‘1 look at least twenty-five. I don’t know why. l’ve always looked older. When I was thirteen I could’ve passed for eighteen. ‘1 have to hope at some point that the clock starts running the other way.’
‘What age were you when you became a model?’
‘Fourteen ‘
‘Long enough to acquire a deceptively mature air of sophistication’ Cristiano reckoned wryly. But she could have been only months out of her teens when he had first met her in Paris. He almost winced for she had been more of a girl than a woman. Rare misgivings stirred.
Simultaneously his attention locked to her flawless oval face. It was very far from the first time that he had tried to pinpoint exactly what it was that made Lydia Powell so unforgettable. Her wide cheekbones? The clarity of her crystalline blue eyes? That ripe peach-soft mouth that opened with such delectable eagerness beneath his?
Just as swiftly Cristiano wasn’t thinking any more. He was reacting on a purely physical plane and moving back to the bed.
‘I held you all last night in my arms and I couldn’t touch time l moved away you sidled back like a homing pigeon.’
Chagrined colour warmed her cheeks. Evidently he had not been joking earlier when he had teased her about being amazingly affectionate the night before.
‘That must have been a pain. ‘ 1 had a cold shower in the middle of the night. I am not used to them. . except around you, ‘cara mia. ‘ he qualified with subdued mockery, tugging her round with great care so that she was facing away from him.
He ran down the zip on her dress. She felt the edges of the fabric part at her spine and she tensed for she wasn’t wearing a bra. He pressed his lips to the hollow in her slender shoulder and she shivered in response not even noticing the instant when the sleeves of her dress slid down to her wrists. But her entire body jerked in sensual shock when he raised his hands to explore the pouting curves of her small breasts and their tender peaks. She shut her eyes tight and swallowed a startled gasp of response.
‘Let me look at you… ‘
Disentangling her from the organza still clinging to her hips, Cristiano lifted her back against the pillows and began to trace the pale delicate swells crowned by lush pink nipples with caressing fingers.
‘You are so very beautiful.’
Lydia fought a selfconscious urge to cover herself. But tension was rippling through her in waves, and her hands coiled tight by her sides. She collided with shouldering golden eyes. Famed though he was for his cool reserve he could not hide his desire.
His hungry, masculine appraisal made an answering warmth pool in her belly. When he bent his arrogant dark head and captured a rosy distended bud, teasing and tasting with his tongue and his even white teeth she trembled. She had not known she would be so sensitive there and he knew exactly what he was doing. Her fingers delved into his black luxuriant hair and curled. ..a whimper of sound was impelled from her throat, and then another. Wonderful sensation seduced her until she twisted and turned desperate to sate the longing that he had awakened.
Cristiano lifted his head again sensuous golden eyes inspecting her. He curved long lean fingers to her fine jawbone and held her fast while he kissed her with passionate thoroughness ravishing the moist interior of her mouth with his tongue.
‘l’ve waited an incredibly long time for you,’ he confided in a roughened undertone.
‘lt didn’t do you any harm.’ Her response was breathless abstracted because even while she was fighting to hold back her response to him she was simultaneously angling her head to extend her long elegant neck for his attentions. When he pressed his lips with practised expertise to a pulse-point below one small ear tiny unmistakable tremors raked her slender length.
‘You want me’ he growled with unashamed satisfaction as he levered back from her to strip off his silk shirt.
‘lt’s possible… ‘ Her mouth was running dry. He looked all dominant male and impossibly sexy.
Pure muscle rippled below his smooth bronzed skin accentuating the solid wall of his chest and the hard contours of his flat abdomen. His athletic lifestyle was etched in the sleek powerful lines of his magnificent body off the bed to remove his trousers she was still watching him as though a spell had been cast over her. Sleek black boxers delineated the noticeable thrust of his rampant arousal and the heat of intense embarrassment and curiosity swept her from outside in.
Immediately Lydia averted her attention from him terrified that her expression might somehow betray her as a fake in the femmefatale stakes. If Cristiano was to guess that he was about to become the first man she had ever slept with he would surely think it was hilarious. Furthermore, he would also realise that her supposed fling with Mort Stevens had been one big, fat pretence!
‘Why should you have a problem with wanting me’?’ Cristiano asked silkily, sinking back down on the bed and reaching for her his every instinct challenged by the aura of constraint and distance that now enclosed her.
Determined that it should be that way, that she should accept what she could not change but somehow remain above it detached and safe from experiencing any real feeling.
‘Liar ‘ he whispered thickly against her full lower lip, piercing gold arrowing down into dense blue in resolute probing enquiry.
‘You fight everything I make you feel. You always did.
‘ lt’s called self-control Cristiano.’ But her voice was distinctly uneven, for she was in his arms the quivering tips of her breasts grazed by the black curling hair that dusted his pectoral muscles. Her body was already betraying her wishes as she was painfully aware of the wanton dampness between her thighs.
‘Lose it for me… ‘ He nipped at her full lower lip and let his tongue delve deep in her mouth in an erotic foray while he skimmed off her panties with sure hands.
She shivered as if she was in a snowstorm.… ‘yes, you can. And you will ‘ Cristiano intoned in husky disagreement. ‘You will enjoy what we share much more.’
Scrambling free from his loosened hold Lydia slid into bed, tugging the sheet over her. She made no answer because she was intimidated by the subject.
At her sudden retreat Cristiano elevated a sleek ebony brow.
‘Are you cold?’
pink flushing her lovely face she jerked a shoulder. A wicked grin curved his beautiful sensual mouth.
‘You were such a tease downstairs. ‘
Affronted by that assurance Lydia sat up again.
‘1 was not teasing you!’
Tossing back the sheet Cristiano drew her to him with keying her with grudging appreciation.
‘You have this touch-me-not look and it drives me crazy. I can feel the cheeky invitation behind it’
‘I don’t do cheeky-‘
‘But you do passion ‘ he claimed bending over her to lash a lush rosy nipple to straining prominence with his tongue, and lingering to punish her tender flesh with a carnal skill she could not resist.
Her spine arched and she shut her eyes tight. He explored the soft swell of her tummy, skimming through the pale curls that crowned her feminine mound to the damp swollen softness beneath. A whimper erupted from her when he found the most sensitive
spot. When a tormentingly sweet surge of pleasure engulfed her she lifted against him in bemused surprise the breath rasping in her throat-Sensation piled on sensation and she writhed her hands smoothing and clutching at the satin hard strength of his shoulders and his back. Wanton heat burned through her nerve-endings, filling her with restive energy, and her longing rose to an intolerable pitch.
Cristiano spread her out beneath him long brown fingers momentarily clinging to hers.
‘You are as hot as I am… ‘
“Don’t talk… ‘ she urged passion-glazed sapphire-blue eyes meeting his in a brief collision as she pushed her mouth almost blindly up to his.
In answer Cristiano drove her reddened lips apart in an explosive kiss his hands fiercely linked to hers above her head as he slid his lean hips between her parted thighs. She felt his hard sex brush her stomach with a sense of wonder. She wanted his weight on her. She wanted to be so close that she did not know where he began or she ended. She squirmed up to him tilting in a desperate effort to ease the dull ache at the centre of her. She wanted everything too much at once and her frustration tortured her.
‘Cristiano… ‘ she gasped strickenly.
‘You are amazing. ‘ He released her hands to press her thighs back and plunge hotly into the slick wet heat of her.
The stab of pain that accompanied that passionate onslaught provoked a cry from Lydia.
Immediately Cristiano stilled. Tom from the hold of the sensual world he had introduced her to, Lydia looked up at him in mortified dismay, for it had not once crossed her mind that any degree of discomfort would accompany her initiation.
His incisive dark golden eyes narrowed and slammed down into hers to hold her suddenly evasive gaze fiercely entrapped.
‘Accidenti? l don’t believe it’.
Severe embarrassment clawed at Lydia. He knew he had discovered her deepest secret and she could not bear it.
‘You are a virgin… ‘Dio mio, there has been no one else.’ His shock unconcealed, Cristiano stared down at her and slowly shook his proud dark head.