Read Online After the Music by Diana Palmer - Free Book Online Page B

smugly. Sabina laughed and rode after Thorn.
    They didn't dress up for dinner that night, although Sabina had halfway expected that they would. Nevertheless, she wore a gray skirt and blue-and-white checked blouse instead of jeans.
    Thorn was alone in the living room, brooding over his drink. The white pullover sweater he was wearing with his dark slacks emphasized his own deep tan and black hair. As if he felt her watching him, his head turned and his icy blue eyes met hers.
    "Where's your satin, rock star?" he chided.
    "I didn't want to risk having your heart stop, Mr. Thorndon the Third," she said with a wicked smile as she joined him.
    He caught her arm with a lean, steely hand and held her as she tried to walk past him. "I've told you that I don't like that name," he said in a tone softly laced with menace. "Don't push me. It's dangerous."'
    She could feel the danger, and she regretted her barb almost as she'd said it. "Mr. Thorndon, then," she said softly. "Will you let me go, please?"
    "Did it hurt to ask?" he chided, abruptly releasing her arm. He turned away. "What will you drink?"
    "I don't."
    He whirled. "You what?"
    "I told you at Al's party. I hate alcohol."
    He scowled down at her. "A social drink isn't considered alcoholism"
    "I'm sure it isn't, and I'm not sitting in judgment," she assured him. "I simply do not like the taste of liquor."
    He shrugged. "Suit yourself, tulip."
    "What?" she broke out.
    "Tulip," he repeated. His pale gaze wandered over her face, down to the deep, full red of her mouth. "Maybe someday I'll tell you why I call you that."
    "It must be some horrible reason," she said with resignation, sitting down.
    "I'm not a bad man," he said, towering over her as he moved to the side of her chair. "I just don't like opportunists."
    Her eyes searched his blue ones. "Or women."
    His face hardened. As he took a long drink from the glass he studied her quietly.
    For an instant the room seemed to vanish-everything seemed to stand still. She found unexpected depths in those eyes of ice blue and her heart felt jumpy and odd. His lean, dark,, fingers caressed the glass he was holding, and she felt as if he were touching her. There was something fierce about the way he was looking at her; an odd kind of violence lingered under his thick black lashes. She had to struggle not to remember what they'd shared in that kitchen at Al's house.
    "Is Sabina your real name?" he asked quietly.
    "Yes." She looked back helplessly, locked to him by a gaze she was powerless to break, while her breath became ragged in her throat.
    "Do you know who the Sabines were?" he continued in a voice like velvet.
    She did, but she couldn't think; she felt hypnotized.
    He bent, moving one hand to her throat. His fingers were cold, and she jumped.
    "I won't hurt you," he whispered, misunderstanding the involuntary reaction. His fingers traced the wildly throbbing artery at her throat, and his mouth was so close she could taste the scent of whisky on it. It should have revolted her, but it didn't. Her eyes fell to his hard lips, and she remembered with aching clarity the way they'd felt when he'd kissed her.
    "The Sabines," he continued huskily, "were women taken by the Romans."
    "Ra...raped by the Romans," she corrected. Her voice sounded odd.
    "Sometimes men and women enjoy wild lovemaking," he whispered. "Passion in itself is violent. Like the way I feel with you, tulip, when I touch you and feel you start to tremble. The way you're trembling now. You want my mouth like hell, don't you?"
    She wanted to deny it, to rail at him. But she couldn't even speak. Her lips were parted and she wanted his. Wanted his!
    "I want yours, too," he whispered roughly, and the hand at her throat slid down to her collarbone, tracing exquisite patterns on her creamy skin. "I want to touch you in ways that would shock you. My skin on yours, my mouth on your body..."
    "Don't," she moaned, and her gray eyes, wider than saucers, looked up into his. "I'm...I'm