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drew a deep breath she let out very, very slowly.
    His eyes crinkled at the corners. ‘That was quite a performance, Ms Hill. I salute you. But would I be right in thinking you’re exhausted?’
    ‘I feel as if I’ve been through a wringer,’ she said candidly.
    ‘Then go through to the green room,’ he instructed. ‘I’ll bring a restorative.’
    Alex hesitated. ‘I should be going home.’
    ‘In a while. Here we go.’ He scooped two glasses of champagne from a passing waitress. ‘After you.’
    She hesitated a moment longer, then did as she was told. This time, her second visit to the green room, she sat down on a settee and removed her shoes with a genuine sigh of relief. ‘Sorry,’ she murmured as she arched her feet and accepted her glass from him. ‘New shoes.’ She studied her feet, then lifted her head to him. ‘That was quite a party. I guess it’s going to take some deconstructing.’
    ‘Margaret and Jake are experts at it—they’re like generals in the field,’ he said with a glimmer of a smile. ‘They’ll both stay the night downstairs and by tomorrow morning you’d never know the South Pacific had come to town.’
    He sat down opposite in an armchair and sipped his champagne. He’d only had one glass during the party, and she, of course, hadn’t drunk at all. Alex took a sip herself and smiled suddenly. ‘Now that is nice.’
    ‘It should be—it’s very expensive champagne. Your convent didn’t warn you off alcohol and all the darker things it could lead to?’ he queried rather dryly. Alex made herself more comfortable. ‘Naturally they didn’t approve of it and I very rarely indulge in it, but thanks to my father I can distinguish between the good and the bad.’
    Max Goodwin watched her with a frown in his eyes. ‘You have—’ he paused ‘—an innate composure about you, Alex. I guess that comes from living in a Diplomatic Corps environment.’
    She shrugged. ‘It could.’ She looked at him with a mischievous sparkle in her eyes.
    ‘Does that mean I passed more than one test tonight?’ she teased. Max Goodwin rubbed his jaw. ‘You certainly did.’ He got up and pulled his jacket off, loosened his tie and stretched.
    ‘So,’ he said, ‘we have the formal luncheon tomorrow, down on the Gold Coast—I have a house there—and then you’ll have a three-day break as the negotiations get going in earnest. I—’ He looked down at her. ‘What’s wrong?’
    Alex swallowed and told herself fiercely she’d never speak to herself again if she blushed like a schoolgirl. Because the fact of the matter was, the sight of Max Goodwin stretching had affected her rather drastically.
    The lean, compact muscles of his chest were etched beneath the fine cotton of his shirt. His diaphragm was as flat as a board and she’d been assaulted by the aroma of pure man, and found it heady and delicious. Not only that, she’d been assaulted by a mental vision of Max Goodwin naked and powerful, tanned and with springy dark hair…
    ‘Nothing,’ she said, but it came out as an indistinct sound and she had to clear her throat. ‘Nothing. Uh—I hadn’t thought about how I’d get to the Gold Coast tomorrow.’ She stood up herself, still horrified and a little desperate to get away.
    ‘You’re coming with me and I’ll bring you home after it. Are you sure there’s nothing wrong?’ He frowned at her.
    ‘Quite sure.’ She was still clutching her champagne glass so she took a fortifying sip of champagne, praying she wouldn’t choke on it. But as she looked up their gazes clashed and she felt trapped, unable to tear herself away from that deep blue of his eyes and unable to still the beating of her pulses.
    You’re lying again, Ms Hill, Max Goodwin thought as he stared at her, at the pulse beating rapidly at the base of her creamy throat. Then his gaze moved down the slim, lovely length of her that had come as such a surprise to him and he found himself stirred physically against