A Delicious Deception by Elizabeth Power Read Free Book Online Page A

that was all it had been. Pleasure. This girl, however, had a way about her that excited him and made his anatomy harden to such an extent that it hurt.
    But why? Why, when to seduce her had been a cold, calculated plan? When he’d intended to remain detached and—if he was honest with himself—to have her begging, virtually down on her knees, for him to take her?
    Well, that just showed him, he thought, mocking himself for his lack of immunity, his inability to stay unaffected, when all he wanted to do right now was rip off her clothes and carry her up to the nearest bed and feel her warm softness closing in around him, her body bucking beneath his as he drove into her.
    Steady on, King …
    He was breathing raggedly as he lifted his head.
    ‘So what’s it to be, Rayne? Your bed or mine?’ He was amazed at how cool—how indifferent—he managed to sound.
    There was nothing cool, though, or indifferent, about the hand that was suddenly making contact with his left cheek, taking him so unawares he nearly overbalanced.
    ‘How dare you!’ Rayne found she was trembling so muchshe could hardly get her words out, realising that it wasn’t just his effrontery that was responsible for her impulsive action. It was also aggravated by the knowledge that she had invited what had happened between them every inch of the way, so that her anger was directed more at herself and her abandoned response to his kiss rather than at him.
    ‘I’m sorry. I could hardly help jumping to what I believed was a very natural conclusion,’ King expressed, holding his smarting cheek, deciding that he had rather overstepped the mark. Nevertheless that still didn’t stop him from enquiring mockingly, ‘Are you usually prone to bursts of violence?’
    ‘You drove me to it!’ It was a small wild cry, born of her despair over responding to him in the way she had, and for striking him, which she was thoroughly ashamed of now.
    ‘You drove yourself to it,’ he said quietly. ‘Firstly by refusing to acknowledge that there’s definitely something between us, and then in not doing so, suddenly finding yourself way out of your depth.’ His mouth moved in a kind of contemplative half-smile. ‘I’ll just put it down to frustration, shall I?’ he remarked, his eyes skimming over her in a shaming reminder of what had just transpired.
    ‘Put it down to whatever you like!’ she breathed, shocked by the passions he could arouse in her and, pivoting away from him, she fled up the stairs, wanting only to crawl into a hole and pretend that none of her shameless behaviour had ever happened.
    In the privacy of her room she sank down on the sumptuous bed, dropped her head into her hands and groaned.
    Whatever had come over her? Not only to throw herself at him as she had when he had had the audacity to kiss her, but then to slap him like that afterwards as though it had all been his fault. Being quite honest with herself, she was forced to admit that he was right. She
had
wanted him to kiss her. Wanted it like she had never wanted anything. A man who had hurt her father and, with Mitch, had as good as destroyedher family. Was that why she had hit him? Was it all part of the need for retribution? Or was King Clayborne simply always destined to bring out the worst in her?
    Angry tears burned her eyes, but they were tears of remorse and scorching shame too. How could she have responded to him so easily, and without so much as a conscience? Without any thought for what the Claybornes had cost her parents. Was she really that weak? She padded over to the en suite bathroom to try and scrub the taste of King Clayborne off her mouth, promising herself, as well as both of her parents, that she would never let it happen again.
    And if he did find out that she had been lying to him?
    She shuddered, closing her mind against that intimidating scenario. That was something she definitely refused to think about on top of everything else.
    The florist at the other end of