Harlequin Presents--April 2021--Box Set 2 of 2

by Dani Collins

‘Well, sometimes a bit, but then I remind myself that you are just a hunk of good-looking...’ She liked his slow smile. ‘I remind myself how mean you can be...’

  ‘Mean?’

  ‘One glass of champagne at my interview!’

  He smiled for he thought she hadn’t noticed the absence of a bottle.

  ‘Ah, that.’

  ‘A meal at your bar instead of your restaurant...’

  ‘You make it sound like the local dive.’

  ‘Perhaps, but even so I deserved five stars last night. Anyway,’ she continued, ‘when I do find myself fancying you, I remind myself how remote you can be and how humourless you are.’

  ‘Well, it’s good you’ve come to your senses,’ Gian said, ‘especially as I don’t have condoms with me. I tend not to keep them in my funeral suit.’

  She stared back and resisted smiling, determined to prove her humourless point.

  ‘Except we wouldn’t need them.’ He held up a purple foil packet of contraceptive pills. ‘What are these for?’

  ‘You’ve been snooping.’

  ‘Not really, I wanted toothpaste. I just wondered what you were doing on the Pill if you’re not sleeping with anyone...’

  ‘Yet!’

  His jaw was set in a grim line. He had this vision of Ariana chasing some bastard who sensed her fragility, yet she was not fragile now. Ariana was looking right at him and there was none of last night’s desperate need for comfort, just the desire that had always been beneath it.

  ‘So?’ he asked. She looked at the purple Pill packet and was about to lie, as she so often did, and say she was on the Pill for her skin, or so that it made her cycle more predictable, or whatever she would say if her mother found them.

  But Gian was certainly not her mother.

  And with Gian there was no reason she could see to lie.

  ‘I went on it because I feel like the only person in the world without a sex life, and when I go away with friends I don’t want them to know I’m the only one...’ She shrugged. ‘Pathetic, huh...’

  ‘No more pathetic than when I was younger and would have condoms on me, just to have them on me...’

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yes.’

  They shared a smile in the thin dawn light but then hers wavered. ‘Look, I’m sorry I’ve made things even more awkward between us. I should never have foisted myself on you. I was all a jumble.’ She looked at his suave good looks and then at his chest. His tie was gone and his shirt unbuttoned, though just at the top—enough to see a glimpse of chest hair—but she reminded herself of how empty a vessel his chest was and again tried to salvage some pride. ‘And it’s not as if I enjoyed kissing you last night. In fact, it was like kissing a screen. I felt nothing...’

  ‘Really?’

  The thin morning light disappeared as his face came closer, but she refused to be moved by the brush of his lips and the softness of his mouth, just as he had refused to be moved by hers.

  Except his kiss was more refined, more skilled, more measured and she found she could not quite catch her breath as her mouth fought not to relent.

  ‘Like kissing a screen?’ he checked.

  ‘Yes,’ she said, and felt the scratch of his chin drag on hers. As his fingers came to her jaw, his tongue slipped in, and she absolutely refused to moan at the bliss. In fact, she held her mouth slack as his tongue moved in and out. He tasted divine, all minty and fresh, but there was nothing clean about his kiss—it was filthy, in fact. Thorough, probing and potent with skill, his tongue felt like it ran a wire straight down between her legs and she bunched her hands into fists rather than reach for his head.

  ‘Still nothing?’ he checked, and now his hand was stroking her breast through her top and Ariana was sure that if she hadn’t been lying down she might have fainted.

  ‘Nothing,’ she lied.

  ‘Do you want me to stop?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Do you understand it is just this once?’

  ‘Oh, stop with the lectures,’ she said, as his fingers slid inside her top. ‘I accept the terms and conditions...’

  He laughed.

  Gian actually laughed. Not that she saw it, for he was pulling her T-shirt over her head, and Ariana was loose limbed and compliant and letting him.

  ‘Please get naked,’ she said. ‘I want to see you.’

  ‘For a virgin, you certainly know how to provoke me,’ Gian commented as he rose from the bed and started to undress.

  ‘Because you provoke me,’ Ariana responded. She felt a blush spread across her chest as he removed his shirt and discarded his clothes.

  Oh, God. She had always known he was stunning, but he looked so toned, and so male—his chest hair, the thick line on his stomach—and she was holding her breath in nervous, excited anticipation as he unzipped.

  He was the most beautiful thing she had seen and she was far from shy, just staring with hungry eyes. It made her blood feel too heavy to move through her heart as he took her hand and closed it around his thick length.

  He was warm and hard and he felt like velvet and he let her explore him. Gian kissed her neck, and he kissed down her chest and when his mouth met her breast she wept inside.

  ‘Help me,’ she said, because he made her so frantic with desire and his warm hand was on her stomach, which made her want to lift her knees.

  ‘Does that help?’ he said, and she moaned as his hand moved down and he stroked her.

  ‘Not enough,’ she gasped. ‘God, Gian...’ And then she whimpered, for the soft vacuum of his mouth on her breast and the relentless pressure below created a feeling akin to both panic and bliss building inside her.

  And though his intention had been to bring Ariana to the edge and then take her, instead he indulged in the pleasure of watching her orgasm build.

  Her eyes opened to his for a moment, and she had never felt more bathed in attention, or so in tune with another person.

  Then she gave up watching him and shut her eyes, arching her neck as she surrendered to the sumptuous pleasure he so easily gave. He kissed her then so slowly that it felt like a revival but then his thighs were between hers and his mouth was by her temple as her hands held his hips, holding him back, digging him in, both wanting and conflicted. She was desperate for fusion and for the initiation she would allow only Gian to give her.

  It hurt, and yet it did not.

  He squeezed into her tight space and it was both pleasure and a pain that must surely end. Yet her lungs were expanding and cracks of light returning to the blackout he had brought upon her, and everything multiplied as he moved slowly inside.

  ‘Gian.’ She said his name as she had wanted to since her interview. She rolled it on her tongue and tasted it as he moved deep inside her.

  She felt crushed, she felt covered, she felt found. ‘Gian,’ Ariana said again, as he moved faster, but his name was more like a warning now, for he was tipping her towards the edge and she almost did not want to go.

  For then they would end.

  ‘Let go,’ he told her. He could feel her slight panic and the mounting tension, and then when she shattered he shot into her in relief.

  Both breathless, both dizzy, they lay there, catching their breath.

  He adored her inexperience, not just because of the honour of being her first but because she could never know that, even while making love, he held back.

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  THEY LAY THERE together in silence. Ariana examined her conscience and heart for regret and found none.

  Not a jot.

  For Gian, there was rare peace as he lay there, their limbs knotted together. Only one thing missing. ‘We need food.’

  ‘I have none,’ Ariana happily admitted. Her world had been turned upside down since the death of her father, and anyway she tended to eat out. ‘Well, I h
ave some ice cream.’

  ‘Ice cream?’

  ‘A lot of ice cream!’ Making it was her hobby, her absolute guilty pleasure. Wearing a small wrap, she padded to the kitchen. There she defrosted two croissants and filled them with ice-cream in flavours of cardamom and pistachio and a dark chocolate one too while she waited for the mocha pot to boil and wondered how best to take back her heart.

  How to accept his terms and conditions and somehow let him go with grace.

  Gian lay there breathing in the scent of brewing coffee, trying to pinpoint the moment he had started wanting her.

  On the day of her farcical interview, when he’d first noticed the true colour of her eyes? No, a more honest examination told him it had been before that, and even Ariana herself had voiced it: the night of the silver ball.

  Or had it been when she’d swept into the planning meeting and said she wanted silver as a theme?

  Instead of gritting his teeth, he had found himself smiling, at least on the inside, for Gian rarely showed how he truly felt.

  But, no, while it might have started then, for Gian things had really changed the night she had worn silver. Rafael had not been there, and Gian had stood by Ariana’s side as she played host. He’d been in awe of how long she’d smiled with the guests and carried on with grace.

  He’d wanted to take her aside and tell her that he knew how hard this was, and how proud of her he felt. Instead, they had danced their duty dance and he had held her back from him with rigid arms so she would not feel how turned on he was and how he had ached to drop a kiss on her mouth, on her bare shoulder.

  And he was hard for her again.

  ‘Colazione!’ Ariana announced breakfast as she came into the room and blinked at his obvious arousal. ‘Good grief,’ she said. ‘I’m far too sore for that.’

  ‘Sore?’

  She nodded. ‘Nicely sore, the best sore ever.’ Oh, God, she wanted him again, but then the ice cream would melt and her phone had already pinged in several messages. She had Nicki coming round and she had to do this without starting to cry. ‘Eat,’ she told him. ‘You can have the chocolate one.’

  It sounded like she was making a concession, but Gian could tell when she was lying. ‘I want the other one.’

  ‘No, no,’ she said, ‘I’ll let you have the chocolate one.’

  ‘But I want the pistachio.’

  ‘And cardamom.’ Ariana sighed and handed the one she really wanted to him. ‘I put in extra when I made it.’

  Gian, though used to breakfast in bed, was not used to this—just sitting in bed, eating and tasting food with a woman, and taking bites of each other’s.

  Bites so big she nearly lost her fingers to his mouth, and they laughed as they fought over food. ‘You really made this?’ he checked.

  ‘Not the croissant, just the ice cream. I’m going to make salted roast chestnut next, and I shall get them from the same vendor. They were the best I’ve tasted...’

  ‘They’re just chestnuts.’

  ‘No,’ she said, and then she gave him the speech she had prepared in her kitchen. ‘They kept me warm. You kept me warm last night, Gian, even if you did not share my bed. You cared for me last night and then again this morning and I thank you.’

  She had surprised him, and then she surprised him further when, with breakfast done, it was Ariana herself who suggested he leave. ‘You’d better go. Mamma might drop in.’

  ‘Doesn’t she call first?’ Gian asked.

  ‘No,’ Ariana said. ‘I always ask her to but then she reminds me that she’s my mother and shouldn’t need an appointment...’

  ‘I’ll get dressed then.’

  ‘Have a shower,’ she offered.

  He declined, or he would be trailing a floral boutique all day if he used her scents. ‘I’ll have one back at the hotel.’

  It was odd, Ariana thought as she lay watching him dress, that he did not call La Fiordelise home.

  ‘I like you unshaven,’ she admitted. ‘You’re always so...’ she fought to find the right word ‘...well-presented and groomed.’

  ‘It’s my job to be.’

  ‘Perhaps, but...’ She shrugged and his eyes narrowed, trying to interpret yet another of her actions, for those slender shoulders could say many things.

  ‘But what?’

  ‘Nothing.’ She smiled wickedly. ‘There are other sides to you, I’m sure. I guess I won’t find out now.’

  ‘You could. Why not tell the doorman to lie and say you’re out?’

  ‘He’s so lazy he’d forget,’ Ariana rolled her eyes and tried to sound casual, when in truth she wanted to cry and cling onto his leg and beg him to never leave.

  Not a good look, that much she knew!

  ‘You really ought to go,’ she said as he buckled his belt, though she wanted to reach up and unbuckle it so she was only half listening as he spoke.

  ‘So how do you have a private life, with her dropping in and out? How do you have a...?’ And then his voice faded. After all, this morning had been her sex life to date. ‘You’ll be okay?’ he checked as he did up the buttons of his shirt and half tucked it in.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘If you’re not...’

  ‘Gian,’ Ariana broke in. ‘I have my family and I have my friends.’ He hovered on the edge of both of her inner circles but was not fully in either. She felt the indent of the mattress as he sat down and bent over to do up his laces, and though she ached to reach out to him, Ariana told him of the practicalities of her day. ‘Also, Nicki is dropping by to tell me about her holiday...’

  He sat up and looked right at her. ‘As opposed to coming by to see how you’re faring after the loss of your father?’

  ‘Of course she’s coming for that.’ Her eyes narrowed as she took in his sulking mouth; she knew he didn’t like Nicki. ‘It’s a bit early in the relationship for you to be dictating who I see. Oh, that’s right, it’s not a relationship, and even if it were...’ she gave him a tight smile ‘...that still wouldn’t give you a right to say who my friends are, Gian.’

  ‘Fine.’ He put up two hands to indicate he was dropping it.

  And he was!

  Ariana was right. It was not his place to call out her friends but, still, that Nicki got his goat.

  All of Ariana’s hangers-on did.

  ‘Look,’ he said, and Ariana could feel him weighing things up before he spoke. ‘I think you were right about working. I do think you’d be an asset for the hotel and if we can both...’ He reached over and toyed with a thick coil of her black hair that sat on her collarbone as he spoke, but she pushed his hand away and her response was sudden.

  ‘No!’

  She could not work for him; far too much had changed.

  ‘I can’t work for you, Gian,’ she said, and used another inevitable truth to disguise the real reason. ‘Mamma’s going to need me now more than ever.’

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  HER MOTHER DID indeed need her more than ever.

  In the tumultuous weeks following her father’s death, Ariana’s mother’s demands were relentless.

  It was still by appointment only—Angela Romano liked her make-up, jewellery and the day’s carefully chosen wig perfectly arranged before even her daughter dropped around.

  Yet the lunches were endless.

  As she sat there, twirling a shred of prosciutto on a fork, Ariana fought to quell a surge of anger as her mother called over the sommelier to tell him that the champagne was a little flat. She wondered how someone so supposedly bereft with grief would even notice, let alone have the energy to complain!

  ‘I’m fine, thank you,’ Ariana said, placing a hand over her glass. ‘I really do need to get going, Mamma,’ she said, reaching for her bag. ‘I’m meeting Dante.’

  ‘Oh, he can wait.’

  ‘Mamma, please, I sa
id I’d be there at three.’ She tried to temper her irritation. ‘I really do have to go...’ Her voice trailed off because she didn’t want to worry her mother, but Dante’s mood of late was pretty grim and nothing seemed to be getting done for the Romano Ball—the invitations hadn’t even gone out and it was just a few weeks away. ‘Would you like me to come over this evening?’

  ‘No, no.’ Angela shook her head. ‘I have the priest coming over tonight.’

  ‘Well, take care.’ Ariana kissed her on both cheeks. ‘I shall see you soon.’

  ‘Tomorrow,’ Angela checked. ‘Here? Or perhaps we could go shopping...’ She ran a disapproving eye over Ariana’s navy shift dress and espadrilles. ‘We could get you something a little less last year.’

  Ariana had never felt more stifled and wished not for the first time that there was more purpose and structure to her day. She took a taxi to Romano Holdings in the EUR district, craning her neck as they passed La Fiordelise. She wished she was working there.

  And then she flushed with sheer pleasure when she recalled the very reason she now could not.

  It was her favourite memory, a harbour in troubled times she could return to, yet there was confusion there too—how, from the very moment they had kissed, Gian had started the countdown to the end.

  She had stopped having drinks there on a Friday. Well, Paulo had been banned and Nicki said they should no longer go in solidarity with their friend.

  Except Ariana had loved going there...

  ‘Signorina?’

  The voice of the driver startled her and Ariana realised they had arrived. Time tended to run away whenever she thought of Gian, and so she determinedly put him out of her mind as she walked into the plush office building.

  Sarah, Dante’s PA, gave her a smile. ‘Go through,’ she said and then added, ‘Good luck.’

  ‘Do I need it?’ Ariana joked, but then all joking faded when she saw him. ‘Dante!’ She could not keep the surprise from her voice when she saw her older brother, looking less than his put-together self, for his complexion was grey and his shirt was crumpled and there was just such a heavy air to him. ‘How are you doing?’ she asked as she went over and kissed his cheeks and gave him a hug. ‘I’ve barely seen you. Mamma is saying the same.’