Read Online Mistress: At What Price? by Anne Oliver - Free Book Online Page B

adjoining family room, where she’d discovered his photographic equipment and was fiddling with his camera. She snapped his picture a few times in rapid succession, checked the results in the little screen. ‘Definitely male model material. I didn’t think so earlier, but I’ve changed my mind. I’ll borrow this for a while,’ she went on. ‘Upload these pictures on your computer. Do you have a website?’
    â€˜No.’ He set their glasses on the coffee table and began walking towards her.
    â€˜Not even for your business?’
    He narrowed his eyes at her. ‘You would not want to put those pictures on my business website.’
    â€˜You must be on a networking site?’
    â€˜Don’t have time for gossip.’
    â€˜For socialising and sharing,’ she corrected. She snapped him again, studied the image. ‘There was atime when you used to share everything with me.’ Her eyes met his, then cooled. ‘Well, almost everything.’
    Shadows of their youth swirled in those green depths, and for a moment he was lost in another time, another world. Shared hot fudge sundaes at the movies. Beach towels and barbecued sausages. The time she’d cheated on a test. The day he got his driver’s licence and taken her for a spin in his father’s BMW without his knowledge and put a ding in the passenger door…
    He reached for the camera but she’d already whipped it behind her back. ‘Getting slow in your old age,’ she taunted.
    â€˜Or you’re getting sneakier.’ He closed the gap till their bodies were a handspan apart. Breathed in the scent of her honeysuckle shampoo.
    â€˜How do you mean?’ She blinked up at him, all innocence.
    He set his hands on her shoulders, felt the fragile bones beneath the smooth firm flesh. ‘You know exactly what I mean. Using your eyes and the you-used-to-share-everything-with-me line as a distraction.’
    As if the shoestring straps beneath his fingers weren’t distraction enough. Not bra straps, he noted. Just dress straps…
    Barely touching her, he slid his fingertips down her arms and felt tiny hairs on her skin rise as a shiver trembled through her. Imprisoning her against his body with one hand, he reached over her shoulders for the camera with the other, and down…
    The reason for the clinch was forgotten. Everything was wiped clean from his mind except the sensation of her breasts snug against his chest and the fragrance of her skin. His free hand slid over the smooth flesh of hernaked back, each vertebra in turn, as he slipped beneath the edge of her dress and the crisp fabric.
    Her head tipped back and her lips were right there, smack bang against his throat. Warm, soft. Mind-numbing.
    Anticipation tingled on his lips, danced on his tongue…
    Damn.
    This wasn’t some nameless woman in a dark unfamiliar room where the slaking of lust was the only thing they had in common. He swore silently. Hell of a moment for his better self to show up. He wanted to throw back his head and howl.
    Unlike last night or this afternoon, he knew he’d not stop this time until he had her writhing in pleasure beneath him. And she wasn’t ready for that. Nor was he willing to take the risk with the ball happening tomorrow night.
    So this time it was he who took a step back, kissed her lightly on those waiting lips with their sweet promise of passion and said, ‘I’ve got some last-minute details to go over for tomorrow night; I’d best be getting on with them.’
    She blinked at him as if she’d just woken up. ‘Don’t let me keep you.’ Her husky voice dragged like barbs across his over-aroused senses.
    â€˜You might want to turn in early. Tomorrow night will be a long one.’ He let the suggestion hang.
    She nodded. Didn’t say a word.
    He turned away before he could change his mind, and climbed the stairs to his study. A man of his