Page 19 of Cinderella's One-Night Baby

‘How are you enjoying the party?’ he murmured.

‘Very well, thank you.’ She answered with such politeness that he moved his head back a little so he could look down at her face. The Gabrielle Breton who’d been at his side the entire evening had been many things towards him but polite was not one of them. He didn’t count her efforts at politeness when she’d searched his car as the underlying bite had negated it. Her lack of deference was one of the many things he liked about her.

Oh, yes, he liked this woman, and not just because he found her the sexiest creature to walk this earth. He liked her humour. Liked her intelligence. Liked her compassion. Liked her commitment. Liked her straight talking. Liked her enthusiasm for food. Liked the pulse in her eyes whenever their gazes locked together. Liked that when he’d snaked his way to her on the dance floor she’d looked at him as if he were the only man in the world.

She was holding herself stiffly, her gaze fixed over his shoulder making it impossible to read her expression.

‘Glad you came?’

‘Yes,’ she replied with the same politeness. ‘Thank you for inviting me.’

‘It has been my pleasure.’

Another slow song began to play.

The crowd around them continued to mushroom. The floor space they had to call their own continued to shrink, forcing their bodies even closer.

The swell of her breasts crushed into his chest. A rush of awareness strong enough to fell a horse thickened his loins. If they hadn’t been so closely entwined he would have missed the hitch of Gabrielle’s breath, missed the shudder that ran the length of her body, missed the almost imperceptible tightening of her fingers on his back.

‘I mean it,’ he murmured, finally giving into temptation and rubbing his nose into her hair. The strands felt like silk. ‘Having you as my date has been a delight, Gabrielle.’

Dios, this womandidsomething to him.

Gabrielle’s head was still spinning with the blood that had rushed to it at the first crush of their bodies. Pressed so tightly against the hardness of Andrés’s torso, his breaths dancing into the roots of her hair, the musky heat of his skin and cologne dancing in her airwaves and their bodies swaying in time together, it was all she could do to keep her legs upright, never mind push him away so she could run.

Because she should run. This was madness. Dancing with him like this was madness. She was feeding the ravenous butterflies in her belly and stoking the flames of a desire that could never be given air.

But her body was begging her to press even closer. Her breasts were as sensitised as she’d ever imagined they could be and pleading to be crushed tighter into his chest, the skin on her back aching to feel the hand making slow circular motions against it without the barrier of her dress.

That same hand moved lower to caress her bottom.

Impulse overcame reason and she turned her face to the opened part of his shirt and rubbed her nose against his exposed throat and breathed him in.

The musk of Andrés’s cologne and another underlying scent...the scent of his skin...filled her airwaves at the same moment she became aware of the hardness pressing against her abdomen. The thrill that rushed through her was so strong it knocked the air from her lungs and infected every cell in her body with pulsing heat. For one heady, tantalising moment she ground herself into the hardness only to come to her senses with a shock that had her yanking herself out of his arms.

Her cheeks burning at her own wantonness, she met his hooded stare and somehow managed to speak through the raggedness of her breaths. ‘I need air.’

Terrified to look at him a moment longer, Gabrielle span around and slipped her way through the pulsing dance floor to escape.

Andrés watched Gabrielle disappear into the crowd with his heart thumping wildly.

Dios, he could hardly breathe through the desire blazing through him, but he filled his lungs and then, uncaring of the dancing couples he had to push out of his way, set off after her.

He’d just cleared the dance floor when she vanished through the opened French doors that led out into the palace gardens.

Following her lead, he stepped out into the quieter, warm sweet air.

Only a handful of other people were out there, sitting on the benches of the perimeter patio...and then he spotted her in the distance, shoes in hand, treading over the immaculate lawn to the nineteenth century gazebo that looked like a miniature castle in its own right, her path lit by tiny nightlights and the stars high in the night sky twinkling down on her.

He descended the steps and stepped onto the grass.

His stride being twice the length of hers, he made an effort to slow his pace and give her a little of the space she needed.

He was closing in on her when she sank onto one of the marble benches. He was out of her eye line but she must have sensed his approach for she turned her face to him before he’d put his foot onto the first of the gazebo’s steps.

She’d done the same on the dance floor he remembered. Sensed his approach.

Propping himself against a pillar a good distance from her, Andrés studied her without speaking. Just as she’d sensed his approach, he sensed that he should wait until Gabrielle was ready to break the silence.

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