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with unnatural care, he reached out to set his glass on an end table, his eyes never leaving her face. And suddenly those emerald eyes were the only splash of color in his whitened face.
    "What?" His voice was quiet, as unnaturally calm as his movements of a moment before.
    A flashing memory of some of Brian's rages made Robyn take an instinctive step backward, but even as she did so she realized that Shane wasn't angry. Instead, he seemed stunned. Would the rage come later?
    "You... you reminded me of my husband, and I wanted to... spend one last night with him. It was a dream! It wasn't real!" she defended herself shakily.
    Shane abruptly rose to his feet, as though he couldn't be still any longer, as though he desperately needed to move. "You pretended I was your dead husband?" he asked in a curiously dazed voice.
    "I'm sorry," she whispered, wanting suddenly to unsay the words, to wipe away the horrible stricken look on his face.
    "Sorry," he repeated dully. "You're sorry." He turned away from her and walked jerkily to the window, standing with his back to her and staring out the window into darkness. "Too perfect to be real," he murmured, as if to himself.
    Robyn wrapped her arms around herself, trying in vain to ward off the chill invading her. She didn't know how to cope with this; the intensity of his emotions unnerved her. Anger she had been prepared for, but this strange, quiet agony was totally unexpected. It was somehow more upsetting than rage would have been.
    "You should have just let it end, Shane," she said huskily. "You shouldn't have made me tell you." He swung around abruptly and came toward her, and she involuntarily shrank back.
    But the large hands that grasped her shoulders were as gentle as though they held a fragile, frightened bird. Though the green eyes were fierce, there was no anger in them. Only disbelief.
    "Tell me you lied , Robyn," he said hoarsely, the words a plea rather than a command. "Tell me there was no ghost in my bed that night!"
    She shook her head silently, not trusting herself to speak.
    "I don't believe you," he grated softly. "No, I don't believe you." His head swooped suddenly, taking her completely by surprise.
    As his lips captured hers, his hands sliding down her back to pull her slender body almost roughly against the hardness of his, Robyn found herself totally unable to struggle. She told herself vaguely that it was the abruptness of his attack, the strength of his embrace, that had drained her resistance.
    Except that it wasn't an attack.
    His lips moved on hers with gentle, insidious persuasion, pleading for rather than demanding a response. Of their own volition Robyn's arms slid around his neck, her lips parting instinctively beneath his. She felt the now familiar flood of wild emotion sweep her body, and she gave herself up totally to the joy of the feelings he aroused in her.
    He slid the zipper of her strapless sundress down, and the colorful material fell in a heap around her feet. The cool air on her skin seemed to intensify the raging sensations in her body, bringing a vivid, almost painful awareness to her fogged senses.
    She felt his tongue moving in a possessive invasion of her mouth, and she found herself mindlessly responding, her own tongue joining his in a passionate duel. A sudden feeling of vertigo told her that he had lifted her into his arms, and then she felt the softness of the plush couch beneath her back.
    Tearing his lips from hers, Shane pressed hot kisses down her throat to the pulse beating madly in the hollow of her shoulder. Robyn bit her lip with a soft moan as he expertly unfastened the front clasp of her strapless bra and smoothed the lacy material aside.
    "Tell me you lied ," he whispered raggedly, sensually abrasive fingers tracing the curve of her full breast, thumb and forefinger tugging gently at the hardening nipple. " Dammit , tell me you lied!"
    His harsh, cracked voice and the demand he made vibrated against her flesh, somehow