Шэрон Кендрик - Too Proud to be Bought

Now you’re just being paranoid, she told herself.

Yet the sensation persisted as she moved through the glamorous throng until she found her eyes being drawn unwillingly to a man who was standing at the far end of the ballroom.

And suddenly, she couldn’t stop looking.

It was like seeing a drop of blood on virgin snow—because he stood out from everyone else in the room. His hair was the colour of beaten gold, his eyes were glacially blue and he possessed a hard and arrogant mouth, which spoke of experience and sensuality. Zara realised that the man’s high, sculpted cheekbones and piercing eyes were oddly familiar—and then she realised why. She felt a shiver whisper over her skin. It was Nikolai Komarov—the Russian oligarch, and the man she was supposed to be targeting.

Her first thought was that his photo hadn’t done him justice—on the page he had been appealing but in the flesh he was perfect. And her second thought was that he was the most intimidating man she had ever seen. His face made her think of a diamond—with its hard, sculpted angles and those cold, glittering eyes. And as for the rest of him …

Zara swallowed down an unfamiliar kind of hunger. Powerful, wealthy tycoon he might be, but, more than anything, he was pure and unbridled masculinity.

A beautifully cut suit moulded his body, emphasising wide shoulders, solid torso and narrow hips, which tapered down to long, muscular legs. He held himself tall and very straight, and stood so still that for a moment Zara thought he might almost have been made from wax, rather than from flesh and blood. But waxen eyes did not gleam like that, did they? And nor did they focus with unmoving scrutiny on their subject—the way he was doing with her. It felt like having all the breath punched from her body as she found herself captured in his cold yet searing gaze.

From his position at the far end of the room, Nikolai saw the woman glance over at him and felt his body tense, although a woman looking at him was nothing new. Women looked at him all the time. Though not usually like that, he conceded. Like a startled little deer who’d just spied the big, bad hunter deep in the forests …

Who the hell was she? He’d noticed her the moment she’d walked into the ballroom in that clinging green gown and he had been watching her ever since. His expression grew thoughtful. Something about her made her stand out from the crowd of overdressed women and he couldn’t work out what it was. How come she’d ignored everybody in the room except to smile rather nervously at the waitresses?

With the practised look of the connoisseur, his eyes swept over her in lazy assessment. Unlike most of the women here tonight, her face wasn’t stiffened with Botox and her hair had the natural shine of youth. But it was her body which was the real showstopper. He felt a sudden flare of lust as he acknowledged that her body was absolutely amazing. All curves and seductive hollows and none of the gaunt look of the over-dieted. He let his gaze drift downwards over her bare shoulders—at skin which gleamed as softly as silk—to where her pert and luscious breasts formed a cleavage which was like an open invitation to a man’s lips.

He put down his barely touched glass of champagne onto a passing waitress’s tray. Nikolai’s interest was piqued. He quirked her a smile he only ever used sparingly, and waited for the inevitable. Any minute now and she would start walking towards him with a hopeful little look of expectation on her face.

She didn’t.

Nikolai’s eyes narrowed as the woman seemed to hesitate, before turning away and beginning to walk in the opposite direction. And for a moment he couldn’t quite believe it.

She had turned her back on him!

Now his interest was definitely alerted. All the hunter instincts which usually lay dormant—made redundant by modern women who preferred to do the chasing—rose to heat his blood. Was she playing games? Had she turned away simply to give him the opportunity to feast his eyes on the delectable swell of her buttocks? Nikolai’s gaze was drawn irresistibly to the twin satin-covered globes and he swallowed. Because nobody could deny that it was a very delectable bottom indeed …

Like a puppet who was having his strings twitched by some unseen fingers, he began to tail her.

Zara could feel the little hairs on the back of her neck prickling and the sudden race of her heart as she moved through the ballroom. She wasn’t being paranoid and she wasn’t imagining it. He was following her! The intimidatingly handsome Russian with the icy stare who had been standing as still as a waxwork was now pursuing her across the room with a sure stealth.

She swallowed. Had he rumbled her? Guessed that she was an imposter with no earthly right to be here? In which case, wouldn’t it just be best if she headed for the door, grabbed a bus and then phoned Emma with the news that her idea had been a disaster and that they should never have entertained it for more than a second? Because suddenly, the idea of waltzing up to him and presenting him with a business card seemed the height of crassness. What had given her the idea that she would have the nerve to do something like that?

Risking a quick glance over her shoulder, she could see that he had been swallowed up by the crowd and she speeded up as much as her impractical shoes would allow. Shielded by a cluster of guests, she ducked behind a huge marble pillar and stayed there for long enough to convince herself that she’d shaken him off. And when she came out, there was no sign of him. That rather daunting presence and those piercing eyes were nowhere to be seen. Quashing down an unmistakeable pang of disappointment, she glanced around, realising that she could make her escape, and …

‘Hey.’

Zara froze as a deep accent she’d never heard cut through the jumble of her thoughts, some bone-deep instinct telling her that it was him. It could only be him. And reflecting how unfair life could be—that a man who looked like some sort of golden and dangerous god should have the kind of voice which sent tingles down a woman’s spine just by uttering a word which managed to sound like both a command and a question. Ignore him, she told herself. Pretend you haven’t heard him and carry on walking.

She made to take a step forward but he spoke again and she found her feet frozen into immobility by his silken question.

‘Are you trying to run away from me?’

Short of being rude and causing a scene, Zara knew that she had no choice other than to brazen it out. Pinning what she hoped was a confident smile to her lips, she turned to face him, her heart hammering beneath the thin silk of her dress. ‘Why, do you think I should run away from you?’ she questioned calmly.

‘Well, that rather depends,’ he murmured as his eyes drifted over her body.

Yet even as Zara felt her skin tingle in response to his unashamed appraisal she knew that this was dangerous. Very dangerous. He was flirting with her—and in a way which was completely outside her comfort zone. Yet what could she do other than to play the part of the sophisticate she had been dressed to look like—even if inside she suddenly felt like a scared little girl who was out of her depth? She tried to remember the kind of things which seasoned flirts said on television programmes.

‘Really?’ She widened her eyes. ‘On what?’

Nikolai’s lips gave a flickering curve of satisfaction. This was better. Much better. For a moment back then, he had thought she meant it—that she was actually giving him the brush-off. And when had that last happened? Never, he reflected sagely. He might have been described as the world’s biggest commitment-phobe, but he was a master at getting women into his arms. He felt the quick beat of pleasure as he realised that up close she was just as delicious. ‘On whether you’re any good at dealing with difficult and demanding men,’ he mused.