The words were low, hot, and dangerous.
He straightened up. Ran the tip of his index finger lightly over her mouth. Then he stood and unbuttoned his shirt. Slowly. So slowly. One button at a time.
The shirt hung open.
He tugged it free of his trousers.
She was supposed to do that. Undress him, touch him, make him lose control.
She caught her breath.
He was beautiful. Truly beautiful. His skin was tanned; the muscles in his abdomen stood out in taut relief.
And the way he was looking at her. The set of his jaw. The narrowing of his eyes. The hard line of his mouth.
A whimper broke from her throat.
She was wet. So wet. She was soaked with wanting him, with watching him.
Terror shot through her, a river of icy fear that made her body arc like a bow.
“I’ve had enough,” she said in a high, thin voice.
His smile was full of wicked promise.
“You haven’t had anything yet, bellissima.”
“Untie me.” Her voice rose. “Untie me, dammit!”
He got onto the bed beside her. “Not yet.”
“This isn’t funny. I don’t—”
“It isn’t meant to be funny, bellissima.”
Her throat constricted. “Whatever you think I want—”
She gasped as his hand cupped her breast.
“Don’t,” she whispered.
“Don’t what?” He bent to her, closed his lips around one silk-covered nipple. She felt the quick nip of his teeth, the heat of his mouth. A moan rose in her throat. “You have beautiful breasts, cara. Have I told you that?”
“Please… Luca. Untie my hands.”
“I’m not going to hurt you.”
His voice was husky. And lightly accented. Most times, she didn’t really notice the accent, maybe because it was barely perceptible, but she could hear it now.
Exotic.
Rough.
Dangerous.
She cried out. Raised her knee to throw him off. He rolled on top of her, angling his body over hers.
“I’m not going to do anything you don’t want me to do.”
“No! No! This is crazy. I don’t want—”
“Si. You do want, and I’m going to prove it to you.”
“How? By making me your prisoner?”
He laughed. It was a sound that spoke of power and pleasure, and she hated it, hated him…
“Get off me. Get off, get off, get—”
“If you truly want me to stop,” he whispered, “you have only to tell me so.”
His mouth covered hers again and as it did, he slid his hand under her gown, just as he had in the hotel.
Stop, she thought, stop…
But she didn’t say the word.
And then it was too late.
His hand moved over her thigh. She heard him catch his breath as he felt her heat, her wetness, all the things that made a lie of her protests.
“Open for me,” he said, as he had said before, and she moaned and her legs parted and she sighed his name as he cupped her, captured the essence of her in the palm of his hand.
She wept.
He kissed her.
She wanted to fight him. Keep herself from him, and she struggled against the silken bonds that kept her his captive, but he wouldn’t untie her, wouldn’t stop caressing her, wouldn’t let her hide from the truth as he found her clitoris with his thumb, stroked it until she was sobbing his name against his lips, writhing beneath him, rising toward him.
What had been heat became flame.
She wanted him.
Like this. Exactly like this. She wanted him to take her. Possess her. Overpower her.
Free her.
Not of the silk around her wrists.
Free her of fear. Of the past.
Of herself.
He took his hand from her and she groaned with frustration.
But he wasn’t done.
God, no. He wasn’t done.
He was touching her everywhere now. Exploring her over her silk gown, his caresses certain and exciting.
She tossed her head against the soft pillows and arched toward him.
She was his. His to do with as he wanted. As she wanted. And what she wanted was more of this, of what he was making her feel.
Of him.
His hands on her naked breasts, his mouth on her nipples. His thigh between hers so she could rub against him.
Most of all, most of all, she wanted him inside her.
She sighed his name.
He whispered hers.
And she said the words, the correct words, the ones that would end this exquisite torment.
“Please,” she said, “Luca, please.”
He gave a growl of triumph.
His hand closed in the deep neckline of her gown. One sharp tug and he tore it open. The silk parted like the petals of a flower.
Exposing her to him.
Baring her to him.
He bent his head. Her nipples tightened in anticipation. Lightly, deliberately, he tongued one nipple. She cried out; her hips lifted from the bed.
He raised his head. “Do you like that?” he whispered. He bent to her again. Tongued her again. Blew lightly over her damp flesh.
She raised her head, sank her teeth into his shoulder, tasted salt and sweat and man. Tasted Luca.
Nothing like this had ever happened to her before. She was always in command. It was the only way she could do sex…
He drew the tip of one breast into his mouth. His hand was still between her legs.
She was mindless. Incapable of thought. She could only feel.
His mouth was at her navel.
On the lowest part of her belly.
She gasped when she realized what he was going to do.
“No,” she said, but her thighs were opening, opening to him, to his fingers, his breath, his tongue.
His kiss.
She whispered his name.
He sucked on the swollen bud of her clitoris. Lights danced behind her closed eyelids.
She was coming apart. No, she thought, no, no, no…
“Let go,” he said, “let go, bellissima, and fly with me,” but she couldn’t, she couldn’t, couldn’t let go of the earth, of reality, of herself because what would happen to her if she did, if she did…
“Let go,” he commanded, and he reached up, undid the silk that bound her wrists.
She sobbed his name and wrapped her arms around him, buried her face in his shoulder and he slid his hands under her, lifted her to him, fused his mouth to hers.
She felt everything slipping away, felt herself flying into the night, and he groaned, shifted his weight between her thighs, and sank home.
CHAPTER EIGHT
Luca was as much a product of his time as any other twenty-first century male.
He knew the protocols of after-sex behavior, the things women liked.
Women liked to be held. They liked to indulge in pillow talk. They liked to… What was that word? Cuddle. Even the word was awful. It made him think of teddy bears, and who wanted to think about teddy bears at the same time he thought about sex?
On the other hand, what a man wanted most after sex, even terrific sex, was to get up and get on with his life.
He’d once been unfortunate enough to overhear his sisters discussing the topic.
He and Matteo, Bianca and Alessandra had all been gathered in the house they’d grown up in, trying to organize their mother’s things a couple of weeks after her death. He’d been heading out to the porch when he heard the sound of Alessandra’s voice.
“Men can be so stupid,” she’d said. “They think it’s only about the big bang.”
At first, he’d thought she was talking about an American TV series. Then, just as he was about to open the screen door, he heard Bianca say that one of her psych profs theorized that evolution had designed men to spread their seed as fast and as frequently
as possible.
“Women, on the other hand,” she’d said in her best academic voice, “were designed to require post-coital relaxation. There’s nothing romantic about it. It’s just that lying still may increase the odds for pregnancy.”
Luca could have sworn he’d felt the tips of his ears redden.
Whoa, he’d thought, and he’d turned on his heel and gotten the hell out of there.
What man wanted to think his sisters knew anything about sex, even when they were grown women?
And what man wanted to think about his sisters at a time like this, when he lay sated in his bed with a woman still wrapped around him…and yes, Cheyenne was wrapped around him, her arms around his neck, her legs around his hips, and Dio, he was still inside her and what he was thinking had nothing to do with his sisters and everything to do with their ideas about men and sex, with his ideas about men and sex.