page3 (1/2)

‘No, of course it isn’t,’ Poppy denied untruthfully She was da to let James make her feel even worse than she already did

‘No?’ Ja cynically as Poppy inadvertently looked up at him ‘So as he, then? It certainly wasn’t Chris, and yet, according to you, he’s the only man you’ve ever loved the only man you could ever love’

Poppy’s face flushed scarlet with fury as she realised that Ja back at her the impassioned words that her sixteen-year-old self had declared to hirown out of her crush on his younger brother yet

‘No one you know,’ Poppy shot back at him furiously ‘In fact’

‘No one anyone knows, including you, is more like it,’ James contradicted her drily

‘That’s not true,’ Poppy lied hotly

‘No?’ James taunted her ‘Well, let’s just put it to the test, shall we?’

Before she knehat he intended to do, soht and hers, so that she was momentarily off balance and forced instinctively to reach out and cling to hie of her vulnerability to tighten his hold on her, using not just one but both ar her so close that she could actually feel the hard, firainst her and the equally fir her head back so that she could look at hiry she was, but her complaint died away in her throat as she saw the way he was looking at her at her an to trip frantically in a series of far too fast, shallow little beats thatquicken and heras she tried to draw extra air into her suddenly oxygen-deprived lungs

A small sound—a protest, a soft asped its way past the locked muscles of her throat and was lost, stifled by the slow, deliberate pressure of Jaainst hers

This couldn’t be happening, Poppy thought, her ainst hers, covering it, caressing it, possessing it

Frantically, she tried to turn her head out of the way, panic flooding her body with a treitation and a desperate need to break free, but Jaainst his body whilst the other grasped a handful of her hair, twisting it through his fingers, and then cupped her jaw, i pressure of a kiss that was ly vulnerable

She could feel the strength in his fingers where they rested against her skin, their touch cool inheat of her own flushed face, just as the steady thud of his heartbeat underlined the wretchedly fast race of her own

She knew, sha froly, that Ja her throat, stroking her skin gently gentlyJames

Tears blurred her vision, burning behind the eyelids she refused to close as she glared her enmity into the cool, clear aqua of James’s unreadable eyes

All these years of drea her, Chris’shers, and now it had to be Ja what should have been one of theparody of everything that her first kiss of real passion should have been

Was it really for this that she had refused dates and explorative teenage snogging sessions? Was it for this that she had held aloof from the sexual freedom that university could have afforded her? Was it for this that she had spent her nights and so? So that James could mock her and destroy her cherished fantasies with a cruel kiss that could only be designed to taunt her—a kiss that?

Poppy stiffened as her brain belatedly recognised soly already seee—namely that if it hadn’t actually been Ja hers she ht almostcould almost

Poppy gave an outraged gasp as she realised just why her lips, herthe sensual contact with Jaistered the sudden, heart-stopping glea James’s as he finally lifted his mouth from hers

Her legs felt oddly weak as she stepped back fros either

‘Well, whoever he was, if indeed he did actually exist,’ she heard Jaood teacher Either that or’

‘Or what?’ Poppy recovered just enough to challenge hiood pupil?’