‘Vaughan, darling!’ she exclaimed, her red lips smiling only briefly before pursing into a reproachful pout. ‘You’re late again, you bad man. You did say two, didn’t you?

‘Why, hello, Miles,’ she managed airily, making no concession to an ongoing and most uncharac-teristic attack of butterflies. ‘Long time, no see. Vaughan tells me you’re out here for six months and want us to whip up a weekender for you. Is that right?’

His momentary hesitation in answering irritated the death out of her, as did his ongoing and faintly contemptuous survey of her appearance. She used the awkwardly silent moments to do a survey of her own, finding to her disgust that she still thought him the most attractive man she’d ever met. She also realised why she’d been transitorily drawn to Spencer. He was a watered-down version of Miles.

Being faced with the real thing, however, brought home to her the many differences. Miles was taller than Spencer, and leaner and far more elegant. That severely tailored pale grey suit looked superb on him, as did the colour, the same as his eyes. Maddie thought his nose wonderfully patrician, and that dimple in his chin quite irresistible, especially since he always held himself with his chin and nose tilted slightly upwards.

He stood before her, the epitome of beauty, brains and breeding.

He was, no doubt, the ultimate choice for the father of her child. But as such, the ultimate challenge.

For it was obvious from the look on his face that he was still as disapproving of her as he’d been at the party last year. There was no sign, either, of any reluctant desire. His grey gaze remained cold as it swept over her a second time.

He would be a lot harder to seduce than Spencer, Maddie conceded. But all of a sudden, she was determined to succeed. Nothing would stand in her way. It might take time, but then, she had a whole six months. She could afford to take her time, to be a little more subtle than usual, if necessary.

She looked him up and down again and decided he would be well worth waiting for. Ah, but he would make a magnificent donor! With his impeccable breeding, he would surely pass on all those qualities she admired. His looks, his intelligence, his strength, his style.

But none she despised. Because he would not be around to give her child those. His offspring would not learn his snobbishness, or his ruthless ambition, or his cold, callous selfishness. His child would learn nothing but love. He or she would be a true love child in every sense of the word.

‘Yes, that’s right,’ he said at last, his voice as rich and cultured as she remembered. ‘I’ve been assuring Vaughan here that I well understand your services come with purchasing one of his houses.’

I’m counting on it, Miles thought with black irony, having already surrendered himself to the inevitable.

It was some salve to his pride that he would not have to make the running. She would do that. Already she was looking him over like a greedy child with a much-desired toy in its sights.

He wondered where her pride was. Didn’t she have any at all? He’d rejected her advances the last time. Quite brutally. Yet the gleam in her eye suggested she was ready and willing to mount a second assault on his supposed virtue. Lord, if only she knew!

‘Have you shown Miles the house at Stanwell Park yet, Vaughan?’ she asked, flashing her partner-cum-whatever a dazzling smile. ‘If you haven’t, then I’ll be only too glad to do the honours. That way you can visit Carolyn and the baby again this afternoon.’

‘Would you? That’d be great, Maddie. Would you mind, Miles?’

Mind? He couldn’t think of anything he’d like better. He wanted her alone. He wanted her anywhere. He just wanted her.

Why, then, did he adopt such a coolly indifferent pose, plus such a formal polite voice? Habit, he supposed. And more of his infernal pride. It was going to be the death of him, that pride.

‘If Miss Powers doesn’t mind abandoning her work to show me the house,’ he pronounced stiffly, ‘then I do not object. I would not, however, wish to put her to any inconvenience.’

Maddie resisted the urge to sigh. Instead, she glanced away for a moment. Getting this pompous fool into bed was not going to be easy. Getting him there without protection might prove near nigh impossible ! She wondered caustically if his underwear was as starched as his personality. All she could hope was that underneath all that chilling English control lay a real man, with real male hormones.

Looking at him, she caught him off guard for a moment, glimpsing a moment of naked desire in his eyes. It was gone in a flash, but it had been there. She was sure of it.

So! The game was the same as last time. He wanted her yet didn’t want her.

It was a game she’d played before, with other men of his ilk. But none, she conceded, of Miles MacMillan’s stiff stature and staunch standing.

How good it would be to break that iron control, to have him practically beg her to let him make love to her.

Maddie’s eyes narrowed at the prospect. The pleasure of a man’s body was nothing compared to the pleasure she gained from his utter surrender to her power as a woman.

Maddie enjoyed sex in her own way but had never had an orgasm in her life. She knew she wasn’t capable of it. But she was such a brilliant faker in bed that her lovers never twigged. She always praised their performance afterwards, and they were left smugly thinking they’d satisfied her as well as any man had ever satisfied her.

Which they had.

Maddie looked at Miles and knew his surrender would give her more pleasure than any man’s had ever done. She would not only win the game, but a prize, as well. A baby...

She could hardly wait.

‘I’ll just get my keys,’ she said sweetly, ‘and we’ll be on our way.’

CHAPTER THREE

MILES clung to the seat belt for added support as the car swung round another sharp curve at far too fast a speed. Lord, the woman drove like a maniac. On top of that, her car was a bomb, an old black thing with a big silver grille in front, which she’d proudly said was one of the original F.J. Holdens, whatever they were.

He wished to God he’d insisted on using his hire car. At least it had air-conditioning. He was beginning to feel rather hot under the collar, not to mention totally frazzled inside.

She was coming on to him again the same as before, with all the subtlety of a steamroller, and he still didn’t know how to handle her. It was one thing to think about the sexually charged Miss Madeline Powers from the safety of England, quite another to be faced with the woman in the flesh. Especially when that flesh was poured into black leather.

‘Runs like a dream, doesn’t it?’ she enthused as another curve was successfully negotiated on two wheels.

The road they were traversing generally followed the coastline. It had started out going through sedate village-like streets but had left. civilisation behind and was winding a narrow path round the edge of cliff faces. Dangerous drops greeted one to the right, raw mountainside covered in virgin bush rose steeply to the left. The place looked as wild and untamed as the woman next to him.

‘Mmm,’ was all he could manage.

‘Am I driving too fast for you?’ she asked in an innocent-sounding voice. ‘Just say so if I am.’

He resisted telling her she did everything too fast for his liking. But maybe his pale face gave her the message, for her foot lifted off the accelerator. She laughed as she slowed.

‘Vaughan’s always telling me I drive too fast. Not that he can talk, the bad man. He has this old red MG with the top down, which he tears around Wollongong in. Though he might have to sell it now the baby’s come.’

‘You and Slater seem very, er, close,’ Miles ventured.

‘Oh, we are. Very. There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for Vaughan.’