The Virgin's Secret

Even though he’d taken her just a short time ago his body was ready for more. In fact he’d never been kept in such a state of arousal after making love. He could feel the unsteady beat of Angel’s heart, slowly coming back to normal, and her breath was a little uneven. He knew that she’d fallen into a sleep of sorts.

Leo reeled. He’d had sex. Lots of sex. But nothing had come close to what he’d just experienced. He tried desperately to rationalise it: It had to be because she’d been a virgin. It had to be. Because if it wasn’t—Angel moved. Leo’s heart stopped; anticipation coiled deep inside him.

Angel was aware of consciousness returning slowly, trickling back. She was tucked into Leo’s body, his arm tight around her, and everything rushed back in glorious Technicolor. She was a woman now. Leo hadn’t rejected her. Immediately she could feel moist heat between her legs, readying her for him again.

Angel’s hand moved down over Leo’s chest, exploring the play of his powerful muscles underneath that exquisitely golden olive skin, the brush of hair that made her tingle all over. She could feel tension come into the muscles under her hand and smiled against his skin. She didn’t want words, she couldn’t speak; she just wanted him.

When her seeking hand found what she was looking for a fiercely feminine exultation ran through her at finding him so hard and ready. She lifted her head and Leo turned to face her. He looked serious, and a little shiver of something snaked down Angel’s spine, but she quashed it. He put his hand over hers, stopping her movements.

‘Angel…you’re bound to be sore.’

She came up and shook her head, putting her finger to his lips. She did ache, but it was an ache that cried out for fulfilment, not an ache of pain. She took her other hand from him and guided his hand to the juncture between her legs where he could feel for himself how ready she was.

Leo said something that sounded guttural and then moved fast, so that Angel was on her back and he was looming over her, already moving between her legs. The ache was building at her core, and if Angel could have stopped and slowed time in that moment, she would have.

‘Yes, Leo…this is what I want…please.’

He bent his head said close to her mouth, ‘Well, since you ask so nicely…’

When Angel woke again, the curtains were open and sunlight flooded her room. For a second everything was a blank. And then she became aware of certain a

ches and sensations in her body that weren’t usual. As her consciousness returned fully everything came back in glorious Technicolor, and her heart tripped before starting up again at double speed. She knew that Leo wasn’t in the bed; she’d somehow known that immediately.

It stunned her slightly to know how quickly her life had changed one hundred and eighty degrees. This time yesterday she’d still been a virgin.

Last night Leo had made her a woman. He’d taken her to a paradise she’d never dreamed existed. Heat suffused Angel from head to toe. And yet she couldn’t stop a smile from breaking across her face. It was impossible to ignore the fact that her body felt as if it had been awoken from a deep, cold sleep…

But just as quickly her smile faded again, when the enormity of it all sank in. How could she be feeling like this for someone who had so coldly set out to take her because he wanted her and wanted to punish her? She frowned minutely, staring at the ceiling. She felt confused; Leo had taken her innocence with such devastating generosity that she reeled. Several times she’d seen the strain of his efforts to hold back, as if he was afraid he’d hurt her.

Angel lifted the sheet and looked into the bed, ignoring the signs of having been seriously seduced on her body, the faint bruises and reddish marks. There was no blood. Angel let the sheet drop; she knew rationally that there wasn’t always necessarily blood, but there was a stinging between her legs that spoke of the potential of it if Leo hadn’t been so gentle. And yet she could remember the desperation with which she’d urged him on, even when he’d tried to hold back for her sake.

With a burgeoning feeling of something huge in her chest Angel got out of bed and pulled on the robe which still lay on the floor. To think of how Leo had pushed it off her shoulders with such singular intent made Angel blush all over again.

Without really thinking of what she was doing, Angel went to the door that connected their rooms. After hesitating for the merest moment, she turned the handle and went in.

She stumbled to a halt when she saw Leo standing at the mirror of his wardrobe, knotting a tie. His eyes merely flicked to her through the mirror and then back to his task, with no change in expression. She hadn’t been sure what to expect, but it hadn’t been that. Angel was immediately tongue-tied. Leo looked so distant and intimidating in a dark suit, white shirt and tie. He looked like the phenomenally successful businessman he was. And nothing like the tender lover of last night. She suddenly knew she’d been an abject fool.

His eyes flicked to Angel again, and she felt heat rise in her face when she registered how cool they were. One dark brow rose quizzically. ‘Was there something you wanted, Angel?’

Was there something you wanted, Angel? Angel balked and died a tiny death in that moment. Was this the same man? Acting as if the most cataclysmic thing on the earth hadn’t just happened? But then, she realised in sick horror, it hadn’t—not for him. If anything, last night for him must have been excruciatingly banal. How could it not have been, with a complete innocent?

She shook her head vaguely. ‘I just…’ I just what? she mocked herself bitterly, cursing her impulse to come in here. How could she have disregarded everything that lay between them, forgotten why she was there?

A lot of things were impacting upon Angel, all at the same time. Leo turned from the mirror, his tie perfectly knotted, his shoulders broad and awesome in the jacket, hair smoothed back, jaw clean shaven. Aloof.

Very quickly Angel assessed the situation, her brain working overtime. She brought her hands to her robe and tightened it, barely registering the way Leo’s eyes dropped there for a split second. She tipped up her chin, forcing her voice to be cool. ‘I was just wondering what time the stylist will be here? You did say that you’d have someone come today?’

Leo’s jaw clenched and he strolled nonchalantly towards Angel, barely leashed power in every step. A flash of memory—those muscular thighs between hers last night—made a light sweat break out over Angel’s top lip. She fought not to retreat, not to show that she was barely holding it together in the face of his obvious distance. He stopped a few feet away, his gaze sweeping up and down in a blistering moment that nearly scuppered Angel’s precious composure.

‘You were an eager student last night, Angel. I can see our time together being most…enjoyable.’

Angel burned inside. With humiliation and, more treacherously, with hurt, in response to his whole demeanour and his calling her eager. She had been desperately, awfully eager. She had fallen into his bed more easily than a ripe apple falling from a tree. She wanted to lash back, and hitched her chin a mite higher.

‘I wouldn’t know, as I have so little experience to compare it to. But for what it’s worth last night was…pleasant enough.’

Leo laughed out loud, a big burst of sound that made Angel flinch. When he looked at her his eyes flashed a warning, and a mocking smile played around his sensual mouth. Angel had to fight against the pull in her belly, the desire to just stop and look at it. She dragged her gaze back up to his.

He stepped even closer and put out a hand, touching her jaw. Angel clenched it.