“No, Cole.” She shook her head insistently, tears glittering in her eyes. “This should never have happened.”
Then, without any further explanation, Alex turned away from him and pulled herself from the water, leaving him staring after her in mounting frustration. As she hurried across the patio, moonlight glistening on her lithe, naked body, his gaze fell to the
Odhroerir
tattooed on her back, and a primal rush of possession swept through him, filling him with resolve, leaving him dead certain he had not been mistaken.
Alex was meant to be his Bride.
Steely determination clenched his jaw, and he sucked in a deep breath, catching the scent of her that still lingered on his skin. With the same single-minded determination he’d used to control his fate over the course of his long, long existence, Cole made up his mind, then and there. Alex
would
belong to him—for all eternity.
He would accept
nothing
less.
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The next two weeks became a frustrating game of cat and mouse. Cole pursued her with undaunted, calculated determination. Alex’s resolved evasion continued with a growing sense of panic. He used the excuse of a love ballad they were working on for the next album to force her into near constant, one-on-one contact, pressing her at every available opportunity with lusty stolen kisses and sexy, heart-stopping glances.
He pilfered caresses, brushing against her at every opportune moment, dropping innuendo after pointed, seductive innuendo. She couldn’t take anymore. Her resistance wasn’t that strong.
Late one afternoon, after spending the better part of the day fending off Cole’s persuasive advances, her poise—and her resolve—was in shreds. She snuck away while he was otherwise occupied, hoping to steal a few moments to reinforce her resistance. Like a bloodhound, he tracked her down and cornered her in the kitchen, in much the same spot as he had that shocking night not so very long ago.
Without a word, he stalked her back against the counter, trapping her with his body, pinning her with his sultry gaze. The spoon she’d been holding clattered to the floor as his lips closed determinedly over hers, robbing her of her breath, turning her knees to jelly, her resolve to mush.
Her resistance trembled and cracked, and he smiled knowing triumph against her lips.
Panting, Alex wrenched her lips from his, pushing 233
ineffectually at his chest. Undeterred, Cole’s lips skated to her cheek, then lower to nibble at the tender flesh beneath her ear.
“Stop it, Cole!” She’d meant the words to be forceful, demanding. They were, instead, a pitiful, breathless, desperate plea.
“Why?” Cole murmured between nips. “You know that’s not what you want. It’s sure as hell not what
I
want.”
“I don’t want this,” she insisted, but her voice wavered, unconvincing.
“Yes, you do. You want this, Alex, and you want me.” He rubbed himself invitingly against her, trailing hot, wet kisses over her collarbone and up the other side of her neck. “I can
feel
it, sweetheart.” When she didn’t immediately agree, Cole’s voice hinted at his baffled torment. “Odin’s teeth,
why
do you fight this, woman?
How
do you fight it? It’s all I can do not to take you right here.”
His words shot liquid flames of desire through her veins as vivid images filled her mind. It took all of Alex’s willpower to feign indifference.
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.
There is nothing to fight, Cole, not anymore,” Alex claimed, her throbbing pulse exposing her lie for what it was.
“Is that so?” His gaze glittered with blatant disbelief as he leaned back to probe deep into her eyes. His slow, smug smile accepted her challenge.
Cole’s hungry eyes dropped once more to her lips, and he moaned aloud when the tip of her tongue slipped out to moisten her lower lip expectantly. Desire was etched in every line on his face, his body was rigid with his need—and yet he restrained himself. She couldn’t decide whether to be relieved, or disappointed.
234
He shot her one last look of cold determination—the look of a triumphant
conqueror assessing spoils of war—then he pivoted on his heel, stalking from the kitchen without sparing her the slightest backward glance. Alex stared after him, bemused. Some tiny voice in the back of her head urged her to run, to run and keep right on running until she’d put Cole and his overwhelming sensual assault on her senses far, far behind her. Yet, the very thought of running was ridiculous.
She was not a coward.
So she’d slipped once. She wouldn’t be weak again. What happened between them had been nothing more than sex…mind-blowing sex, true…but it had been a serious mistake, nonetheless. From now on, she’d just have to make sure it was business only between them.
Business was unemotional.
Business was safe.
Alex wandered from the kitchen then, oblivious to the fact her spoon still lay on the floor where she’d dropped it, and the container of yogurt sat on the counter behind her, unopened.
She stepped inside the studio and blinked in surprise. The band was not alone. Several women had joined them, an anomaly she hadn’t been expecting. The beauties lounged at various, strategic points around the room, indolently watching as the band eased into another session.
Gritting her teeth in vexation at this unwelcome change in routine, Alex took a chair in the corner, determined to ignore the unwanted distraction. She wasn’t sure where they’d come from—the estate had been absent of excessive groupies of late, after all—but she sure as hell didn’t appreciate their reappearance.
The band rehearsed for well over three hours, 235
and at every pause, one or more of the women meandered unimpeded throughout the room of instruments, flirting with the musicians. Every time one of them drifted toward Cole—whenever one of them ran a manicured finger over his arm or trailed a greedy hand across his chest—Alex tensed, prepared to leap and dis
member in an uncharacteristic, primitive surge of
possessiveness.
When a leggy blonde slipped her arm around Cole’s waist and pressed her garish red lips to the side of his throat, Alex’s nails bit into her palms.
Somehow, she managed to restrain herself with commendable control, not uttering a single sound, even though she longed so desperately to screech and tear the woman’s hair out by her touched-up roots.
The woman stretched up on her toes and whispered into Cole’s ear, letting her hand trail down his stomach and lower. He simply grinned with wicked interest instead of pushing her away.
Alex had had enough. She stiffly stood up, chin proudly elevated, and silently stalked to the door.
“Yo, Slim! Where ya off to? We’re not done yet.”
“
I
am. You’ll have to excuse me, but I just can’t focus on the music with all the catty noise in here,” she bit out, unable to hide the hostility brewing in her eyes. “When you’re ready to have a real session, let me know.” With that scathing remark, she shot a pointed look at Cole, then stomped from the room, letting the door slam in her wake.
She huffed down one hall after another, too upset to slow down. Somehow, she ended up in Cole’s study. She shouldn’t have been surprised.
That seemed to have become a regular haunt of hers, though she tried to stick to hours when 236
Cole wasn’t likely to be around.
The sound of the lock sliding home hit Alex like a jolt of lightning, and she jumped in surprise. She spun around, only to find Cole standing in front of her. How had he moved so fast? Struggling to process how he’d managed to cover the distance in the blink of an eye, she sidled away, anxious to keep as much space between them as possible. But the look in his eyes hit her like a shockwave. There would be no interruptions this time, no reprieve. No escape.
She could see it in his eyes. Her time for evasions had run out. Cole would not be denied. He stalked her step for step, his electric blue eyes drilling into hers. He was untamed and unleashed. A conqueror, eager to consume, dangerous and undeterred.
Molten desire surged through her system, but she fought it with everything in her.
“That’s an interesting tattoo you have there, Alex,” he murmured, his eyes roamed her body with a sultry familiarity that left her breathless.
“I’ve been wondering. Why did you choose that particular symbol?”
His question threw her a little, as that very thing had been weighing on her mind since the moment she’d first walked into this room and had seen his collection. Bewildered, she sidestepped him again, wondering where her anger had gone.
A few moments ago, she’d stomped from the studio and down the hallways, fuming over the way he’d let that tramp crawl all over him, pawing at him like a cat in heat. Now, suddenly, he was here—giving her
that
look, using
that
tone—and instead of blasting him with her fury, all she could do was mumble and dodge, trying to get away before she melted in a quivering puddle of hunger at his feet.
237
“It’s not so very special,” she mumbled, slipping a few more paces to the left. But he dogged her every step, and she wanted to scream with frustration.
“Oh, I would beg to differ,” he drawled, treating her to the full impact of his sensual smile. “I’ve never seen another woman with a tattoo quite like that. I’m certain of that. After all, I’m very familiar with that particular symbol.
Every piece in my collection bears that same mark, Alex. But then, you’ve seen that for yourself, haven’t you, sweetheart? Don’t you think it a bit
too—coincidental?” Shrugging, muttering
s
omething
noncommittal beneath her breath, Alex eyed the distance to the door, panic flashing through her.
Could she make it before he caught her? As if reading her thoughts, Cole stepped between her and the door, his grin stretching, daring her.
Alex shifted course, but Cole was in front of her once more, and she could only blink.
Astonished. Before she could react, he cornered her in the curve of the Steinway, hemming her in with a strong arm. A nimble hand landed on the piano on either side of her. He’d moved so fast, she’d had trouble tracking him. One moment he’d been several feet away, and the next, he was pressing against her, caging her in.
Alex struggled to mask her panicky surprise.
She frowned up at him, but her voice wavered, betraying her. “What do you think you’re doing?” The smile came to Cole’s lips, slow and sensual. That smile made her nervous, right down to the tips of her toes. What was it about him that was so different? Every time one of the others made a pass at her or a play for her attention, she could push them aside with cool humor now. They were no threat to her—held no 238
interest for her. Yet with Cole, she couldn’t remain detached, couldn’t hide behind indulgent, sarcastic humor.
With him her defenses had cracked, and she was
flustered
.
His smug satisfaction took on a distinctive shade of wicked. At length, Cole reached up and drew the pencil from her hair, letting the mass tumble down her back. He glanced at the pencil in his hand with wry amusement, apparently remembering the last time he’d removed one of those from her hair. Then again, perhaps he was laughing at her penchant for using pencils rather than the traditional hair-clips.
Without warning, he tossed the pencil over his shoulder, and her unease grew. “I’m solving a puzzle.”
Alex forced the lump of desire in her throat down with a hard swallow. Her wide-eyed gaze locked on his iceberg blue eyes. “What puzzle?” Cole tilted his head, his eyes studying her face with infinite care. “You intrigue me, Alexandra Sinclair, with your prim, all-business attitude and your ruthlessly restrained hair. But there’s fire in your eyes. I’ve felt it.” His speculative gaze turned sultry, intense. “I’ve had a taste of it. It’s burned me, and I find myself wanting more, and more still. And I can’t help but wonder…” His voice trailed off as he traced the curve of her cheek with the back of his finger.
Although she told herself not to, she invited, breathless, “You wonder what?” His eyes lock with hers and his head lowered, until his lips hovered just above hers. Their breath mingled. “I’m wondering how long it will be before you finally admit that you want me every bit as much as I want you?” His words race across her lips, sending sparks cascading 239
through her, touching off a hunger neither of them could contain. “I
need
you, Alex.” Her eyes widened. Her lips parted, but before she could form a denial, his mouth sealed over hers, ravaging and ruthless. His hips pushed against her, and his tongue swept inside her mouth. The rigid heat of his arousal pressed against her in an unforgiving demand for surrender. Her knees shook, buckled.
She couldn’t fight the moan gurgling up inside her throat, hardly aware she’d even emitted a sound. His mouth became greedy, voracious…driven.
Cole’s long, agile fingers skimmed over her hip, up to cover her breast. The lace of her bra and the silk camisole were far more barrier than she could tolerate. In little time he stripped away her camisole, just as his lips stripped away her resistance. His questing fingers trailed across the scalloped edge of her bra, found the clasp between her breasts, releasing it with one deft flick. Baring her to his voracious hands.
Cole’s lips left hers to trail hot, open-mouthed kisses down her throat and across the delicate skin of her chest, nuzzling the sensitive flesh in the valley between her naked breasts. A low rumble of pleasure escaped him, rapacious and primal.
The sound both startled and thrilled Alex, jolting her to awareness o
nce more. Struggling to regain her senses, she began straining
backwards, pushing at his shoulders, panicked at the thought that she’d been within a hair’s breadth of diving headlong once again into waters best left uncharted. She’d already taken this swim, she reminded herself, and she’d lost her heart in the process. What more was she in danger of losing should she allow herself to fall 240
prey to Cole’s masterful seduction? Her sense of self? Her very soul?