The Italian's Christmas Proposition (HQR Presents)

by Cathy Williams

  Temptation had never looked so irresistible.

  Rosie pushed her fair, curly hair behind her ears and stared at him. Her heart was pounding like a sledgehammer in her chest. It was chilly in the room, but her body was on fire, as if someone had taken a match and lit a bonfire under her feet.

  He flung back the duvet, inviting her in, and she could see that he was completely naked. Her mouth went dry and the fire burning up inside her went from sizzling to molten.

  She stifled a groan as their bodies met and she felt the push of his erection against her.

  ‘I don’t get it,’ she whispered. ‘I can’t seem to help myself.’

  ‘What’s going on here,’ he said, ‘Is something that neither of us had banked on. There’s a chemistry here that defies logic. Like you said, I’m not the sort of guy you’re accustomed to dating and the same goes for me with you. Sexual attraction has a way of defying logic.’

  Rosie’s breath hitched in her throat at the feel of his hand gently smoothing her thigh, circling just by her crotch. She moaned softly and lay back, eyelids fluttering shut, parting her legs just a bit more so that he could nudge the dampness between her thighs with his knuckles. It was gentle, seductively rhythmic, and her breathing quickened in response.

  ‘You have no idea how much you turn me on,’ Matteo rasped shakily, tugging her so that he could plant a series of kisses on the side of her neck. ‘You’re breathtakingly sexy.’

  ‘So are you.’ Rosie’s eyes were hot and drowsy as she caressed the side of his face before cradling the back of his head with her hand and pulling him into a kiss that melted everything in her body. His mouth was cool and firm and the feel of their tongues meshing was indescribable.

  It was a kiss she never wanted to end. She curved into him, her body pale and smooth in the dim light.

  He didn’t talk but he didn’t have to. His appreciation of her body was in the way he touched her and the hot fire in his amazing eyes.

  He bent to suckle one throbbing nipple, drawing it deep into his mouth, tasting and feasting while sensations spiralled in her, making her wriggle and writhe underneath him.

  She’d never wanted anyone so badly. Had never come close.

  Her body was flushed and tingling all over when he eventually straightened. The contrast in their colouring was dramatic—she so pale, he burnished gold. He stepped off the bed and she could see that he was rummaging in his wallet for a condom. He dropped it on the wooden table by the side of the bed and looked at her with brooding intensity for a few silent seconds.

  ‘What are you doing?’

  ‘I’m looking.’ He held himself in his hand and absently pleasured himself for a few seconds.

  Without thinking, she reached up. On cue, he stepped towards her, and she traced the sinewy ridges of his erection with a trembling finger, starting at the base and working slowly to the tip, which she circled until his fists were clenched at his sides in an attempt to maintain some semblance of self-control.

  He finally caught her wrist and breathed deeply.

  ‘Any more,’ he said roughly, ‘And I’ll come—and when I come I want to be deep inside you.’

  He slowly joined her back on the bed but, instead of kissing her, he lowered himself to her belly and kissed her there, along her rib cage, while she trembled under the caress.

  He circled her belly button with his tongue and then darted it into the sensitive hollow there before moving down lower to her panties, in an intimacy she had never experienced before.

  She fought against snapping her legs shut and, as if sensing the impulse, he placed both flattened palms on the inside of her thighs, holding her open for him.

  That very first sensation as he began to nuzzle the dampness between her legs was electrifying.

  She wanted to thrash around, arch up against his questing mouth. The breath caught in her throat and then what emerged was a guttural groan of utter pleasure as he began working his tongue along the slippery groove that shielded her clitoris.

  When he delicately began tracing the delicate, throbbing bud of her clitoris, she fisted her hands and moaned against her knuckles. It was exquisite. Transporting. She began to move against his mouth, finding his rhythm and matching it to her own.

  She couldn’t stop the shattering force of her orgasm. It ripped into her and she spasmed against his mouth, stifling her cries of pleasure, reaching to curl her fingers into his hair so that she could press his face harder between her quivering thighs.

  The strength of her orgasm left her weak, flushed and drowsy and it took her a few moments before she surfaced.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she uttered, dismayed, but he was smiling.

  ‘For what? Enjoying yourself?’

  ‘This wasn’t what was supposed to happen.’

  She wrapped her arms around him and buried her face against the side of his neck because there was something shockingly intimate in what had just taken place, at how her body had reacted.

  The freedom she had felt at that moment of coming made her feel as though her soul had opened up.

  Suddenly, she wanted more, but she wasn’t too sure what.

  She tentatively rested her hand on his lean, firm buttocks, then stroked him. He flipped her over and positioned her so that she was lying on top of him. Like this, his pulsing manhood against her was a powerful reminder of the chemistry uniting them against all odds. She had just had an explosive orgasm, and her body wanted a repeat performance, but this time she wanted him inside her, moving deep and hard.

  X-rated thoughts made her feel faint. She arched up so that her heavy breasts dangled invitingly close to his mouth and their eyes tangled in the subdued darkness.

  ‘Very sexy,’ Matteo murmured shakily and, when he contained her breasts between his hands, squashing them gently together, he couldn’t contain a groan of utter pleasure.

  That did something to her. A strain of wanton recklessness that she had never known she possessed sizzled through her with lightning speed.

  She angled her body lower and levered her nipple into his mouth, propping herself up so that he could suckle on it while she watched. It was erotic, giddily so. Very slowly, she began to move against him, sinuously and seductively, inching left to right, and then in small, circular motions that heightened his responses and brought a flare of scorching lust to his eyes.

  In the end, he couldn’t stand it any longer. He groaned, pulled her down to him and then kept completely still for a few seconds, breathing himself back into a place of some self-control.

  ‘I need to be inside you,’ he said hoarsely. ‘You’re driving me crazy.’

  That was music to Rosie’s ears. She felt as though she was waking up, stepping into the real world, for the very first time in her life. She watched him heave himself off the bed, every movement clumsy and uncoordinated, testimony to the fact that, whatever he was feeling, it had complete control over him. He donned protection, easing the condom over his erection, taking time because of his size.

  She was aching for him...couldn’t stay still. She whimpered as he levered himself over her and then the whimper turned into a cry of intense satisfaction when he finally pushed into her.

  He moved slowly at first, driving deeper into her, and then faster, holding them both at bay until, on one final thrust, he groaned and she felt him swell inside her. Indescribably turned on, she wrapped her legs around him and let wave after wave of pleasure surge over her. Their bodies were as one. She could never have imagined feeling so close, so united, with anyone.

  Spent, her breathing took its time returning to normal, but then she sighed happily and wriggled against him.

  Her head was against his chest and Matteo trailed his fingers through her hair, sifting free the tangles. Her warm breath puffed against him. She had one thigh across his and he felt her dampness. She was so soft...sexy curves and bounti
ful breasts...with an eagerness that was as sweet as the summer sun.

  For the first time in his life, Matteo felt exposed. Had sex ever been that good? He had only just come down from a high and he wanted to go there again. He had no inclination to head straight for the shower. His mind wasn’t moving on to other things. There was no creeping urge to free himself from the presence of another body sharing his bed.

  Disquieted, he eased himself back with a frown and lay flat to stare up at the ceiling and, immediately sensing the shift in atmosphere, she pulled back as well.

  The urge to get her back close to him, pressed against him, was strong but Matteo resisted, asserting control over a situation that seemed to have pulled against the reins and galloped off in directions unknown.

  ‘I know you’re going to say that this was a mistake,’ Rosie began and he turned to look at her.

  Matteo thought that she would do well to steer clear from mind reading because she couldn’t have been further from the truth. If what had just happened between them was a mistake, then he had been well and truly caught in the grip of it, and furthermore wanted a repeat performance. What was going on? He had encouraged the situation. He would be the first to admit that. He had wanted her and he had finally succumbed, had laid his cards on the table, made a pass, did what came so naturally to him. He just hadn’t predicted that their love-making would be so explosive. Disturbingly so.

  ‘You have no idea what I’m going to say,’ he managed.

  ‘I can tell from your silence...’

  ‘I wouldn’t call it a mistake.’

  ‘Then what would you call it?’

  ‘A complication. I’d call it a complication, and now we need to think about what we’re going to do about it...’

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  ‘WE DON’T HAVE to do anything about it,’ Rosie said, mouth down-turned as she stared at her pale hands clasping her knees. ‘You’re right. It shouldn’t have happened. These things do.’

  But never, Rosie thought with a rapidly beating heart, to her. In her world she’d become friends with some guy, there would be a little bit of flirting, but nothing, in the end, would lead anywhere—because sooner or later she would lose interest and there had never been the driving physical need she had felt with Matteo.

  Nothing like it.

  In her world, nothing had ever happened. No lights had been ignited. No breathless excitement. No wanting so big that it drowned out all the little voices urging caution.

  In her world, she thought, life had never really been lived.

  And, now that she had tasted what living to the full felt like, it was going to be snatched out of her grasp, because what had been momentous for her had been routine for him.

  ‘Not to me,’ Matteo said seriously. He reached to clasp her hands and held them in his, and Rosie relaxed a little.

  The last thing she wanted was for him to see how vulnerable she felt.

  ‘What do you mean?’ she asked cautiously.

  ‘I mean...’ Matteo raked his fingers through his hair and frowned, as though trying to get his thoughts in order. ‘Life doesn’t spring surprises on me.’

  ‘What, never?’

  ‘Never.’ He paused and looked at her. ‘We don’t come from the same world,’ he said flatly. ‘I may have as much money as I could ever want now, but life is more than just the sum total of the present. Life is a series of small sums, adding up to the person we eventually become, to the way we deal with what life throws at us. You have always lived your life in the exclusive conclave of the wealthy. You, I am sure, have always been open to surprises because there was always a comfort blanket waiting to break your fall if the surprise didn’t turn out to be a good one.’

  Matteo felt safe saying that. Black and white he could deal with. Grey occupied unknown territory and something inside resisted the threat of dealing with it.

  Rosie blushed. ‘That’s not fair.’

  ‘No, I don’t suppose it is, but you can see what I’m getting at.’

  ‘Yes. You’re going to tell me that I’m not the sort you’re attracted to because I don’t have a hot-shot career in the City. Not everyone does and hot-shot careers aren’t what they’re cracked up to be. Have you any idea how stressed out some of those women are?’

  ‘Stress can be an issue,’ he murmured.

  ‘I would rather be outside teaching sport than cooped up in a building popping anti-depressants because I’m finding it hard to deal with the anxiety.’ Rosie wasn’t going to roll over and play dead.

  Matteo grinned, eyebrows raised, expression so unconsciously sexy that it was making the blood in her veins hot with a resurgence of desire.

  How was it possible to be so fiercely turned on by someone who was in the process of giving her her walking papers because she wasn’t suitable? But she was and she shifted uncomfortably.

  ‘You don’t have to bang the drum for people who don’t wear power suits.’ He shrugged. ‘My point is that neither of us anticipated this but it doesn’t mean that...’

  ‘That?’

  ‘That I didn’t want it to happen and don’t want it to happen again.’

  ‘What are you saying?’ She licked her lips and registered the way his eyes followed that tiny movement. With hunger. The same hunger she was feeling inside her. Like a match set to tinder, it ignited a series of popping explosions inside her.

  Matteo Moretti, self-made billionaire, had come to this five-star Italian ski resort for one reason and one reason only—to close a deal that meant a lot to him.

  He hadn’t banked on suddenly having his life go off the rails because of her. One minute he had been politely shaking hands with his prospective clients, the next minute he had been on the back foot trying to justify bad behaviour of which he wasn’t guilty. He’d been forced into a situation not of his making because of circumstances he could never have predicted. He wanted to do what it took to make his deal happen, and what that took involved a pretend romance with the least likely woman on the planet, as far as he was concerned.

  So far, so bad, but on top of that here they were. Unlikely lovers. Had she expected that? She’d certainly acknowledged his massive sex appeal but no way had she projected that thought further into the realms of actually making love.

  Now he was being honest and telling her like it was. He’d enjoyed what had happened between them. He wanted more, but there were a lot of conditions attached to that and a lot of sub-clauses he wanted her to understand.

  She wasn’t his type. She led the sort of privileged lifestyle he had commandeered for himself and made his own but his respect was reserved for people who had fought their way up, as he had. He dated bankers and lawyers and she was an intellectual lightweight—she would be the first to admit it. She’d never been in the league of either of her sisters and she’d packed in trying to be years ago, roughly around the time when her form teacher had kindly suggested to her parents that she focus on sport and arts and crafts.

  Rosie was at a crossroads. Back away and put that one night down to a fantastic experience, never to be repeated, or else do what he wanted to do and prolong that one night for just a tiny bit longer, until the charade was over and they went their separate ways. An amicable break-up, initiated by her, between two people who had fallen for each other in haste but had thankfully come to their senses before any permanent damage could be done.

  In a flash, she trawled back through the years and could see that her rebellious behaviour, her travelling and changing jobs and all those brief, barely notable liaisons with unsuitable boys had been as predictable as the rising and setting of the sun. He’d been right when he’d said that a comfort blanket of financial and emotional security had made all her choices safe. None of his choices had ever been safe. He would always have had a lot to lose and that dangerous edge to him was so appealing.

  For the first time in
her life, she knew in her heart that to follow him to where he was now pointing would be the most challenging and exciting choice she would ever make. It was so far out of her comfort zone that she had no idea where it might lead.

  Not together in some happy-ever-after scenario, was the thought that flashed through her head. But would she still be in one piece...?

  ‘I know what you’re saying,’ she said in a rush. ‘You don’t want this to be a one-night stand but you want me to remember that it isn’t going to be anything more than a brief fling.’

  Matteo was looking at her carefully, his silver eyes hooded and watchful.

  He was waiting for her to accept his proposal on his terms. No involvement.

  ‘I’m not looking for any kind of relationship,’ he told her flatly. ‘Here we are and the sex was fantastic.’

  ‘Have you ever been interested in having a relationship with someone?’ Rosie asked with genuine curiosity.

  ‘That’s not on my radar.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Why? Because everything I’ve ever seen has taught me that romance and all the fairy-tale nonsense that accompanies it comes with a lamentably short lifespan. I prefer to hedge my bets where the odds are better for a successful outcome.’

  ‘Making money.’

  ‘Works for me.’ His voice hardened and she was reminded of the gaping chasm between them.

  Common sense was making her question how she could be attracted to a guy who was so brutally honest when it came to his intentions.

  ‘We are going to be stuck together for a few days more...’ she began, yielding to the riptide of physical attraction.

  Matteo’s slow smile was the smile of the victor and he angled her so that their bodies were pressed together, stomach to stomach, her generous breasts squashed against his muscled chest.

  She rested the palm of her hand firmly on his chest, just in case he thought that she was a rag doll, helpless and obedient. He was so staggeringly sexy, so stupidly good-looking, that she knew without a shadow of a doubt that women would trip over themselves to get an invite into his bed. ‘And I get it. You don’t have to warn me that you’re not interested in a relationship with me. I’m not interested in any kind of relationship with you either.’