Move! But she couldn’t heed the silent command pounding in her brain. Her feet refused to move. She was still immobilised when he swung towards the room.
He stilled, dark-green eyes zeroing in on her in that fiercely focused, extremely unnerving way.
After several seconds, his gaze travelled over her, head to bare toes, and back again. Slowly, without taking his gaze off her, he downed the rest of his drink. His tongue glided out to lick a drop from his lower lip.
The inferno stormed through her, ravaging her senses with merciless force.
No. Hell, no! This could not be happening.
Her fingers tightened around her bag until pain shot up her arms. With brutal force, she wrenched her gaze away, walked towards the sofa and dropped her bag beside it.
‘I’m done with the bathroom. It’s all yours.’ She cringed at the quiver in her voice, a telling barometer of her inner turmoil. Her tablet lay where she’d left it on the table. Itching for something to do with her dangerously restless hands, she grabbed it.
He came towards her and passed within touching distance to set his glass down on the cabinet. Brianna decided breathing could wait until he was out of scenting range.
‘Thanks.’ He grabbed his bag and walked to the door. ‘And Moneypenny?’
The need to breathe became dangerously imperative but not yet; a few more seconds, until she didn’t have to breathe the same air as him. ‘Yes?’ she managed.
‘It’s time to clock off.’
The tightness in her chest grew. ‘I just wanted to—’
‘Turn that tablet off and put it away. That’s an order.’
It was either argue with him, or breathe. The need for oxygen won out. She placed the tablet back on the table and stuffed her hands under her thighs.
Satisfaction gleamed in his eyes as he opened the bathroom door. ‘Good.’ His gaze darted to the bed. ‘You take the bed, I’ll take the sofa,’ he said. Then he entered the bathroom and shut the door behind him.
Brianna sucked in a long, sustaining breath, trying desperately to ignore the traces of Sakis’s scent that lingered in the air. She eyed the bed, then the sofa.
The logic was irrefutable. She pulled out and made up the sofa bed in record time. And she made damned sure she was in it and turned away from the bathroom door by the time she heard the shower go off.
The consequences of giving lust any room was much too great to contemplate. Because giving in to her emotions, trusting it would turn to more—perhaps even the love she’d been blindingly desperate for—was what had landed her in prison.
Being in prison had nearly killed her.
Brianna had no intention of failing. No intention of sinking again.
CHAPTER FOUR
SHE WOKE TO the smell of strong coffee and an empty room. Relief punched through her as she tossed the light sheet aside and rose from the sofa bed. A quick glance at the ruffled bed showed evidence of Sakis’s presence but, apart from that, every last trace of him had been wiped from the room, including his bag.
Before she could investigate further, her tablet pinged with an incoming message.