Free One Month with the Magnate by Michelle Celmer Page A

her, that he didn’t even like her, that to him this was just some stupid game of revenge. She didn’t even care that he would probably take her fragile heart and rip it all to pieces. She was going to take what she wanted, what she needed, what she’d spent the last fifteen years aching for.
    One minute her arms were at her sides and the next they were around his neck, fingers tunneling through his hair, and something inside Emilio seemed to snap. He shoved her backward and she gasped as he crushed her against the wall with the weight of his body. The kiss went fromsweet and tender to deep and punishing so fast it stole her breath.
    He cupped her behind, arched against her, and she could feel the hard length of his erection against her stomach. If not for the skirt of her dress, she would have wound her legs around his hips and ground into him. She wanted him to take her right there, in the hallway.
    But as abruptly as it had begun, it was over. Emilio let go of her and backed away, leaving her stunned and confused and aching for more.
    â€œGood night, Isabelle,” he said, his voice so icy and devoid of emotion that she went cold all over. He stepped into his office and shut the door behind him and she heard the lock click into place. She had to fight not to hurl herself at it, to keep from pounding with her fists and demand he finish what he started.
    She had never been so aroused, or so humiliated, in her life. She wasn’t sure what sort of game he was playing, but as she sank back against the wall, struggling to make sense of what had just happened, she had the sinking feeling that it was far from over.
    Â 
    Damn.
    Emilio closed and locked his office door and leaned against it, fighting to catch his breath, to make sense of what had just happened.
    What had gone wrong?
    Things had been progressing as planned. He had been in complete control. He’d had Isabelle right where he wanted her. Then everything went to hell. Their lips touched and his head started to spin, then she wrapped her arms around his neck, rubbed against him and he’d just… lost it.
    He’d been seconds from ripping open that god-awful uniform and putting his hands on her. He had beenthis-close to shoving up the skirt of her dress, ripping off her panties and taking her right there in the hallway, up against the wall. He wanted her as much now as he had fifteen years ago. And putting on the brakes, denying himself the pleasure of everything she offered, had been just as damned hard.
    That hadn’t been part of the plan.
    On the bright side, making Isabelle bend to his will, making her beg for it, was clearly not going to be a problem.
    He crossed the room to the wet bar and splashed cold water on his face. This had just been a fluke. A knee-jerk reaction to the last vestiges of a long dormant sexual attraction. It was physical and nothing more. So from now on, losing control wasn’t going to be an issue.

Seven
    I sabelle stood at the stove fixing breakfast the next morning, reliving the nightmarish events of last night. How could she have been so stupid? So naive?
    Just tell me what you want and I’ll do it.
    Well, she’d gotten her answer. He hadn’t come right out and said it, but the implications of his actions had been crystal clear. He wanted to make her want him, get her all hot and bothered, then reject her. Simple yet effective.
    Very effective.
    As much as she hated it, as miserable and small as he’d made her feel, didn’t she deserve this? Hadn’t she more or less done the same thing to him fifteen years ago? Could she really fault him for wanting revenge?
    She had gotten herself into this mess, she’d asked for his help, now she had to live with the consequences. She could try to resist him, try to pretend she didn’t melt whenhe touched her, but she had always been a terrible liar. And honestly, she didn’t have the energy to fight him.
    The worst, most