The Harder They Fall by Doreen Owens Malek Page B

him as she kissed him back, her very lack of expertise inflaming his desire as he lifted her into his arms and onto the couch. They lay entwined as his lips trailed down her neck and inside the collar of her gown. She was wearing nothing beneath it; he fumbled with the buttons on the front to open it fully, then she whimpered as his mouth found her breast. Her eyes squeezed shut as his free hand trailed up her leg and to the inside of her thigh, and then she surged up eagerly when he moved to kiss her again. Thought fled, time stood still as his tongue found hers and Helene submitted completely to his kisses. Too soon, he drew back slightly, still holding her fast.
    “Do you want me?” he whispered harshly against her lips, pulling her lower body against his. She arched to meet him.
    “Do you?” he prompted.
    “Yes, yes,” she moaned, drawing his head down to hers again, incapable of anything but desperate, headlong yearning.
    “Then say it,” he demanded.
    “I want you,” she sighed.
    “Is that what you said to my brother?” he asked.

 
    Chapter 4
     
    Helene shoved him off her with as much force as she could muster and then jumped to her feet, sputtering.
    “You... you,” she said and stopped, at a loss and shaking so hard she had to put a hand out to the wall for balance. She stared at him in malevolent silence; she just couldn’t think of anything vile enough to call him.
    “Bastard?” he supplied, sitting up and then vaulting easily to his feet. “Isn’t that the word you’re searching for—doubly appropriate in my case, don’t you think?”
    “You did that to me deliberately,” she gasped, when she could talk again.
    “Just an experiment,” he said casually.
    “I thought you wanted to take care of me and the baby, not upset me.”
    “You’re not upset, lady, you’re turned on—don’t you know the difference?”
    “So this was a test?” she said, rebuttoning her nightgown with trembling fingers.
    “And you failed,” he said, with a slight insinuating smile.
    “Then you failed, too,” Helene retorted, revamping her shattered defenses.
    His expression changed, became guarded.
    “Don’t flatter yourself,” he replied coldly.
    “I’m not doing that,” Helene said, striving for calm. “I may not have your vast experience of... of physical relationships, but even I know that what just happened between us was not typical.”
    “It was typical for me,” he said cruelly.
    “So you just felt like seducing me?” she asked, staring at him in disbelief.
    “Sure,” he said flippantly. “Why not?”
    “Then what was all that talk about avoiding me because you have a secret?”
    He turned away. “Whiskey rambling,” he said dismissively. “You shouldn’t pay so much attention to drunken drivel.”
    “In vino veritas,” she said.
    “What the hell does that mean?”
    “That people often tell the truth when they’ve been drinking ,” she fired back at him.
    “Not me,” he said, rounding on her with a leer. “It just makes me feel like stripping impostors of their pretenses.”
    “You promised me that you wouldn’t touch me!” she burst out, stung by the unfairness of it.
    “You wanted me to touch you,” he said darkly. “Every day you’ve been in this house you’ve wanted me to touch you.”
    “You broke your word!” she insisted, dodging.
    “I don’t remember forcing you to do anything you didn’t want to do,” he countered, folding his arms and glaring at her.
    “That’s not the point!” she yelled. “You lied to me when you proposed marriage. You planned this all along.”
    “I did not!” he said heatedly, and it was the first thing he’d said that she believed.
    “Then what?” she said softly, changing tactics, sensing that she was getting closer to an admission.
    “Then nothing!” he exploded, taking a step toward her, his fists balled at his sides. “I don’t have to explain myself to you.”
    “Then stay away from me!” she flung at him