CHAPTER 1

      HIS BIG,WARM HAND against the small of her back, Ash allowed Nikos to guide her into the exclusive Boston restaurant. It felt good to walk into the air-conditioning. Boston in the summer was muggy and hot, but the instant cold sent shivers chasing along her arms and made her nipples bead behind the black silk bodice of her dress.

     Rather than discomfort, her body reacted with a sensual pleasure that was her constant companion in this man's company.

    It had marked their first meeting and had not abated since, leaving her with a need to explore a side to her character that she usually ignored. Her feminine sexuality. She found herself dressing more sexily around him than she ever had in the past and reveling in the small, possessive touches he peppered their dates with.

Tonight, she'd worn a dress by Armani that she loved because it was both elegant and sexy. Its sleeveless design and scooped neck left her arms, a good portion of her chest and her back exposed, but the hem swirled modestly below her knees. The black silk clung to her understated curves and the thin fabric offered no real barrier between his hand and the sensitive skin of her back. And that single point of contact was enough to send her nerve endings rioting.

She had to concentrate on maintaining a bland façade for him and the other restaurant patrons, but she couldn't help wishing they were someplace private. Someplace she might actually get the nerve up to ask why he'd never pressed for deeper intimacy when his good-night kisses were powered by a wealth of barely leashed passion. Passion she'd decided she wanted to explore.

She recognized several faces as the maître d' led them to their table and wished she didn't. She would like to go out, just once, to a restaurant that was not one of the accepted watering holes for their kind. But Nikos Petronides demanded the best. In everything.

Sometimes, it made her wonder what he was doing with her.