The Pregnancy Shock by Lynne Graham Page A

and the terrible guilty sense that she was breaking every one of her rules. Yet when she met those heavily lashed golden eyes, it struck her that rules were made to be broken and that, for her, Alexei Drakos would always be an exception. He laced long brown fingers slowly into the tumbling fall of her red hair, smoothing and fanning the vibrant strands across his palm in the lamplight in a move that accentuated the different shades.
    ‘I never found red hair attractive until I saw yours glowing in the sunlight with all those crazy streaks of copper and gold and bronze,’ he admitted, before he jerked her head back and took a hungry driving kiss that exploded through her wound-up body like a depth charge.
    The renewed taste of him was a wake-up call to her slumbering senses. That kiss was insanely stimulating. Indeed the probe of his tongue sent a spasm of fierce sexual need spearing right to the heart of her, releasing a feverish energy that pulsed through her receptive fleshin a sensual wave. Alexei pulled back from her to remove her T-shirt, an action that left her blinking in surprise like an owl suddenly thrust into bright light.
    ‘You’re always wearing too many clothes, moraki mou. I can’t wait to get them off,’ he confided thickly, one lean hand already engaged in unzipping her skirt so that he could slide it off her as easily as if she were standing up.
    Uneasily conscious of her body’s semi-clad state in a serviceable black cotton bra and panties, Billie went stiff and self-conscious. She was hopelessly convinced that he was sure to notice his mistake now when he discovered that—shock! horror!—her garments did not miraculously conceal a designer-thin body with dainty breasts and legs as long as a giraffe’s. She knew that though there was nothing wrong with her figure it was very ordinary, and while she might be undersized in the height department she certainly wasn’t in her bust or hip measurements. Her face was scarlet with self-consciousness.
    ‘I have a huge sense of anticipation,’ Alexei revealed, reaching for her bra, his attention welded hungrily to the snowy hillocks firmly encased in black cotton.
    ‘But anticipation often leads to disappointment,’ Billie warned him worriedly, pushing his arms back so that she could start unbuttoning his shirt and occupy her trembling hands. She was desperate to conceal her nerves and her sheer embarrassing ignorance of such intimacies. ‘It’s my turn.’
    ‘Always the pessimist and so democratic,’ Alexei mocked.
    Billie was very well aware that she was dealing withan autocrat, who had learned in the cradle that he had no need to share anything with anyone. Her fingers were clumsy on the buttons of his shirt and to complete her task she daringly yanked the garment free of his belt. Deep down inside her head, a frightened voice was wailing, ‘What on earth are you doing?’ over and over again. Black hair curled over Alexei’s powerful pectoral muscles and arrowed down over his taut abdomen to vanish from view below his waist. He was a hot but sexually intimidating vision and he took her breath away.
    With an unhurried hand he unhooked her bra and trailed it off. Billie had to fight a powerful urge to try and cover her breasts with her hands like some shocked maiden from an old comedy film; her skin had never felt so naked or exposed.
    ‘You’re magnificent,’ he told her in Greek ‘Lush…’
    And the taste of that word resonating in the silence made her tremble, while his almost reverent finger brushed the prominent bud of a pouting pink nipple adorning her voluptuous blue-veined flesh. He bent his dark head and closed his mouth to that tantalising peak, rolling the unbearably tender bud between his lips while he used skilled fingers to administer similar pressure to its neglected twin. Pushing her back on the pillows, he cupped and squeezed her plump breasts, stroking them while he suckled ever more strongly. Swiftly he plunged her