She was convinced of that.
She wasn’t certain that it dominated. In fact, she was almost sure that it was far below … the thrill of excitement pounding through her even after Connor Carnegie had dragged her back inside the ‘fortress’ and the gates were closed.
Logically, she thought that it could be put down to nerves from what might have been a deadly encounter and anxiety of a continued threat.
She couldn’t completely dismiss that.
But her mind wasn’t focused on any sense of threat or danger, really.
It kept replaying the moments when she had spotted ‘him’ and when he had dropped from the branch and stood before her--close enough he could have reached out, easily, and grabbed her.
Instead, he had merely stood examining her with his gaze while she had examined him with hers.
He was a … stunningly beautiful creature, she thought.
Stunning to her, anyway.
Exotic … strange to her eyes, but … beautifully made for all that he seemed so very alien.
Powerfully designed--sleek and muscular--his chest and arms. Even his thighs and legs that had been sheathed in some sort of leather trousers and boots had seemed powerfully muscular, well defined in a way that made him more of a work of art than a flawed creation of nature.
Not that he looked like any of the creations of the mythologies she had always found fascinating--but in that vein, she thought--a winged being.
With horns.
And a narrow, angular countenance that missed ugly entirely because it screamed high testosterone male, she realized.
Especially with the heavy brows.
Thatwas what had her body in chaos, she thought abruptly.
He had only to land within an arm’s length of her to throw her entire system into chemical Armageddon.
She dismissed the thought as suddenly as it formed.
He screamed ‘alien’--not male in the sense of attraction!
It wasinsanethat the thought had even occurred to her!
If anything it was Connor’s sudden appearance that had prompted it, she was sure.
It wasn’t as if she was immune to the bastard’s scary-stunning attractiveness any more than any other woman on the damned ship!
No doubt about it. Unless a woman justpreferredanother woman, Connor wasthemale, thepinnacle of what every woman wanted. Heexudedself-confident male as if it was some mind-bending drug-cologne that made women want to climb up him.
Inspired psychos--like the one that had just … accosted her out of the blue.
As rattled as she was, even though she wasn’t actually aware of it at the time, she was sure it was Connor showing up like some kind of super hero/knight in shining armor to rescue her that had thrown her completely off-kilter.
“What the fuck was that about?” he growled, shattering her fantasy abruptly when he dragged her to a halt the moment they cleared the crowd that had gathered near the gate.
Belle gaped at him, trying to regain her equilibrium. Finally, she managed to blink and that seemed to jumpstart her brain function.
Prompted by her thoughts and a sudden sense of guilt, heat rose to her face and intensified.
Because it occurred to her that it was not an accident that he’d been heading her way.
And she’d feared, at the time, that it was pointed because of something the bitch had said.
