The Sicilian's Bought Cinderella

With an immediate surge of delight her body rejoiced to feel those wonderful warm, firm lips upon her again, but there was enough anger still rippling through her to ignore the delight of sensation, hold her breath and keep her mouth there for the count of three before pulling away, just as she felt his hand breezing onto her waist.

‘There,’ she said primly, clasping her shaking hands together and stepping out of the lift. ‘Now I have finished.’

‘What was that for?’ The amusement had gone from his voice.

‘So that I can apologise. I’m very sorry for kissing you. We made a promise to keep things platonic. I have broken it. I’m very, very sorry.’

He took the longest inhalation she’d ever heard, followed by a ragged burst of laughter.

‘You still find this amusing?’ she demanded.

‘You would prefer me to push you back into the elevator and take you right now? Because I have to tell you, dolcezza, seeing as we are being honest with each other, that right now I am more turned on than I have ever been in my life.’

She squirmed as the warmth between her legs, there since before they’d shared their first kiss, heated and bubbled again, and she pressed her thighs together as tightly as she could. ‘You find my insulting you a turn-on? Are you a masochist?’

Aislin thought she might be one. Grabbing hold of him and kissing him like that...

As her sadly deceased grandmother had been fond of saying, she didn’t have the sense she was born with.

‘I must be.’ Dante put his hand on the exit door and blew out air. ‘I keep telling myself all the reasons why I shouldn’t touch you and, before you argue with me, the thing about our mutual sister is a complication that neither of us can deny.’

She made a noise that sounded like agreement.

‘I need to keep a clear head to get through this weekend,’ he explained heavily. ‘This is the biggest deal of my life, and if we don’t convince Riccardo about us then I lose it. That means I miss the profit that comes with it, miss out on breaking into America and I will lose face too, because news of the broken deal is certain to get out. I should be keeping my eye on the potential prize but all I can think about is what making love to you would be like and it is driving me crazy. Why do you think I filled my house with staff? Without people to distract us, the temptation to touch you and taste you is a battle that consumes me.’

‘Is it?’

He gave an incredulous laugh. ‘Five minutes alone with you without any staff in sight and I’m kissing you, so what does that tell you? That kiss blew my mind.’

She stepped to him and gazed into his eyes.

Heat pulsed through him to remember the sweet taste of her tongue in his mouth.

The succulent lips parted and her throat moved. ‘It blew my mind too.’

He suppressed a groan and tightened his hold on the door handle.

‘I’m sorry for overreacting,’ she whispered. ‘Dante, your kiss...what it did to me... I’ve never felt that before. It scared me—my reaction to it scared me. I forgot why I’m here and how important this weekend is to you.’

He ran a finger across a high cheekbone that flushed with colour at his touch and managed a smile he thought probably looked more like a grimace. ‘Let’s just get through this weekend as best as we can.’

Her shoulders rose high and she nodded.

He opened the door and they stepped into the warm spring air.

His car was parked outside waiting for them.

* * *

Aislin gaped through the car window at the sprawling concave Renaissance castle before her that made the British royal family’s palaces look cheap.

Dozens of cars that even she, the least petrol-headed person around, recognised as the most expensive on the market were lined in a row to the east side of the villa, sandwiched between the beautiful cream-and-gold masonry and the towering landscaped trees.

Dante, who had surprised her by getting behind the wheel of the sleek red car that had been parked outside his home, jumped out and hurried round to open her door. He held a hand out for her.

The pear-shaped diamond ring that had so floored her with its beauty and obvious expense glittered under the high sun as she took hold of it and joined him on the gravelled grounds, so flat and even, she suspected someone must have brushed it.

She stared up at him and took a deep breath.