‘Have you got around to telling your mother about my moving in?’ Riccardo asked, and Julia looked at him with troubled eyes.
‘What?’
‘Your mother. Have you told her that I have moved in?’
‘No. Ah, I didn’t…I haven’t had the opportunity as yet.’ She returned to the fork in her hand, washing it more carefully than was required. She could smell the clean, tangy, masculine scent of him, filling her nostrils, and she edged a little away from his arm next to hers.
‘How do you think she will react? It never occurred to me that mothers might be a bit protective about their daughters living with a man.’
‘You’re Nicola’s father; it’s an unusual situation but Riccardo, I don’t think this situation…can…is going to work out. I…’
‘Why not?’
‘Because…’ Her voice trailed away into silence and she could feel his eyes on her, running over her flustered face and along her body.
‘Because I have told you that I still want you?’ Riccardo asked silkily, abandoning all his efforts to put her at her ease and not charge in. He wanted her to admit her attraction to him. It wasn’t enough seeing it in her eyes. He wanted to hear it as well, wanted her to break down and confess that she couldn’t resist him. He wanted her to come to him and the only way that was going to happen was if she was truthful, with herself and him. ‘Would you rather that I had not said anything? Even though you must have felt it, must have seen it in my eyes whenever I looked at you.’ He could feel himself getting hot under his collar as she clung to her stubborn silence. Dammit! This was taking English reticence too far! ‘And you’re going to have to deal with this because I’m here now and I won’t be going away.’
‘You’ll go away if I tell you to!’ Julia bit out, her grey eyes flashing as they met hers. ‘This is my house, in case you’ve forgotten!’
‘Your house in which my daughter lives!’ He knew that it was a low trick, bringing Nicola into the equation whenever he needed a winning card, but not all things in life were fair and playing by the book had never been one of his strong points. ‘If it had not been for you, your brother and my ex-wife, this situation would never have arisen! Like it or not, you will just have to accept some of the responsibility for my being here in the first place!’ A more convoluted argument it would have been hard to find, but he stood his ground, challenging her with a hard, unyielding stare.
‘I won’t tolerate you being here if you’re going to make things awkward for me,’ Julia told him unsteadily. She slipped off the daffodil-yellow washing-up gloves and draped them over the side of the sink, then she dried her hands on the small towel on the counter and sidled away from him, still watching him from under her lashes as though afraid that he might strike unexpectedly.
‘In other words,’ Riccardo mocked, turning around to look at her and folding his arms across his broad chest, ‘I should just go along with the pretence that we’re no more than, what…acquaintances? Two people who happen to be accidentally living under the same roof because of a third party? Tell me, do we converse at all or should I abide by strict guidelines that I never get too personal?’ There was biting sarcasm in his voice that made Julia cringe.
‘Of course we can be polite to one another—’
‘Polite!’ He gave a crack of hard laughter and walked towards her. ‘We made love and yet you expect us both to behave like polite strangers when we’re in each other’s presence?’
‘I…I wish you wouldn’t keep bringing that up,’ Julia stammered.
‘There are a lot of things you seem to wish.’ He stopped in front of her. It took supreme will-power to fight down his natural urge to say what needed to be said and hang the consequences. ‘Look,’ he sighed and raked his long fingers through his hair, then stuck his hands in his pockets, ‘we’re standing here arguing. I do not want to argue with you. Why don’t I make us both a cup of coffee and we can go into the sitting room and discuss this like two adults?’
‘You mean you’re prepared to stop bullying me?’
‘Is that what you think I’m doing?’
Julia hated herself for melting whenever he came close to her, whenever he spoke, whenever he so much as glanced in her direction. How could she be rational and logical when he made her feel as if she was walking along the edge of a cliff in a strong wind?
‘Isn’t it?’ Julia asked, sticking her chin out and refusing to go weak-kneed.
‘I don’t bully,’ Riccardo said, briefly looking away.
‘No, you just carry on shouting until you get your own way.’
‘Now you make me sound like a toddler. Throwing a temper tantrum if he doesn’t get some sweets.’ His voice was so disarmingly rueful that Julia felt herself beginning to smile, only to dimly remember the cause of their argument.
He could move from rage to charm, from aggression to humour so seamlessly that he never failed to take her by surprise. Was that how she had so carelessly managed to fall in love with him? Because her defences couldn’t withstand the complexity of his personality? Every other man she had ever met seemed one-dimensional in comparison.
‘Now, you go and wait for me in the sitting room and I shall bring some coffee in. And you have my word that I won’t raise my voice or bully you. Deal?’
‘Why do I trust you even less when you’re being nice, Riccardo?’
‘Because you’re suspicious.’ He held his hands up in mock-surrender. ‘I will be as good as gold.’
Julia headed for the sitting room, vaguely aware that she had somehow been manoeuvred, and then sat on the sofa, her legs curled up beneath her. God, he might drive her crazy, scare the hell out of her when she thought of the damage he could do to her heart, but every pore in her body felt alive when he was around. It just wasn’t fair!
He came in a few minutes later, carrying a circular tray on which were two cups, the glass jug of percolated coffee and a small jug of milk. ‘I waited tables when I was at university to earn some money,’ he said, resting the tray on the table and sitting on the sofa. ‘Are you impressed?’
‘You waited tables? I’m not impressed, Riccardo, I’m surprised,’ Julia said, diverted by this revelation. She watched as he poured her a cup of coffee and handed the cup to her.
He shot her a gleaming look over his shoulder as he leaned to pour himself a cup. ‘Did you imagine that I would never do anything so menial as waiting tables?’
‘I imagined that you would not have had to. Caroline said that—’
‘I came from a lot of money? You and my ex-wife seem to have had quite a lot of conversations about me.’
‘I guess there was a lot of stuff she needed to get off her chest.’ Julia shrugged and hoped that this would not lead to another surge of anger over his ex-wife’s dubious politics concerning their daughter, but he seemed relaxed.
‘My family is very wealthy; I would be the first to admit it.’ He sat back and stretched out his legs. ‘But I never felt that I had the right to use their wealth when I was perfectly capable of supporting myself. I did a number of jobs when I was at university, including bartending and holiday work at a building company. Now, that is what I would call hard work. Lifting bags of cement and heaving bricks.’
Julia imagined him bare-backed under the summer sun, body glistening with sweat as he heaved bricks, and her cheeks pinkened at the violently erotic image her mind conjured up. He would have been the sort of workman that women paused to wolf-whistle rather than the other way around!
‘I worked my way through university as well,’ she admitted. ‘Although that was largely from necessity.’
‘What did you do?’ There seemed no end to his curiosity. He wanted to find out everything he could about this woman, every little detail of her life.
‘I worked at the check-out tills at the supermarket in the evenings. It was fun. The people were a good laugh. And I worked in shops.’ She smiled at the memory and sipped her coffee.
‘So we have more in common than
you admit,’ Riccardo murmured and he sensed her tense, but he would just have to break through that tension. Either that or remain politely distant until the time came for him to leave with his daughter. And he was not going to remain politely distant.
‘We should be able to share this house quite amicably,’ he continued.
‘You know why we can’t, Riccardo.’
‘I know why we might not be able to…’
‘It’s the same thing.’ Julia rested her cup on the table and drew her knees up, circling them with her arms as she looked at him.
‘It is very far from being the same thing,’ he told her conversationally. ‘If I thought we couldn’t share this house because our personalities were incompatible then I would never have moved in. But I don’t. The reason we might not be able to share this house is because I am honest about the way I feel, while you persist in holding on to a lie.’ His voice was quite calm, as were the dark eyes resting on her flushed face. Persuasively calm.
‘Why do you have to insist on reducing everything to a personal level?’ Julia pleaded.
‘Because, whether you want to admit it or not, the personal level exists between us. I can feel it throbbing in the air whenever we’re in the same room, I can feel it down the end of the line whenever you’re on the phone! Why pretend otherwise?’ When she didn’t answer he shook his head impatiently. ‘You never answered my question.’
‘What question?’
‘The one I asked you earlier. You told me that you weren’t after a casual affair. So what are you after, Julia? Love, marriage and fireworks? Romance with all the frills and a happy-ever-after ending?’ His mouth twisted cynically and Julia blinked rapidly as tears tried to push their way through from under her eyelids.
This was why they had to be polite to one another! Because every time feelings entered the equation a Pandora’s box was opened and they came up against the same, immovable brick wall.
‘I thought you were immune to such dreams?’ he pressed on ruthlessly. ‘I thought you had rebelled against your mother’s nagging for you to settle down, have two children and spend the rest of your life playing the housewife.’
‘I’m just not interested in having a casual affair.’ Her mouth was set in a stubborn line and she began to stand up, to run away from the conversation, but his hand descended on her wrist, forcing her to remain where she was.
‘You’ve had affairs in the past, haven’t you? You’re not a virgin!’
‘I haven’t had affairs in the past! You make it sound as though I’ve led a life of debauchery! I had a couple of boyfriends, yes, but that’s it!’
‘So why is it so different this time?’ he asked, jerking her towards him, his eyes grim.
Because I’m in love with you, Julia wanted to throw at him. Because I can’t just have uninvolved fun with you! I want too much.
‘Maybe I’m just getting older,’ she said, her breath catching painfully in her throat. ‘I don’t want to waste any more time with someone who isn’t meant for me. So it doesn’t matter about physical attraction or about whether you want me or I want you. I might want you, Riccardo…’ Saying it hurt but she had to, or else he would pursue her. Challenges for a man like Riccardo were fine, just provided none of them got away. If they did then he would chase them to the ends of the earth and back, but if she mentioned commitment and marriage he would back off. She looked at him without flinching. ‘I just don’t want what you have to offer.’
‘Are you sure about that?’ he murmured lazily. He began to gently caress the tender back of her wrist with his thumb and Julia’s eyes widened.
‘Very sure,’ she replied hoarsely.
‘How can you say that,’ he chided softly, ‘when you haven’t sampled all I have to offer? It is very small-minded to reject something when you haven’t first tried it.’
‘I don’t think…tha…that that refers to sexual experimentation,’ Julia whispered. He was no longer holding her wrist, yet still her arm refused to move. It lay there, leaden and impassive, inviting him to run his forefinger from elbow to wrist, making her shiver.
He mesmerised her, and the devil knew it. She could hear it in his smoky voice and see it in the slow smile.
‘You want a routine courtship and a white wedding,’ he drawled softly, ‘but take it from me, there’s more to life than marriage. What we have is bigger than both of us…why fight it?’ He shifted until he was close to her, then he very gently smoothed her legs flat so that she was lying on the sofa and staring up at his darkly sexy face.
‘I miss your spectacles,’ he murmured wryly. ‘There is something very erotic about removing a woman’s glasses.’
‘You’ve done a lot of that in the past, have you?’
‘Never,’ he admitted, tantalising her senses with another of those lingering smiles. ‘I pride myself on being open for new experiences.’
‘And that’s what I am, isn’t it, Riccardo? A new experience.’
He halted the fight she wanted by putting his finger on her lips. Then he held both her hands and raised them to the back of the sofa so that she was stretched out for his hungry eyes.
They could argue until the cows came home, he thought as his body reared up in response to the sight of her, she could preach about right and wrong and should and shouldn’t, but they were drawn to each other like magnets.
He lowered his head and kissed her. It was a lingering kiss and he traced her lips delicately with his tongue, explored the softness of her mouth until she was gasping.
Then he kissed her neck, nibbling the slender white column, letting their anticipation mount while his thoughts played with images of her nakedness, milky white against his copper skin.
‘Riccardo…’
‘Ssh, don’t talk.’ She wasn’t wearing a bra. He knew that much, had spotted it as soon as she had appeared after her shower. The top was not transparent and she probably wasn’t even aware of how lovingly it shaped the contours of her breasts. He teased her collarbone with his mouth and with a little groan Julia curled her fingers into his hair.
This shouldn’t be happening! But the minute he touched her she was lost. She didn’t just want him, she was burning up with it! She wanted to taste him, that sweetly addictive masculine taste that dragged her into a vortex of desire.
She gave a little squeak when his mouth moved down to her breasts and he began sucking her nipple through her clinging top, dampening it until the outline of her nipple was evident.
‘No bra,’ he murmured, lifting his gaze to her.
‘I hardly ever wear one when I’m in the house,’ Julia panted unsteadily.
‘Keep it that way,’ he laughed huskily and resumed his tender nibbling of her breast, saving himself for the moment when he could lift her top and view the real thing.
One hand stroked the line of her thigh. Jeans had to be the most frustrating item in a woman’s wardrobe, he thought. Now if she had been wearing a skirt he could have felt her skin under his, felt every little shudder.
He gently lifted the top and groaned as he looked at her pert nipples, aroused and dark. He flicked his tongue over one and she shifted on the sofa, releasing little sighs of contentment that went straight to the core of him, making him want to take her right there and right now, without the preliminaries of foreplay.
‘If you don’t want this, tell me now,’ he ordered roughly.
‘You know I don’t want it,’ Julia moaned, but when he raised his head she pulled him back down. ‘I don’t want it, but I need it. Make love to me, Riccardo.’
The sweetest words ever uttered. He stood up, watching her watching him, and undid his belt, letting it slither to the ground, then he unzipped his trousers and stepped out of them.
Julia had never found anything remotely fascinating about male strippers. In fact, on the one occasion she had gone with a gang of friends to see some perform at a club for a hen party she had found the sight of men removing their clothes positively comical.
But
this was mind-blowingly erotic. She knew that he was looking at her, maybe amused by her intent gaze, maybe turned on by it, but she couldn’t help herself. She watched as he removed his clothing and then carried on watching when he stood in front of her, unashamedly masculine and very obviously turned on.
‘Now it’s your turn,’ he said, standing proudly male while she slowly stood up and began fumbling with the button on her jeans. She might have changed her image and polished her exterior, but her newly acquired outward shine certainly did not penetrate below skin level. She had never been watched by a man before, not like this, not knowing that his eyes were focused on her every movement, and her hands were slippery with nerves.
‘I wish you wouldn’t stand watching me like that, Riccardo,’ she said shyly, and he grinned.
‘OK. I’ll sit.’ He sat down and watched. Not much better from her self-conscious point of view.
But it was a sight he would not have missed for the world. So gauche, so unrehearsed, so utterly, utterly feminine with it. He had a stab of painful regret that he had not been the one to gently lead her out of her virginity. Her fingers were trembling and he wanted to pull her towards him and bury her against his chest.
She modestly stood, nude, before him, her arms crossed and he beckoned her to him with the crook of one finger.
‘You are beautiful,’ he murmured throatily, tucking her alongside him on the sprawling sofa. She needed tenderness, and he made love tenderly, rousing her with his tongue, with his hands, with his fingers, tracing the outline of her body, revelling in her pliancy and bringing her to the point of orgasm, only to thrust inside her with an explosion of fulfilment when neither of them could hold out any longer.
Julia lay against him, her head on his chest, listening to the rhythm of his heartbeat.
When she stirred he gently pushed her head back into its resting position.
‘Now tell me what we just did was a mistake,’ he said softly and Julia sighed.
‘You know it was. It won’t happen again.’
‘A one-off?’ he said, lazily content. ‘Like the last time? We are irresistibly drawn to one another. Now is the time for you to admit it.’
Riccardo's Secret Child Page 15