The Chancellor walked into Lucy’s bedroom. His brown eyes gleamed at her with a heat greater than the candles that lit the room, greater than the flames that roared in the fireplace.

All her dreams, all her desires were coming to fruition at last.

“Lucy,” he said, “I want you.”

His beautiful, scarred mouth smiled and even in the flickering candlelight she could see the shadow of the bruise that blackened his eye. Wounds gained in her defense, for her pleasure.

She lay on her bed, transfixed by the sight of his tall, lanky body.

Slowly, he removed his shirt, his chest appearing inch by inch as he undid his buttons. His skin was golden in the firelight. A sensation grew inside her inexorably, rising from her stomach up into her throat as he divested himself of his trousers and his pants and approached her, gloriously naked, every bone and muscle and inch of skin perfect. His erection, huge thick and hot, swayed towards her.

Lucy’s hands flew to her throat.

“Jesus Christ, will you get the hell away from me with that thing before I throw up,” she gagged, and only just had time to reach the bin before she puked all over her satin lingerie.

I groaned and pushed the keyboard away from me. I tried to take a sip of the ice-cold water that was the only thing I could stand the thought of just now, but the glass suddenly seemed to have a sickening, evil, hitherto-unknown smell of its own.

The mere idea of sex made me shudder. All that touching, and sweating, and panting, and heaving. All that hair and liquid. And why?

When smart-mouthed New York City cab driver Zoe Drake finds a tall, dark and brooding man on her doorstep, she doesn’t know what to think – does he want something, or has Christmas come early this year?

Nick Giroux is looking for his long-lost father – not a new-found woman! But there’s something about him that makes Zoe let down her ice-cool defences. She’ll use her profession to drive Nick to Maine…

“No!” Warren hurled himself across the bar and grabbed her hand. “No salt in the margarita! You put it on the rim of the glass!” This woman is doing something she’s never done before, and making mistakes. She’s probably never had a margarita, which makes her pretty naïve–about drinking anyway. So why’s she in a bar?

Marianne’s hand, jogged by Warren, shook a dollop of rock salt into the container. She looked down into the aluminium cylinder, and an expression of wild regret passed over her face. She is bothered by making mistakes, out of proportion to the mistake that she has made. A problem here. Then she shook her head a little, and smiled.

Nick shifted his weight, stretched his legs in their lightweight outdoor trousers, he’s an outdoorsman settled his back more comfortably against the tastefully neutral-coloured wall, and then he was motionless again. And patient. And in control of his body. I’ve tried to make him heroic in the first two sentences.

I giggled again. I was sitting on a grand piano, in a bar, in a hotel, in Milton Keynes, England.

I seemed to be a little bit drunk.

Harry sat down on the piano stool and opened the cover over the keys. He hit a key or two, experimentally, and then nodded, satisfied.

“I dare you to sing a song,” he said.

“Do you play the piano?” I asked.

“My parents made me take lessons from the age of eight.” He played several quick, jazzy chords. “I can play Mozart, Chopin, and most of the Monkees’ songs. So what are you going to sing?”

Why was I not surprised that Harry Blake, the well bred, had taken piano lessons as a child? Briefly, I wondered what my parents would have said if I’d asked for piano lessons at age eight.

Get a job, probably.

“‘I Wanna Be Sedated’ by The Ramones?” I suggested.

Harry’s long fingers danced over the keys, feeling out the Ramones tune briefly. “I think that song needs some electric guitars, not a grand piano.”

I watched his hands. Had I always found a man who could play the piano sexy?

I couldn’t remember any other occasions. In fact, I couldn’t remember watching a male play the piano since junior high school when geeky Donnie Deconzo used to play the intro to “Axel F” from Beverly Hills Cop whenever he got near a keyboard.

But Harry’s hands were so dextrous. I leaned over towards him, so I could see them more clearly.

“What are you going to sing, then?” he asked, still strumming out a vague, jazzy, improvised melody.

“You decide,” I said, mesmerised by the movement of his fingers. “It’s your dare.”

Harry looked up from the keys and met my eyes. Slowly, he smiled.

He stopped his melody and picked out another. Immediately I knew the tune, and the first line, and why he’d chosen it.

“‘Can’t Take My Eyes Off You,’” I said, but what I was thinking of were the first words of the lyrics. About someone being too good to be true.

Sneaky so-and-so.

“Do you know it?” Harry asked, filling in more of the chords as he continued with the melody.

“I know it. Do you want the Andy Williams version?”

“I don’t think the Ramones do a version,” he replied.

I crossed my legs and leaned back on one hand in “lounge-singer vamp” style. “I’m ready whenever you are,” I said.

He immediately segued into an introduction. Watching him, addressing every word to him, I sang.

I’d trained my voice, though for rather a different purpose, and when I began singing, I heard the room go quiet around me.

And Harry’s eyes were on me. Blue, steady, keen, smiling. I looked back and told him I couldn’t take my eyes off him.

I told him touching him would be heaven.

I saw him moistening his lips with his tongue when I sang how much I wanted to hold him.

His eyes told me that for once, he believed me. And then some.

Oh, this was fun. And sexy as hell, I thought, and then as I finished the first verse, I realised suddenly that I had no idea what the second verse was.

I paused, and Harry filled in with an improvised chord progression. “You okay?” he asked.

I had it. I gave him what felt like a catlike smile. “I’m great. Ready when you are.”

“You can really sing,” he commented.

“All that time in the shower must’ve paid off,” I said, and waited for him to work through his improvised bridge.

On my cue, I began singing again:
“You’re like a dream, Harry Blake,
Am I asleep, or awake?”

I saw his eyebrows raise themselves in surprise and amusement when he realised that I was making up the words. I reached forward and twirled a lock of his silky, wild hair around my finger as I sang.

“You have the funkiest hair,
C’mon and dare me a dare.
I don’t need E.S.P.
To know you want to touch me.”

And then I was telling him again how he was too good to be true.

And he was. Too honest, too principled, too well-bred for me to even think about getting tangled up with.

But I still couldn’t keep my eyes off him.

I shimmied on the piano to the build-up to the chorus, and then sang it out to the room and to Harry Blake. Loud, dramatic, throaty and full of all the desire I felt sitting on this piano feeling Harry touching the keys and sending musical vibrations through my body.

The next verse was a repeat of the first, and I lay on the piano to sing it. My belly and chest pressed against the cool glossy surface of the instrument. I could feel every note against my skin. I propped myself up on my elbows, my face only a few inches from Harry’s, and sang the verse and the chorus, my voice getting softer, huskier, and more intimate with every line. I slowed down the pace, a caress of a chorus instead of a flourish, and Harry followed me. Or maybe I followed Harry.

All I knew was that we were together, note for note, beat for beat.

We finished the song with a whisper and a tickling of keys. There was applause, but I barely heard it. I was caught up in Harry’s blue eyes, and couldn’t look away.

The last echo of the music died off. It felt very quiet, and Harry felt very close.

He had dark hair and he wore a loose white shirt, unbuttoned at the cuffs. His hands were in the pockets of his faded jeans. He stood casually, comfortably, looking straight at her, and his eyes were dark blue. Even across the room she could see it.

Jane’s fingers gripped her BlackBerry hard. This was her model. It must be, he looked so familiar. But somehow, in a different way than she’d expected. It wasn’t like recognising someone from a photo. The sight of him connected inside her stomach, making her joints ache and her breasts tighten. Her tailored suit stifled her, felt too tight across her chest.

He had perfect teeth, sculpted lips, high cheekbones, and he wasn’t just smiling at her, he was beaming.

Jane couldn’t help it. She flicked her head to the side, looking over her shoulder to see who was behind her, because men this gorgeous did not beam at her.

When she looked back he was striding across the restaurant, nearly at her table, his hand outstretched.

And then he was there. In front of her, holding her hand in his, though she didn’t remember offering it.

“Jane,” he said, his head tilted slightly to the side, his smile digging creases into the side of his mouth. His voice was deep, soft, and friendly.

The sound of her name in his mouth did something to her blood flow because she felt as if she had too much of it, heating her skin, pumping her heart harder, tingling in her fingertips and chest.

“Yes.” She stood on weak legs, hearing her voice shaky and realising, somewhere in the back of her boiling brain, that she should really try to control her behaviour before she made herself look like an idiot. But this man… “You look different from your photographs,” she said.

“God, I hope so,” he said, and the warmth in his eyes and his hand made her swallow, hard.

“Dude, you found her!”

A man in a white linen suit burst out of nowhere. He clapped the gorgeous man on the shoulder and kissed Jane on both of her cheeks. “Hey Jane, great to see you babe, I see you know Jay already.”

“Thom,” she said, in confusion, and then realised that she was still holding the model’s hand. “It’s great to meet you, Jay,” she said, giving his hand a shake, trying to inject some professionalism into the gesture that was, for her, quite frankly sensual.

His hand enfolded hers, warm and dry, and it was as if she could feel every line of his palm, every print of his fingertips against her. It was more than a handshake. She felt as if she knew him.

She met his eyes again and he was smiling as if he shared a secret with her.