A Pawn in the Playboy's Game

Not thinking crazy thoughts that weren’t going to get anyone anywhere...

But right here, touching her and putting an end to the will-they, won’t-they game. Those sorts of games were tiresome. Reduced to its barest bones, the chemistry between them was as powerful as a live current and there was no way that a three-act tragedy about why she shouldn’t sleep with him should get in the way.

Caught in a balancing act of wondering what she should or shouldn’t do, Laura allowed her body to sink into that feathery touch. Her mouth trembled and she half closed her eyes, released a small sigh. She wasn’t even aware of raising her hands so that she could curl her fingers into the lapels of his coat, or of reaching up on her toes, her whole body leaning towards him and demanding more than just the touch of his finger on her skin.

Her mind went blank when she felt the coolness of his mouth hit hers. She couldn’t get enough. She returned the kiss urgently, fiercely seeking out his tongue. Her breasts were pushed against the rock-hard wall of his chest and she nearly collapsed when he shifted his big hands underneath her jumper and cradled them.

Her nipples itched and strained against her bra. She wanted to reach behind and rip it off because the need to have him touch her without the barrier of itchy, starchy fabric was overwhelming.

Somehow he had managed to manoeuvre her against the wall without breaking the contact of their kiss.

Nothing, but nothing, had ever felt like this before. So this was what it felt like to be submerged in a tidal wave of passion.

He cupped her bottom, shifted her so that she could feel the hot steel of his erection, and she squirmed against it.

‘I don’t care,’ she broke away to whisper, and he looked at her. ‘I’m not going to be careful. I want you. You were right. I want you so badly...’

Alessandro was so turned on that he feared the unthinkable might happen, especially as the chances of them ending up in a bed somewhere were remote, not while Edith was asleep upstairs.

When he took her, he wanted to do it slowly, without having to listen out just in case her grandmother came flying out of a bedroom somewhere.

It shouldn’t matter but somehow it did. For once, he wasn’t operating in his usual vacuum, where he had no one to whom he had to refer and no one whose opinion mattered.

‘We can’t...here...’ He was breathing heavily and his hands were shaking ever so slightly as he set her apart from him. ‘Trust me, I would sling you over my shoulder and take those stairs two at a time to the nearest bed, but...’

‘But Gran’s upstairs. I know.’ She straightened her jumper and did something with her hair.

‘Dream of me tonight,’ he said roughly. ‘When we make love, I want to take my time.’ He sifted his fingers through her hair, marvelling at its sexy, silky length. ‘Trust me, Laura, it’ll be worth the wait...’

CHAPTER SEVEN

FROM ALWAYS MAINTAINING a polite distance, Alessandro found, over the next week or so, that his father now seemed to be around constantly.

The sale of the house, as he had confidently predicted, was all progressing nicely. It just went to show that anyone could be bought, because the Saunders children, having initially made noises about their sentimental attachment to the place, jettisoned all that the second there was a concrete and very inflated offer on the table. In fact, they couldn’t hurry things on fast enough.

Builders were on standby, ready to begin work on renovations, and his father wanted a say on every single detail of those renovations.

‘Not being shoved out of my own house to find myself in a dump!’ he had bellowed the evening before as they had sat at the kitchen table, poring over plans.

‘I’ll get Edith along to back you up when you say that you’re being shoved out, shall I?’ Alessandro had countered. ‘I’m thinking she might have a different take on the matter.’

Frankly, he was finding it almost impossible to concentrate on anything, never mind where a greenhouse was going to go, because Roberto Falcone was going nowhere unless there was a greenhouse of a specific size that could house specific plants, flowers and vegetables. Alessandro was making the occasional trip back down to the city, but for the most part he was working from his makeshift office, and for the first time in his life focus was proving a problem.