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  'By the same token decent women don't allow themselves to be picked up,' Luke retorted dryly. 'So that makes us two of a kind, wouldn't you say?'

  Jemma blushed at his insulting comment. 'I would prefer not to say anything to you at all,' she shot back, but she could not deny his reasoning.

  'Unfortunately that's not an option; I have no intention of leaving here until I discover what made you sleep with me—other than my undoubted charm, of course,' he said with a grin. 'As I recall you came into my arms and my bed willingly, and what followed was a wildly passionate and mutually satisfying encounter for both of us. I've rarely met a more compatible woman in the bedroom, so why the lies about your name, your married status?'

  There was a long silence as they stared at each other, the air in the room heavy with the tension of two people who had shared a brief, fiercely physical episode. Jemma was trying her best to forget it had ever happened, even as an unwanted heat surged under every inch of her skin at the memory. As for being compatible with him on any level, her heart shrank at the notion, and she tore her gaze from his to focus on the window behind him, the evening sun streaming through the glass panes blinding her for a moment.

  Jemma blinked; she had absolutely nothing in common with a super-rich sophisticated giant of the financial world like Luke Devetzi. Hers had been a typical middle class upbringing, comfortably provided for by a small family business. It was only after her father had married again that the house she had known as home all her life had been traded in for the lavish house in Connaught Square, at her stepmother's instigation, and that the company had expanded in leaps and bounds and the family had become very wealthy, according to her dad. Not that Jemma had noticed—she worked for her living.

  'I asked you a question,' Luke prompted sharply. He could tell by the expression on her beautiful face that her thoughts had drifted away from him, and he didn't like it at all… 'Why did you lie?'

  The demand in his deep voice finally captured Jemma's attention. Thinking about the past was not helping her present situation, she realized, and her own common sense told her Luke was never going to let her forget or leave her alone until he had an explanation.

  Rising slowly to her feet, she glanced down at him. 'Okay, I'll make a deal with you. I'll tell you what you want to know.' Her own innate honesty urged her to tell him the truth and shame the devil, and finally draw a line under the horrendous event once and for all. 'But you have to promise to leave and never bother me again—no more excuses.'

  'Fair enough,' Luke agreed smoothly.

  She wasn't convinced his word could be trusted, but she gave him the benefit of the doubt—mainly because she could see no other way of getting rid of him. Jemma walked across the room and picked up her favourite picture of Alan from the console table, then returned to her seat on the sofa. She looked at the photo for a while, and then, lifting her head, saw Luke had leant back on the sofa again and was watching her with hard, intelligent eyes.

  'The day I met you would have been my fourth wedding anniversary,' she said flatly. She saw him grimace and knew she had scored a hit. 'But it wasn't just that. It was a culmination of…' she paused for a moment '…disasters, if you like. I had arrived on Zante two weeks earlier with my aunt, at her insistence; it was the first time I had visited the island, and in fact I didn't even know Aunt Mary had a home there. For various reasons she wanted me to go with her—the main one being she'd been told a month earlier she had a very limited time left to live. Naturally I was upset, and as it happened she died a few months later from asbestosis.'

  Jemma drifted from the point, her amber eyes darkening with remembered sorrow. 'Odd, but I'd always thought of asbestosis as an industrial disease only afflicting men. But Aunt Mary reckoned she probably contracted it working in laboratories decades ago, where the perceived form of protection against fire was asbestos lining in the ceilings and walls. Anyway, it wasn't the happiest of holidays,' she continued, 'but we did try to enjoy ourselves, and I built her the rockery she had always wanted. In the process I dropped a stone on my hand. Three of my fingers were badly swollen, and my wedding ring had to be cut off.' She looked at Luke, her expressive face bleak. 'I took it to a shop in the town to be repaired, and when I met you I had just retrieved it from the jewellers. I had tried to put it back on in the shop, but my finger was still a little swollen. You wouldn't understand, having never been married, but I was upset.

  'I don't usually drink, but I ordered a glass of wine from the bar while I waited for the local bus and the waiter brought a carafe instead. I had a couple of glasses, maybe more, and I was thinking about Alan and our wedding day when the accident with the wine happened and you appeared.' She stopped and, leaning forward, she very deliberately offered him the photo. 'Take a look.' He took it from her outstretched hand without comment.

  'That's my favourite photo of Alan, and when I looked up into your eyes that day—so blue and so concerned, just like Alan's—and you asked me my name, in my befuddled state I said Mimie, because that was what Alan always called me. Then in a daze of sadness and confusion I simply followed where you led. I admit I behaved badly, and by the time I came to my senses I was horrified. Perhaps it was the reflection of the water or something.' A puzzled frown briefly marred her smooth brow. 'Because actually your eyes are nothing like Alan's—yours are grey, like granite,' she said with a glance at him. Seeing the thunderous frown on his face, she realised she was digressing. 'Anyway, I dashed into the bathroom, got dressed, and forced my ring back on my finger. You know the rest.'

  'My God!' Luke exclaimed, white hot fury engulfing him. To hear this woman he had made love to say she had been horrified afterwards was bad enough, but as for the rest…! 'You expect me to believe you slept with me because I reminded you of your husband?' he demanded scathingly. And, dropping the picture, he leapt to his feet and crossed the space dividing them. 'I look nothing like the man,' he snarled.

  He had never been so insulted in his life, and he was damned if he was going to let Jemma get away with such a damaging blow to his pride. Angrily he studied her, his eyes raking over her body. The cotton top she was wearing was pulled tight across her high, firm breasts as she perched on the edge of the sofa, her hands clenched into the soft fabric either side of her like some exotic bird ready for flight.

  Shocked by the extent of his fury, Jemma saw the dark flush across his high cheekbones, the icy glitter in his eyes, and too late realised it had probably not been the best idea in the world to tell such an arrogant man the truth.

  A man with an ego the size of Luke Devetzi's wasn't exactly going to be pleased to discover he had been used as a stand-in for another man. It was ironic, in a way, and the briefest of dry smiles curved her lips as she recalled Jan telling her how Luke was renowned for using women. But, discretion being the better part of valour, Jemma didn't voice her thoughts; instead she slipped along the sofa and stood up, as far away from him as she could get. 'I didn't say you looked like him. I said your eyes appeared blue—a trick of the light.' She attempted to mollify him. 'But it's not important now, because you promised to leave me alone if I told you the truth, and I have.' As far as Jemma was concerned she had kept her part of the deal and she wanted him gone.

  'Oh, I'm leaving all right.' Luke stepped towards her, and for a moment Jemma thought her ordeal was over and he was going. 'But first I'm going to prove to you that you're fooling no one but yourself.' And before she could react to his outrageous statement, he reached for her and pulled her against his hard body, his sensuous mouth capturing hers with punishing ferocity.

  CHAPTER FOUR

  For a heartbeat she was frozen in shock as he tried to force her lips apart. But only for a heartbeat. Not again, Jemma vowed, incandescent with rage at his caveman tactics and his total disregard of his promise to leave. Curling her hand into a fist, she lashed out at him and brought her knee up hard, aiming for the most vulnerable part of the man. With lightening reflexes he jerked away. But, caught off balance, he
fell back and took her with him and they landed in a tangled heap on the sofa.

  Winded, and before she knew what had happened, Jemma was flat on her back, with the weight of his body pinning her down. She tried to lash out at him again, but he caught her hands and secured them firmly above her head with one of his.

  'Oh, no, you don't,' he grated. 'I won't tolerate violence from anyone, and certainly not from a she-devil like you.'

  'What do you call this, then?' she cried, trying to wriggle from beneath him. But in reaction to her movement she felt the hardening potency of his masculine arousal against her thigh and realised her mistake. The last thing she needed was a rampant, raging Luke—the heat that suffused her own body she put down to temper.

  His hard mouth curved in a lethal smile. 'A lesson in how to greet your lover,' he rasped, and she knew he was going to kiss her. She whipped her head to one side to avoid him, and his mouth closed over the rapidly beating pulse in her neck. She gasped as his firm lips trailed up to her ear. Blowing gently, he added, 'Because, however much you wish it wasn't true, I am your last lover. Not your long-dead husband.

  Fury at his comment battled with a rising tide of excitement that she fought to control. She wanted to deny him, but the warmth of his breath in her ear, the familiar male scent of him, the weight of his body on hers, evoked a multitude of memories she had sternly suppressed.

  With finger and thumb Luke grasped her chin and turned her face to his. 'You know I'm right,' he murmured, and his teeth nipped at her lower lip, demanding that she give him access and abandon herself to the sensual awareness that had simmered beneath the surface between them ever since they had met again last night.

  Later she would realise just how cunning he had been, but now, as he stroked his tongue gently across her lips, she ached to give in to his erotic demand and lose herself in the heady pleasure of his kiss. Still she tried to resist the shattering sexual impact of his mouth, teasing and tasting hers, and she might have succeeded if he had remained forcible, but he was too experienced a lover to be so crass. And when his hand dropped from her chin to slip up beneath her cotton top and cup one firm breast, an arrow of excitement shot from her breast to her groin.

  Her lips parted involuntarily and his tongue probed the soft, moist interior with an eroticism that aroused an answering passion in her she battled to control… and failed. His fingers found the pert pink tip of one breast and plucked gently, bringing it to a tight, hard nub of aching desire before stroking across to deliver the same exquisite pleasure to the other. And all the time his sensual mouth devoured hers in a kiss of ever-deepening desire.

  His head lifted and a low moan escaped her. As though it was a signal Luke had been waiting for, he released her wrists and pulled her top over her head. Blinded for a moment, when Jemma opened her eyes it was to see Luke, minus his jacket, staring down at her body with intent, hungry eyes. Then his dark head dipped and he kissed her again, before placing kisses down her throat and then lower, his tongue teasingly circling a swollen nipple, slowly drawing the rigid tip between his teeth to suckle it.

  Jemma's back arched in helpless response as a feverish excitement rocketed through her body. It had been too long since she had been in a man's arms—in this man's arms—since she had felt the exquisite pleasure of sexual arousal, and Luke had seduced her utterly. One small hand slipped beneath the open neck of his shirt to cling to his broad shoulder, the other curving around the nape of his neck, her fingers combing involuntarily through the silky black hair of his head and urging him closer to her aching breasts. Jemma's eyelids drifted down in helpless response to his expert touch and she gave herself up completely, to revel in the exquisite sensations consuming her whole body. She felt his hand on her belly and had no idea when he had unzipped her trousers. But she didn't care as his long fingers slipped beneath her lace panties to cup the mound of her sex.

  Luke raised his head, his molten silver gaze burning over her near-naked body. She was everything he remembered and so much more, and his own hunger threatened to explode as he saw her beautiful face flushed with passion, her glorious eyes…closed…

  Luke growled deep in his throat and reared back. 'Open your eyes, Jemma,' he demanded harshly. Her thick lashes lifted and she stared up at him, her golden gaze hazed with desire. With one long finger he outlined her pouting mouth. 'Now, say my name.'

  'Luke,' she murmured breathlessly, and tried to push his shirt from his shoulders.

  'And again,' he insisted, dipping his head to lave and then briefly nip the peak of first one breast and then the other before returning to take her mouth once more. He felt her body jerk up beneath him and he ached to be inside her, hard and fast and immediately… 'My name, Jemma,' he demanded yet again.

  'Luke,' she groaned. 'Luke, don't stop…'

  'Good. Very good,' he grated between suddenly clenched teeth, and with superhuman control he forced himself to grasp her shoulders and push her back against the sofa, to rise to his feet.

  Jemma looked up at Luke with passion-dazed eyes and involuntarily lifted a hand towards him. She felt the cool air against her breasts, but it was as nothing to the coldness in the gaze that swept briefly over her reclining form.

  'But stop we must, because although we have established that you say my name so eagerly, you will never mistake me for your husband or any other man again.'

  Jemma shivered at the implacable tone in his voice. Something had gone wrong. Instinctively she edged up into a sitting position.

  'And, beautiful and wanton though you are—' he reached out and brushed a few tendrils of hair from her brow '—I have no intention of making love to you in this shrine to your dead husband.' His silkily voiced comment acted like a bucket of iced water on Jemma's overheated senses. 'The next time we make love will be at a place and time of my choosing, Jemma.'

  She stared up at his shuttered face, unwilling to believe what her mind was telling her was true. She recognised the gleam of cynical triumph in his steel-grey eyes, the dark desire in the enlarged black pupils, and turned her head away. He had deliberately made love to her for no other reason than as a sop to his monumental ego. How could she have been so dumb? Such a push-over?

  Desire and disgust fought inside her. Her shattered gaze lighted on the picture of Alan on the sofa opposite, and somehow it gave her strength. She took a deep, shuddering breath, and then another. She wouldn't let Luke know how easily he could reduce her to the wanton he had called her; she wouldn't give him the satisfaction. Instead she would play him at his own game.

  'Nice thought.' She forced a smile to her swollen lips and slid off the sofa. Picking up her top, she added, 'You're right. This isn't the place.' She pulled her top over her head and smoothed it over her breasts, taking her time to regain some semblance of control before glancing up at him. If she had not been so bitterly ashamed and angry she might have laughed at the expression of surprise on his face. He had obviously not expected her to agree with him. 'Thank you for reminding me and, speaking of time, it's time you left.'

  Gathering every scrap of will-power she could muster, she sauntered towards the door and had stepped about three paces along the hall before Luke caught up with her. Taking her arm, he turned her around to face him, a querying light in his shrewd grey eyes.

  'You're suddenly being very reasonable.'

  'Why not?' Jemma casually shrugged her shoulders and brushed his hand from her arm, opening the front door. In seconds she had walked down the short garden path and stepped out onto the pavement, and turned to find he was right behind her. Bravely she looked him in the eye, though she was shaking inside with humiliation and rage. 'After all, you and I both know it's never going to happen.

  Because you're incapable of making love,' she jeered softly.

  'Incapable!' Luke repeated in amazement. 'Whatever gave you that idea? Don't tell me.' He answered his own question. 'It's your frustration talking, because I wouldn't make love to you just now.' Why did this woman feel the need to insult h
is sexual prowess when she knew perfectly well that she was putty in his arms any time he chose? He shook his head in exasperation. Jemma was the most infuriating female he had ever met. He really didn't need someone like her in his well-ordered life when he knew without conceit that he could take his pick from dozens of much more amenable women. And how the hell had she manoeuvred him out onto the pavement?

  Jemma saw him stiffen in outrage and she didn't give a damn. It was way past time the arrogant devil heard a few home truths. 'No, it's not frustration talking, just the simple truth,' she stated bluntly. 'You don't make love—you have sex, and lots of it, with countless women, by all accounts. But I suppose, given your great wealth, that's to be expected. To give you your due, you do appear to know all the right buttons to press,' she declared with a humourless smile, and added, 'But you do lack a lot in the sensitivity stakes. And, since I have known real love, I'm never going to settle for anything less,' she concluded, not bothering to hide the utter contempt in her tone.

  Luke wanted to grab her by the shoulders and shake her till her teeth rattled. He was enraged at the brutal dissection of his character—although a part of his anger was with himself, because he could not totally deny what Jemma had said. He drew in a deep, harsh breath, fighting to control his temper.

  'You say that now, Jemma, but never is a very long time.' He smiled unpleasantly. 'And you may not have a choice.'

  'One always has a choice,' Jemma asserted, and almost added And I would never choose you, but, glancing up at him, she saw the threat in his eyes, in the powerful body looming over her, and she held her tongue as a sliver of apprehension ran down her spine.

  'True… But sometimes the choice is not between good and bad, right and wrong.' His grey eyes held hers, a calculating and sinister light in the glittering depths. 'Often it's between the lesser of two evils, as you will no doubt learn.'

  Jemma watched Luke shrug on his jacket, and with a last contemptuous glance at her he spun on his heel and walked away. She saw him step into a racy black car parked a few metres along the pavement. He never looked back.