Defying the Prince

‘Look, I don’t want it to happen any more than you do.’ As jumpy as a kangaroo, she shot out of her seat. ‘I have plans. Goals. Hot sex with you is nowhere on my list.’

In the semi-darkness, his eyes met hers and that look brushed every part of her until her skin was hot and her breathing shallow.

Izzy gulped. ‘I’m getting vertigo up here, so I’m going down.’

His hand closed over hers, his fingers warm and strong. ‘If you’re dizzy someone should hold on to you.’

‘Unless that someone is the reason for the dizziness.’ Her heartbeat going crazy, Izzy extracted her hand from his in the hope that it might help. ‘If it’s OK with you I’ve had enough of this romantic darkness. I’m going to go and stand in a spotlight. You should do the same thing. It might help me to focus on your deficiencies.’ Without waiting for his response, she picked her way down the steps as fast as she dared in the fragmented light.

It would have been so easy to lose her footing and plunge down, down, and part of her felt as if she was about to do exactly that. Ironically she managed the steps perfectly well but then lost her balance on the uneven floor of the arena.

Strong hands caught her as she stumbled and the next moment he’d swept her into the shadow of a stone pillar, away from the intrusive sweep of the lights.

Instead of releasing her, his hands tightened on her shoulders.

‘I have never wanted a woman the way I want you.’ His raw confession acted like a shot of adrenalin and suddenly her heart was pounding.

‘I feel the same way.’

‘I don’t like feeling this desperate!’ The words were dragged from him but even as he spoke, his hand locked in her hair and he powered her back against the nearest hard surface which just happened to be the pillar.

Trapped between rough stone and his hard body, Izzy barely had time to suck in a shocked breath before his mouth came down on hers and he was kissing her with such unrestrained sexual hunger that her body erupted in a burst of flame. This time there was no tantalizing exploration but a full on assault of her senses, the erotic stroke of his tongue deliberate and explicit as his mouth possessed hers and showered sensation over every millimetre of her trembling body.

She’d always prided herself on being in control of her responses but she’d never been kissed like this before and his expertise smashed down every feeble barrier until she was a seething mass of shivering, quivering desire.

Somehow his hands had moved from her hair to her bottom, trapping her against the hard heat of his arousal, and her arms were around his neck as they both instinctively tried to connect every single part of themselves. The sun had set hours earlier so the air had cooled, but their bodies were slick with sweat as they drove each other wild. Desire was thick and molten, dark and dangerous, unheeding of time or place.

His breathing was laboured, and as his hands slid beneath the thin fabric of her top she gave a whimper of encouragement and then jerked as his thumbs boldly traced the straining peaks of her breasts. On fire, Izzy moaned against the heat of his mouth but he was already ahead of her, dispensing with her bra with expert fingers and then employing those same skilled fingers on her sensitive peaks until the ache between her thighs grew almost unbearable.

A beam of light tracked towards them again and with a rough curse he shifted her further into the shadows, using the pillar to protect them from the intrusive beam of the spotlight.

Izzy moaned. ‘Someone might see—’

‘I don’t care if the whole damn Roman army is watching.’ His thickened tone was barely intelligible and then he was kissing her again, his mouth hard on hers, hot and hungry, the lick of his tongue a blatant prelude to an intimacy she craved as much as he clearly did.

She covered him with the flat of her hand and heard him groan.

He slid his hand under her skirt, his fingers finding their target with unerring accuracy.

Sure, clever fingers traced that secret part of her and the pleasure was so crazily intense that she would have cried out had he not already had his mouth on hers.

Drowning in an overload of sensation, she forgot everything except this. Here, behind the cloaking shadow of the ancient pillar it was just the two of them and the contrast between their private world, and the swirling lights of the auditorium somehow added to the intimacy. And it was intimate. What had started as a kiss swiftly exploded into something deeply p

rimitive as the fire between them burned through the restraints they’d imposed on themselves.

Izzy was so lost in that kiss, so focused on what he was doing with his mouth and his fingers, that it came as a shock to feel his hands slide under the flimsy barrier of her skirt and close hard over her trembling thighs.

They were both out of control. Both past the point of caring about consequences.

She was so desperate that even as a tiny sane part of her brain was reminding herself that they couldn’t possibly do that in such a public place, she felt his fingers rip the elastic of her panties.

Crazy excitement collided with shock.

Surely he wasn’t actually going to—

Oh, goodness, he was ….

Dark, intense and terrifying, it consumed them and drove them as they raced towards the inevitable like addicts with no thought to the past or the future. Izzy was a seething mass of sensation. Her pelvis ached, the explosive heat engulfing her as he explored her with erotic precision and careless disregard for their surroundings.