After the Music by Diana Palmer Page B

and a wink. As he walked out, she had to fight the urge to run after him.
    "You make everything a challenge, don't you?" she asked Thorn after a minute.
    His gaze almost knocked the breath out of her. "Honey, you're a walking challenge," he said. "And if you aren't careful, baby brother or no baby brother, I'm going to take you up on it."
    "I'm not issuing an invitation. I have wonderful instincts for self-preservation," she replied as lightly as she could.
    He drew a cigarette out of his pocket and lit it without taking his gaze off her. "What a hell of an irony," he said with a cold laugh. "That night in Al's kitchen, I'd never touched anything so sweet. And not five minutes later, I had to face what you actually were."
    Her temperature was rising. "I'm a rock singer," she told him coldly. "Not a tramp. My profession has nothing to do with my morals."
    His breath came deeply, as though he were deliberately controlling it. The cigarette fired trails of smoke between his lean fingers. "I won't let you marry Al," he said forcefully. "I'll do anything I have to do, but I'll stop you."
    "Anything?" she challenged.
    He nodded slowly. "Within limits," he said quietly, letting his eyes wander slowly down her body. "Don't make me hurt you, Sabina." His voice was deep and as smooth as velvet as he watched her. "You can't help what you are, I suppose. But I want Al married for something more than his bankroll."
    Her face dropped. "You think I'm a gold digger?"
    "I know you are," he said. "Remember the check for twenty thousand that I gave you?"
    She wanted to tell him what she'd done with it. But that would lead to other questions, questions she didn't want to answer. He might get the truth out of her in a weak moment, and where would that leave Al and Jessica?
    "If you do what I ask, I'll forget the check," he said. "And I'll get you all the performances you and the band can handle. All you have to do is leave Al alone."
    "But, he's such a sweet little feller," she murmured with a wicked smile. "Besides, he turns me on, you know?"
    He moved closer, so that she could feel the warmth of his body, and the wild longings it produced tricked her into looking up. His eyes trapped hers. His free hand moved to her face and lightly touched her mouth. The slight sensation made it tremble.
    "Stop that. You're no more an experienced woman than I am a monk. I've had women. And if you're not damned careful, I'll have you."
    "After I've been embalmed, maybe," she retorted. "And will you please remember that I'm engaged to Al?" she said too quickly.
    His fingers were under her chin, sensually tracing the long line of her throat, and she could taste his smoky breath on her lips, feel the strength, warmth and power of his lean body and smell his cologne and faint leathery scent.
    "Sure you are. For now." He traced his fingers over her soft cheek, down to the curve of her lips. He drew in a slow, heavy breath. "Skin like milk," he whispered. "Soft mouth, even if it doesn't quite know how to kiss."
    Her eyelids felt heavy, her body felt weak. She looked up at him and couldn't look away.
    He dropped his hand abruptly as if the contact with her skin was disturbing to him. "I'm not gentle," he said abruptly. "There's never been a woman who could make me gentle. I like it rough, and I don't hold anything back. And that's the last thing you need, cream puff. I won't seduce you. That's not my way. But I could lose my head with you, so keep a few yards away from me while you're here, okay? It would be hell living with myself if I seduced a virgin."
    She couldn't even move, the words were such a shock.
    "Yes, I know," he said softly, searching her eyes. "It doesn't go with your image, or even with the other things I know about you. But I'd stake my life on your innocence." His eyes fell to her mouth, lingered there. "It would have been so easy, I even had it planned. Now I'll have to find some other way."
    "I don't understand."
    "I'm ruthless. Didn't Al tell you?