Read Online Marchese's Forgotten Bride by Michelle Reid - Free Book Online

minutes ago probably described it best—I remember you but I don’t remember you.’ The slanted half-smile he offered was as rueful as the answer itself. ‘You are playing the starring role in some knock-out flashbacks, Cassie Janus. They hit me like a door that flings open in my head then slams shut again before I can get a proper glimpse at what is being shown to me. A couple of them have hit me like lightning bolts,’ he grimaced, ‘one of which stretched me out like a corpse at your feet.’
    The mention of his corpse made Cassie shudder.
    ‘You need to get out of that wet dress,’ he said briskly, misreading the shudder for a shiver.
    ‘No, I’m all right. Just a bit w-wet,’ she dismissed impatiently.
    He’d explained it all so casually but really there was nothing casual about it. He didn’t remember her but he did remember her. The whole confusing evening began to make a mad kind of sense.
    ‘H-how badly injured were you?’ She was frowning again, already scanning him for signs of injury, as the idea of Sandro lying in a car wreck somewhere, hurt and unconscious, was so horrible to her that she couldn’t stop herself from checking him out. The olive-toned skin stretched over his perfect bone structure with no signs of scarring or puckers or dints anywhere that she could detect. Dropping her gaze lower, she even checked out the unblemished skin at his throat then was scanning his arms and his chest as if she were equipped with X-ray vision and could see through his shirt. She did not notice how still he had gone, or that the long fingers holding up her chin had lifted away and now hovered a bare inch from her cheek, or that his eyes had narrowed.
    Then she heard his low and very husky, ‘If it helps you, cara , just say the word and I will take my clothes off so you can check me out more thoroughly….’

CHAPTER FIVE
    C ASSIE JUST FORGOT how to breathe.
    He wasn’t joking. He didn’t even sound sardonic. A fire leapt into life deep down in her abdomen as belatedly she picked up the tension possessing his very still frame.
    Sexual tension.
    Looking up, she saw it burning out of the centre of his eyes like a flickering amber signal, felt its fierce heat prickle the surface of her skin, turning her own eyes a darker shade of green.
    She wanted to say something cutting and dismissive— needed to say it—but the words wouldn’t form in her head. He’d told her only a few minutes ago that he ached to kiss her again and she’d chosen to ignore the warning; now she felt like a rabbit trapped in the headlights of the car that was about to run her over. She parted her lips to utter a protest but made the mistake of running the tip of her tongue over the quivering, damp surface of her upper lip. As if he’d been standing there waiting for exactly that kind of sign from her, Sandro uttered a groan which seemed to scrape the very walls of his chest then moved his hovering fingers, spearing them into the silken fall of her hair to hold her head.
    It was like a rabbit hit by a head-on collision. If he’d let go of her Cassie knew she would have folded down in a puddle of her own shattered emotions as he lowered his head and took driving possession of her mouth.
    Nothing after that moment made a single ounce of sense to her as pure sensation took her over, springing life into every nerve-end to fling her like a fool to a place she’d believed she never wanted to visit again.
    Why with him—why this man? she tried asking herself as her fingers released their grip on the towel so they could leap up to clutch at his shirtfront, her fingernails digging into warm, solid muscle as she gave herself up to his hot, deep, hungry kiss.
    One single night spent in his arms six long years ago and her body remembered him with this strength and intensity. He felt so big and strong and so desperately familiar to her—as if she’d never been parted from him at all! Her heart was pounding madly, her head was spinning, her