"A gift from a fairy G.o.dmother.. let's keep it like that."

She didn't want to talk to him she didn't want him to take on a more real form for her than the one he already had. Already some part of her knew that she must preserve something of herself from him for her own safety. It was easier like this . easier to pretend that this was all part of a dream, a fantasy come to life. Instinct told her that she could trust him, that he was no s.a.d.i.s.t, no violent psychopath who would do her any physical harm. The pull of her senses towards him was so strong that she dared not let there be anything more than that between them.

He was a lover sent to her as a gift by fate, or so her champagne-bemused brain told her, and she didn't want to a.n.a.lyse the situation any further than that.

It never even occurred to her to tell Ralph and Jane that she was leaving. She had no wrap with her, and it was the simplest thing in the world to let him lead her downstairs and out into the night;

for them to stop beside a sleek Porsche sports car, which he unlocked and then carefully tucked her into.

She felt too dreamily hazy even to fasten her seat-belt, letting him do it for her, breathing in the male scent of his skin. He took off the periwig he had been wearing as part of his costume and tossed it into the back of the car before starting the engine. His hair, thick and black, lay close to his skull, making her ache to touch it; to feel its softness beneath her fingertips. She closed her eyes as he set the car in motion.

His cottage was a middle one in a short row of what had once been estate workers' homes, down by the river. The headlights from the Porsche as he swung it to a halt picked out the stone facade with its white-painted trellis on which a clematis was just beginning to put out new spring tendrils of green.

As he switched off the engine silence enveloped them. This was the moment when she ought to be having second thoughts Sarah realised, but instead she was wrapped in a blanket of euphoria, a feeling of such intense happiness spreading through her that she herself could hardly believe it was real. She seemed to have been freed of all moral and mental restraints; free to follow her emotions and her desires in a way that was totally unfamiliar.

It was only as he helped her out of the car that her companion said rawly, "Do you realise that we haven't even exchanged first names yet?"

Sarah smiled at him. She felt no fear; no hesitation, only an intense sense of rightness.

"Is that a gentlemanly way of telling me that you're having second thoughts?"

They were standing under the small porch by the front door and he turned her towards him, his hands cupping her face so tightly that she could feel the faint callouses on his fingers imprinting against her face.

"No way," he told her huskily.

"I wanted you the moment I set eyes on you."

"Even without knowing my name?"

It was the first time Sarah had ever played such a teasing flirtations game and the look that darkened his eyes was as heady to her senses as the earlier champagne had been.

"What's in a name?" He muttered it against her skin, caressing her jawline with his lips, smoothing a stray ringlet behind her ear.

"I.

only know that from the first moment I saw you, I knew I wanted you in my arms . in my bed," he told her fiercely, adding on a lighter note, " What is your name? "

"Sarah," she told him promptly, not vouchsafing her surname; it didn't seem necessary.

"Mine's Joss," he responded, smothering her response with the fierce, heated pressure of his mouth.

His kiss obliterated the last remnants of her other saner self. She clung to him, welcoming the taut contraction of his muscles as she slid her hands beneath his jacket and clutched his shoulders. Her own body seemed to be a boneless, fluid ent.i.ty incomplete without the hard strength of his against it. Her lips parted readily to welcome the heat of his tongue. His hand stroked up from her waist, moulding her breast, caressing her convulsively, and immediately she ached to be rid of the barriers of her clothes. She wanted his hands on her body . his skin, his mouth. against her own.

When his mouth abruptly left hers, she felt bereft; almost abandoned.

Her lungs ached from the cold night air and she was shivering.

Joss was as affected as she was herself, fighting to control his own ragged breathing. His voice was deep and raw as he muttered, "For G.o.d's sake, what are you doing to me? You've got me in such a state I could almost take you right here. We'd better go inside while I'm still capable of doing anything that doesn't involve having you in my arms."

He turned away from her to unlock the door, and then preceded her inside to switch on a light.

Sarah followed him, blinking in the light which illuminated the tiny sitting room. She noticed rather absently that the small room had been attractively renovated, and that it was pleasantly furnished, but her mind was not on the decor. A flight of open stairs led up from the sitting room and involuntarily her eyes followed it.

She managed to drag her attention away, feeling the colour crawl up over her skin as she saw that Joss was watching her, the same hungry burning need she could feel eating away at her, openly displayed in his eyes. She felt oddly lightheaded, and moved automatically towards him.

He held out his hands, not to take hold of her, but to hold her off.

For a moment rejection and pain sliced through her.

"Don't look at me like that," he demanded thickly.

"If I touch you now, I'll end up making love to you here where we're standing like a raw teenager. Who are you, lovely Sarah?" he whispered huskily.

"What magic, do you possess to make me feel this way?"

Slowly Sarah reached out and touched her fingers to his lips, her body tensing under their warmth, her senses relaying to her the knowledge that he was as affected as she was herself by that brief contact.

"No questions. Tonight is special," she told him softly.

"If there is any magic, it's in the fact that tonight we've found one another.

Let's not spoil it by questioning why. "

She saw his eyes narrow faintly, and tensed herself, unwilling to question too deeply her desire to keep her image of him as a complete stranger. It was because she didn't want to be disillusioned that she didn't want to know more about him, she told herself defensively, but somewhere deep inside her part of her knew better. It was fear that urged the secrecy on her; fear that the more she knew about this man the more she would want to know.

Joss took her hand and led her towards the stairs, pausing there to demand rawly, "Are you sure this is what you want, Sarah?"

She liked that in him; that he was man enough to give her the chance to back out if she wished.

"More than anything I've ever wanted in my entire life," she told him and it was no less than the truth.

The smile he gave her was whimsical, edged with faint self-mockery.

"You might not believe this.. but this is the first time anything like this has ever happened to me," he told her softly.

"Just for the record, I don't make a habit of making love to strange ladies, no matter how beautiful they might be."

"I'm glad that in my case you're prepared to make an exception."

Sarah said it demurely, but there was nothing demure about the way she looked at him, letting him lead her up the narrow flight of stairs.

Two doors opened off the small landing, and Joss turned the handle of the first of them, flicking a switch that snapped on a bedside lamp.

The room was furnished in soft greys and blues; the walls papered in a fabric that looked vaguely Sandersonish. A matching bedspread covered the bed, a soft blue-grey carpet underfoot.

Somehow, the room did not match the man;

neither had the room downstairs Sarah thought reflectively.