Response

by Penny Jordan

  Her mouth was as dry as parchment, and Sienna knew that if he chose to he could make love to her here and now and she would glory in his possession of her womanhood. He turned, fastening his own seat-belt, his knuckles gleaming faintly through the tautness of his skin as he set the car in motion, and Sienna knew that there hadn’t been a thought or emotion she had experienced since meeting him that he hadn’t known of and shared.

  The knowledge was so unfamiliar and so heady that she sat silent as he manoeuvred the large car through the heavy lunchtime traffic, sending up a mental prayer of gratitude to whoever it was who directed her fate that she had been permitted this glorious enchantment. It was awesome to think of the faint threads of chance from which so much human happiness dangled. If Alexis hadn’t been recommended to try the agency; if she hadn’t been there….

  ‘We’re here.’ His cool, faintly husky voice broke through her thoughts. A doorman opened the car door and she stepped out, vaguely aware of Alexis saying something to him and the crisp crackle of new notes, and then they were stepping into the foyer, and Alexis was directing her towards the lift, his lazy, long stride covering the thickly carpeted ground so quickly that she almost had to run to catch up with him.

  He had a large suite at his disposal and someone had set up a desk with an expensive electronic typewriter and a small computer keyboard and VDU. There was another desk with three telephones and an in-tray stuffed full of papers. Sienna took most of it in in one single glance; after all, apart from the luxurious surroundings it was the sort of background she was now familiar with; the typewriter was a make she knew and had worked on before, and the computer presented no problems if she was required to use it. Mentally blessing Rob’s forethought in insisting on sending her on a three-day computer course when she first arrived in London, she started to slide her coat from her shoulders, tensing when she felt Alexis’ hands on her arms, his warm breath stirring the hair at the nape as he bent to assist her.

  She was trembling and she couldn’t stop; one part of her mind still bemused and half inclined to be appalled that she could feel like this; that she could be so ready to turn into his arms and let herself become part of him on such a short acquaintanceship, but the older, eternal womanly core of her urged her to follow her instincts to listen to what her heart was telling her and ignore the restrictions of generations of programming.

  Suddenly she was fiercely glad that there had been no one else; no other touch to sully the pleasure she would find in Alexis’ arms; a primaeval and intense need to give herself to this man and this man alone.

  He removed her coat and hung it up on the stand by the door, while Sienna watched him, her body as attuned to his as the gazelle’s to the hunter, quivering finely, every nerve ending aware of his presence and the frisson of pleasure it caused against her skin. When he returned to her he took her in his arms, simply holding her, looking down at her for several seconds, while Sienna returned his regard, knowing what he was reading in her face and eyes and making no attempt to hide her love and adoration from him.

  ‘Tell me that it’s true what your eyes are saying to me so eloquently; tell me that there’s never been any man you’ve felt about the way you feel about me.’ And then before she could respond his lips were brushing hers, lightly and then not so lightly as he felt her immediate response, her mouth parting eagerly, hungry for the hard possession of his.

  If it was possible to become intoxicated by sheer happiness then that was what must have happened to her, Sienna thought dizzily as Alexis’ lips left hers, travelling teasingly across her face; touching lightly against her fluttering eyelashes, closing her eyes, exploring the tender curve of her jaw; his fingers pushing aside her hair, his hands tightening their grip as he felt her involuntary response to the caress of his tongue and lips against her ear and the soft column of her throat, her body arching shamelessly against him as she responded with blind instinct to his touch.

  At last his mouth returned to hers, touching, taking, possessing. Her hands slid under his jacket and found the hard muscles of his back, her body glorying in the sudden aroused tension of his; in the way he held her against him, his hands moving down to her thighs, pressing her into his body, and then slowly releasing her as he ended the kiss. He took a step away from her and smiled down into her flushed, bemused face, his thumb softly probing the mouth his had just bruised with such devastating hunger. ‘So…’ he said softly, ‘it has begun….’

  ‘You… you felt it too?’ Sienna asked hesitantly, groping for the right words to describe her feelings and aware that those she had chosen were hopelessly inadequate to describe them. Two hours ago she hadn’t known that he existed, and now… now she was so deeply in love with him that nothing else mattered but him.

  ‘I felt it too,’ he confirmed, still keeping that small, tantalising distance between them. ‘Together we will make the world rock and feel its hushed tremble, my little virgin. When I make love to you and my body finally possesses yours it will be as though we are immortals, gods, and not mere human beings, but as yet you know nothing of the pleasure that will be ours. No other man has shown you what I shall show you. I shall be the first.’

  He said it with such assurance that she held her breath, staring wonderingly into his face. It was as though he had always known her; as though he knew everything there was to know about her, and so all she did was murmur slowly, ‘and the last….’ And then watched his eyes darken, with the same kind of wonder and awe with which she had listened to carols being sung on Christmas Eve as a child, the lump in her throat threatening to render her completely speechless. Alexis saw her reaction and laughed deep in his throat, a husky, satisfied sound, and she knew that the fact that she was still a virgin was pleasing him.

  ‘Ah, yes, we shall be lovers, you and I,’ he promised her, ‘but not today… not yet. First we shall enjoy the anticipation a little, and I shall try to school myself to playing the suitor rather than the lover. Also there is work to do, because I wasn’t lying about my need for a secretary.’

  Work? After this? Sienna stared mutely at him, but as she discovered as the day progressed he hadn’t been joking. Marvelling at his ability to change from lover to employer, she tried to follow his lead and concentrate on the detailed dictation he was giving her, all the time acutely conscious of the maleness of him; the way his trousers moulded the strong muscles of his thighs; the breadth of his shoulders and the depth of his chest in the clinging silk shirt that seemed to mould itself to his body.

  In that afternon Sienna gained a brief understanding of how diverse his business interests were: he wasn’t just the Chairman of Hellas Holidays, he also had an interest in an international airline, in villas on the islands, which he owned and let out, in olive groves, and even a vineyard in the Napa Valley in California. That had come to him through his mother, who Sienna deduced from the brief comments that he made had been half Italian and half American, which no doubt accounted for his height, and less swarthy complexion than she might have expected. It also explained the grey eyes which were so totally unexpected and devasting in the pure symmetry of a face which had its beginnings in the very best of the ancient sculptures.

  They worked without pause until six o’clock. Sienna felt limp and drained when they had finished. Alexis had dictated consistently in English, but she had translations to make into French and German, and she was relieved when he told her that she would have the best part of the following morning to work on what he had just given her.

  ‘I shall be in meetings for most of the morning.’ He saw her face and smiled, and the dying rays of the sun streaming through the windows lingered against his skin casting shadows that gave him a faintly cynical, predatory air, and one which was totally at odds with the man Sienna thought him to be. She shivered in spite of herself, faintly repelled by the transformation, the cold, almost detached air with which he seemed to be studying her, but then he moved and it was gone, and she laughed inwardly at her own folly. It had been a tric
k of the sunlight, nothing more, and she forgot that he was a man who came from a land that was more used to harsh sunlight then gentle shadows, she forgot everything as he came towards her, pulling her out of her chair, gently removing her pad and pencil from nerveless fingers, framing her face with his hands as he studied her wildly flushed features.

  ‘Tomorrow I must work, but we still have tonight. Will you let me take you out to dinner?’

  Would she? Sienna moistened her lips and trembled as she saw the flaring reaction of his eyes to the gesture and felt its echo in his body.

  ‘No, I am not going to take you to my bed tonight,’ he muttered accurately reading her mind… ‘but one night, not so very far from now when you are ready for me, I shall.’

  I’m ready now, Sienna wanted to tell him, half appalled by her own immodesty and hunger, but he was already releasing her, putting her away from him, smiling at her as he asked politely, ‘Will you be able to be ready by half past eight? I’ll book a table for nine. Aristotle, my chauffeur, is waiting downstairs to take you home. Unfortunately I am expecting an important call from New York, otherwise I would go with you. Do you live alone?’

  With a shock Sienna realised it was the first personal question he had asked her. Somehow exchanging past histories had seemed irrelevant, but now she managed to murmur, ‘No… with my brother, but he’s away at the moment. He’s a reporter. Our parents are dead, and Rob very kindly took me in when our father died. I used to work for him, you see, and when he died I just didn’t know what to do with myself.’

  ‘You love your brother very deeply?’

  Sienna frowned, wondering at the darkness in his eyes and the curt iciness in his voice. Surely he wasn’t jealous of Rob? ‘Yes,’ she replied simply. ‘Everyone likes him. He’s a marvellous person, so kind and thoughtful….’

  ‘And he has a woman, this kind and thoughtful brother?’

  Sienna hesitated, disturbed by the thread of sarcasm she could sense woven into the words. ‘I… I don’t know,’ she finished lamely, feeling it would be wrong to discuss her suspicions about Rob’s feelings for Gillian with anyone else, even Alexis.

  ‘So…. Then he has never discussed with you a special woman, this wonderful brother of yours whom you so admire?’

  He must be jealous, Sienna thought blankly, there could be no other reason for the dislike and, yes, almost hatred embittering his voice. ‘Never,’ she responded resolutely.

  ‘You had better leave now, Aristotle will be waiting.’ The abrupt change of subject startled her a little at first, but Sienna accepted it, thinking there would be time that evening to question Alexis about his family and background.

  She went over to the door and shrugged into her coat, picking up her bag. ‘And, Sienna…’ She paused, wondering if he was going to change his mind and command her to remain with him after all. He smiled, warmth infusing the darkness of his features and making her weak with the need to go to him and touch him. ‘Yes?’

  ‘Tonight wear something that permits me to see a little more of your body than the clothes you are wearing now. That way I shall have something to warm my lonely bed tonight.’

  He saw her face and shook his head. ‘No, this is no brief casual thing between us, and I will not hurry it. When a man finds the food which is to last him for the rest of his life he does not consume it with greed as though it were his final feast. Now go,’ he said softly, ‘before I forget all my lofty ideals and remember only how badly I want to make you mine.’

  All the way down in the lift her heart sang. Alexis had put the final seal on her happiness. He wanted her, not just for now, but for always, it had been implicit in his final words to her. She thought of having Alexis as her husband, of bearing his children, and her body shook with the pleasure the thought gave her.

  CHAPTER TWO

  AS she dressed for her dinner date with Alexis, Sienna found herself going over and over in her mind the circumstances of their meeting; re-living the touch of his hands against her face and the warm, intoxicating pressure of his mouth on hers. It took her half an hour to decide what to wear, delicious tremors shivering across her skin as she remembered his parting words. In the end she opted for a dress she had bought when she had to accompany her father to a dance at the university.

  Far more sophisticated than the clothes she usually chose, it was in matt black jersey, cut to reveal the svelte contours of her body, outwardly demure with its high rounded neckline and long close-fitting sleeves, but the way it moulded her body was far from demure. Would Alexis find her attractive in it? It was startling to discover how much she wanted to be alluring for him; in the past she had always been careful to dress in clothes that masked her sexuality rather than revealed it and had even been faintly scornful of those women she knew who dressed mainly to please their men. It was a strange and almost frightening sensation to have fallen so deeply in love so quickly, and Sienna knew that if Alexis hadn’t made it so clear to her that her feelings were reciprocated she would be maintaining as great a distance as she possibly could from him. For the first time in her life she could imagine the desolation of unrequited love; it shivered across her skin chilly as a November wind, until she pulled the reassuring, warming blanket of Alexis’ love back round her.

  He arrived to pick her up himself, and her breath caught in her throat as she studied him beneath the hall light. ‘Your heart quivers like a frightened dove’s. What is it that frightens you so? Surely not me?’ His fingers curled round her wrist, his thumb probing for and then stroking the swiftly beating pulse.

  How could she explain that the reality of him far exceeded the mental picture she had carried away with her, that falling in love with him was something so totally outside any experience she had ever expected to have that it left her weak and, yes, slightly frightened by the knowledge of her new vulnerability. Yesterday she hadn’t known he existed; today her life would be insupportable without him. He seemed to know what she was thinking, because he lifted her wrist to his lips, their heat sending waves of pleasure beating through her veins, his eyes hot and slumbrous with desire as they slid slowly over her face and body.

  ‘It is frightening. I have felt it too,’ he assured her. ‘To be so dependent on another person for happiness—for life itself.’

  ‘And you’ve never felt like this before?’ He was thirty-three, Gill had told her that, and his name had been linked with those of many, many beautiful women. It seemed to Sienna incredible that he could feel this way about her.

  ‘I have never felt towards any woman what I feel towards you.’ The words had the unmistakable ring of sincerity. She trembled beneath them, the hallway suddenly cramped and infused with the same subtle tension she had sensed the first time she saw him. ‘Ah, Sienna, you must not look at me like that. How can you look at me the way you do and still have remained a virgin? Your eyes tell me that you want me to make love to you.’

  ‘I do.’ She whispered the words shyly, still amazed that she could feel this way, that there could be this depth and intensity of feeling, something she had never suspected existed. ‘And I am still a virgin because I have never looked at any other man the way I look at you. I have never loved any man before you….’

  ‘And will not love any man after me. I shall imprint myself on your heart and body so that you will never forget me. We have not yet made love, but already I know how you will feel in my arms, how you will taste against my lips, how sweetly you will cry my name and abandon yourself to me.’

  He bent his head, sliding his fingers into the thickness of her hair, holding her still beneath his mouth, letting her feel the depth and heat of his passion, leaving her shaking and achingly bereft when he eventually lifted his head, his lips curling into a smile as he caught her half-smothered protest.

  ‘So reserved and English,’ he murmured, probing the parted warmth of her mouth with his thumb, ‘but I promise you I will make you forget your reserve and the politeness of your good manners, and in my arms will remember
only that you are a woman.’ He smiled down at her, a dark seriousness in his eyes that stilled the frantic racing of her pulses. ‘I cannot promise you that I will be a tender, gentle lover, Sienna, my need for you does not permit that. If you wish to change your mind, to retreat, then now is the time to do so, while I am still able to let you go.’

  He knew! He knew how fear mingled with her love for him, how tremulous she felt about committing herself completely to him, about walking blindfold into waters which she sensed were deep and dangerous and he was offering her the chance to turn back. She returned his smile with one of her own faintly wavering and hesitant, unaware of the shy vulnerability glowing in her eyes as they met his.

  ‘I don’t want to turn back, Alexis,’ she told him huskily. ‘I fell in love with you the moment you walked into Gill’s office. I….’ She tried to find the words to describe the awe and wonder of that moment, then gave up, knowing that it was a feat beyond her.

  ‘And if I had not fallen in love with you in return?’

  She shivered, despite the warmth of Rob’s centrally heated flat. ‘I don’t know….’ How could she explain to him that she wasn’t the type of girl who had the confidence to go out and get the man she wanted, that if she hadn’t seen the desire, the hunger in his eyes she would have had to dam up her feelings for him?

  ‘Your silence is its own answer,’ Alexis told her. ‘Without the security of my admission of love you would never have been able to bring yourself to tell me of your feelings. You would have worked for me as my temporary secretary, harbouring impossible dreams, is this is not so?’