immediately dropped to her bare legs and Miller felt slightly  uncoordinated as she continued across the room to the closet.

She wanted to say yes, but he would no doubt think she was being  uptight again-and anyway it was petty. The man was doing her a favour by  being here-albeit a reluctant one-and who was she to tell him he  couldn't go for a run? She might dislike the tumultuous feelings he  incited in her just from looking at him, but she was going to have to  get used to it if she was going to survive the next twenty-four hours  with any degree of dignity. She had already decided she wasn't going to  be his weekend plaything, so how hard could it be?