Free Playboy's Lesson by Melanie Milburne Page A

champagne bottles against boats?’
    She pursed her lips. ‘I do lots of things behind the scenes. I don’t like the spotlight so I leave the showy stuff to Madeleine. I organise the palace timetable. Setting up dinners for visiting royals or dignitaries. Garden parties, guided tours of the palace, that sort of thing.’
    ‘Boring stuff, then.’
    Lottie pushed her tongue into the side of her cheek and inhaled a long breath. ‘It might seem hideously boring to someone like you, but I happen to find it immensely satisfying.’
    The edge of his mouth tilted upwards, setting off a mocking light in his eyes as if the same muscles were involved. ‘Sounds like a riot. Getting all those unruly ducks in a neat little row. Day after day after day. Year after year after year.’
    She shifted in her chair as his satirical scrutiny continued. ‘So I like order. Is that a crime?’
    That same side of his mouth lifted in a lip shrug. ‘You can’t control everything in life. You have to leave some wriggle room for spontaneity. No fun waking up each day to the same old tedious routine.’
    She gave him an arch look. ‘I am quite sure no two days in your calendar are ever the same. Waking up every morning with a different woman lying beside you would almost certainly guarantee that.’
    ‘Ah, but that’s where you’ve got me all wrong.’
    She tried to ignore the wicked gleam in his eyes but even so the backs of her knees tingled. ‘Oh, really?’
    ‘I never spend the whole night with someone.’
    Lottie couldn’t decide whether to show surprise or disgust. ‘Why not?’
    ‘Why would I want to? Once the sex part is over it’s time to say goodbye. I need my beauty sleep.’
    ‘So no post-coital hugs or pillow talks till dawn?’
    He gave a deep rumbling laugh. ‘No. Not my scene, I’m afraid.’
    ‘Interesting choice of words.’
    His smile was still in place but it had hardened slightly around the edges. ‘Which words would they be?’
    ‘You’re afraid.’
    The hardness moved up to his eyes like a screen of opaque glass. ‘What would I be afraid of?’
    ‘Intimacy.’
    He pressed his index finger on to the tabletop and made a game-show ‘wrong answer’ sound. ‘Nope. I love sex.’
    ‘I’m not talking about sex,’ Lottie said. ‘I’m talking about allowing someone to get close to you.’
    ‘You can’t get much closer than having sex. Or is it so long since you got down and dirty you’ve forgotten the moves? Do you want me to give you a refresher course? I’d be happy to oblige. I’ll even do a house call—or palace call, I should say.’
    Lottie gave him a quelling look. ‘Do you really think I would sink so low as to indulge in a fling with you ?’
    ‘Whoa there, sweetheart, I didn’t say anything about a fling.’ He winked at her. ‘Just one night of bed-wrecking sex.’
    She arched one of her eyebrows. ‘One full night?’
    ‘Half.’
    ‘You drive a hard bargain.’
    He glinted at her again. ‘You won’t find anyone harder than me.’
    She suppressed a shiver of reaction and hoped he didn’t see it. ‘I was being sarcastic.’
    ‘Sure you were.’
    ‘I was!’
    He reached across the table and captured her right hand before she had time to snatch it away. He turned her hand upwards and traced a light-as-fairy-footsteps circle around her palm, all the while holding her gaze with the impaling sexiness of his. ‘You think by hiding your assets underneath that horse blanket you’re wearing you’re going to stop me from wanting you?’
    Lottie swallowed. His touch was like fire against her skin, his gaze like a searing laser. Her body was a pathetic traitor. It trembled and ached. It pulsed and throbbed. It wanted .
    She pulled her hand out of his with a sharp little jerk. ‘I hate to deflate that overblown ego of yours, Mr Chatsfield, but I am not going to be seduced by you.’
    His smile was lazy and supremely confident. ‘You want me so bad I can feel it from here.’
    She coughed