ANNIE’S lips were soft, yielding, as they parted on a little gasp of surprise. Not the response of a seductress bent on luring a man to his doom, he thought, more the reaction of a girl being kissed for the first time.

Arousing in a way that no practised kiss could ever be.

And when, slightly breathless, he drew back to look at her, her eyes were closed and the mouth that had tempted him to take such outrageous liberties was smiling as if it had discovered something brand-new.

‘The first rule of wearing a disguise,’ he tried again, his voice barely audible as he struggled not to kiss her again, ‘is never to let it slip, even for a moment.’

It took a moment for his words to get past the haze of desire but then her eyes flew open and he felt the heat beneath his fingertips as colour seared her cheekbones. Whether at the way she’d responded to his touch or at being found out in her deception, he’d have been hard put to say.

‘H-how did you know?’ she asked, making no effort to put distance between them, which appeared to answer that question. The innocent blushes had to be as fake as her glasses.

‘Since you weren’t wearing them when you checked your messages, it seemed likely that they were purely for decoration,’ he said.

‘Decoration?’ The beginnings of a smile tugged once more at the corners of her mouth. ‘Hardly that.’

‘I’ve seen prettier,’ he admitted, struggling not to smile back.

‘The wretched things fell into the potato peelings. I put them on the draining board and then forgot all about them.’

As clear an admission of guilt as he’d ever heard.

‘You should have tossed them into the bin with the peelings.’

‘I doubt they’d have added much to the compost heap.’