by Penny Jordan
“You what!” She pressed back into the rail behind her.
“I asked her if we should wait until she was available to attend the wedding or make it official immediately. I realize that’s a clichéd negotiating tactic, giving her a choice between yes and yes, but it worked. She supports the marriage,” he said dryly.
Nevertheless, Gabrielle Reid had registered her disapproval. Lauren could sense it in the way Paolo took on a look of suppressed umbrage.
“Yes, well, marrying was the right thing to do,” Lauren said into the middle of his chest, both relieved and dreading her next call home. She quickly asked, “And Elenore?”
She braced herself, too often the target of judgment from Ryan’s mother to take her reaction lightly.
“Chris made a declaration on your behalf.” A muscle pulsed in Paolo’s jaw. “He wasn’t happy, but it’s done. Everyone liable to be affected is aware that we’ve married. This photographer works for a friend.” He nodded to the camera below. “They’ll leak the news with the least amount of sensationalism. No more secrets, no more impediments.”
A rush of power and excitement surged in him as he absorbed their freedom to finally be together. The feeling had its root in sexual anticipation but carried subtle branches of pride and triumph and elation. She was his now. His hands tightened on her.
“He’ll leave us alone shortly,” he assured her. “Meantime, let’s give him what he’s being paid for.”
Lauren ducked his kiss before it landed, skittering her gaze toward the pool next to their feet, her only direction of escape.
Paolo frowned. “What’s wrong?”
“I don’t want to play the devoted wife for the world again,” she said, flickering a glance of hurt up at him. “This is between you and me, Paolo. It’s real and it’s private.”
He was oddly touched, realizing that Lauren wasn’t just being shy. When something meant a lot to you, you protected it. Her sensitivity to intrusion spoke volumes about how important their intimacy was to her.
“You’re right. Come, Signora Donatelli. I’ve waited too long to have you to myself.” Taking her hand, he led her into the villa.
The ivory walls and linens in the bedroom reflected the rosy glow of the sinking sun. Lauren’s heels made a soft click on the marble as they moved into the cavernous room. She unconsciously tightened her hand on his to prevent a slip.
Paolo took it as a signal to stop and turned to face her. His hands came up to the buttons of her shirt.
Lauren drew back in surprise at his forwardness.
A smile twitched his lips. “I’m not rushing you, just dying to see how the baby is changing you...” He tugged the tails of her shirt free while Lauren bit her lip, unable to keep from grinning as he parted the edges of her blouse and looked down.
“There’s hardly anything there, but I’m ridiculously proud,” she confided, holding her shirt parted as Paolo unbuttoned her pants and lowered the zip.
His warm hands rolled back her fly to expose the pale swell of her abdomen, the subtle shape only discernible because she was naturally slender. He let his hands rest at her bare waist for a few moments, forehead tilted against hers. She could see a doting smile playing over his lips.
Fascinated, Lauren reached to trace the shape with her finger, seduced by their smooth texture.
He caught her hand and kissed her palm. “I’m glad you’re having my baby, la mia adorata.”
His quiet ferocity sent a cupid’s arrow of sweet joy through her. “Me, too,” she said in a voice thinned by deep emotion.
“I’m also intrigued by the lack of a bra.” His darkening eyes lowered to gaze on her chest as he lightly brushed the shirt back on her shoulders, exposing her bare breasts.
Stimulated by the tickling brush of fabric and his caressing touch, Lauren stood straighter and sucked in a startled breath, unconsciously lifting her breasts into prominence. The combination of cool air and hot focus from Paolo’s avid gaze made the orbs go tight, the nipples pinching sharply, contracting into thrusting points.
“All my bras got too small overnight,” she confided, losing her train of thought and shakily gasping for air as he traced the outsides of her breasts with light fingertips. The heaviness in her breasts increased. They seemed to fill and harden, nearly painful in their sensitivity to his light, light touch.
“Hurray for growing out of bras.” He came a half step closer and very, very gently enveloped her breasts in his hot hands, slowly closing them in firm cups that made her blood thicken into the soles of her feet.
She whimpered at the sensation of swirling pleasure spiraling from her middle into the hot ache between her thighs. His grip loosened. “Too much?”
She couldn’t speak, could only clutch at him as she swayed on her feet.
“You’re so beautiful, Lauren.” His hot breath caressed her neck while he slid his hands into her pants to begin easing them down her bottom.
She couldn’t help wriggling her cheeks into his sure hands.
He paused long enough to groan with approval and say, “I’m trying to hang on to control here, cara. Help me out.”
“I like it when you lose control,” she said, then bit her lips together.
He flashed her a look that was a little incredulous, a little wary, and very, very dangerous. A muscle pulsed in his jaw as he lowered to squat before her, drawing her pants down her legs without any increased urgency, but a fresh, very thick sexual tension imbuing his movements.
“We’re going to keep these on for a minute,” he said as he threaded her pants over her shoes, one hand steady on her hip to keep her balanced. “Because there’s something I need to tell you.” He threw her pants away and gazed at her nude limbs. The angle of her high heels contracted the lithe muscles of her thighs and calves, elongating her legs and making her feel strong even though she was nearly shaking with nervous arousal.
“What?” Lauren prompted, voice a husky whisper deep in her throat.
“I.” He made her wait as he wound his gaze down to her polished toenails. One finger traced the cheeky strap around her ankle, then his gaze climbed up her shin and knee to the length of her thigh where he stared a long time. “Am a leg man. And yours are exquisite.” He followed the path with his hands, drifting his caressing touch up sensitive skin and twitching calves, smoothing the backs of her thighs to her backside so his long fingers teased the sensitive globes of her bottom through the silk of her underpants.
Lauren’s stomach flip-flopped, making her exhale through a tickling sensation that was in her nerves and muscles and blood. Wild sensations made her legs quiver and she shifted self-consciously.
Paolo slid one hand down to her ankle. “I have been stealing looks for years, cucciola mia. Today I can look and touch and kiss...” His knowing fingers found the sensitive skin at the back of her knee, making her reflexively shift her weight and retract her leg.
His strong grip at her hip kept her steady on one shoe while he bent her knee and brought her inner thigh to his mouth so he could nuzzle his hot, firm lips against her skin, grazing damp kisses that incited her to mewl in distress.
“I won’t let you fall,” he murmured reassuringly, shoulder muscles flexing under her grasping hands as she tried to balance.
“It’s not that. I—” Lauren swallowed, dizzy and a little frantic. Her fingers dived into his hair to stop what he was doing to her and when she had both feet on the ground she instinctively pressed her thighs together, trying to ease the throbbing pulse between them.
Paolo chuckled softly, his breath on the lace triangle a sinful caress. He hooked his finger in them and tugged one side down.
With Paolo’s sultry eyes holding hers in a kind of trance, Lauren let her thighs relax so he could drag the scrap of lace and silk down to her knees.
They dropped around he
r ankles and he sat back on his heels for a long, unabashed study.
“Step out of them.” It was a graveled command, but his knuckles showed white where his hands rested on his thighs. The rise and fall of his chest was uneven.
Seduced by how affected he was, she brazenly lifted one foot then the other, setting her feet down well on either side of the abandoned lace.
Paolo’s breath hissed in and he lifted his gaze in an agonizingly slow and sensual drift upward, making each square inch of her tremble and burn. Her thighs shivered, the secretive place between dampened with liquid heat, pulsing for the breach of his thick shaft. Her stomach quivered under the impact of his gaze and her breasts thrust upward again, this time in proud invitation as she took a constricted breath.
Like an animal scenting his mate, his nostrils flared and he rose in a rush of power, overwhelming her in a heartbeat with his looming size. But his grip was gentle as he pulled her into him, crushing her naked front into his clothed one while he took her mouth in a rapacious kiss.
They both opened their lips in passionate hunger. The flick of his tongue was a claiming and they were pulled into the undertow of suppressed desire released at last.
Every blood vessel in her body lit up where she pressed to him, like polarity on a magnet gravitating to its source of attraction. Her skin flooded with sensitivity and she couldn’t help rubbing the aching orbs of her breasts into the friction of his shirt. The tips stung with need.
Paolo made a noise in his throat that was pure, frustrated predator. She understood. He was roaming his hands over her, melding her to him as though he could absorb her through his skin. She couldn’t reach enough of him, but his clothes were in the way. Both wanted the offending garments gone and neither wanted to pull away to remove them.
Lauren tilted her hips, intuitively seeking contact with the hard proof of his craving for her. She lifted higher on her tiptoes at the same time. Her fingers dug through his hair and she pulled him down as she pressed her lips harder to his, yearning for everything he could give her. Now. Please.
With a curse, he dragged his head up and pressed her back a step.
She couldn’t help it. A hitch of horror and chagrin caught her. It was last night all over again.
“Dio! Don’t look at me like that! You’re pregnant. I’m not going to take you to the damned floor. I’m about to—”
Before she realized what he was doing, he had swooped low and caught his arm behind her knees, sweeping her into a cradle against his chest. His long legs took the few steps to the bed and he set her there gently, glaring with disgruntlement.
“One of us has to try to control this.”
Lauren didn’t move, too fascinated by the struggle she could see behind his scowl. His skin was dark with a flush of arousal, his movements jerky as he yanked at his clothes with brutal disregard for their value. The tension in his cheeks pulled his mouth into a grim line, but his eyes were like blazing coals, singeing her skin as he raked his gaze over her.
“Look what you do to me,” he said, kicking away the last of his clothes to stand before her naked and proud. His muscled frame was pure power, the thrust of his erection stunningly potent. He worked his hands into fists that he loosened and gripped, his control visibly tenuous.
Awed, Lauren slowly swung her feet to the floor, but remained sitting on the edge of the bed. With a bold suggestiveness she had never imagined herself capable of, she spaced her wicked shoes far enough apart to open her knees and motioned him closer, eyes on the proof that he wanted her beyond bearing. “Come here.”
“You are out of your mind if you think I can hold out for that.”
She wanted to push him to the very brink. She reached out and took his hand, forcing him to step closer. Taking both his hands, she set them on her hair, murmuring, “Show me what you like.” Then she circled her fingers around the silky muscle that pulsed in anticipation.
He swore heatedly and at length, but for a few precious moments he let her drive him out of his mind until he clasped her upper arms and pulled her to her feet, kissing her with near brutal passion before pulling back and tilting his face to the ceiling, breath hissing like a steam train.
Lauren smiled as he yanked her shirt off her, his eyes nearly blind with passion. She loved it. Loved the feel of the sweat she’d lifted on his skin, the way his heart slammed in the rib cage expanding in labored breaths, the taut thighs that shook when she grazed her hand over his buttocks and down his leg.
Her own arousal was secondary and barely acknowledged until he pressed her beneath him on the bed and held himself above her to look at her nude length in a way that was undeniably proprietary.
Old shyness struck. It was full daylight, the windows only covered by a filmy white curtain. He began setting tiny kisses onto every inch of her, heating the pulse in her wrist, teasing the side of her breast, making her flood with heat when he reached the sensitive crease at the top of her thigh.
“Paolo,” she murmured in a tiny protest.
“Payback is a bitch, tesoro,” he muttered in Italian, sliding low to take ownership of her in the most intimate way.
She shattered and before she could recover, he rose over her.
Lauren was trembling so hard she thought she’d fall apart. He was quivering like a bowstring, his eyes holding hers with the intensity of an aim on a target. His thick hardness slid against wet, welcoming tissues that parted for him and then he was invading, silk into liquid satin, moving deeper, reaching the absolute limit of penetration and filling her up with such incredible hardness that was hot and smooth and oh... A sense of wholeness and completion enveloped her. Joy rippled out from her center, bathing her whole body.
They both shuddered, her gasp mingling with his jagged exhale. It was too good. She couldn’t hold his gaze, wanted to turn her head and close her eyes, but he murmured, “Look at me. Keep looking at me, cara. Let me watch you... Si, like that...”
He withdrew and returned and she melted. Her insides glowed and expanded and the rush of supreme pleasure was too much to bear. She wanted to throw herself into the inferno, but he held her in hard arms, controlling their movements so his slow thrusts dragged out the pleasure, making it last so they both groaned in abandon.
She couldn’t hold back forever. Unrestrained whimpers escaped her, urging him on and he responded with a snarl and shift to a wilder, deeper thrust. The meltdown started for her and the instant her nails dug into the skin of his back and her spiked heels spurred his buttocks, his neck muscles stood out with strain. His movements became jerky as he claimed her with masculine aggression that pulsed with the hot power of his release. His cries were primal and as unconstrained as hers as the cataclysm enveloped them.
They buried their faces in each other’s neck, clinging on as the final quakes wrung through them, convulsing their bodies.
Bliss filled Lauren, but it ended in a barb. She suspected she might love him. Always had. And it hurt.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
“HOW ARE YOU a banker, Paolo?”
Lauren’s lazy, somewhat rhetorical question pulled Paolo from a state of lassitude. They’d been making love on and off for hours. Her thigh was a warm line across his waist, her breasts plump and soft against his ribs. The weight of her head numbed his shoulder, but he didn’t care. At this moment he was a newlywed and everything else was a dot on the horizon.
He yawned and stretched, then snugged her back against his side, saying dryly, “My father died before I could become an astronaut. If we’re going out for dinner, we need to leave soon. Shall I call to have something delivered instead?”
“Delivery sounds good, but was that a joke? About being an astronaut? I mean, I’m sure you could have done it if you wanted to. You went to all those fancy international schools so your education was first-rate and you’re incredibly fit, but really? Is that someth
ing you wanted?”
“It was a childish dream. I always knew I had to step into my father’s shoes.”
She came up on an elbow, her kittenish sleepiness replaced by curiosity. “Did you resent that?”
Paolo skimmed a finger along her temple, smoothing back a wisp of her short hair, surprised at how easily she was bringing up the sting of his old regret. “I might have registered my frustration with a few moments of bad judgment.”
Lauren’s kiss-swollen lips widened into a knowing smile. “Like surfing typhoon waves in Thailand, for instance?”
“Heard about that, did you?” He made a face at the ceiling, wondering where he got the nerve to be alive after some of the stunts he’d pulled. If his child turned out like him, he didn’t know what he’d do.
“Your mother seems to think you were testing your own limits, not acting out, but were you rebelling?”
He thought back to his impatience with school and its dry courses in statistics and economics, languages and political policy. They’d made his eyes cross. The only thing that had held remote interest for him had been history because at least there was action, intrigue and battles.
“Not rebelling so much as determined to live my life to the fullest. I knew my father would eventually push the mantle onto me and I didn’t want any regrets. I pulled my application to the space program when he died. It was time to put away romantic notions and do what was right.”
He thought he saw a flash of protest in her eyes, but she lowered her gaze, brows tugged together in consternation. After a moment of reflection she asked, “Were you angry with him for dying?”
“Yes. I thought I’d be old before I took the reins and hated the idea of being second in command for most of my life, which is another reason I wanted to make my mark elsewhere. In space even. But you never appreciate what you have until you lose it. I’d give anything to have had him breathing down my neck all this time, training me to take over.”
She nodded in understanding. “I always felt cheated, not really knowing my father. That’s why I was determined to spend as much time as I could with Mamie. I didn’t have your ambition for making marks, though. I took a degree with the community college in French-Canadian literature of all things. Fat lot of good that did me. I hope you’ve grown to like your job because I can’t support myself on that.”