He glided and was suddenly looming over her, his palm wrapped around her throat, fingers on one side of her neck, thumb on the other. His strength was enormous. She’d forgotten how truly strong he was. He tipped her head back so she was staring into his dark green eyes. Eyes that held no mercy whatsoever.
“Do you expect me to believe that a beautiful woman with a voracious sex drive such as yours has gone without a man for two long years, Emmanuelle?” His voice was very soft, but it carried a warning. “I wonder if you ever considered how often I might be lying in my bed awake going a little insane thinking of another man touching you.”
His free hand stroked her right breast gently under the little silken top she wore. His thumb brushed her tight nipple back and forth. Each light brush sent darts of fire straight to her core, scores of fiery arrows that were like lightning strikes, every single one of them.
“Go ahead, Val, I can’t resist you. That’s why we’re here, at this point, but I won’t marry you and I won’t stay. I’ll let you seduce me and distract me because that’s what you always do to get your way and I’m so damn easy.” There were tears in her voice, but there wasn’t a single one in her eyes. She wasn’t going to shed one for him. Or for herself.
“Is that what you think I’m doing, Princess? Seducing you? Distracting you so I don’t have to give you answers?” He reached out and caught the hem of the silk top she wore, pulling it over her head and dropping it on the chair behind him.
There had been a note of dark humor in Val’s voice, but she couldn’t detect any on his face. His gaze was riveted to the bruises on the swell of both breasts and just below, in the valley in between.
“Isn’t it?” She could barely breathe. The look on his face distracted her too much. Rage was back. His eyes were alive with a swirling promise of absolute death, but a long, slow one to any man who would do such a thing to her.
“Give me a name, Emmanuelle. Who the fuck did this to you?”
“He’s dead. I killed him,” she reiterated. She had told him after the doctor had worked on his injuries. “It happened when Miceli’s men attacked the lake house. I was taking out the men in the vehicles coming up the drive.”
The pads of his fingers moved to the valley between her breasts to lightly trace the dark, angry black-and-blue splotch there. He was making it so hard to think. His other hand was still around her throat, but so gentle. His head remained bent and so close she could see the spill of his thick dark hair and his long lashes as he examined the colors running down the lighter olive of her natural skin tone.
“There were quite a few men in each of the SUVs and trucks. By the time I got toward the end of the line, they knew someone was attacking them and they were waiting, set up for that. Those in the truck behind the SUV were also watching. There was a helicopter in the sky with a spotlight as well. It was a tricky situation.”
“I told Dario to order you inside.”
His fingers stroked lower, to the very top of that tiny scrap of crimson material she called panties. Her thong was already damp. More than damp. His long fingers slipped inside and caressed her bare mound. She kept herself shaved because the sensation inside the tubes of being pulled apart was easier without hair. She normally braided the hair on her head very tightly before going into the shadows to keep from feeling as if she were being scalped.
“I wouldn’t have come inside even if Dario had gotten a message to me. My family was running the operation, Val. I go where I’m assigned, just like everyone else. I’m good at my job.”
“All communication went through Emilio, and he made that very clear to Dario. To me. Stefano was giving the orders. He had given out all the assignments. Lie back, baby.”
“Val, this isn’t a good idea. You were shot. You’re not healed yet. I was beat up. We haven’t worked anything out.”
“This is the only idea. Two long fucking years, Emmanuelle. Do you honestly think I’m going to wait any longer for you? We can talk after. I’ll be gentle with you. You can be gentle with me.”
He never stopped moving the pads of his fingers along her mound. Now they dipped even lower, skimming along her bare lips, feeling the dampness, her slick heat. He slid one finger through her wetness. Her feminine channel clenched hard. Every individual muscle. It was disturbing to need him so much. He’d barely touched her, and yet every nerve ending in her body was totally alive and aware of him.