The Legend of de Marco

He tore his mouth away after long, dizzying seconds and said gutturally, ‘I won’t take you like an animal again.’

He bent down and lifted her into his arms, strode back into the bedroom. He put her down on the bed and stripped the towel from around his waist. Gracie’s eyes were glued to him as he came down over her, twitching her towel aside so he could feast his eyes on her body, laid out for him. He reminded her of some mythical pagan god. She’d sensed a raw wildness in him the night she’d met him, but the reality of it was intoxicating.

He trailed the back of his hand from the valley of her breasts to the juncture of her thighs. She squirmed and bit her lip even as she wanted to have the strength to grab his hand and throw it aside, to tell him that she wouldn’t succumb to him again.

He pushed her thighs apart with one hand and pressed his palm against her. He looked deep into her eyes, ‘You’re mine, Gracie O’Brien, and I’m going to make you mine over and over again—until you don’t even know who you are any more.’

‘I’m going to make you mine over and over again—until you don’t even know who you are any more.’

Rocco was standing at the window of his bedroom with his back to the view of a faint pink dawn breaking over London’s skyline. His arms were crossed and he was looking warily at the woman sleeping in his bed, as if she might jump out at any moment and grab him. He felt as if he’d just been catapulted back into reality after a psychedelic mind-altering experience.

Those words were reverberating in his head. When he’d said them to her he’d meant that he wanted to make her forget her own name because she’d made him forget … everything. Who he was. What he was. Why he was.

It had only been in the shower, as she’d looked up at him with those dark serious eyes, that the first sliver of sanity had returned—and with it the awful, excoriating realisation that he’d exposed himself comprehensively.

Acute vulnerability of a kind he hadn’t felt in years—so long ago that he’d hardly recognised it—had burnt him up inside and he’d lashed out. But Gracie had stood up to him, like she had from day one, and he’d soon been f

ired up all over again, that feeling of vulnerability dissolving like a mist to be replaced with sheer lust.

Last night had proved to him that for all his hard-won control and precious rationale he couldn’t keep from acting on base desire. Once he’d touched Gracie there had been no going back. He grimaced. There had been no going back from the moment he’d seen her standing in that elevator, looking so pale and anxious.

And from the moment she’d walked into the drawing room in that provocative uniform Rocco had bitterly regretted that Honora Winthrop was there. If he’d ever needed a stark comparison between two women they’d unwittingly provided it. As the evening had unfolded, and Gracie had served them exquisite dish after exquisite dish, Rocco had become more and more entranced. More and more surprised that she wasn’t using the opportunity to humiliate him. And more and more certain that he wanted her.

He’d battled an increasing need to see her. He’d suffered through the courses, tuning out Honora Winthrop’s cut-glass tones, and come to life each time Gracie came back into the room, eyes devouring her, painfully aware of his state of arousal—for her.

He’d become so impatient at one stage that he’d gone looking for her himself, only to see her stretching up to kiss his own security man sweetly on the cheek. He’d looked as if he’d just received a bonus. The jealousy had been swift and shocking. He’d wanted to fire George on the spot and shake Gracie until she rattled.

When Honora had made those snide comments about the food Rocco had had to restrain himself from reaching across the table and pushing her sanctimoniously perfect face into her dessert. As soon as Gracie had walked out of the room he’d stood up and told Honora coolly, ‘This evening is over. Thank you for coming, but I think we both know that this won’t go any further.’

She had stood up too, quiveringly angry. She’d spat at him, ‘It’s over because you want that tart of a housekeeper? Is that why you’ve refused to sleep with me?’ Before he could answer she’d said, ‘You don’t get it, do you? You can have me and still have her. That’s how it’s done. I would only expect discretion. You can sleep with who you want while we maintain the façade of a happy marriage.’

She had articulated exactly what he’d set out to achieve by wooing her into marriage, and suddenly Rocco had recoiled from her words as if they were poisonous. Tight-lipped, he’d said, ‘Get out. I’ve changed my mind.’

Honora had just shaken her head, eyes as cold as ice and full of malicious pity. ‘You won’t get another chance like this.’

He’d all but snarled at her, ‘I’ll make my chances—just as I’ve always done. Now, what I’d like you to do first is apologise to Gracie for your rudeness and then leave.’

She’d thrown her head back and laughed. And then she’d walked out, slamming the door behind her.

Now, in the early-morning light, Rocco could hardly believe that he’d so spectacularly ruined his reputation in one fell swoop. He knew someone like Honora Winthrop would waste no time in spreading the word, along with half a dozen untruths, so that her own reputation wasn’t damaged. He wouldn’t get so close to a society darling again for a long time. They were a closely knit clique. And yet he couldn’t seem to drum up any urgency to want to rectify the situation. Not when he was looking at the woman on the bed, sprawled in voluptuous abandon, with the marks of their passionate lovemaking on her delicately pale skin.

Wild red curls and waves rippled around her head across the stark white pillow. One long curl twisted enticingly down over her breast, kissing the tempting curve. Rocco’s body was already hard. All it took was a look, or the memory of what it was like to surge into her tight, hot embrace.

He couldn’t remember if he’d ever been with a lover so responsive and generous. He prided himself on being a virile, sensual man, and he enjoyed sex, but his experiences in recent years had all been … restrained. He’d found it easy not to lose control.

But all that had changed with Gracie. He cringed inwardly now to remember how he’d swept the things off the table in the kitchen so that he could take her there, as if he was some out of control rutting animal. And yet … she’d loved it. She’d splintered apart around him like his most secret erotic fantasy.

It was as if he’d been merely existing for a long time, and something or someone had woken him from a trance. Colours were more vivid, sounds sharper. Something fundamental in his beliefs about this woman had shifted last night when he’d seen how hard she’d worked to put together that beautiful meal. And when he’d seen the genuine hurt in her eyes at how she’d been spoken to. The fierce pride in her expression.

She’d spent the bare minimum on his credit card for the food. George had handed it back to him with an explicit look when he’d come back to the apartment before dinner, as if to say, See? She’s not like the rest. And the assertion struck Rocco again that she didn’t have anything to do with her brother’s machinations. Even so—the voice of reason intruded—she was loyal to her brother, and that alone meant he couldn’t fully trust her.

Rocco could feel the dominant part of himself that had struggled for so long to survive and attain his position try to assert itself. How could he be jeopardising so much, so easily, just for a woman? All his life he’d wanted to distance himself from drama and passion. Chaos and violence. The life he lived now was the absolute antithesis of that. And he was considering diving back into it with Gracie?

Yet surely all was not lost? He could have Gracie O’Brien, and when this desire burnt itself out—as it always did—he would gather around the structures of his life again and ensure his precious status once more.

He smiled cynically. Despite Honora Winthrop’s dire warning, he knew money could buy anything, and ultimately one of those women wouldn’t be able to resist if he wanted to enter into their protected society via marriage. Ever since that day in Italy when he’d been spat at and ignored by his own blood family in the street, and he’d watched them walk away, immune and protected by their status, he’d craved that protection. That security. And he could not lose sight of that now, when he had it in the palm of his hand.

He could have it all, including Gracie, and he intended to.