by Maya Blake
Alejandro’s face was stamped with the same naked hunger clawing through her.
‘I have waited long enough, querida. Tonight you’ll be mine,’ he commanded thickly. ‘Say the words, Elise.’
Her heart lurched, then sped up its beat. ‘I’ll be yours,’ she whispered.
His breath shuddered out. Cradling her hands between his, he kissed her knuckles, then drew her out of the alcove. Wordlessly, he led her back to the party.
Elise spent the rest of the evening drifting in a haze of anticipation and trepidation.
She’d pledged her virginity to a powerful, virile man who knew his way around a female body, whereas the circumstances of her upbringing had made her shy away from even the mention of sex. She knew the technicalities of the act, but beyond that she would be operating blind.
A hysterical bubble rose in her throat. Quickly swallowing it down, she tried to breathe through her nerves. She was still battling her way through her anxiety when Gael approached where she stood with Alejandro saying goodbye to the first wave of departing guests.
The brothers shook hands, a look passing between them that was almost too intense to witness. ‘Not bad for a good day’s work, huh?’ Gael joked, but his eyes shone with more than just triumph. They shone with pride, and yearning for acceptance, both of which Alejandro’s lopsided smile reflected.
‘You have my permission to pat yourself on the back now.’
Gael snorted. ‘That’s what the girlfriends are for.’ His expression veiled for a moment, then returned to Alejandro. ‘I’m heading to Spain in the morning. I’ll be back in time to join you for the first site tours at the end of the week.’
Alejandro had stiffened at the mention of his homeland. Imagining the subject disturbing enough to be dropped, she was surprised when he nodded. ‘Do you see her often? Your mother?’
Eyes a few shades lighter than his shadowed before Gael’s expression cleared. Shrugging, he said, ‘She visits me in California a couple of times a year. I’ve set her up in a villa outside Barcelona. I try to see her when I can.’
Mild shock lit Alejandro’s eyes. ‘She’s no longer in Seville?’
Gael shook his head. ‘She moved ten years ago.’ He paused a beat. ‘Reconnecting should be easier now...for all concerned.’
Alejandro’s tension mounted. ‘The past needs to stay where it belongs.’
His younger brother looked as if he wanted to debate the point, but eventually, he shrugged. ‘Muy bien. Hasta luego, mi hermano.’
This time their goodbye involved clasped hands and half-hugs.
Alejandro remained the attentive host to his remaining guests, but he got more brooding the later the evening grew. It didn’t take a genius to guess Gael’s words had penetrated to a vulnerable place. But the moment the last guest left, he strode across the living-room floor and seized Elise in his arms.
The kiss was ferocious, his need a living beast intent on devouring her. She met him in hunger and desire, her need just as potent. When hands framed her face, and his kiss deepened, something incredibly powerful jolted within her. She wanted to hang the sexual desire term on it, but Elise knew it was more. So much more.
For good or ill—and a dark painful place within her suspected it might be the latter—she had fallen in love with Alejandro Aguilar. Deeply, irrevocably in love.
The beauty, purity and hauntingly doomed nature of her feeling caused tears to prickle her eyes. Desperate to seek the pleasure and forget the impending pain, she tightened her grip in his hair, luxuriating in the brilliant vitality of him.
He swung her into his arms without breaking the kiss. She didn’t need to know where he was taking her. Surrender was as inevitable as breathing.
In his room, he placed her on her feet and broke the kiss. Eyes turned a dark, gleaming moss, fired only by hunger, unrelenting and all-encompassing, blazed down at her. His hands found the side zip of her dress, and tugged. The heavy material dropped, leaving her in the new white lingerie set she’d let the stylist talk her into. White, the colour of innocence, the symbol of inexperience.
Nerves arrived, cold and urgent, to gnaw at the edges of her desire.
Sensing her sudden wavering, he closed his hands over her shoulders, his possessive touch warming her inside and out. ‘You’re breathtaking. I want you, amante, more than I’ve wanted anyone in a long time.’
She shivered at the intensity, the harsh purpose in his voice. She didn’t doubt the veracity of his statement. Only her ability to reciprocate even an ounce of that purpose. And then there was that vein of disillusionment in his eyes. She knew it needed addressing.
‘Alejandro, can we...clear the air?’ she ventured.
Coldness momentarily washed over his features. ‘No, amante. You’re about to be mine. By the time I’m done with you, you’ll forget every single thing about him. But until that happens, there will be no discussion, entiendes?’ he bit out roughly.
She shook her head. ‘Please—’
His thumb on her lower lip stilled her words. He took her hand, placed it on his chest, over his strong, racing heartbeat. ‘Feel what you do to me, even before we’re in bed together. You kiss me like you need me, like you’re on fire for me—’
‘I do,’ she asserted, her voice clear and certain. ‘I am.’
A deep shudder ran through him, transmitting through his thundering heartbeat. Dropping his head, he brushed his lips against hers. ‘That, Elise, is all I need.’
She allowed relief to wash away the doubt, aware that she was also buying her heart a little time before it was totally devastated. Because once she explained her reasons for Kyoto, she would be laid bare.
Standing on her tiptoes, she deepened the kiss, which he allowed her for a few dizzying heartbeats. Then his primal dominance took over.
Turning her in his arms, he traced his hands down her side and over her waist to cradle her hips. When a soft, hot kiss landed at the base of her spine, she shivered, even while her skin tightened and tingled with the most delicious pleasure.
Sure fingers hooked into her panties and drew them down her legs, his fingers lingering in places she hadn’t known were sensitive. Her shoes followed, and then she was naked. Naked and exposed to the man who held her heart in his hands without knowing it.
She sensed him rise behind her, felt the towering wall of his lust engulf her.
‘Turn around, mi corazón,’ he growled, his voice barely recognisable, but at the same time empowering her.
Slowly, she turned, met his bold, burning gaze. Something shifted in his eyes. She wanted to hope that it was an emotion akin to that which moved through her, but then his gaze swept down, possessing her, branding her.
‘Tu es magnífico,’ he grated roughly.
‘And you...you have too many clothes on,’ she whispered brokenly.
His rough laugh broke the spellbinding moment. But only for a second. In the next breath, the air thickened again, unspoken wishes and frenzied desire whipping around them even though he took his time to shrug off his jacket and step out of his shoes.
It was like her own personal striptease show; she watched, totally captivated as he undid the buttons of his shirt. Golden skin, a chiselled torso dusted with silky hair became her prize. Heat flooded her entire being, before centring hard and hot between her thighs. By the time he lowered his zip and tugged down his trousers and boxer briefs, Elise was certain she’d lost the ability to breathe. He was big and proud and utterly beautiful.
‘Alejandro...’
He closed his eyes for a second, as if gathering in his control. When he opened them again and speared her with green fire, he was once again in command. He caught her hand and led her to the king-size bed, stretched her out on it, then reached into his bedside drawer. At the sight of the condoms, she blushed.
He laughed almost cruelly as he stretched out beside her, his fingers tracing her heated cheeks. ‘Am I insane to still love your blushes?’
‘Yes. I hate them.’
‘As much as I’d love another battle of words with you, right now, amante, I crave your kiss even more. Kiss me, Elise.’
With a moan torn from the very soul of her, she wrapped her arms around his neck and satisfied their need. Within seconds the drugging kiss had set her on a course from which she didn’t want to return. Alejandro’s hands explored, gripping, demanding, lingering, and moulding until her moans threaded together in a continuous litany.
Then his fingers breached the heart of her. Her eyes flew open, her breath catching as pleasure arrowed, swift and lethal, between her thighs. Teasing the bundle of nerves, he dipped lower, one finger sliding inside.
He groaned, and swallowed hard. ‘Dios, so wet. So tight.’
She shuddered as he pulled out and slid back in. ‘Oh!’ A different set of emotions gathered, a promise of something transcendental on the horizon that shimmered just beyond her reach. Heart hammering, she strained for it, groaning in protest when Alejandro’s finger left her.
His trailing mouth on her skin made up for it though, until she sensed his destination.
Her head jerked off the pillow. ‘Alejandro, no...’
Molten eyes speared hers as his shoulders parted her thighs. ‘Yes. Save your breath, querida. I intend to win this argument, too.’
He didn’t ease her into pleasure. Alejandro dropped her hard and screaming into it. Emotion she came to recognise as bliss engulfed her seconds later as she climaxed, wild and free and shattered, against his open-mouthed kisses.
She floated down, vaguely aware of his hot, sweat-sheened skin beneath her hands. But slowly, her senses sparked once more, her body responding to the demands of his hands and the pressure of the body braced above hers.
He parted her thighs, positioned himself at her core. His eyes locked on her face. And she glimpsed the look again.
He started to lean down. She placed a hand on his chest.
‘Wait.’
He froze, his breathing harsh, teeth clenched. ‘Elise, por favor, now is not the time—’
‘Yes, it is. I didn’t... Nothing happened with... In Kyoto,’ she stammered.
Shock built in his eyes, but there was also scepticism. ‘You don’t need to say that to appease me,’ he bit out.
She shook her head. ‘But it’s the truth, Alejandro. I’m still a virgin.’
He stared deep into her eyes, his gaze piercingly raw. Whatever he saw in her face made his chest heave. ‘Elise...’ His voice rumbled away like distant thunder.
He didn’t need her reassurance. She knew he saw the truth in her face. But she gave it anyway. Reaching up, she placed her hand on his cheek. ‘I’m still untouched, Alejandro. Make me yours?’
The arms braced on either side of her trembled as the last trace of harshness trailed away from his face to leave fierce, ravenous hunger.
His kiss was deep and rough and intense, as if he meant to consume her completely.
When he lifted his head, her excitement was cresting a fever pitch.
She swallowed as his gaze latched on hers. ‘Lo siento, querida. I’m sorry. This cannot be helped.’
Biting her lips, she nodded.
‘Hold on to me,’ he rasped.
She complied, her hands finding purchase on his muscled shoulders and holding tight. Before she could take another breath he penetrated her, sliding in deep and sure.
Pain jerked through her, sharp and primal, ripping a scream from her.
Above her, Alejandro hissed and held himself still. ‘Dios, are you all right?’
She blinked through prickling tears and struggled to speak. ‘Y...yes.’
He kissed her again, a gentle anointing and a promise of things to come. The pain receded, leaving behind the reality of the power and fullness of him inside her. He moved. Her nails dug deeper into his skin as a different sensation thrummed inside. His hips rolled again. Intoxicating pleasure lanced through her, dragging her eyelids down.
‘No. Look at me,’ he instructed. ‘Feel me. Feel what you do to me.’
Her gaze reconnected with his. Exhaling, he increased the tempo, and she cried out. ‘Oh...yes!’
The word seemed to breach a dam inside him. With a guttural groan, he sealed his mouth to hers, his tongue commencing a brazen mimicry of what his body was doing to hers. Elise could only attempt to keep up as he set her on a trajectory of pleasure so overwhelming her cries grew into a scream, right before sheer bliss catapulted her into a different dimension.
Alejandro watched her, unable to take his eyes off her radiant beauty as her pleasure overtook her. She was already proving to be a responsive lover; her eyes didn’t once stray from his, a deed he found almost too much to bear when his pleasure surged high. Higher than he’d ever felt before. For one wild second he wondered if it was because she’d confessed her innocence at a crucial stage. He didn’t deny the declaration had filled him with a primal emotion that had left him raw and exposed. That beast still prowled through him, urging him to possess, to stake his claim here and now.
But no. This feeling of heightened awareness and existing on a visceral realm had existed between them long before they’d stepped into his bedroom.
The sex had just brought it to the fore.
But now it was here? Now he’d had a taste of it? Dios, he wanted to die in it. Alejandro spiked his fingers into her hair, angled her head to receive his deeper kiss, the feeling of falling, losing himself in her tight heat a drug he never wanted to be freed from.
Her legs clamped tighter around his waist, urging him on, welcoming him home. A harsh groan ripped from his throat. And he allowed himself to fall.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
ELISE WOKE UP some hours later to the feel of a warm towel drifting over her skin. Blinking awake, she blushed at the sight of Alejandro perched naked on the side of the bed, tending to her.
‘You don’t need to do that,’ she blurted.
A slow, sexy smile lit his face, drawing her absorbed attention to the delicious stubble gracing his jaw. ‘No, I don’t. But doing it pleases me.’
He grasped her knee and spread her wider. Elise’s hands flew up to cover her face, shaking her head wildly as a full body blush engulfed her.
Alejandro laughed. After a minute, he said, ‘Open your eyes, guapa. The ordeal is over.’
She dragged her hand down her face to see him toss the washcloth away. ‘That can’t happen again. Ever.’
His smile was arrogantly confident and blatantly possessive. ‘I have extensive and uninhibited plans for your body, amante. After-sex care should be the least of your worries.’
Prowling over her, he took her mouth in a long, mind-melting kiss. ‘Do I have a say in these plans at all?’
His mouth drifted down her collarbone, planting kisses on her skin. ‘Only when it comes to vocalising your pleasure.’
She cringed. ‘I seriously doubt that will happen.’
He smiled against her skin. ‘Is that a challenge?’
A sliver of ice cooled her desire. ‘No. It’s not.’
Alejandro’s head jerked up. ‘What’s wrong?’
Elise shook her head. ‘It’s nothing... I don’t want to ruin the...this.’
‘Then tell me what’s wrong.’
‘What you said about being vocal...it was another of those motherly pieces of advice I received when...’ She pressed her lips together. ‘Can we change the subject, please?’
‘No.’ Alejandro rose and planted his hands on either side of her head. ‘It’s time to end this.’
‘Alejandro—’
‘You have severe hang-ups about your sexuality. Which is understandable considering the less-than-stellar guidance you were given regarding your body. Your parents tried to turn what should be a natural expression of desire into a commodity to be peddled. You denied them the power to do that by choosing how you used your body. You’re beautiful, querida.’ He punctuated the compliment with a kiss. ‘You have nothing to be ashamed or embarrassed about. When we made l
ove, you held nothing back. You fell apart in my arms and that’s how I want you, every time. Telling your lover what you want in bed doesn’t demean you, especially if he wants it, too. Sí?’
Elise didn’t realise tears had welled up until she blinked. When they rolled down her eyes, he brushed them away. ‘Yes.’
‘Good.’
He kissed her, soft and sweet. Then he rolled them over so she was poised above him. ‘Now, to demonstrate, here comes your first instruction. Brace your hands on the headboard.’
She glanced up at the smooth, silk-lined board that extended halfway up the wall. ‘I... What?’
His grin was pure wickedness. ‘I didn’t stutter.’
When she continued to stare in puzzlement and trepidation, he gripped her waist and pulled her up until her torso was suspended above him, her breasts a tantalising inch from his mouth.
With a deep groan, he parted his lips and closed them over one nipple. Elise gasped, her hands seeking the solid reassurance of the headboard as white-hot pleasure seared her.
After an age he freed her bud, and licked her areola. ‘I’ve wanted to do this since the day you walked into my office.’
‘Just this?’ she asked, her voice a breathless mess.
A sexy smile formed around her aching nipple. ‘Oh, no, amante. But this was what I had in mind for starters. Hours and hours of this.’ His tongue flicked rapidly over her heated flesh, sending spears of need straight to her core. Fingers digging into the headboard, she gave in to the insane urge to look down, see what he was doing. The visual sensation was even more intense as he switched his attention to her neglected nipple.
‘That sounds...dangerously mind-altering,’ she whispered.
Merciless teeth nipped. ‘You’ve had me in a state for a while. It’s only fair that I reciprocate.’ He nipped again.
‘Alejandro!’
He groaned. ‘Sí, say my name like that.’