Chapter 5 They rode

THEY rode away from the gallery in Nonie Powell's chauffeured Rolls-Royce-borrowed briefly for the trip to the restaurant. Jordan's mother had rolled her eyes over the request, chided him for deserting her and given a long-suffering sigh as her gaze flicked over Ivy before waving them off, obviously resigned to her playboy son's weakness for a new attraction.

Ivy didn't care what his mother thought. Her own mother had been quite happy for her to leave with the billionaire, probably seeing him as the ultimate city man who might very well seduce her from country life. Ivy didn't care what Sacha thought, either. As far as she was concerned, this was simply an experience she wanted to dabble with while it was desirable.

When it stopped being desirable, she would take a taxi to her car and drive home. In the meantime, she was enjoying the experience of riding in a Rolls-Royce. She'd never done it before and it was most unlikely she would ever do it again. It felt luxurious. It smelled luxurious. She focussed her mind on memorising everything about it to tell Heather because it helped distract her from an acute awareness of the man sitting beside her.

He totally wrecked that mental exercise by reaching across, plucking her hand from her lap and stroking it with his long, elegant and highly sensual fingers. Her pulse bolted into overdrive. She found herself staring at their linked hands, fascinated by the juxtaposition of his olive skin and the extreme fairness of hers. She visualised them in bed together...naked...intertwined...black hair, red hair. The image was wickedly entrancing.

Ben's skin had been fair, though not as fair as hers. Jordan Powell was very different, in every sense. Was it the sheer contrast that made him so appealing? Why did being with him excite her so much? Was it the idea of living dangerously, which was not her usual style at all?

'What are you thinking?' he asked.

No way was she about to reveal those thoughts! 'Where are we going?' she countered, giving him a bright look of anticipation.

'Wherever you want to go,' he purred back at her, the sexy blue eyes inviting her to indulge any desire she had on her mind.

'I meant the restaurant,' she stated pointedly. 'My car is parked near the gallery. If I decide to walk out on you, which I might want to do, I'd prefer not to have a long journey back to it.'

He laughed, squeezing her hand as though asserting his possession of her even as he replied, 'Your escape route won't be a hardship. The restaurant is at Rose Bay. In fact, we're almost there.'

'Good! What's it called?'

'Pier. It specialises in seafood-spanner crab, lobster, tuna. I can recommend the trout carpaccio as a starter.'

'Then I hope you don't say anything offensive before we dine.'

'I'll watch my tongue,' he assured her, smiling as though he found her absolutely delicious.

Ivy immediately started wondering about how sexy his tongue was, in kissing as well as other intimate things. She had to wrench her gaze away from his mouth before he started guessing what she was thinking.

The idea of new experiences could be terribly beguiling.

It was another new experience to be welcomed so effusively into a classy restaurant, led to a table with a lovely view of Sydney Harbour, and given immediate smiling service. Obviously Jordan Powell was known to be a very generous tipper. Who could blame the average working person for bending over backwards to please him? Besides, he really was charming. To everyone! The maître d', the wine waiter, the food waiter, to her especially. Being in his company was an undeniable pleasure.

And the seafood was superb.

Especially the lobster, done simply in a lemon butter sauce.

Ivy sighed in satisfaction.

'Up to your expectations?' Jordan asked, his eyes twinkling pleasure in her pleasure.

'Best I've ever had,' she answered truthfully. 'Thank you.'

He gave her a slow, very sensual smile. 'I think the best is yet to come.'

Her stomach muscles contracted. Her mind jammed over what to do next-have a one-night fling with him or scoot for home. 'I couldn't fit in sweets, Jordan,' she said. 'Though coffee would be good.'

A glass of champagne at the gallery and a glass of chardonnay over dinner should not be affecting her judgement, yet she couldn't seem to manage any clear thinking with his eyes tempting her to stay with him and find out if he would deliver 'the best'. Maybe the coffee would sober her up enough to make the break, which, of course, was the most sensible thing to do. This whole thing with Jordan Powell was fantasy stuff. It wouldn't-couldn't-develop into a real relationship.

He ordered the coffee and handed his credit card to the waiter, indicating they would be leaving soon.

'I'll need to call a taxi to get back to my car,' Ivy quickly said. 'I can't walk that far in these killer shoes.'

'A taxi in twenty minutes,' Jordan instructed the waiter, apparently unperturbed about going along with her plan.

Twenty minutes later they left the restaurant.

A taxi was waiting for them.

It was only a short drive to where she had parked her car, but every minute of the trip shredded Ivy's nerves. Jordan had taken possession of her hand again and somehow she couldn't bring herself to snatch it free. Her heart was pounding. Her whole body felt on edge, fighting against the restrictions her mind was trying to impose on it. The pulse in her temples seemed to be thumping, Go with it. Go with it. Go with it.

The taxi stopped right beside her car.

Jordan released her hand, paid the driver, and was out, reaching back to help her alight on the kerb side of the street. Ivy finally teetered upright in the vertically challengingly high high heels and was fumbling in her handbag for her car keys when the taxi took off, leaving Jordan with her. Alone together. In the shadows of the night.

She scooped in a quick breath, desperate to relieve the tightness in her chest. 'You should have kept it,' she said with an agitated wave at the departing taxi.

'A gentleman always sees a lady safely on her way,' he replied with mock gravity.

With roses, her mind snapped.

'I have to change my shoes,' she muttered, dropping her gaze from his, fighting the physical tug of the man. 'I can't drive in these.'

She pressed the Unlock button on her key fob and forced her legs to move, needing to open the trunk and get out her flat-heeled sandals.

'Let me help you take them off,' he said.

Those seductively sensual hands on her legs, her ankles, her feet... Ivy's mind reeled at how vulnerable she might be to his touch. 'I can manage,' she rattled out, reaching down to lift the lid of the trunk.

He intercepted the move, taking her hand, turning her towards him. She darted an anguished look of protest at him, caught burning purpose in his eyes, and suddenly her defences caved in, totally undermined by a chaotic craving to know what it would be like at least to be kissed by him.

'Ivy,' he murmured, stepping closer, sliding an arm around her waist. He lifted her hand to his shoulder, left it there and stroked her cheek, featherlight fingertips grazing slowly down to trace the line of her lips, his thumb hooking gently under her chin, tilting it up.

She was aware of weird little tremors running down her thighs, aware of her stomach fluttering with excitement, aware of her breasts yearning for contact with the hard wall of his chest, aware of the wanton desire to experience this man running completely out of control. He lowered his head. She stared at his mouth coming closer and closer to hers. She did nothing to stop him. It was as though all her common-sense mechanisms were paralysed.

His lips brushed hers, stirring a host of electric tingles. His tongue swept over them, soothing the acute sensitivity and teasing her mouth open. He began with a soft exploratory kiss, a tasting, not demanding a response but inevitably drawing it with tantalising little manoeuvres. Ivy couldn't resist tasting him right back, revelling in the sensual escalation that sent heat whooshing through her body.

The urge to feel him was equally irresistible. Her hand slid up around his neck, her fingers thrusting into his hair, loving its lush thickness. Perhaps it signalled her complete acquiescence to what was happening. Ivy was no longer thinking. Her mind was consumed with registering sensation, pleasure, excitement, the rampant desire to have her curiosity about Jordan Powell satisfied blotting out any other consideration.

His thumb glided along her jawline, caressed the lobe of her ear-an exquisite touch, moving slowly, sensually, under her hair to the nape of her neck. The arm around her waist scooped her into full body contact with him as his kissing became more demanding, less of an invitation, more an incitement to passion.

Ivy barely knew what she was doing. She loved being held so close to him, feeling the hard, male strength of his physique-the perfect complement to her highly aroused femininity. Excitement was flooding through her. Her mouth hungered for more and more passion from him, exulting in the deeply intimate aggression of his kisses. Never had she been so caught up in the moment. Never had she been driven to respond so wildly, so uninhibitedly.

She felt his hand clutch her bottom, pressing her more tightly into contact with his sexuality. Her stomach contracted at the hard furrowing of his arousal. It should have been a warning to break away from him. Her body didn't want to. Her body wantonly rubbed itself against the blatant evidence of his excitement, exhilarated by it, madly bent on fanning this desire for her. It was wonderful to feel wanted again. She had been too long alone, and the woman inside her was craving connection-connection with this man, regardless of time and place and circumstances.

He swung her back against the trunk of the car, lifting her onto it, his mouth still ravishing hers as his hand burrowed under her mini-skirt, moved her silk panties aside, found the soft moist furrows of her sex and stroked her to a fever pitch of need, her whole being screaming for it to be fulfilled. Nothing else mattered. Nothing else existed for her.

It all happened so fast, the jolt when he plunged into her, the savage joy of it, the relief, the release of all nerve-tearing tension as her inner muscles convulsed and creamed around the marvellously deep penetration. And he repeated it, storming her with waves of ecstatic pleasure, pumping hard to the rhythm of his own need until he, too, reached the sweet chaos of climax.

She lay limply spreadeagled on the trunk of the car with him bent over her, the heat of his harsh breathing pulsing against her throat. If traffic had passed by them on the street, she hadn't heard or seen it. The night seemed to have wrapped them in a private cocoon, intensifying the feelings that still held her in thrall.

His arms burrowed underneath her, gathering her up. Amazingly her legs were wound around his hips and he supported them in place as he lifted her from the car and carried her to the passenger side, only relinquishing their intimate connection when he opened the door and lowered her to the seat. He kissed her while he fastened the safety belt, fetched the handbag she had dropped somewhere and laid it on her lap, kissed her again before closing the door and rounding the car to the driver's side.

She watched him in a daze-this virtual stranger with whom she'd shared such an erotically intimate experience. Languor was seeping into her bones. Somehow any action was beyond her. She barely grasped the fact that he had seized control of the situation, putting her in the car, retrieving her handbag and the car keys which he was now inserting in the ignition, having usurped her driver's seat. Her mind was stuck in one groove, endlessly repeating...

I can't believe I did that.