She was only asking for one night because she knew instinctively that she couldn’t risk anything more. Yes, she might be inexperienced, but she knew that much.
‘Emma—’
It was a plea from his lips. One that she couldn’t allow herself to listen to.
She took the final step towards him, closing the distance between them. Looking up at him, standing chest to chest, she saw his lips hovering so close to her own. It was intoxicating. She’d never tasted need, actually tasted it on her tongue, but she knew that it would be nothing like the taste of him, his true self. Without the masks, the fakery of performance.
Her chest rose, trying to contain the beating of her heart, pushing against the silk that cleaved in a V to her breasts, as if inviting his gaze, begging for his touch. She had never felt like this. Had never felt the power of desire rushing over her skin, making her bold, making her needy.
‘You said I could have anything I wanted. Please...please don’t make me—’ The word beg stuck in her throat.
She reached up, her hand cold against the hot skin of his clenched jaw. He hadn’t moved a muscle, but she felt emotion swirling within him with the force of a storm. He was almost vibrating with it.
Their breathing was harsh and it echoed within the silence of the suite. Antonio’s eyes were a molten mixture of fury and desire, matching her own. She allowed the heat from his body to lap against hers like a tide, threatening to overtake her and knock her down. Her mouth was inches away from his. But she wanted him to make that last move. She wanted it, needed it—needed him to prove that it wasn’t just her in this. That he was as weak as she in this moment.
And suddenly his lips were on hers, almost punishingly. His arm snaked around her back, holding her against the onslaught of passion that was so much stronger than a tide. For a moment she basked in that power, in the feel of him encompassing her completely. She allowed it to happen to her, to shock her as his tongue demanded entrance and his body commanded surrender. Then she came to life under the sheer level of need that was binding them together.
She pushed back against the kiss, opened herself to him. Tongue clashed against tongue, teeth nipped at lips. Her hands unclasped from his shoulders and ran down the shirt covering his chest. She pushed with one and pulled with the other, desperate to feel more. His hands wound their way into her hair, and she thought she might have heard a groan as he sank his hands into the sleek knot and sent the pins flying, leaving her dark auburn hair to cascade down her back.
He started to walk her backwards and she felt his strong thighs against hers in an almost erotic slide. The slit of the silk skirt parted, allowing her bare legs access to the rich material of his trousers, making her feel naked against him.
As if he, too, was thinking the same thing, one of his hands left her hair, trailed over the naked V left by the silk around her chest, down to her waist. His hand flared to span it for just a moment, before lowering even further down, skating over her hip before his fingertips traced their way to the cut in the skirt and slipped through to the bare skin of her thigh.
Emma gasped as his hand wrapped around her bottom, bringing her thigh up, allowing him to step fully between her legs, and gasped again as she felt the hard ridge of his arousal at her core. It was a promise. It was a threat.
He pulled back from their kiss, gazing down on her as if warning her that this was the point of no return, failing to realise that she’d crossed that bridge a long time back. As if her body was completely his now, her hips pressed forward against his, desperate to feel him deeper, needing to feel him deeper.
They came up against the arm of the sofa and he guided her back, perching her there.
‘Had you asked any other man, Emma, he would have taken you to a bed covered with roses,’ he ground out against her lips, unaware that that she wouldn’t have wanted that. Simply because it wouldn’t have been him. ‘Had you asked any other man, he would have showered you with gifts and seduced you with words,’ he continued, unaware that he had given her the greatest of gifts, offering her words of truth instead of lies, and that it meant so much more.
‘I am not that man,’ he said, as if answering her thoughts. ‘But,’ he said, with a fierce sincerity that pinned her heart, ‘I will stop at any point. Know that. You are in control here, Emma. This is your decision. If you want me to—’
She cut off his words with a kiss of her own—just as powerful, just as impassioned as any of those he had given her.
As if the last barrier had been broken, a flood of need passed between them in that kiss. His hands ran the length of her chest and breasts, down once again to the silky slit in the dress. She nearly cried out as his hands caressed the soft skin of her thighs, as his hands found the thin piece of material holding her thong together and pulled, tearing the string as if it were nothing and tossing it aside. He brought his hands down around her bottom and lifted her up against him, the material of his trousers pressed against her core, shocking her and setting a fire within her.
He stepped back, and the loss of heat from where his body had pressed against hers allowed the cool air of the room to raise goosebumps on her arms. At least that was what she told herself as she shivered against his touch. His fingers found the slick wet heat of her core, at first gently running over her clitoris, bringing an unbidden cry from her mouth.
She thought she heard him curse, but she couldn’t tell. The sensations he was wringing from her body were overwhelming. She might not know what to do, but her body moved instinctively, her legs opening to his hand as his fingers mirrored his tongue as he kissed her, pushing into her, delving further and deeper. Her body arched back over his powerful arm of its own volition, pulling her away from his kiss.
Need rose deep within her, yearning, demanding something that she couldn’t fathom. Her breath became gasps, and she felt unable to contain all the emotions, all the sensations within her. She cried out, his wicked sensuality bringing forth even more want, and found herself begging, pleading for something she couldn’t quite name.
She barely noticed him settle between her legs, but the moment his tongue pressed against her core, wet heat against wet heat, a wildness was wrenched from her and she came apart in an explosion of white firebursts. Stars dusted the back of her eyelids and she fell into an abyss.
* * *
Antonio watched as Emma’s orgasm spilled waves of shivers across her skin, flushing her cheeks with pleasure, and he was speechless. He had never seen anything so beautiful, tasted anything so sweet, experienced anything so humbling as this moment.
But as she opened her eyes, and he saw wonder and awe painted in them, he knew it wasn’t enough for him to know these things. She must too.
‘Do you trust me?’ he asked.
‘Yes,’ she said simply.
He gently reached for the shoulder straps of her dress.
Emma stiffened.