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‘Yes!’ she lied brashly, without batting an eyelash

He tilted his head, so that his hair slithered sexily against his cheek, catching on the dark fuzz of his jaw, giving her a bone- you to ain?

She launched herself at hi flurry of rounded limbs

‘Only if this tiet to use the ice cubes!’

CHAPTER NINE

‘CIAO’ Justin acknowledged Veronica’s greeting with an engaging grin as he and Luc walked out of the Avignon Centre train station and across the road to the Porte de la République entrance to the walled city, where she had found a convenient patch of shade in which to shelter from the mid-afternoon sun

‘I’d say it was cool to see you, but I think “Phehat a scorcher!” would be ainst his tan as he switched his bulging backpack to his other shoulder He was several inches shorter than Luc, his light brown hair streaked by the sun, hisa definite style state in Rome and not much better in Marseilles, but at least the friend who put me up there had air-con, and we could dunk ourselves in the Med with the girls in the string bikinis whenever we began to brown around the edges’

He was as mischievous as she re very Italian,’ she remarked with a smile

He laughed and saluted her with a lift of his sunglasses, revealing bright blue eyes ‘Grazie, signorina! In an Italian hotel kitchen you either assi the accessorised drink bottle and ca sandals ‘And you’re looking very French Tourist Chic Especially the hat Bargain at the market, was it?’

‘Yes, it was,’ she admitted, amused by his cheek

Passing through the towering, , tree-lined street running up towards the square where Veronica and Luc had had coffee before he had patiently followed her fascinated h the nearby Palace of the Popes They had arrived in Avignon early, so that Luc could show her the highlights of the historic city before the heat and crowds flocking to festival events began to clog the streets, and Veronica’s head was filled with intoxicating sights, sounds and experiences

And not only her head, she thought, with a sideways glance at Luc, looking relaxed and sinfully sexy in his jeans and dark red shirt Her heart fluttered in her breast You’d never know from his air of crisp vitality and fluid, loose-lietic activity

As she had herself Veronica adjusted the bri cheeks from her companions Every now and then she found herself bathed in honey-coated memories of their secret tryst The afternoon in Luc’s bed had drifted on into evening and then later that night, after she had refused to join him at the Reeds’ dinner table—afraid that she would be unable to hide her tu like a seductive wraith out of the darkness, a bottle of chane tucked under his arm

‘I didn’t want to spend the night without you,’ he said sine ‘To celebrate our second first night together—’

This tih, with the fierce intensity of his passion, extorting thein her sobs of need even as he sweetly satisfied the her wide, single bed until dawn crept through the shutters and the village bells tolled to the fading stars