Lost in Light by Kat Kingsley Page A

beautiful home,” I said, grasping at anything to make him stop looking at me like that.
    “Thank you,” he said with a gracious nod of his head, his lips once again touched by the hint of a smirk, making me frown at him. “What’s the matter?” he asked, his voice warmed by the barest traces of humor.
    “You’re laughing at me,” I muttered, dropping my gaze to my hands in my lap.
    “What of it?” he pressed, his smile bubbling over into his words.
    “It’s not fair.”
    In a rush he closed the small distance between us and loomed over me, his knee resting on the couch beside me. One hand was braced against the back of the couch behind my head while the other cupped my chin and turned my face up towards him. I was instantly struck by how similar the situation was to the fantasies that had plagued me ceaselessly in recent days.
    “I thought I made it quite clear, Miss Parker, that I play to win,” he murmured darkly, his face cast in shadow and his eyes gleaming like icy shards of emerald. “I care nothing about being fair.”
    “Oh,” was all I could whisper in response, my heart beat ratcheting up several notches as I stared breathlessly up into his face. Trailing his thumb along the edge of my lower lip he smiled devilishly at my sharply inhaled breath.
    “So innocent,” he mused, his eyes sparkling as they watched the slow progression of his thumb, and then widened as I gave in to the sudden urge to flick the tip of my tongue against the pad of his thumb. “And yet so curious,” he amended with a dark chuckle as he wiped the moisture from my tongue on my lip before drawing up to his full height and stepping back.
    “I believe dinner is ready,” he said with a rakish smile as he ran his hand back over his hair, a gesture that I was beginning to think was an expression of frustration.
    Several minutes later we were settled comfortably in the dining room at the table, a simple yet delicious meal of rosemary roasted chicken, steamed carrots, broccoli and cauliflower, and roasted potatoes spread out between us. Music filtered softly out of the small iPod dock on the buffet, the sultry voice of Adele somehow reassuring in its familiarity. I slowly sipped at my wine between bites while he drank iced water, the sight of his long throat working as he swallowed bringing an unexplainable tightness to my belly.
    “This is delicious, thank you,” I said into the not wholly uncomfortable silence, earning an honest smile of pleasure from him as he inclined his head towards me in thanks.
    “There are berries for dessert… if you are a good girl,” he replied. That damned teasing smirk lifted the corners of his mouth and crushed my hard won sense of calm, leaving me breathless and full of nervous flutters.
    “Evil man,” I muttered under my breath as I stabbed a carrot.
    “Pardon?” he asked with a raised brow, the humor glinting in his eyes letting me know that he had heard me just fine.
    “Nothing,” I said, popping the carrot into my mouth.
    He cleared the table once we were done eating, urging me to stay seated when I offered to help clear away the dishes. Sitting back contentedly in my chair I looked around the room. The backyard was barely visible through the large picture window behind his chair, the sun having fully set now. A large landscape showing a gnarled tree branch in stark relief against a backdrop of misty water and distant mountains hung above the buffet. Pushing my chair back from the table I moved to stand in front of the picture, lost in the play of light on the water.
    Spying the scrawled signature on the matting I called absently over my shoulder, “Is this a signed Ansel Adams?”
    “Beautiful isn’t it?” he said right behind me, his nearness catching me off guard and making me jump.
    “Y-Yes,” I said as I turned to face him, breathless as he loomed over me, the scent of his cologne intoxicating as it swirled around me. I felt weightless as I stood in his shadow, the heat