Her Man with Iceberg Eyes (19 page)

“I’m not out of ideas yet,” he said. “For
instance I could—” and his fingers and tongue roamed over her
again, summoning a squeak and a blush and eventual capitulation to
his wishes. And there was still bed, she thought, as her body
responded to him and the pleasure came flooding back again.

Kate had never experienced sensations as
intense as those Matthew created for her. She fell deeper and
deeper into a web of fantastic feathery nerve-thrills, a sleek
musical instrument awaiting his skilful touch. As his warm mouth
and clever hands whispered over her; as his husky voice encouraged
and suggested; as she took him deep within her, Kate soared and
trembled until he tipped her over to shatter in yet another
exquisite soft explosion of heat and near-pain. Then she found
herself gently rocked in the languorous warmth of his arms as his
eyes approved of her reaction to him, and his lips again found
hers.

“I need to send an e-mail,” she said, near
eleven o’clock. “It’s too late to phone them now, and my phone’s in
my room, anyway. Can I use one of your computers?”

Matthew’s euphoria deflated just a little as
his former doubts returned to niggle and tease at him. Surely she
hadn’t given herself to him with such apparent passion to disguise
the fact she wanted access to his secrets?

He thought bitterly of Martine, who’d
downloaded some of his most sensitive files as they were arranging
their divorce. A wonderfully creative piece of blackmail, he had to
admit.
Another two million please or I’ll hand these on to
someone who’d really appreciate them.

He hadn’t let her get away with it. Had
brought the full force of the law down on her, but the fact that
she’d tried and nearly succeeded still stung like hell.

But surely not Kate too? He was now more
impatient than ever to know what Sy Karlsen could trace about
her.

“I’ll make some fresh toast,” he said,
inspecting the cold and curling slices they’d abandoned for each
other. “And get my iPad. That do you?”

“Great.”

So she didn’t seem worried about not getting
into his office? And she’d never be able to access anything without
knowing his passwords. Unless she was very, very clever. He relaxed
slightly as he padded off, naked, to grab it. Tomorrow he’d check
out whatever she’d sent.

By the time he returned, Kate had wrapped the
huge possum-fur throw from the end of the sofa around herself.

“Cavewoman,” he said. “With all mod cons.” He
handed her the iPad.

She grinned. “Including caveman.”

“You know the address you want?”

“Just my Dad. I should have thought about
this much earlier. He doesn’t know where I am, or for how
long.”

Matthew’s buoyant mood evaporated further.
“Thought you were a free agent?”

“Free as a bird,” she said, still smiling at
him.

Was it a smile of treachery or innocence he
saw on her pretty lips?

“It’s only a celebration I said I’d try and
attend tomorrow,” she added. “I need to let them know I won’t be
there after all.”

Only a celebration? He wouldn’t feel too bad
about snooping on that.

She settled the iPad on her knees. “Any
chance of something to drink with that toast?”

He dropped a kiss on her shoulder. “Coffee?
Juice?” His fingers glided down her arm in a soft caress.

“Juice would be great.”

Kate’s eyes roved over him as walked away.
Long legs, strong and sinewy. That fantastic tattoo, looking almost
like shorts in back view—except his cute butt-wiggle gave away the
fact that it was sensational skin. His strong back. Even stronger
shoulders. No wonder he’d been able to lift her with ease and wrap
her around his waist like a sinuous vine.

Surely, surely, she could now make something
good of this situation? Had the on-again off-again possibility of
the job now switched in her favour? Matthew’s initial cool
reception had definitely thawed. Her own flip comment after they’d
returned from the movie—about the job being ‘not quite what she’d
been expecting’—seemed a long way in the past. She hoped he’d
quietly forgotten it so they could move forward together and see
where things led.

Sighing, she turned her eyes down to the
screen. ‘robpleasance@’ she keyed in. She hesitated. Perhaps she
should phone him in the morning instead. Oh, to hang with it—do it
now. She completed the address.

‘
Dad—needed to let you know things are not
running quite according to plan. I can’t be with you tomorrow
because I was asked to stay on—too good an opportunity to miss, and
the extra time is proving interesting, to say the least. You and
Terry will hardly miss me. There are complications here I hadn’t
foreseen, but compensations, too. Good luck for your big merger
announcement. I still think you’re going to stun people, but we
must all look to the future instead of the past. Back Sunday
evening. Kate xx.’

She sent the message just as Matthew arrived
with two tall glasses and set them on the low table by the sofa.
“Done,” she said.

He reached for the iPad and turned for his
office. “Nearly ready for bed?” he threw over his shoulder.

“Right after this.” She raised her glass in a
small salute. “If I have the energy for it,” she added. She smiled
as the man who’d been a mysterious, out-of-reach stranger just two
days ago gave her another spectacular eye-full.

A few minutes later, he said, “Stay just like
that. I want to draw you.”

“Not again.” She glanced down. “At least I’m
covered this time.” She reached out to put her half-empty glass on
the table.

‘No. Just as you were. Holding the glass.
Link your fingers like you had them before.”

Kate obeyed, albeit with an enquiring
expression. Matthew collected a pencil and some sheets of computer
paper from his office and tossed them onto the table. He sat on the
floor, fixed his glittering gaze on her hands, and started to
sketch. The pencil raced across the paper in a complicated pattern.
He regarded his handiwork, grimaced, and crumpled the sheet into a
ball. “Next time,” he muttered, starting again.

She watched his face. The corners of his
mobile mouth curled up into the slightest of grins as the drawing
started to take shape again.

“What are you up to? I can’t work it
out.”

“I’ll show you in a minute.” He continued to
sketch, flicking his eyes up occasionally. The slight grin became a
wide and wicked smile. Finally, he laid down his pencil, rolled the
paper into a tube, and held it up for her to see just as she took
another sip of juice. It was her hands, beautifully drawn,
clutching not a glass, but an erect penis.

“In your dreams!” she exclaimed, coughing
through her giggles as the juice went down the wrong way. Once
she’d recovered, she said, “Did you know Leonardo da Vinci is
quoted as saying, ‘The function of muscle is to pull, not push,
except in the case of the genitals and the tongue?’”

Matthew tossed the drawing onto the table. “I
gather he knew a good bit about both. Led an interesting life, old
Leonardo. Can you picture this as the final piece of my
tattoo?”

Kate’s eyes grew wide, imagining the pain.
“You can’t. You’d have to go without sex for weeks.”

“And that bothers you?”

“Not as much as it’ll bother
you
.
You’re not serious?”

Matthew gave a shout of laughter. “You should
see your face,” he said.

She had no idea if he really planned to do
it. Her mouth grew dry at the thought.

They walked, embracing, through the huge warm
house, and Matthew drew her down onto his bed.

“Lie still,” Kate said. “I want to explore
you.”

She angled one of the bedside lights down and
traced around the curving black Celtic panels with the pad of her
index finger. She moved lower. “There’s a fish!”

“There are several fish,” he said, raising
his head to watch her. Her cloud of hair brushed across his belly
in exquisite torture.

“And flowers,” she discovered.

“Renga lilies. Kowhai. And fern fronds to
lead into the Maori panel. There’s a tiny jokey windmill for Lottie
somewhere there, too.”

“I like the little fish,” she said. “And this
big
fish is just wonderful.” She’d closed her fingers around
him before he could protest. He flexed in her hand.

“That fish can’t wait to get caught,” he
murmured. “He’d like to be swimming in the dark soft sea of your
hair.”

She pushed herself up and knelt astride his
thighs. Swept her tumble of waves over his chest... down his
torso... and then luxuriantly back and forth across his hips.

Matthew heaved a huge gusty sigh.

Hidden beneath her hair, Kate’s tongue
started to tease him. The fish jerked helplessly on her silken
line.

She woke with a start. Something was
different.

The bedroom curtains were open—Matthew had
never made it as far as the windows to close them the night before.
She turned toward the light and gasped. There was nothing outside
except soft white snow forever. Any noises were hushed by the
muffling blanket. It was like being afloat on a sea of foam.

Her beautiful man was still deep asleep—his
broad chest rising and falling with each slow breath. He looked
younger, more relaxed. Or maybe a night of great sex had done that
for him?

She stretched. Her body felt about three
hundred percent alive—thoroughly used, thoroughly pleasured. She’d
never been so receptive, so inventive, so entirely wakened to her
senses. Her plane ticket to Auckland was booked for four o’clock
the next afternoon. She couldn’t wait to tidy up her life there and
fly back south to Matthew.

Her mother’s stylish townhouse in Herne Bay
was now hers. She’d rent it out until she knew what her longer-term
plans might be.

But snow right outside! To a girl from the
north, this was a novelty. She slid from the bed and crept to the
window to look. White forever. And the view would be even more
spectacular from the front of the house. She let herself out of his
room, collected her robe and slippers from her own, and went
exploring. It was only just light, but every window she peered
through brought a vista of untrodden, uninterrupted snow. The
mountains and foothills were pristine. The big expanse of tussock
garden bulged and dipped under a lumpy white coverlet. The driveway
had disappeared.

She leaned close to Matthew’s study window,
admiring the jagged mountains, now sifted with even more snow. As
she turned away, her gaze landed on a long ribbed cylinder.
Inspiration struck. She’d been searching for big flat sketches the
day before, but of course they could be rolled and concealed in a
tube like this. She reached for it and started to wrestle the end
off.

“What do you think you’ll find in there?”

His voice was cold, flat and hard.

She was horribly disconcerted. “I...well,
nothing maybe...but...it doesn’t matter now anyway.”

“It matters to me. What are you looking
for?”

She put down the cylinder and crossed the
room to him. He backed away, avoiding her touch.

“No, it really
doesn’t
matter now,”
she insisted. “I’ve been wondering where you hid those sketches of
me. I wanted to find them and get them...out of your ownership.”
She dropped her gaze. His eyes were so frigid and accusing she
could no longer look at them.

“Those are the house plans, Kate. Nothing to
do with you.”

“No. Fine. Sorry.” She stood like a chastened
child. Matthew moved deliberately further away. When she glanced up
again she saw his mouth had twisted into a savage grimace. All his
warmth from the night before had evaporated.

She remained stock-still and shaken. He
jerked his head toward the hallway to indicate she was to leave his
office. Why was he so upset? It made no sense. She’d told him the
truth, and agreed it didn’t matter now whether she found the
sketches or not. He’d seen a lot more of her last night than his
drawings had revealed! “What the hell’s wrong, Matthew? I only want
those sketches. I’ve already asked you twice where they are and
you’ve avoided answering.”

“So you thought you’d come and do a sneaky
search on your own?”

“I was looking at the snow. It’s
amazing.”

“Feeble excuse, Kate. You’re in my office
while you thought I was safely asleep. I saw what you were
doing.”

His expression and tone of voice, and swift
withdrawal of warmth, made it somehow impossible to argue further.
Once she’d slunk out, he slammed the office door and stalked off,
leaving her to return in confusion to her own bedroom. Why did the
house plans matter so much to him? She crawled into her bed. The
sheets were cold and unwelcoming against her skin. She retrieved
her robe and wrapped it around her for comfort. But there was
little comfort to be found.

Matthew controlled his breathing with a will
of steel as Kate turned her innocent eyes on him. What an
actress
. What had she really been looking for? And what was
the message she’d sent last night while he’d been out of the way?
He strode back to the office as soon as she disappeared to her
room, and retrieved the email she’d been so keen to send.

His blood ran cold. There it was—as clear and
cruel as it could be.

To Rob Pleasance. Her father. At least she
hadn’t lied about that.

Dad—needed to let you know things are not
running quite according to plan.

Not now, anyway, Matthew vowed.

I can’t be with you tomorrow because I was
asked to say on—too good an opportunity to miss, and the extra time
is proving interesting, to say the least.

Yeah. Right. He slowly sat.

You and Terry will hardly know I am
missing.

Terry Halstead of Geni-Tel? Or Sir Terrence
Quaid, one of the Brits sniffing around the industry? Matthew’s
imagination ran riot as he considered possibilities...
probabilities... as he computed the known facts and extrapolated
them into myriad distasteful scenarios. What the hell was the
opposition up to? And how was Kate involved?