Julia Marquis has just road-tested a potential masseur for her all-female health club. Grant Delaney has certainly passed the test with flying colours, but Julia is in danger of losing her professional cool . . .

It was ridiculous how nervous Julia felt afterwards, how like a coy schoolgirl and how unlike a fully-grown independent businesswoman. She lay inert while Grant gently wiped her with a moist tissue and removed the oils from his hands with a paper towel. Her mind still inhabited the realm of the senses that her body was slowly leaving, and she found it impossible to rise briskly and get back to business. Grant seemed to sense this.

'Excuse me while I wash my hands,' he murmured, his voice low and mellow, scarcely disturbing her silence. Julia lay on, limp but glowing, while she considered his performance. She would have to give him ten out of ten, of course. And that meant she would have to take him on. So why did she feel a pang of disquiet at the thought?

Rising from the couch while his back was turned, Julia said she was going to take a shower and disappeared through the side door. The enlivening play of water on her body soon had her mind focused again so that by the time she emerged, swathed in a white towel, she was able to say to Grant quite casually, 'Your turn now. I'll see you back in my office in ten minutes or so.'

She caught his eye, briefly, and the look of frank enquiry in its blue depths startled her so that she scurried into the cubicle and drew the curtain across. After dressing quickly she ran a brush through her tangled, dark blonde hair until it clung to her head in sculpted waves. She sprayed herself with a light perfume as if, by doing so, she could hide the lingering scent of her recent passion then left the room, her exit masked by the noise of running water.

Alone in her office, Julia set about trying to resurrect the image of efficient manager. She sat behind the barrier of her desk, wondering what she would say to Grant when he appeared. Of course, he would do as Warren's replacement. There was no question of that. Yet something in her had changed, irrevocably, and he was the man responsible. Unbeknown to him he had acquired a secret power over her, but she must never ever let on or he might take advantage. Julia had fought hard for sole control of Sybarites, her authority was unquestioned by her staff and her clients admired her obvious success in a tricky field. She could never allow anyone to upset that status quo.

So when Grant knocked at her door, Julia called 'Come in!' with the peremptory tone of a headmistress about to interview a difficult pupil. The cheeky look he threw her as he entered, however, almost destroyed her carefully prepared front.

'Well, will I do?' he enquired, directly he had sat opposite her. His dark brows were quizzically raised, and as Julia glanced down to avoid his gaze she couldn't help seeing his capable brown hands lying loosely in his lap, the very hands that had brought her to a climax only minutes before. To her horror, she felt a telltale flush rise in her cheeks.

'I should think so,' she replied brusquely, hiding her face by searching in her desk drawer. She pulled out a contract and handed it to him. 'Take this away and read it through. There were one or two minor points I wanted to make about your...er...technique, but they can wait till next time.'

'I would rather know right away, if you don't mind.' His voice was light, but insistent. 'I think the closer a de-briefing is held to the event the better, don't you?'

He's trying to tell me my job, she thought, angrily.

'Very well.' Her tone was tinged with sudden frost. 'Firstly, I think it's best to avoid speech altogether once the massage has begun, unless it's absolutely necessary of course.'

'I agree,' he smiled. 'It ruins the relaxed atmosphere. I don't know why I said anything. I was probably nervous.'

'Then you hid it well. I thought your technique was good too, although at times you seemed a bit too... rough.'

'Sometimes you need to increase the blood flow quickly to a certain part of the body,' he explained. 'When I worked on your buttocks, for example, or stimulated your breasts.'

Julia couldn't believe he was talking so coolly about such intimate matters. Was that all she'd been to him, a backside and a pair of boobs? She knew it was unreasonable to expect any more of him, and yet surely he had been moved in some way by the strength of her passion?

'Well, your techniques certainly worked, as you no doubt realised.'

She threw him an uncharacteristically coy look, instantly despising herself for doing so. He smiled the smile of a man who knows he has satisfied his woman, and Julia rose abruptly, barking her shin on the leg of the desk as she did so. Cursing inwardly, she fixed her lips in a grin that was more than half grimace, and held out her hand.

'Once you've read through the contract we can have another chat about conditions and so forth. Shall we say... tomorrow at ten?'

'That'll be fine.'

He held her hand a fraction longer than she expected, just long enough to make it feel slightly imprisoned in his larger grasp. Then he moved directly towards the door and was gone.