Reluctant Husband by Lynne Graham

Author:Lynne Graham [Graham, Lynne]
Language: eng
Format: mobi
Tags: Romance, General, Contemporary, Love Stories, Fiction
ISBN: 9780373119714
Google: t4tqVlq4afMC
Amazon: 0373119712
Publisher: Harlequin
Published: 1998-01-02T05:00:00+00:00

'You'll feel a lot better after you eat,' Santino asserted drily.

Unconvinced, Frankie stared down at the rather charred toast on the breakfast tray. It was safer than looking at Santino. Severe embarrassment clawed at her, for she recalled almost every awful moment of the previous night. Santino initially incredulous at the state she was in, then impatient, exasperated, but ultimately kind. And why had he been kind? It was bred into Santino's privileged bones to be kind towards those weaker or less able than he was. She squirmed, pride choking on a generosity which had only increased her sense of humiliation.

'Thank you,' she contrived between clenched teeth, pushing up the sliding strap of the slinky nightdress she had woken up in, shamed as only a woman could be by the knowledge that she had no recollection of donning the garment.

'There has to be a reason why you got that drunk.'

'I wasn't drunk...I was only a bit tipsy,' she countered, so desperate to escape a post mortem, she even bit into a piece of that unappetising toast while wondering if she ought to preserve it for posterity. Unless she was very much mistaken, this toast was the closest Santino had ever come to cooking.

'Are you in love with Matt Finlay?'

Frankie almost choked on the toast. 'Of course I'm not...he's just a friend!' she spluttered in frustration.

Santino contemplated her with galling cool. Then you over-indulged because you were nervous—'

'That's ridiculous! Why do you have to make such heavy weather out of something that was purely accidental?'

Santino's beautiful mouth clenched hard. 'Possibly because the idea of you endangering yourself with such reckless behaviour in the company of a less scrupulous male angers me. You should know better.'

The days when I looked to you to tell me how to behave are far behind me.'

Santino dealt her a derisive glance from the doorway. 'It shows.'

Head lowering, cheeks burning, Frankie swallowed convulsively.

Having believed Santino had left the room, she was startled when the tray was lifted away and he sank down instead on the edge of the bed. Unprepared for that proximity, her pained eyes unguarded, she stiffened defensively as he threaded long, sure fingers through her wildly tumbled hair in a disturbingly comforting gesture.

And then, without warning, Saniino smiled, one of those blinding, sudden, charismatic smiles that shook her up and made her treacherous heart race. That wasn't a very generous comment when you spent so much time apologising last night,' he conceded huskily.

He was so close she could smell the hot, sun-warmed scent of him, intrinsically male and powerfully familiar. Her nostrils flared, her breath catching in her throat as she raised an involuntary hand and let her fingers rest on one broad shoulder to steady herself, her gaze welded to the shimmering gold of his. She shivered as he eased her forward and bent his dark head. A warm, drugging anticipation trapped her in submissive stillness.

He kissed her very gently, his tenderness a soothing balm to her smarting sensitivities. And it made her want him even more.

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