Page 27 of The Tycoon's Shock Heir

That bed was probably never cold.

She turned. Looked at him. At the navy stretch of his boxer shorts as they cut across his perfect stomach, the bump of each muscle and the dark arrow of hair. His wide, hard chest, its bones extending out, broken and uneven on one side, perfect on the other. The wide trunk of his neck, his stubbled jaw, hair messed up and framing his cool morning-after face.

For a split second she hovered. The urge to jump into his arms and wrap her legs around his waist, to bury herself in all that man, glory in the kissing and hugging and sweet, dirty loving they had shared was as tempting as her next breath.

But she didn’t move a muscle. Because she couldn’t unwrap herself all over again. She’d get away with it once, but not another time. Not now that she had bound herself back together again.

She shook her head vigorously.

‘I can’t. I have to go. I’m sorry—I need to...to get things done.’

He was looking at her carefully, warily, and then he put his hands down. ‘Fair enough. You don’t need to explain anything. I’ve got a lot on too.’

‘Yes, I hope it goes well. So, can you call me a cab, please?’

He looked at her, then lifted his phone. ‘Send the car,’ he said.

He stared at her, his brown berry eyes now glassy and hard. The coffee brewing on the hob began to splutter and spill out of the spout.

‘It won’t be too long.’

The lid of the coffee pot rose up as steam and coffee broke free. Matteo reached for it and casually lifted it to the side.

‘I can wait downstairs.’

‘If you like.’

She strode through the hallway, her heels clicking on the tiles, the faces on the walls grinning like clowns now, mocking her desperation to get out of the apartment, onto the street and out of this stupid dress.

She stared at her scarlet reflection in the hallway mirror, and the agony of waiting was accompanied by the sonorous bell as the lift slowly climbed closer.

‘Wait,’ said a voice, and then Matteo too was in the mirror, hopping towards her, pulling on a pair of joggers, his big body loose and powerful, his face smooth, his lips closed.

The lift doors opened and she rushed gratefully inside, willing the doors to close before he could come in. But in he came, utterly consuming the air, the space, her line of sight—everything.

She stared straight ahead at their twin reflections, blurred lines in the glass: her in last night’s dress and him broad, bronzed and bare-chested.

She bowed her head. ‘You don’t need to do this.’

‘I’ll see you into the car.’

The rest of the trip down thirty floors was silent but for the whoosh of the lift. She stared at her shoes. The satin toe of one was scuffed. His feet beside hers were bare. She turned her head.

With infinite slowness the lift finally bumped to a stop and the doors eased open. She stepped out into the plush, hushed reception area. Ahead, the glass doors screened the city—the world she knew, the world she was desperate to reclaim. Anywhere but here.

‘This doesn’t feel right,’ he said, suddenly grabbing her hand. ‘This doesn’t feel right at all. Did I say something? Or do something?’

They were almost at the doors. A round glass table laden with fruit stood in their way. A car rolled into view.

He swung her round and she looked up into his face. She memorised the lines of his eyelids, the crooked bridge of his nose, the soft pillow of his lower lip. She’d never see them again.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said. ‘You’re just not my type.’

He winced as if she’d slapped him and stepped back.

A doorman loomed into sight through the glass. The doors were opened. She looked at the roll of burgundy carpet spread out before her, ending at the gutter.

The car door was opened. She stepped inside.

‘Nobody is,’ she whispered as the car sped away.

CHAPTER EIGHT

THE WAITING ROOM at the clinic was light and bright and cheerful. Magazines lay neatly stacked in a wall rack and a water cooler offered its shimmery blue contents silently beneath.

Above the sofa opposite a screen flashed news from an announcer as a tape of stories ran underneath. To her left the white-uniformed staff competently filed and welcomed and attended to various other things.

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