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‘Why did you bring me here, Xenon?’ she de corandmother—’

‘That desire was genuine,’ he interrupted coolly

‘And what else? Did you picture this scene when you estion? The inevitable shohich would result when I found out that I’d be expected to share a bed with you?’

For a moment he didn’t answer and when he did, his words were accompanied by an odd kind of sh not at first’

She stared at hi very fast ‘Tell me’

He lifted his shoulders in a careless kind of shrug and once again she could see the bunching of muscle beneath his shirt ‘I admit that when I came to your house that day I was little more than curious I wanted to see the woman I had married and to see what life had done to her I’d even proive you your divorce papers, if I were so inclined And then you opened the door and’

His voice tailed off in a hich made Lexi look at him suspiciously Because Xenon didn’t do hesitation And neither did he screw his eyes up as if he had been presented with a problem he couldn’t quite work out Because wasn’t he the ?

‘And what?’ she prompted

‘I realised I still wanted you,’ he said simply ‘I wanted you in a way I’ve never wanted any other woman, not before and not since I wanted you in my arms I still do I look at you, Lex, and my body aches for you I want you so badly that I can hardly think straight Even now’

She felt the dull crash of disappointment—for these were not neords They ords he’d spokenher—when she’d bewitched and infuriated hiht into his arh e which was just out of reach He’d never said the He’d hadn’t spoken of wanting her when she’d been lying in that hospital bed with her wo that she had failed him as a wife

‘We can’t,’ she said in a hollow voice