It was hot. She had to dispose of the thin cardigan as soon as she stepped foot out of the plane. And the sounds... The sounds of insects all around her, noisy but out of sight. She could smell the faint, salty tanginess of the sea. She began peppering him with all the questions she would have asked on the plane had she managed to keep her eyes open. It seemed that the island was very small, tiny, a little jewel in the sea where the rich and famous had houses that were nestled in lush, tropical grounds, far, far away from the prying eyes of the paparazzi. Tourism accounted for most of the income of the locals and the businesses that had sprung up on the island were there as a response to the millionaires and billionaires who had houses there, some of them permanently occupied rather than used now and again.
There was someone to meet them, a smiling, dark-skinned guy who chatted for the duration of the short trip, at the end of which the four-wheel-drive car bumped away from the main road and ascended an incline. On either side of the narrow road, trees and bushes vied to gain control. Tall coconut palms swayed above dense shrubs, and wildly colourful flowers dotted the undergrowth.
Laura feasted her eyes until the road gave way to a small courtyard in which stood a low, ranch-like house. Simply put, it was spectacular. A wooden porch spanned the length of it. She barely noticed the driver melting into the darkness, and inside the house she paused and looked around her, open-mouthed.
‘How can you never come here?’ she wondered aloud, and Alessandro shrugged.
‘Time constraints. It’s late. The place is fully stocked with food. I could have arranged with someone to come and cook while we’re here, but I didn’t see much point, considering we’re only going to be here for a short while...’ Her hair had fallen into wild ringlets. He had never set eyes on anything quite so disingenuously tempting. ‘But shall we postpone the food until we’ve freshened up?’ he murmured encouragingly, strolling towards her, wanting her to feast her eyes on him and not on her surroundings.
He hadn’t been to this house for quite a while, but he could still recall its layout, and if memory served him right the bathroom adjoining the main bedroom was big enough and lavish enough to host a party. He looped his arms around her, turned her so that she was looking at him and lowered his head to kiss her.
‘I want to explore the house first,’ Laura breathed, and Alessandro groaned.
‘It’s a house. Some bedrooms, a few other rooms, a pool, some lawns. What’s to explore? The only room I want you to explore is the bedroom.’
‘It’s not all about sex!’ But the hot urgency of his voice filled her with a fierce longing that craved satisfaction. He occupied so much space in her head that just seeing the way his dark eyes were fastened on her made her want his hands and his mouth on her body. As easy as that, he could ignite all her senses.
It took all her willpower not to blindly let him lead her into the bedroom. Instead, they explored the house, which was beyond amazing.
There was, apparently, air conditioning throughout, but right now the house had been aired and as he flung open doors and shutters, balmy breezes blew in. The smell of the sea was even stronger here and he told her that it was a short walk down to a private cove. ‘But not now,’ he said drily, noticing the way she gazed wistfully through to the garden.
‘It’s just the most beautiful house.’ She ran her eyes over the exquisite wooden flooring, gleaming through lack of use, and the light bamboo furniture and fine muslin drapes. ‘Like from a magazine.’
‘And I’ve saved the best for last,’ Alessandro murmured, drawing her away from the living area towards the bedrooms, although he’d already made his mind up, and individual see-and-touch exploring sessions within the seven guest ones wasn’t going to happen. At least not right now, when his libido was making walking a challenge.
The master bedroom, reserved for his exclusive use, was at the far end of the house and opened out, through French doors, to a view of the ocean. It had its own private veranda and he watched as she took it all in with open awe. He had flung open the French doors and she stepped outside to breathe in the clean, warm tropical air. Then she admired the giant bed with its gauze curtains, which would have seemed feminine were it not for the dark-coloured bedding and the starkness of the furnishings.
Without even noticing, she only realised that she had been led by the hand into the biggest bathroom she had ever seen when he began tugging the strap of her sundress.
Laura gazed up at him helplessly. It mystified her that she couldn’t create some distance between them when she knew that this was a situation that was going to leave her stranded and hurt. There was not one single part of her that could resist when he touched her, even when he glanced at her. She burned for him and made absolutely no attempt to stop him from undressing her. The sundress was tugged down, pooling at her feet, and she obediently stepped out of it, then off came the bra and the knickers so that she was standing naked in the vast bathroom while he was still fully clothed.
It was unreasonably erotic but when she reached to strip him of his shirt, he stilled her hand with a half-smile.
‘I need to go slowly,’ he breathed huskily. ‘Watching you sleep on the plane tested me to the outer limits. If we have sex right now, I won’t be able to do justice to the act.’
Pink tinged her cheeks and she reached up as he began kissing her, very slowly and very thoroughly, and as he kissed her he played with her breasts, murmured into her ear, told her things that made her face burn and turned her on so much she could barely contain the feverish excitement coursing through her body.
He eased himself lower until he was kneeling before her. Laura could scarcely stand. Her legs felt like jelly because she was so turned on, and the hand that gently slipped between her thighs to part her legs elicited a moan in response.
Legs apart, she flung back her head and savoured the exquisite sensation of his tongue probing the wet slit, slipping between the folds of her femininity to tickle the roused bud of her clitoris. Of their own accord, her fingers curled into his hair. She widened her stance, created more space for his lazy exploration, sank into the caress of his wet mouth between her legs.
Her orgasm came fast and furious, building quickly and carrying her away with a whoosh.
A sultry breeze blew through the open window. So alien from what she was used to. Even the loud, shuddering groan that escaped her lips didn’t seem to come from her. Neither, she thought, opening drowsing eyes and catching sight of herself in the mirrored wall opposite, did this woman resemble the one she thought she was and always had been.
She was in a parallel universe and all she could do was wait for the bump when she returned to earth to happen...
That...and protect herself the best she could...
CHAPTER TEN
SITTING BY THE infinity pool, slowly being toasted by the sun, which was still hot even though it was after five in the afternoon, Laura reflected that time had stood still and now the hands of the clock were once more on the move.
First thing the following morning the private jet that had whisked them to his island paradise would be whisking them away from it and back to reality. Harsh, inescapable reality.
They hadn’t spoken once about the so-called relationship they were supposed to have, concocted for the sake of his father and her grandmother. They were supposed to be madly in love. They were supposed to be thinking about a series of tomorrows and not just the here and now, but that was just a technicality that suited Alessandro. He’d told her to forget about Roberto and her grandmother and to see the long weekend as an opportunity for hot sex, and such was his hold over her heart that she had pushed her anxieties and misgivings to one side and, yes, coward that she was, she had enjoyed him. Enjoyed him, being with him and the glorious tropical paradise into which she had landed. A little sparrow thrown into an exotic world far beyond her reach.
She couldn’t have been further out of her comfort zone. The little island was the playground of the fabulously wealthy. Vast plantation-style houses were screened behind sweeping, palm-tree-lined drives. Exquisite beaches were nestled into the mountains, although they had actually been to only one of those because they had their own beach, a beach with sand as fine and as white as icing sugar with placid, turquoise water to swim in. The town centre was picturesque, with several top-rated restaurants, a few very expensive shops and then all the other businesses that were needed to support the economy of the island and keep the locals employed.
She had felt as though she had inadvertently stepped onto a movie set. Everything was so picture-perfect that there was an air of unreality about the experience.
It was as unreal as their relationship and she knew that being on this island was like being in a bubble, where it was easy to forget about things that would need to be dealt with.
She sighed and shut her eyes. When she opened them, it was to see Alessandro standing by the sun lounger, looking at her through sunglasses.
‘You’re not the picture of joy and rapture,’ he said without preamble.
Laura shielded her eyes against the glare of the sun and propped herself up on her elbow. Would she ever tire of the sight of him? He took her breath away. When he was near, her heart beat faster and her pulse raced. There was no bit of her, emotionally, physically, intellectually, into which he didn’t intrude. He had managed to take over her entire being and when she thought about him no longer being around she felt as though she was staring into a black, bottomless void that filled her with tearing emptiness and despair.
She knew that she had only herself to blame. He hadn’t asked her to fall in love with him. In fact, he had made it clear from the start that love was a four-letter word that didn’t exist in his vocabulary. If her heart had broken free of its leash, that had had nothing to do with him.
‘I’m going to miss all this when we leave...’ She forced a smile as he settled into the sun lounger next to her.
His first thought was that the house wasn’t going anywhere. Who was to say that she wouldn’t be back? Then he frowned because that was just the sort of forward planning he always avoided with a woman.
‘Holidays in the sun aren’t out of reach just because you live in Scotland.’ He shrugged and Laura kept on smiling because that was just the sort of response she didn’t want. Of course he couldn’t guess that a holiday in the sun, any old holiday in the sun, wasn’t what she was talking about.
‘I’ll have to start saving,’ she said lightly. ‘Believe it or not, teachers don’t earn all that much...’
Alessandro slanted a killer smile and leaned on his side, feathering a light touch on her arm and feeling the soft shudder of her body with a familiar, mounting arousal. She was so responsive and that never failed to turn him on. He couldn’t get enough of her. ‘I admit this particular resort is probably out of reach for the average teacher,’ he murmured, ‘unless, of course, the average teacher happens to be the lover of the above-average tycoon... I’m glad you enjoyed it here. It’s good for the place to get a little use.’
‘Why do you have places like this if you never use them?’
‘As investments,’ Alessandro said lazily. ‘It’s not exactly killing me. This house has appreciated substantially in value since it was bought and right now I’m glad I was never tempted to sell it.’
‘So you’ve never brought anyone here?’
‘When you say anyone...’
‘Women. Those lucky women who you happened to be dating...’
‘I’ve tended to stick closer to home.’
‘Why’s that?’
‘I really want you right now...’
‘When you don’t want to talk, you resort to the physical. I’ve noticed that.’
Alessandro flung himself back and stared up at the bright blue sky. He’d never known a woman more disrespectful of his boundaries. He pointed them out, she saw them and then she proceeded to trample all over them as though they didn’t exist.
‘I happen to enjoy the physical,’ he said, turning to her, and she looked at him with something approaching pity. ‘It beats,’ he was pressed to continue irritably, ‘having long, meaningful conversations about things that don’t matter.’
Laura’s soft mouth tightened. ‘Well...I hate to burst your bubble but sometimes people do have to have long, meaningful conversations, even if you find them boring and irrelevant.’
She hadn’t meant to have this conversation. It cast a stormy cloud over what remained of the little paradise she had spent the past few days occupying, but how could she carry on pretending? Knowing that the more time she spent with him, the deeper in love she fell and the more painful it would eventually be to extricate herself?
What a mess.
Alessandro stilled. Did he want to hear this? He sat up and removed his sunglasses to look at her.
Laura’s heart was racing. Her mouth was dry. Did she really want to ruin what was left of their stay here? She could laugh and change the subject. She could just accept that it wasn’t an ideal situation but why rock the boat, why not just enjoy what was on offer until the offer was rescinded? Why not play the game, as he suggested, and when things ended, just explain to Roberto and her grandmother that it hadn’t worked out in the end? Why not enjoy the hedonistic pleasure they got from one another and enjoy it without an agonising guilty conscience?
But how much enjoyment would she honestly get, knowing that it was just a matter of time before everything came crashing down around her and she was left to pick up the pieces? Every time he touched her, she would think that it might be the last. Every time she gazed at him, she would have to try not to let her feelings show, knowing that if he suspected the depth of what she felt, he would run a mile.
It would be like walking in a field of flowers knowing that underneath the perfect ground a series of landmines was waiting to be detonated.
‘I never said that I found them boring or irrelevant,’ Alessandro said carefully.
‘I can’t play this game. I can’t just have a mindless affair with you. I can’t take advantage of what my grandmother and Roberto mistakenly assume to have no-strings-attached sex. That’s just not the way I’m made.’ Her eyes shot away from his lean, beautiful face. ‘I know you think it’s a straightforward situation, I know you think that it makes it easier for us to...well, have this fling and then, when it comes to an end, we just break the news and walk away, but I...I can’t do that.’
‘Why not?’ Alessandro demanded.
He knew. He raked restless fingers through his dark hair and stood up abruptly. The open space around him felt too small, pressing down on him. For the first time in his life the job of ridding himself of a woman who had made the terminal mistake of falling in love with him felt like an anchor dragging him down. And she did love him. He’d managed to shove that into his blind spot but she loved him.
He had his rules. He always made them clear. It had always been easy to bid farewell to someone who hadn’t taken them on board. But then again, his boredom threshold was low. He had never felt the need to pursue any woman who wanted more than he was prepared to give. On the few occasions when this situation had presented itself, he had already been on the way to finding the whole thing pretty tedious anyway. Ending it had never been a hardship.
Not so now. He wasn’t ready.
‘Aside from the fact that I don’t feel comfortable deceiving Roberto and Gran—’
‘How are we being deceptive?’ He spread his hands in a gesture of frustration. ‘We have a relationship!’
‘We don’t have the sort of relationship they imagine we do.’
‘We’re not hurting anyone,’ Alessandro persisted, bemused by his own inability to start the process of disentanglement and not wanting to voice the
reality lying like a leaden weight between them. Their eyes tangled and he flushed darkly.
‘Why don’t you just say what you have to say and get it over and done with?’ he rasped.
Laura hesitated, torn between a desperate need to try to patch things over and a driving urge to just tell him how she felt. She knew there was still a part of her that half hoped an admission of love wouldn’t drive him away, and feeling like that, hoping against reason, annoyed and dismayed her.
She drew in a deep breath and held his gaze levelly, even though she was quaking inside.
‘I’m too involved with you emotionally to do this, Alessandro,’ she said, choosing her words carefully. ‘It’s not a game for me and if I carry on with...with this, I’m going to end up horribly hurt, and I don’t want to be hurt.’
‘I warned you not to...get involved. I told you I don’t do love.’
‘Sorry if I disobeyed orders!’ Laura’s voice had risen angrily. How could he just stand there and look at her as though she had suddenly turned into a stranger? His dark eyes were guarded and cool. ‘Some of us actually have emotions!’
‘I have emotions. I just know how to control them!’
‘I can’t do this.’ She stood up and stormed off.
Alessandro watched her go but he had to force himself not to follow her. He waited until she was out of sight, unnerved by his indecision, and finally he swung round angrily and headed for the beach.
The sound of the sea would soothe him. He needed perspective but for the first time in his life perspective eluded him. She loved him and he had known and he hadn’t walked away. Shouldn’t that have been his first instinctive response?
A Pawn in the Playboy's Game Page 16