It hadn’t been a conscious decision to wrap his heart up and bury it along with his mother, yet it had somehow happened anyway. He’d stood at this same graveside all those years back, a man-child, barely a teenager, suddenly alone and bereft of love. No one had come close to melting the ice around his heart since then, though many had tried.

He’d grown up beautiful and rebellious, trouble to everyone and desired all the more for it by the girlfriends who’d littered his past.

Lucien reached out a hand and laid it against the cold, hard stone. Her face was indistinct in his mind now; she was more a feeling than an image. Her memory had kept him safe as he’d grown. She was the only person who’d looked at him and understood his heart.

He scrubbed his hands over his face. He’d come here because he needed to talk and there was no one else to listen.

What was he doing with Sophie Black? Why was he trying to save her? What the fuck did he think he was: Knight by name and Knight by nature? And if that was it, why did he feel more and more like she was the one saving him?

Without even trying, Sophie had gotten under his skin in a way that the many polished and predatory women who’d populated his life and his bed before now had never managed. Her softness and her bravery impressed the hell out of him, and finding her in his arms when he woke seemed to still his ever-present need to get up and fight.

He closed his eyes for a second in silent remembrance, and then turned and walked away.

CHAPTER THIRTY

All cried out and resolved to make the most of these last stolen hours, Sophie returned to Lucien’s bedroom and noticed the note he’d propped on the bedside table.

“I’ve fired up the saunarium for you. Try it, I think you’ll like it.”

Sophie wandered back into the bathroom, the note still in her hand. Saunarium? Was that the same as a sauna? She’d noticed the wooden door in there yesterday, but the tiered, planked room had been cool and dry when she’d peered in.

It wasn’t cool in there anymore.

She glanced down at the white fluffy towel wrapped around her body. Her own private spa session was too good an opportunity to pass up. She grabbed a glass of cold water then stepped inside, instantly aware of ambient heat, and thankful that she was able to breathe easily thanks to the clever mix of heat and humidity. So a saunarium was something between a sauna and a steam room, she realised. Trust Lucien to have the best of both worlds.

Sophie breathed in through her nose and out through her mouth, then settled herself into the corner of the lower bench opposite the door. Her whole body felt infused with heat, as if the warmest sunshine was kissing her skin. Low lights glowed in the ceiling, turning the room into a blissful cocoon.

A sigh of pleasure left Sophie’s lips as she leaned back and willed herself to relax. Her tearful session in the bath had proved cathartic on many levels. She’d cried out of regret for the loss of trust in her marriage and sadness at her trampled hopes of forever love with Dan. She’d finally taken off her rose tinted glasses and, come tomorrow, she was ready to grab her life by the scruff of the neck and shake it, hard. She had no idea where the jumbled pieces would fall, but she refused to allow herself to be cowed by fear of the unknown.

Hadn’t this week shown her that life could be bigger and better than she’d ever imagined it to be? This fantasy interlude with Lucien wasn’t real life, but it would be a lie and a disservice to him to deny that every minute had been anything other than breathtaking.

Still, she had no idea how she could continue working for him after this week. He was hands down the most charismatic, fabulous man she’d ever met, the stuff of every woman’s daydreams, but life with him in it felt rather like having her foot jammed on the accelerator. He left her breathless and giddy, and he did things to her body that she didn’t even know could be done. She barely knew him, yet he seemed to know her inside out.

She’d climbed out of the bath, and like a snake shedding its skin, she’d left the old Sophie behind. The girl gazing back at her in the steamed up mirror was all new and shiny-eyed, and ready to rock her own world.

Sophie breathed in deeply as she relaxed back onto the saunarium bench. She was warm to the bones. Hot, in actual fact. She opened her eyes and glanced down at her towel, then up again at the doorway. She was certain no one would come in here aside from Lucien, and he was still out pursuing his mysterious business ends. Her fingers unworked the towel from beneath her arms, and with a last glance towards the door, she unwrapped it and let it fall open on the bench.

She was naked in Lucien’s saunarium.

Feeling suddenly exposed, even though she was alone, Sophie took a long slug of cold water and pushed her damp hair back from her forehead.

Thoughts of Lucien in the woods earlier crept unbidden into her mind when she closed her eyes. Her wrists still tingled from where he’d tied her up, and her body still fizzed with the memory of her orgasms. She glanced down at her body, flushed and glistening damp, and wondered what she’d do if Lucien were to open the door at that very moment.

Would she grab for the towel to cover up, or would she invite him in? Easy. Her feeling of ultra-relaxation morphed slowly into nerve-tingling arousal as she imagined him. Yes, she could well imagine Lucien using this room… big, bronzed and butt naked. Her hands smoothed down the length of each of her damp arms, and then settled lightly over her breasts at the thought of him undressed.

She closed her eyes and massaged her own warm flesh, slick with a sheen of moisture from the damp heat. Her nipples peaked beneath her sliding thumbs, the imprint of Lucien’s mouth fastening over them in the woods that morning seared clear on her memory. She sighed as she laid her head back against the stepped wooden bench behind her, caught up in the heated recollection of Lucien’s hands on her body. That little moan of appreciation he’d made low in his throat when he’d discovered she’d obeyed his command to leave her knickers at home. The way he’d licked her lips as he slid his hand inside her jeans and found himself cupping her bare sex. She cupped it herself now, mirroring his actions to recreate that throb of anticipation between her legs.

Sophie caught her lip between her teeth and gasped softly as she slipped her fingers inside her slick folds, one knee lifted on the bench.

She was so warm, and so open, and completely caught up in her own private re-enactment of the morning’s events beside the waterfall. Jesus, he’d tied her up, anyone could have seen. Her fingers sought her clitoris as she recalled Lucien on his knees pushing his tongue into her sex. He’d licked her here… it had felt like this… Sophie arched as she touched herself, her fingers as insistent as Lucien’s dexterous tongue had been. She squeezed her eyes tightly shut as the sensations intensified.