‘Sí, cara—I know we should. And what is more, we’re going to. Right now—just like we both want to.’ The declaration was honeyed, irresistible and undeniable as Casimiro began to ruck up the baggy T-shirt—his hand alighting on the flesh of her inner thigh to where a woman was always soft. But Melissa’s skin was like cool silk, he thought—a tantalising contrast to the molten heat which was beckoning him inexorably upwards.
It had been so long, he realised with a jolt. Like an empty arid waste of time since he had last made love to a woman. His heart had not been in it and neither had his body—but now the hunger and the need had returned like an urgent fire which was consuming him. For one fleeting moment, he questioned his sanity, it having chosen this woman with whom to break his self-imposed curfew. Until he caught the unmistakable scent of her arousal in the air and again felt her restlessness as his fingers trickled enticing little circles over her thigh.
For a moment he tantalised her. Letting his hand linger there—inches away from its sweet destination. Hearing her sharp intake of breath as she waited to see if he would continue. He left it just long enough to make her frantic. To make her flesh crave his touch. And to hear her stumbled little gasp of relief as he plunged his fingers into her molten warmth.
‘Oh!’
‘Oh, but you wanted that, didn’t you?’
‘Yes, yes!’
‘Wanted it badly?’
‘Yes!’
‘How badly?’
She knew what he was doing. Playing power games with her even while his fingers were inflicting such sweet torture. She knew that a stronger woman might have torn herself away. Looked at him with a cold dignity and told him that she would not negotiate anything which revolved around sex.
But Melissa wasn’t feeling strong right then. She felt helpless and torn by conflicting emotions as he lowered his lips to her ear.
‘This badly?’ he questioned as he began to move his fingers intimately against her aroused flesh.
She closed her eyes. Tell him no. Tell him no. But her fists, which had been tightly clenched by her side now unfurled themselves, like daisies in the heat of the sun. ‘Yes. Yes. Oh, please—yes!’
He could feel her pleasure building quickly, inexorably, and in normal circumstances he might have brought her swiftly to orgasm before seeking his own fulfilment. But these were not normal circumstances. Urgently, he looked around. The floor? Or the bed? His mouth hardened. No, definitely not the bed. Take her to bed and he might just be tempted to spend the night with her.
Without warning he picked her up and carried her over to one of the sofas, slowing sliding her to her feet and then tilting her chin up so that she was caught in the cross-fire of his amber eyes. ‘Now undress me,’ he commanded unsteadily.
Melissa wasn’t exactly a novice, but that was what it felt like—until she reminded herself that Casimiro had taught her everything she knew. Her fingers were trembling, but somehow she managed to free the button and then the zip of his jeans. Gently jerking it down over the massively aroused shaft, she heard him give a strangled little groan of pleasure.
She felt shy almost as the formidable power of him sprang free—almost too shy to touch him—and was glad when, impatiently, he pushed her hand away to yank off his jeans. He pulled the T-shirt over his head, and with a single scoop peeled off her own baggy nightwear, his eyes scanning her body only briefly—as if he was not content with visual stimulation. As if he couldn’t wait…
But he waited long enough to pull a silver-foil packet from the pocket of his discarded jeans and Melissa flinched as she stared at it.
‘Were you so sure I’d agree to make love with you, Casimiro?’
‘Was I so very wrong, then?’ he mocked.
‘Or do you always come prepared?’ she whispered as he pushed her down onto the soft cushions of the sofa.
‘You are in no position to interrogate me,’ he murmured, his lips against her ear as he placed his hands on either side of her narrow hips and lowered himself down on her. ‘In fact, you are in a position to do one thing and one thing only, mia bella. And that is this…this!’
With an urgent groan, he thrust deep into her body and Melissa gasped with pleasure, clinging to his shoulders as he moved inside her—so hot and so hard that it took her breath away. She could feel the heat building—spiralling out of all control—barely able to believe it was happening so quickly. She hardly had a moment to reacquaint herself with the sweet pleasures of sex, when suddenly the world began to splinter and shatter around her and she cried out in an orgasm that had her vulnerable and helpless and trembling in his arms.
Dimly, she was aware of his own drawn-out moan of completion, and the way his muscular body shuddered inside her as she struggled to hold onto her composure—a strong cocktail of painful feelings threatening to override the warm satiation of her body. And unable to prevent the slow slide of tears down her cheeks as she contemplated what she had just done.
Reality returning with the slowing beats of his heart, Casimiro bent his head and kissed her—his face drawing back a little as he tasted salt on her lips. With a frown, he stared down into her brimming eyes as some rogue thought came drifting into his mind from nowhere. Emerald stars, he thought. But it was gone again in an instant.
‘Tears?’ he murmured as he wiped one away with the tip of his finger. But he could not wipe the smile of satisfaction from his lips. He had her exactly where he wanted her—all warm and soft and sated beneath him. She was greedy for him—and that sexual weakness would allow him to call all the shots. ‘And here was me thinking that sexual pleasure was supposed to make you smile.’
Sexual pleasure? Melissa could have hit him. But how could you hit a man when you were still joined intimately with him—his body still quietly pulsating inside your own? When she’d made herself so vulnerable in front of him that she felt as if he’d torn off a whole layer of skin and exposed her raw heart to the world? And she suspected that any hand she raised to strike him might instead be distracted by the lean musculature of his torso. So that she might be tempted instead to curl her fingers into the whorls of dark hair which arrowed down his chest so enticingly.
Melissa stared up at the shifting shadows of his aristocratic face.
‘Now what?’ she questioned unsteadily.
CHAPTER FIVE