by Abby Green
She’d refused to tell him anything about her agreement with his grandmother, so he had no way to know what she’d been promised. If she told him then he could negotiate. On the other hand, if she wanted to pit him against Jocelyn wouldn’t she have told him everything? Perhaps she’d been offered such a huge amount of money that she genuinely believed he couldn’t top it?
The circling questions irritated him intensely, because he was a man who dealt in knowns. Not unknowns. And worse than the questions circling in his head was the burning awareness of her. Her scent...those curves, more pronounced with her pregnancy. And this primal thing he felt—stronger every time now when he saw her belly. Mine.
It was too reminiscent of that night when he’d taken her innocence...when he’d wanted to brand her, mark her.
It was only when Zac saw Rose clapping enthusiastically, with suspiciously bright eyes, that he realised he’d all but missed the entire performance because he’d been so fixated on her. Again.
* * *
Rose had been so lost in the beautiful open-air performance that she’d almost been able to block out the man by her side. Almost. But every now and then his hard thigh had brushed hers, or their elbows had connected. His scent had reached her nostrils when he’d shifted in his seat—which he’d done a lot—and she’d had to grit her jaw to try and stop her body from responding with a fresh wave of awareness and desire. So really she hadn’t blocked him out at all.
Everyone was standing now, and moving, and Rose was embarrassed at the emotion that had taken her unawares. She stood and avoided Zac’s too shrewd eyes, feeling a little raw.
As they joined the throng of people making their way out to the street, someone stepped on Rose’s dress from behind, jerking her backwards. She let out a small yelp of surprise, and suddenly Zac was reaching for her and steadying her, pulling her into his arms. The older man who had stepped on her dress was effusive in his apologies and Rose smiled, saying that it was okay, more shaken by the man holding her now than the almost-fall.
After the apologetic man had left she looked up, heart pounding. Zac seemed to be oblivious to the fact that the crowd had to snake around them to go down the stairs, and that they were drawing more than a few looks.
Her body was slowly going on fire from the inside out...every curve pressed against that hard body. She felt panicky. Why wasn’t he moving back, letting her go? He would see in a second how much she wanted him, and she couldn’t bear that humiliation again.
She tried to pull back, but he only tightened his hold. She could feel the swell of her belly pressed against him, and then the unmistakable hardness of his arousal pushing against it. Her eyes widened as adrenaline and lust shot into her system.
Zac said mockingly, ‘Don’t look so shocked. It’s not as if you’re an innocent any more.’
The memory of that kiss came back...the way he’d looked so cool afterwards, unruffled, when she’d been standing there horribly exposed in her desire. ‘But I...I thought you didn’t...’
‘I think the evidence speaks for itself.’
He moved subtly and Rose almost moaned, hardly hearing his taut admission. She could recognise through the haze of desire that he obviously didn’t welcome it. That much was obvious in his grim expression. It was enough to make Rose jerk free and hurry down the steps.
Zac caught up with her, though, and took her hand, keeping her by his side. He said nothing more as they walked through the busy streets outside the opera house to where a driver was waiting to deliver them back to where the helicopter had landed earlier.
When they reached it, after a tense silence in the back of the car, Zac strapped Rose into the seat, his hands brushing against her sensitive breasts.
She bit her lip—hard—and he saw it. He lifted his hand and with his thumb tugged her lip free, rubbing it.
A pulse throbbed between her legs as she watched Zac walk around and take his seat beside her. He didn’t look at her again, but she had the strangest feeling that some silent dialogue had just passed between them and she’d made some tacit agreement...to what?
She was afraid she knew, much as she’d like to deny it. It was in every pulsing erogenous zone in her body. Engorged with blood and heat.
Anticipation gripped her as the helicopter lowered itself down over the villa grounds, and Rose desperately tried to bring her body back under control. Because she knew that as soon as they got out Zac would look at her with that familiar cool, disdainful expression and she’d have been made a fool. Again. No matter what his body might have said.
Zac’s brooding silence, and the speed with which he drove the Jeep back to the villa, seemed only to confirm Rose’s suspicion that he wanted her out of his sight as soon as possible.
When they stopped, she almost fell out of the Jeep. She was eager to put some distance between them before he saw how jittery she was.
She was almost inside the villa when Zac said from behind her, ‘Where do you think you’re going?’
She turned around slowly in the main doorway to see Zac standing in front of the Jeep. He was pulling at his bow tie, undoing it and then flipping open the top button of his shirt.
Rose felt a bead of sweat roll down between her breasts. She could hardly breathe. ‘I’m going to bed...’
Zac’s face was half in the shadows, and when he stepped forward she gasped to see the sheer naked hunger in his gaze. She was rooted to the spot as he came closer, even though she knew she should turn and go.
There was too much between them—too much unsaid and tangled and dark. He hated her. But he wanted her. And she was weak...and she wanted him.
And then he was in front of her, touching her. He placed a hand on her waist and pulled her into him, and the same rogue part of her that had allowed him to seduce her whilst knowing it was unutterably selfish and wicked surged back into life.
And worst of all, as he bent his head and blotted out the world with his mouth on hers, she knew that she was giving in because she desperately wanted to pretend for a few weak moments that perhaps animosity and resentment wasn’t all that Zac felt for her...
* * *
Zac’s mouth was on Rose’s and he was drowning in soft sweetness. Her tongue was tangling hotly with his, arms twining around his neck. And he didn’t give a damn about anything else in that moment. Except this. Her. Now.
He knew that if he didn’t move while he still retained some control over his motor functions they might well end up on the ground right there, and he’d waited too long to take her like a rutting animal.
He lifted her into his arms for sheer expediency and walked through the villa, straight to his bedroom suite. The room was in darkness, and Zac lowered Rose to her feet and reached for a light. He wanted to see every inch of her. Laid bare to him. He was done with fighting his desire for her.
When he straightened he took off his jacket, letting it drop to the floor. Not taking his eyes off hers, he undid his shirt and took that off too. As much as he’d have enjoyed her doing it, he was too impatient now.
She was just standing in front of him, looking transfixed, as if she couldn’t really believe where she was. And something glowed in those huge eyes—something he didn’t want to see, because it blurred the present into the past. So he said, ‘Turn around,’ with a roughness to his voice that he didn’t relish. It betrayed too much.
But then she did turn around, and he forgot about anything else. Her zip had been driving him crazy since he’d walked out of the villa behind her at the start of the evening. He pulled it down to where it ended, just above her buttocks. And then he pushed the dress over her shoulders and off, so that it fell to her waist.
Rose’s hair was caught up into a chignon of sorts. He could see where the pins stuck out slightly, as if she’d struggled to tame it. Something about that hint of vulnerability struck him, and i
t was not welcome. To defuse it, he pulled the pins out and her hair fell around her shoulders. Soft, silky, fragrant. He wanted to run it through his fingers and bury his face in it... He stopped himself. That was the kind of thing crazy, besotted men did.
Instead, he focused on getting her naked. He undid her bra from behind and pushed that over her shoulders too, and then he came close behind her and pulled it down her arms so it fell to the floor.
He cupped her breasts. They were bigger, more beautiful, perfectly shaped. The puckered pink areolae surrounding the nipples were larger too. This evidence of her pregnancy was intensely erotic. He pinched them, softly, and felt Rose quiver against him, sucking in a breath. He kissed her where her neck met her shoulders and the taste of her skin clouded every sense.
When she turned to face him, dislodging his hands, Zac was feeling feral. He yanked off the rest of his clothes and saw Rose push down her dress and underwear until she was fully naked.
On a reflex Zac went to reach for the protection in a drawer by the bed, but then stopped as the realisation dawned on him that he didn’t need it.
He knew that this should actually be making him come to his senses, reminding him of who he was dealing with, but all he could think about was how badly he wanted to sink inside her with no barrier between them.
She was looking at him and he saw uncertainty in her expression. His gaze dropped down, taking in the luscious dips and curves, and one curve in particular: the swell of her belly.
Acting on an impulse he couldn’t ignore, he reached out and touched her there, spreading his hand over the swell. It was still soft...but he could feel the hardness just underneath.
An unknown emotion gripped him, making him feel powerful in a way he’d never experienced before—and also humble. For a crazy moment he wanted to drop to his knees and press his mouth to her there, to wrap his arms tight around her... The desire was so strong that it nearly felled him.
‘Zac...?’
He looked up and the feeling passed. Lust engulfed him. He gave in to it with a sense of relief. ‘Lie back on the bed, Rose.’
The uncertain expression left her face, to be replaced by something more like anticipation. She sat down and Zac put a hand on himself, feeling the drop of moisture at the head of his erection.
But then something dark rose up inside him. He wanted to obliterate what he’d just been feeling and he stepped forward, relishing Rose’s avid gaze on his body.
Just when she’d started to move back to lie on the bed, he said, ‘Wait—I want you to take me in your mouth. Taste me, Rose.’
She looked up at him and he saw the flare in her eyes, along with that uncertainty again. Every cell was crying out for her touch. The beast inside him roared for full release, but he needed this more right now—needed her mouth on him in a classic supplicant pose, as if that might dilute some of the intensity swirling in his gut.
She reached out a tentative hand and he took his own hand away so she could wrap her fingers around him. He sucked in a breath to see that small pale hand around his hard flesh. ‘Stroke me.’ For pity’s sake, he almost howled.
She moved her hand up and down, eyes widening as she saw how he thickened even more. Her thumb swiped over its head, spreading the fluid, and Zac had to bite down on his tongue.
And then, with a quick glance upwards, she leaned forward and took him into her mouth. She was awkward at first, but that, coupled with the knowledge that this was the first time she was doing this was tantamount to having one of the world’s most experienced lovers take him into her expert mouth.
She sucked, stroked and licked until Zac honestly didn’t know how he was still standing. His hands were buried in her hair. He was a heartbeat away from holding her still so he could thrust into her mouth and find his release at last. But there, teetering on the edge, something stopped him.
He couldn’t do it. Couldn’t demand that she milk him like this...
He pulled free of her mouth and she released him, looking up, eyes unfocused. No woman had ever looked at him like that...as if she’d got off on it too. He gently deposited her in the middle of the bed, coming down beside her, every nerve and cell taut with anticipation.
He spread her legs with one hand, feeling more animal than man, and explored the slick evidence of her readiness. It was all he could do not to thrust in, harder and deeper than he ever had before, but he moved over her, mindful of the vulnerable swell of her belly that impacted upon him somewhere he chose to ignore, and lodged himself between her spread legs. He forced himself to go slowly. It was torture...delicious torture...as inch by inch he felt her hot sheath accept him and clasp him tight.
When he was so deep he could barely breathe, her whole body arched like a bow against his, and she let out a long, low groan.
Zac couldn’t move for a moment. Had anything ever felt so perfect? No. And then he started to move, and perfection was eclipsed.
Rose’s eyes were shut tight as he lifted one of her thighs, hooking her leg around his hip. ‘Look at me,’ Zac demanded.
She opened them, and he willed her to keep looking as he drove into her again and again and again. The intense battle of wills was won when she started raking his back with her nails, her body quivering and shaking against his as she pleaded hoarsely for release.
Only then did Zac unleash the demon inside him, and their worlds collided in a shattering explosion of tension that was almost fearsome in its intensity.
* * *
Hours later Zac sat on the edge of the bed, looking at the dawn breaking over the Tuscan hills, a faint mist clinging to the earth before it would be burned off by the sun.
He felt turned inside out—undone, exposed. There was movement behind him on the bed and he stood up, reaching for his trousers. He heard a sleepy and sexy-sounding, ‘Zac...? Where are you going?’ and knew what he had to do.
He’d let his guard down here in Italy. He’d told Rose too much the other night, and this was proof that given half a chance she would insert herself under his skin until she was in so deep he’d never get her out again.
He turned around. She was raised on one elbow, the sheet barely covering her lush breasts. He recalled how it had felt to drive into that perfect heat and feel the press of her swollen belly against him. Predictably his body responded, and a sense of desperation filled him.
‘I’m not going anywhere—but you are. You’re going back to New York today.’
CHAPTER NINE
THE IRONY THAT Rose was flying over the land of her parents was not lost on her as she looked out of the plane’s window. Unfortunately she was too high to see anything of the green island, but her heart ached for her mother and her father.
She’d called the clinic soon after Zac’s private plane had taken off and had spoken to her father. The operation was taking place in just over a week—a couple of days after Zac was due back in New York. Her father had sounded in good spirits, and that, at least, was some balm to her ravaged spirit.
Ravaged because she now knew that she’d lost herself body, heart and soul to Zac Valenti. And he didn’t want to know.
He’d stood in front of her that morning and every line of his body had screamed regret for what had happened the previous night. Regret and rejection.
And then she’d made it worse, because her body had still felt the bliss of his touch and she’d foolishly thought that she had to try and reach him...to make him understand. She hadn’t been able to bear the thought that he believed she’d wanted to do this to him.
She’d knelt on the bed, the sheet pulled around her, and said, ‘You have to believe me when I say that I truly never wanted to betray you, Zac.’
His face had assumed that mask of indifference she hated.
‘You say you didn’t want to do it, but you did. So which is it, Rose? I’m not in the m
ood for riddles.’
The words had trembled on her tongue. She’d ached to blurt out the whole sad and sorry story. To confess about her father... But under that infinitely cold gaze, even while her body had still held the memory of his blazing touch, she’d felt insecure. Unsure. How could he flip so easily between cold and heat? He just wanted her. He didn’t care about her. And she just couldn’t take the risk that he wouldn’t care what happened to her father.
She’d felt defeated and had sunk back down. ‘It doesn’t matter,’ she’d said.
Zac had shaken his head. ‘You clearly have an agenda here, Rose, and I know what it is.’
‘You do?’
He nodded. ‘I think you’re going to wait until the baby is born and then you’re going to pit me against my grandmother. That’s it, isn’t it? You’re going to sell my baby to the highest bidder... But you’ll wait until then—until we all know exactly what’s at stake.’
Shock and horror had coursed through her as Zac had paced towards her and his expression had grown even harder. Hard enough to strip away any sense of civility.
‘I’ve already told you I’ll do whatever it takes to bring my child up as a Valenti. And if that means ruining myself in the process, to pay the highest price, I’ll do it. I’ve done it before and I survived. I can do it again.’
Zac had stepped back then, and Rose had felt the very physical wave of his sheer animosity and hatred. Despite last night, nothing had changed. Things were actually worse. He resented her for what he saw as his weakness. A weakness of the flesh. And her heart had contracted into a small ball in her chest, as if that could offer some protection.
Zac had said finally, ‘This is the last discussion we will have on this topic until the baby is born—and, believe me, when it is I’ll be ready to fight for custody, Rose.’ He’d continued in a clipped voice. ‘When you return to New York you’ll move into the adjoining apartment to mine for the remainder of your pregnancy. We can communicate through my assistants.’