‘Raul—?’
‘But below the surface—’ his finger slid deep inside her ‘—you are wild. All bubbling passion. All mine.’ And to prove that point, he lowered his head and slid his tongue over the delicate bud of her womanhood and she cried out in shock because her whole body reacted so dramatically to his touch.
She was consumed by arousal, acutely conscious of every move he made; of the restless flick of his tongue, the flex of muscle as he supported himself on his arms, the roughness of his jaw against the smooth skin of her inner thigh—and it was so agonisingly perfect and he was so skilled that she shot into another climax that he caught with his mouth and fingers.
He slid up her body, fastened his mouth to hers and kissed her deeply, and then he shifted slightly and turned her over. For a moment Faith just lay on her front, her eyes closed, her body still quivering from the touch of his mouth. Then she felt him move and gasped as his hard fingers captured her hips and lifted her onto her knees.
‘Raul—’
‘I love it this way,’ he groaned and before she could wriggle away or protest that she just wasn’t ready for more, that she just couldn’t do this again, he sank into her with a decisive thrust.
Her trembling, sensitised body clamped around his in ecstatic pleasure, apparently ignoring her brain, which was telling her that she just couldn’t be doing this again.
He surged deep into her slick heat and it felt so mind-blowingly good that she cried out in shock. In this position he controlled her utterly, his hands holding her bottom, the roughness of the hair on his thighs brushing against her soft flesh. The ache inside her grew and grew with each purposeful thrust of his body and the slow ripples of pleasure spread and built to a crescendo until she was caught in a vortex of excitement so intense that she lost touch with reality.
She was on fire, her senses stormed by an attack of almost excruciating pleasure, her climax so intense that she barely registered the rhythmic thrusts that signalled his own release. For a moment there was nothing but pure, blind ecstasy, a shower of erotic sensations that left her in a state of numb shock and speechless disbelief.
Boneless and exhausted, Faith flopped forwards onto the bed in a weakened, quivering state and Raul sprawled next to her, his lean, powerful body suddenly relaxed, the smile on his face clearly reflecting his belief in his own sexual supremacy.
For a moment Faith just lay there, too shattered to speak. Part of her was afraid to move or draw attention to herself in any way in case he just hauled her against him and tried yet another position. And another part of her—a wicked, wanton part of her that she didn’t understand—wanted him to do just that because he was so incredibly gifted and she couldn’t get enough of him.
Acknowledging that fact made her turn her face into the sheets with a groan of disbelief and mortification. No matter how she liked to pride herself on her brain, she was a complete pushover when it came to this man.
He only had to touch her and she was his. Every time. Every way. Whenever he wanted.
And just what would her pathetic display of female submission have done to his already over-inflated ego?
Raul already thought he was the best and hadn’t she just gone right ahead and proved it?
She raised herself on her elbow but before she could speak or do anything, he rolled her onto her back and flattened her to the bed again, his gaze surprisingly gentle as he studied her from beneath thick, dark lashes.
That long, slumberous look softened everything inside her and her stomach and heart performed a series of acrobatics as she stared up at him.
He cared, she knew he did and her own gaze softened in response as she waited for him to say something affectionate. After what they’d shared, how could he fail to?
He stroked her flushed cheek with gentle fingers and lowered his head to kiss her gently on the mouth.
‘Now talk to me about feeling insecure,’ he breathed and then rose from the bed in a fluid movement and strode into the bathroom with long, confident strides.
Faith stared up at the ceiling in stunned, silent disbelief.
That was why he’d made love to her over and over again?
To try and prove that she had no reason to be jealous?
Feeling numb inside, she slid off the bed and followed him on shaking legs into the bathroom.
‘Insecure?’ She croaked the word from the doorway. ‘That was why you made love to me? Not because you love me or wanted me, but just to prove a point?’
His strong, muscular body already under the shower, he gave a shrug of his shoulders. ‘After the last few hours it should be obvious that I’m not thinking of any woman other than you.’
Faith swallowed. ‘I wanted you to think about my feelings. A conversation would have done the trick.’
‘I’ve always been more of a practical kind of guy,’ he drawled, tilting his head back so that the water cascaded over his glossy dark hair and bronzed shoulders. ‘And that is a ridiculous accusation because I have been thinking of nothing but your feelings for the past few hours, cariño.’ Wiping the water from his eyes, he threw her a sexy, suggestive smile.
‘Not those sorts of feelings!’ This was the wrong place to have this talk, Faith realised numbly. He was gloriously, unashamedly naked, his aggressively masculine body proudly on display in front of her and she just couldn’t concentrate because she was agonisingly aware of his broad, powerful shoulders, the burst of dark body hair that shadowed the centre of his chest and the impressive contours of his manhood.
Averting her eyes, she concentrated her attention on the neat pile of towels. ‘Tell me something,’ she asked shakily. ‘Why is it that you think sex solves everything?’
Without answering her question, he stemmed the flow of the water and stepped out of the shower, completely unselfconscious. ‘Towel, please?’
She handed him a towel and too late realised her mistake because he closed his fingers around her wrist and hauled her hard against his damp, naked body. ‘You want to know why it is that I think sex solves everything?’ His mouth hovered above hers and his damp, heated skin brushed her quivering flesh. ‘Before, we were arguing and you were angry with me. You were spitting like an angry cat and now you no longer want to spit and you are no longer angry—so you see sex does solve problems.’ Having driven home his point, he released her and raked wet spears of hair from his eyes with strong, confident fingers while Faith stared at him helplessly.
‘I feel more like your mistress than your wife.’
Raul shot her a meaningful look. ‘Considering the effect that marriage can have on a couple’s sex life, you should be relieved about that.’
‘You think you’re such a genius in bed, don’t you?’
‘No.’ He hooked the towel round his waist and gave her a slow, dangerous smile. ‘You are the one who makes me think I am a genius in bed. You melt, you sob.’ He shrugged. ‘You like what I do to you, cariño.’
Knowing that it was true, her cheeks coloured. ‘I promised myself I wasn’t going to let you hurt me again, Raul.’
He frowned. ‘I made sure you were protected.’
‘I didn’t mean that,’ she muttered and his eyes narrowed.
‘So what then? I was too rough?’
‘No!’ She was silent for a moment, impossibly aware of his searching gaze. ‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘Sí, it matters. If it brings that look into your eyes after we have made love, then it matters.’ With an impatient sigh, he took her face in his hands and stroked his thumbs over her cheeks. ‘All right, if you want to talk, we will talk. Go on. I’m listening.’
‘That isn’t enough! You have to do some of the talking, too. This chemistry between us is amazing, we make love and it’s like nothing I’ve ever felt before.’ It was difficult for her to be so painfully honest because she was making herself vulnerable and he was so completely invulnerable. ‘When we’re together like this I feel so close to you but when it’s over I realise that I’m
not close at all. It’s just physical. I don’t know you at all. We don’t talk. Even tonight we didn’t talk because the moment I raised a problem, you just turned to sex. I really do feel more like your mistress than your wife.’
‘A woman thinks she wants a man to be honest with her but what she is really saying is that she wants that man to tell her what she wants to hear.’ His tone was cool. ‘I’m not like that. I don’t lie.’
‘All right, fine, don’t lie. But I need you to think about my feelings!’
He released her and stepped away. ‘This business with Pedro is concluded. You won’t have to see Sofia again.’
‘It isn’t just about Sofia. She’s just a symptom of what’s wrong with our relationship—the fact that we don’t talk. When we have a problem, I want us to talk about it. I don’t just want you to throw me on the bed and have sex with me! I want to know you, Raul. And if the truth about how you feel is painful to hear, so be it. At least it’s the truth. I want to know you and I want you to know me.’
His dark eyes were shuttered and she almost felt his emotional retreat.
‘That is why women have female friends, so that they can chew over issues that are entirely irrelevant to men.’ Raul released her and stepped away, his handsome face cold. ‘I just gave you a whole lot of messages, all of them positive. If you choose not to read them, then it’s up to you.’ He strode back into the bedroom leaving her staring after him in exasperation.
Exhausted after her sexual marathon with Raul, Faith slept late and woke to find Raul gone.
Deciding that she needed a distraction, she dressed quickly and walked over to the stables.
As usual they were a hive of activity and Eduardo greeted her with his usual warmth. ‘It is good to see you back. Raul is on the polo field, working off his energy with some of the guests.’
Faith spent a few minutes with her favourite horses and then walked towards the nearest polo field where a game was being played.
People came from all over the world to play polo on Raul’s estancia but only rarely were they afforded the privilege of playing with the boss himself—but today, it seemed, was one of those prized occasions.
Raul thundered down the field with such an astonishing burst of acceleration that the watching crowd of guests and grooms gave a collective gasp. He rode his pony alongside his opponent’s mount, moving him away from the ball so that he could take possession.
‘And that’s how it’s done,’ murmured one of the grooms who was watching. ‘Just glorious.’
The ponies were drenched in sweat and above them the sun blazed in a perfectly blue sky.
Where did he find the stamina? Faith wondered, watching Raul demonstrate a move to one of the guests and then drive his horse down the field after the ball. He’d had virtually no sleep and yet he was as energetic as ever.
The temperature rocketed and dust flew from the ground as the ponies stampeded over the grass.
Faith watched him, thinking about the parallel Sofia had drawn between Raul and a stallion.
Even the most difficult stallion could be tamed.
But she hadn’t tamed Raul, had she?
She’d trapped him. Not intentionally, but if she’d known how he’d felt she never would have gone ahead with the wedding, no matter how much she’d loved him. But the truth was that she’d loved him so much and she’d thought their relationship so perfect, that she hadn’t even questioned his proposal. To her it had been a natural progression.
And he hadn’t given her the chance to question it.
It was only now, looking back on it, that she realised that from that point until the day of their wedding, he’d been running.
In the middle of delicate negotiations with some company in the Far East, he’d flown to Japan for two weeks and then on to New York.
He hadn’t come home and at the time she hadn’t thought it particularly odd. Raul set himself a punishing work schedule and his absence hadn’t seemed particularly strange. Until now.
Faith watched as the horses came off the field and the grooms sprang into action. She’d been so wrapped up in her own emotions she hadn’t really thought about his. When he’d immediately proposed marriage, she’d assumed everything was all right.
Naïvely thinking that their love had been sufficient for him to make him rethink his views on marriage, she’d gone ahead without questioning how he really felt.
Arrogance? She’d accused him of arrogance but she’d been the one with arrogance, hadn’t she? She’d assumed that she was different from all the other women he’d ever been with. She’d thought that was why he’d been so eager to marry her.
Raul rode over to her and vaulted from his horse. ‘You’re awake.’
A groom took the horse from him and he walked with her back towards the Beach House. ‘You’re very quiet. Sofia again?’
‘No.’ Her voice was small because she was feeling completely and utterly tormented with guilt and Raul gave a driven sigh.
‘I have no feelings for her whatsoever. I thought I’d made that clear.’
‘Actually I’m not thinking about Sofia,’ Faith muttered. ‘I’m thinking about us. Our marriage. The baby.’ She felt his immediate withdrawal and grabbed his hand in a desperate little movement, as if holding on to him physically might prevent his emotional retreat. ‘Don’t back off. I know this is difficult but will you at least talk?’ She watched him, recognising all the signs as he placed himself well and truly on the defensive.
His eyes were hard as diamonds, his thin mouth an uncompromising line in his handsome face. Every muscle in his powerful frame vibrated with tension and his body language screamed ‘keep off’. ‘I know how upset you are about losing the baby. I fail to see what talking achieves unless you simply want to make me feel more guilty.’ His raw tone stunned her.
‘I—I’m not trying to make you feel guilty.’ She shook her head. ‘Why would you think that?’
He inhaled deeply and something flickered in the depths of his eyes. ‘I suppose because I do feel guilty,’ he confessed in a husky voice. ‘You lost that baby because of me.’
‘No—’
‘I upset you—’
‘After I lost the baby,’ she said gently. ‘And even if it had been before, you wouldn’t have been the cause.’ She swallowed and gave a painful smile. ‘It wasn’t anyone’s fault, Raul. I think it’s normal to feel like that, but it wasn’t anyone’s fault. Miscarriage is horribly common. A doctor in the hospital told me that—’ She broke off for a moment, a rush of emotion catching her by surprise. ‘He told me that some babies just don’t stick and that is nature’s way of saying that something isn’t quite right.’ Her hand was still on his arm and she felt the flex of muscle under her fingers.
‘Fine.’ His voice was as tense as his body. ‘Good.’
‘That wasn’t what I wanted to say,’ she mumbled quietly. ‘I wanted to say that I’m sorry.’
He stilled, and a faint flush spread across his cheekbones, highlighting his striking features. ‘So you admit that you became pregnant on purpose?’
‘No!’ Horrified by his interpretation of her apology, she stared at him. ‘No. It was an accident.’
‘Then why are you saying sorry?’
‘Because I never once saw it from your point of view. And I’ve only just realised that,’ Faith admitted wearily. ‘I discovered I was pregnant and I was a bit nervous but when you immediately proposed, I assumed you were all right with it. I—I wasn’t really thinking. I should have questioned you more closely. There was no way I would have married you if you had doubts.’
He was cold and uncommunicative. ‘I didn’t have doubts.’
‘You didn’t want to get married!’
‘Once you told me you were pregnant, there was never a choice.’
‘So you did the decent thing.’ Admitting that was so hard and Faith gave a painful smile and let go of his arm. ‘I thought you were marrying me because we had a good relationship,’ she admit
ted. ‘Silly me, hmm?’ She tried to keep her tone light but the pain cracked her voice and she heard him inhale sharply.
‘We did have a good relationship,’ he snapped impatiently. ‘We still do.’
‘In the bedroom,’ she said dryly and he frowned.
‘That isn’t true. We talk. You’re a very intelligent woman and you have an opinion on everything.’
‘We didn’t talk about feelings,’ Faith muttered. ‘And especially we didn’t talk about your feelings that I was pregnant. So I’m apologising for that. I’m sorry if this marriage wasn’t what you wanted and I’m sorry I didn’t stop you doing the decent thing.’
‘Nothing you said or did would have stopped me marrying you,’ Raul delivered in a forceful tone. ‘So you can tick that problem off your list of things to talk about.’
‘Maybe not when I was pregnant, but if I hadn’t been pregnant or if I had told you I’d lost the baby before the wedding—’ She broke off and he cursed softly, his dark eyes glinting with naked exasperation.
‘Last night we were happy! Now you’re upset and for no reason! This is why I don’t like talking endlessly about issues that can’t be changed.’
‘Was it Sofia?’ The question burst from her and she put a hand on his arm. ‘Something must have made you feel this way. Was she the reason that you never wanted marriage or children? Did she hurt you?’
He shut down like a nuclear reactor in an emergency. Nothing was going to escape.
‘We’re married, Faith,’ he said coldly. ‘Leave it at that.’
And he turned and walked into the Beach House, the set of his shoulders warning her not to follow.
CHAPTER TEN
FAITH curled up on one of the white sofas in the Beach House, horribly conscious of Raul’s absence and furious with herself for her lack of tact.
Why had she pushed him?
After their conversation—the conversation that she’d forced—he’d changed into a sleek dark suit, apparently cut to display every single one of his assets, and announced that he had business in Buenos Aires.
One Night In Collection Page 111