The Yuletide Engagement & A Yuletide Seduction Read Online Free PDF Page B

lightly acrossher slightly swollen lips. “Now you actually look like a woman out for the evening with her lover!” he added with satisfaction.
    Of course. That was the reason Patrick had kissed her. The only reason.
    â€œPerhaps next time you could give me some warning of what you’re about to do,” she bit out abruptly, covering her confusion—and her blushes!—by opening her evening bag and searching through its contents. “Lipstick,” she told him abruptly, and held out a tissue for him to wipe his mouth.
    â€œYou do it,” Patrick encouraged huskily. “I can’t see what I’m doing,” he reasoned before she protested.
    She swallowed hard, willing her heart to stop pounding, her hand not to shake as she reached up to wipe the smears of lipstick that he now had on his mouth.
    So engrossed was she in not betraying how shaken she felt that she didn’t even see the man walking past, a dark scowl on his handsome features as he stopped to stare at the two of them.
    â€œEllie…?” he questioned uncertainly—as if he couldn’t quite believe the woman in the red dress, a woman who had obviously just been very thoroughly kissed, was actually her.
    She stiffened before looking at him. “Gareth,” she greeted him distantly, feeling rather than seeing Patrick as he moved to stand beside her, his arm curving possessively about her waist. She glanced up at him, a shiver running down her spine as she saw the narrow-eyed look he was giving the younger man. “Patrick, this is a work colleague—Gareth Davies,” she dismissed with deliberate lightness, glad of that lightness as she saw Gareth’s scowl deepen. “Gareth—Patrick McGrath,” she addedeconomically, still too shaken by that kiss to think how to describe him to the other man. “ The Patrick McGrath?” Gareth questioned abruptly as he looked frowningly at the other man.
    Patrick smiled—a smile that didn’t reach the cold grey of his eyes. “I very much doubt there’s only one Patrick McGrath in the world,” he answered the other man tauntingly.
    â€œWe really should be going in, Patrick,” Ellie put in determinedly as she saw the light of challenge that had now appeared in both men’s eyes. “If you’ll excuse us, Gareth?” she added dismissively, not giving him a second glance as she turned and walked in the direction of the main restaurant, Patrick at her side, his arm still firmly about her waist.
    Not quite the way she had envisaged the evening beginning!
    But then she hadn’t expected Patrick to kiss her either…
    Why on earth had he kissed her? Just for effect, as his words afterwards had seemed to imply? Well, he couldn’t even begin to imagine the effect his unexpected behaviour had had on her!
    She could still feel the sensuous touch of his lips against hers, still feel the hardness of his body as she moulded perfectly against him, the warmth that had coursed through her, that totally not-knowing-where-she-was-and-not-caring-either feeling.
    As for Gareth! Amazingly, she had felt absolutely nothing as she’d looked at him just now. Except perhaps a vague disbelief that she had ever been taken in by his overt good looks and charm…
    What did it all mean…?
    But as they walked into the restaurant and Patrick was greeted effusively by her boss, George Delacorte, Senior Partner at Delacorte, Delacorte and Delacorte, Ellie knew she would have to get back to that particularly puzzling question later!

CHAPTER THREE
    â€œI HAD no idea you were going to be here with Ellie this evening, Patrick.” The older man greeted him warmly and the two men shook hands. George Delacorte was a tall, distinguished-looking man with iron-grey hair and twinkling brown eyes that belied the shrewd trial lawyer he actually was. “You should have told me, Ellie,” he chided teasingly.
    Told him what? Until