Free Beauty Ravished by Celeste Anwar Page B

impatiently, cutting her off.
    “I did. How would you know that I didn’t? I have it right here,” she said, rooting through her purse.
    “‘Cause I’m the host, Nigel Francoeur.”
    Cherry stopped her search and looked up at him, feeling her face redden under his scrutiny. She would’ve rather had her teeth pulled than to have to admit that she’d crashed such an exclusive party, but there was no hope for it. That being the case, she summoned the ‘helpless female’. “I’m sorry. I admit, I wasn’t originally invited, my friend was.” She held out her hand, which he ignored. “I’m Cherry—Cherry Roman. Anyway,” she added, dropping her hand once more, “she couldn’t come, so she passed it on to me. There’s no harm in that, is there? And, I’m here now.”
    He was silent a long moment. A muscle in his jaw ticked. “You have to leave. Now.”
    Dismay filled her when she saw he didn’t seem even slightly moved by her attempt to placate him. The man didn’t have one sympathetic bone in his body. She’d spent much of her severance traveling here. Now she’d have to go back without even some pleasant memories to sustain her, she thought glumly.
    All of a sudden, everything that had happened beset her like a wall of dominos she’d carefully stacked to the ceiling. She’d done her best to look on the bright side, keep her chin up, stave off the temptation to just fall on the floor and kick her heels and wallow in her misery. This trip had been her panacea, however. It was going to cure her ills. She was going to have a good time and relax and she’d figure out what to do when she’d had just a little breather from the battle she’d just lost.
    Except now she wasn’t going to get it. Now, she was going to have to face the fact that she’d blown money she couldn’t afford to on a vacation she wasn’t going to get. It took a supreme effort of will to ignore the sting of tears in her eyes and nose. “I can’t,” she said, her chin wobbling with the sudden urge to burst into tears. She swallowed, forcing herself to calm down. “The last ferry is gone. I … I barely made it here as it is.”
    He closed his eyes as if searching for patience. When he opened his eyes again, he stared past her at the setting sun. His face tightened. He gave her a hard look. “It’s just as well. Come, I’ll show you to your room.”
    “Really?” She felt instantly better, even though he didn’t look like he was very happy about the fact that she couldn’t leave.
    He glanced toward the glass doors again. “It’s gettin dark. It’s too late. You can’t leave tonight anyway.”
    He had his hand on the back of her waist, riding her hip, all the way up the stairs and down the hallway to the room he took her to. If it had been a cattle prod, it couldn’t have been any more galvanizing. It seemed to burn a hole right through her clothes, right through her flesh and forked outward to spear her erogenous zones electrifyingly. She didn’t know if it was that that made it so difficult to catch her breath, or the fact that she traversed the entire distance trying to outrun that hand.
    The room was beautiful, far more elegant than anything she’d ever experienced in her life—it looked like the sort of room only the filthy rich could afford, from the elegant furniture, to the carpet that was so thick she felt like she was walking through water, to the king sized bed filled with pillows.
    As chaotic as her emotions were after what she’d already experienced, she was still awed enough that it penetrated her emotional roller coaster ride, striking her deaf, dumb and blind.
    “You will stay here. Is that understood?”
    Cher turned around and gaped at him. “This is my room?”
    He frowned. After a moment’s hesitation, he left the door and strode toward her. Cher blinked, too surprised even to think about retreating from the purposeful set of his face. He caught her jaw, forcing her to look at him—though why,