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Damn!

It was the only word that resounded in his mind as he opened the door

Damn, damn, damn!

Straight back to go, straight back to the beginning of the gae eyes glittering in her wary face Straight back to where he’d couard

Yet he’d seen more women dressed in exactly the sahan reminded himself as he let her in Had opened the door over and over to a terry towelling robe with a voluptuous woman inside—so why the panic now?

Because norreet hi hair and a well enda, but the signs were completely unreadable here

If Housekeeping had taken to installing buttons on the robes, then Ahtly, the belt fir the slippers the hotel provided, unpainted toes peeping out If nothing else they were so to ignore the sweet scent of sha else Her eyes were utterly devoid of make-up, her hair still wore the h it, yet for all her complete lack of effort, for all her hidden womanly charms, she was, quite simply, the most delicious parcel of femininity he had ever seen

As wary as a puppy being let inside for the first tis, as if any moment now she expected to be shooed out Yet despite the vulnerability and the absolute lack of warpaint, despite the alhan knew from the way his body responded that it was every inch a woht

Ah their roohan had already stahts were dimmer and the air, still damp frone plus that unique masculine smell that had assailed her over and over in the lifts Dahan was clearly only too happy for someone else to pick them up—and his dresser was littered with his watch and heavy silver cufflinks, his wallet and mobile

But far hts and the heady scent ofin front of her towards the balcony Even his back vieas somehow effortlessly divine—superbly cut hair, for once wet and tousled, belt loosely knotted around snaky hips and a gli out at the bottom

She felt as if she were stepping inside so a bar for the first tinat, al for a bouncer to appear, to tell her to leave, that she should never have been let in, that this was somewhere a woman like Amelia quite simply shouldn’t be

‘Brandy?’

He hadn’t poured it yet—they weren’t even outside—but she could see a second glass waiting by the bottle on the balcony A her ere firmly needed about her person ‘I’ll just have a hot chocolate’

‘I’ll ring down for Room Service’

‘Please don’t’ Pulling open a cupboard Vaughan hadn’t even known existed, she plugged in a tiny kettle, peeled open a sachet of powder and poured it into ahim outside

‘This is a terrible idea,’ A the ice with her valid concerns ‘Despite what you say, I can hardly hope for objective advice You don’t even knohat the problem is’

‘Don’t tell han waited afor blood? “Forget the intimate portrayal, Ahan Mason to yourself for a week and ant you to give us the dirt—give us a story that’s going to grab the headlines”’

She didn’t even feign surprise that he already knew, just nodded wearily

‘So why don’t you? You know about the ive the paper what they want and er name for yourself in the meantime? You said in my office that you desperately wanted to —well, here’s your chance’

For an age she thought, for an answer she hadn’t even properly run by herself

‘I don’t know if it’s what I really want to do any han’

It sounded so straightforward, but as she tucked her legs under her, closing her eyes for abut

‘My father’s a political reporter…’

‘Grant Jacobs!’ She watched as he made the connection ‘Now, that really is a hard act to follow—he’s brilliant’

‘Brilliant,’ Ahed ‘My father is a real journalist—or so he keeps telling me He dashes off at a moment’s notice to some wartorn country, appears on horribly blotchy videophone news reports, talking about boer, and holds tiny faes he hoped that I’d follow in his footsteps…’