Page 173 of Modern Romance January 2025 1-4

Ramon was serious now. Finally. ‘Because you’re a danger to the deal.’

‘Yes.’

The startling blue of his eyes thinned as his pupils flared and she found herself sinking into their dark depths. The crackling sensation across her skin was so foreign it took her too long to realise what it was. Chemistry. Sexual chemistry. To her horror she realised her heat wasn’t entirely comprised of rage at all. Her pulse thundered because this wasn’t some tempting tendril of intimacy. This was an untrammelled cannonball of lust suddenly running amok within her. All because he was standing so close. It was something she’d never before felt. Instant. Intense. Completely and utterly inappropriate. Horrified at the utterly unbidden rush of want, she gasped sharply. But the attraction was overpowering—and terrifyingly unstoppable.

‘And you’re a danger to me,’ he whispered.

‘Very much so.’ She bluffed.

Because she knew now that the opposite was true—he was an absolute danger to her. But she couldn’t seem to back away from him. She should. She should get away. She didn’t need to test his measure. He thought and said and did what he wanted with no compunction and no remorse and certainly no consideration for another’s feelings. And yet here she was, a heartbeat away from him.

‘How, exactly?’ he breathed.

That heat from deep within spread across every inch of her body and burned her skin. To her amazement a light flush echoed on his—colour scorching those angular cheekbones as his intense focus dropped to her mouth. With innate understanding she realised that he was considering kissing her. Instinctively her lips parted—that was to breathe, right? Because the shock stole her breath.

But she didn’t step back. She refused to let him intimidate her. Because that’s all this was—an attempt at intimidation. He was so sure of himself—enraptured with his own power—sensual and otherwise. But this close she caught a hint of his rich, oaky scent and the reason why she was even here at all began to slide from her mind as a shadowy, heated haze enveloped her. His long jet lashes lowered and suddenly his lips were but a whisper from hers.

With the last thread of resistance she remembered. Murmured, ‘You would cheat on your fiancée so easily?’

His eyebrows flickered but he didn’t pull back. ‘You would betray your sister?’

‘It’s no betrayal,’ she denied huskily. ‘I’ve already told you I’ll doanythingto stop this marriage.’

She would put herself between him and her sister.

His lips twisted in triumph and he lifted his head away from her. His eyes glittered as he stared as she ran a tongue across parched lips. She realised thathe’dbeen testingher. He hadn’tactuallyintended to kiss her and that she feltdisappointmentwas truly awful.

‘You’re not in love with her,’ she accused bitterly.

‘No,’ he admitted with brutal candour.

Pain and fury and humiliation coalesced within her. How could he—and how could her parents—do this? Elodie wouldn’t let them hurt Ashleigh in this way.

‘So she’s nothing but a toy?’ she flared scornfully. ‘A pawn in some bigger game you’re playing? Just a thing to be sacrificed?’

‘You think it would be so bad to be married to me?’ he asked too mildly.

‘Apparently I’m not the only one who thinks that, given the lengths you’re having to go to get yourself a wife.’

His flash of amusement infuriated her all the more. How could he laugh? It was sickening.

‘It’s all about you,’ she erupted. ‘Your status. Your needs.’

‘You don’t think there’ll be any benefits to her in the arrangement?’

‘None that are worth it.’ Not Ashleigh’s innocence and liberty and dreams for her own future.

Elodie had long ago vowed never to get involved with another man again. She’d fought hard for her own freedom. She’d done horrible, necessary things. But she would suffer far more if it could save her sister from the same.

‘For some unfathomable reason you want to get married,’ she said. ‘So perhaps it doesn’t matter who the unfortunate woman is.’

He was unnervingly still, that intensity sharpening his eyes. ‘You have another candidate in mind?’

Candidate. As if it were a job.

‘Another poor soul, you mean?’

The devastating good looks of the man, his searing wealth, his callous lack of care and her own horrendouslyanimalresponse to him fuelled her fury to the point where all control was lost.

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