‘Trust me,’ he said, brushing his lips across hers. ‘This is no empty seduction. I am as much a slave to this as you are, agape mou.’
A statement he quickly proved when her fingers flexed in an instinctive response against his shoulders and he shuddered, the breath rushing shakily from his lungs.
Taking hold of her hand, he led her across the room—a room, she realised for the first time, that was a bedroom, big and gracious, its green and grey furnishings softly lit by a bedside lamp.
By the big double bed he turned her to face him, eyes still black with need but gentle now as they gravely explored her face. She blushed, feeling shy suddenly and awkward now that he had given her a moment to realise just what they were doing.
‘No,’ he murmured, lifting her chin with softly stroking fingers when she tried to hide her face from him. ‘Passion becomes you, agape mou. Don’t hide it all away from me.’
He lowered his head again, silk lashes brushing tantilisingly against her flushed cheeks as he kissed her nose then each corner of her mouth and ran his fingers in a feather-like caress down her throat and over naked shoulders before sliding them into her hair, pushing the long, thick fall back from her face and making her senses leap as he lowered his head to run his tongue around her exposed ear.
She closed her eyes, preening sensually as the sweetest sensation turned her muscles to liquid. Her fingers curled into the lean, tight flesh at his waist. His tongue slid lower, forcing the breath from her lungs in short, sharp gasps as he licked his way to the other ear to wreak the same havoc there.
Then his mouth closed over hers again, his hands sliding down the sides of her body from breast to hip and back again, sending her arching sensuously towards him as, slowly, he began peeling her dress downwards. It had no zip, was nothing more than a tube of stretch fabric and it went easily, exposing her breasts, high-domed and peaked by two tight buds. His hands explored, probed, excited, then pushed the dress further, over her slender ribcage, her narrow waist and the softly rounded curves of her hips. By the time it fell in a pool around her feet, her arms were curved languidly around his neck, all hint of shyness lost to the pleasure of his touch.
They were kissing so deeply now that she was barely aware of his quick movements as he divested himself of his shirt. It was only as he crushed her against the heat of his naked chest that she realised what he had done. And by then she was revelling in the feel of him, of the hard-packed muscle beneath heated flesh, his skin like stretched satin beneath her fingertips, of the rasping pleasure of chest hair moving against her breast. The scent of him was warm and clean and intoxicatingly musky, sensual, so sensual that it sent her dizzy, dizzy enough to sigh and sway, and groan something helpless in her throat which she didn’t understand but he seemed to do because he turned and, with her still held in his arms, lowered them both on to the cool green cover on the bed.
It was a long night. A beautiful night. Tender and excruciatingly patient, Leon guided her down sweet, sweet paths of sensual pleasure. He taught her with each new intimacy what making love really meant. First of the flesh, bringing her skin alive with the lightest, most tantalising caresses until she seemed to quiver all over with a bright tingling pleasure that had her arching and flexing in movements that were so instinctively sensual that she had no idea what it did to him to feel her like this.
But she thought she’d die a thousand deaths at the confusing rush of feeling she felt when his touch became more intimate.
‘Shh,’ he soothed as she tightened in shocked rejection to something utterly alien to her, and he caught her shaky protest with his mouth while his fingers stroked the moist, silken core of her, drawing her—inexorably drawing her—deeper into the chasms of desire.
It flowed and ebbed, like a lazy summer tide washing over her until she thought she would drown in its sensual flow, only to feel it fade away again as, skilfully, she realised hazily, he brought her to a boneless state where nothing he could do would shock her now. She began to feel restless, her body pulsing to a rhythm that seemed to demand something more from him.
‘Leon,’ she whispered threadily.
‘Yes,’ he murmured. ‘I know...’ And he took her mouth in a long, languid kiss while gently urging her thighs wider, then slid his body over hers.
No pain, just a short, sharp sting that had her eyes flying open on a breathless, ‘Oh,’ to stare at him in surprise.
He was watching her, supporting his upper body on his forearms as he gazed into her eyes, his own face wearing the glaze of a fiercely reined-in passion. He was hot and tight, his laboured breath rasping over her face as he waited, lean hips pressing into the cradle of her hips, letting her feel—know—the power of his possession before slowly, carefully he thrust himself deeper inside.
Then they were one, moving together, breathing together. Mouths locked, bodies locked, and the pounding drumbeat of their hearts paced the growing power of their pleasure. She could feel him inside her, exalted in his pulsing strength, the power of him, the need in him, each stroke, each beautiful silken stroke carrying them closer and closer to some potent place hovering just out of their grasp.
Then suddenly they reached it, and as if a volcano were erupting deep inside her she was tossed into a world of fire and force and hot, pulsing lava.
Afterwards she curled herself up into his arms, clinging to him as though life itself revolved around him in its entirety. The fact that he held her close, said nothing but just held her, told her that he too was in awe of what had just happened. She hadn’t expected it; she wondered if he had.
Whatever. As far as she was concerned, Leon had just given her the most beautiful experience of her life, and at this moment she wanted to do nothing more than be held close to him while she savoured it. Because surely it could not be that good every time, could it?
CHAPTER FOUR
‘ARE you going to move in with him?’ Trina demanded. It was late Sunday night and Jemma had not returned until half an hour ago.
What had gone on in the interim would, Jemma thought dreamily, go down in her secret store of memories as the most precious forty-eight hours of her life. As he had promised, Leon had made that first time beautiful for her. His care and patience and mind-blowing sensuality had left her stunned and dazed.
And it could be as good the second and even the third time around, she acknowledged with a soft secret smile. In fact, their responses to each other became so exquisitely tuned that they could barely look at each other without experiencing the electric fizz of desire.
‘No,’ she answered Trina’s question, then grimaced, remembering the one of several small skirmishes they’d had during the weekend. ‘He wants me to, but I decided it was best if I remain here. I’ll find it less—stressful that way. He goes away a lot, and that big empty house would drive me insane with no one to talk to.’
‘No servants?’
She shook her head. ‘A woman who comes in daily to clean for him, but nothing more. If he wishes to entertain, he employs a caterer. He is surprisingly self-sufficient for someone from his background,’ she confided with a smile. ‘And his tastes are simple.’
‘A Greek trait,’ he’d told her. ‘At heart all Greeks are simple people. We make money by necessity—and because we find we possess a rather good knack for doing so,’ he’d added with a grin. ‘But I live in a world constantly filled with people. People who are in constant demand of my attention, my thoughts, my time. When I come home I want only to answer to myself. Servants fussing around me would spoil that.’
‘And so would a lover,’ she’d pointed out. ‘So I am right to remain in my own flat.’
He’d frowned at her when she’d said that, as if he wanted to argue—then changed his mind, pulling her towards him and kissing the top of her head. ‘Perhaps you are at that,’ he’d agreed. ‘Except the weekends,’ he’d added firmly, ‘when you will arrive here directly from work on Friday and remain until Sunday night. And I will buy you a wardrobe of exquis
ite clothes so you won’t have to waste time packing and unpacking.’
Which had begun the next small skirmish—or maybe it wasn’t so small, she mused as she sat there on the lumpy old sofa after enjoying a day of sinking into luxurious feather.
‘No wardrobe,’ she’d refused. ‘And no more presents, Leon,’ she’d added, going to dig out the reason she had actually decided to meet him the night before, and handing the plastic carrier bag to him. ‘You take me as I am—nine-carat-gold jewellery, off-the-peg clothes and all—or not at all, but I don’t want any more...gifts.’
He stared down at the plastic bag for a moment before silently opening it up. Out fell the velvet boxes.
‘I don’t want you to buy me things,’ she explained huskily when he didn’t say a single word. ‘When you do, it makes me feel...’ She paused, searching for the right word which wouldn’t offend.
He provided it. ‘Cheap?’ he clipped.
‘Inadequate,’ she amended. ‘I can’t match your generosity, Leon, simply because I don’t have the necessary funds to do it. When you buy me expensive things, it makes me feel...’
‘Bought.’
‘Will you stop putting words into my mouth?’ she flared, irritated because really he was only stating the truth. ‘You are deliberately misconstruing everything I say!’
‘And you are not misconstruing my reason for buying you these things?’ he countered, suddenly so contemptuous that it hit her that she had managed to offend him anyway. ‘You call these expensive!’ On an act of disgust he threw the boxes to one side. ‘They were nothing but cheap little nothings I saw and bought for you because they pleased my eye and reminded me of you!’
She gasped at the interpretation he had put on her words. ‘So your choice of word was right, and I do look cheap?’ she retaliated, her own anger and hurt rising with his.
‘If you looked cheap, my dear Jemma,’ he decided, ‘you would not be standing here in my home right now!’
‘So, why are you offering to buy me an expensive wardrobe of clothes?’ she challenged. ‘Why the expensive—sorry, cheap gifts? If it offends your ego to be with a woman who wears high-street bargain clothes and gold-plated jewellery, Leon, then maybe we should just call it quits right now!’
‘I never said that!’ he sighed in exasperation. ‘Or even implied it! You are a very beautiful woman, Jemma—sackcloth or silk, you would always look beautiful. Why is it so wrong for a man to want to buy his woman beautiful things?’
‘Because this particular woman feels more comfortable without them,’ she replied. ‘I have nothing but myself to give to you and I want nothing but yourself in return. Is that so difficult to understand?’ she appealed.
He sighed at that, and, in a way which brought tears to her eyes, reached out and drew her against him. ‘You are wrong, you know,’ he murmured into her hair. ‘You have given me the most expensive and precious gift a woman can give a man, agape mou. And if I let it pass by unacknowledged, then I would certainly be playing you cheap.’
She blushed, knowing exactly what he was referring to. ‘It was given freely, Leon,’ she whispered softly.
‘And cannot be handed back as my—paltry gifts to you can be,’ he pointed out.
She lifted her head to look at him at that, her eyes suddenly alight with mischief. ‘And do you want to give it back?’ she enquired provocatively.
‘Vixen,’ he scolded. ‘You know I do not! But,’ he added, ‘in all fairness, according to your rules, you must accept something back from me in return.’
‘All right,’ she reluctantly conceded. ‘One gift I will accept graciously—but nothing else!’ she warned him sternly. ‘And something small! If I come here next Friday night to find a wardrobe stuffed with fine clothes, I’ll throw them out of the window!’
‘Jemma...?’
‘Mmm?’ she murmured hazily now, the tender smile softening her face taking its time to fade as she slowly refocused.
Trina was looking anxious. ‘Are you absolutely sure you’re doing the right thing?’
No, Jemma thought, but I know I can’t do a thing about it. She got up, stretching tiredly. ‘What’s right or wrong for me doesn’t seem to come into it,’ she confessed as she let her body relax again. ‘I want him,’ she tagged on simply. It seemed to say it all to her.
‘You love him, you mean,’ Trina grimly corrected.
Did she? Jemma paused to ponder a concept she had until now refused to so much as peep at. Had she fallen head over heels in love with Leon Stephanades at the first moment she saw him?
‘I know you, Jemma, and there’s no way you would put yourself in this kind of no-hope situation unless your heart was involved. You love him,’ she stated again. ‘And that bastard most probably knows it, and couldn’t give a hoot so long as he gets what he wants from you!’
‘I’m going to bed,’ Jemma said pointedly, turning towards the door. ‘Goodnight, Tri.’
‘He’ll hurt you!’ her friend warned, real concern darkening her rich green eyes. ‘He’s the kind of man who sees something he wants and goes after it and damns the consequences! It wouldn’t enter his arrogant head to wonder whether it was the right and fair thing for you! Men like him exist on a different plane from us mere mortals. They’re takers, Jemma!’
‘And you think I’m not taking as much from him?’ she challenged.
‘It’s not the same,’ Trina sighed. ‘You’ll be the one left hurting in the end while he walks away sublimely unscathed! Oh,’ she groaned in frustration when she saw Jemma’s set face. ‘Why couldn’t you have put it around a bit like the rest of us more normal creatures? Gained some experience before taking on a man like him!’
‘Goodnight, Trina,’ Jemma sighed out wearily, announcing the end of the discussion.
‘Goodnight,’ her friend mumbled. Then, as Jemma reached the door, ‘I hate him!’ she yelled at the top of her voice.
‘I’ll be sure to tell him,’ Jemma replied, smiling, because poor Trina was only behaving like this out of concern for her.
‘You won’t need to,’ Trina snapped, ‘because I’ll damn well tell him myself!’
And she did.
It was Wednesday before Jemma saw Leon again. He was tied up with business until then, and in a way Jemma was glad of the respite. Not least because her body physically ached from the sensual onslaught it had been put through.
He called her at work, though. Usually around three each afternoon, his voice like warm honey on her senses, gliding sweetly over her. On Wednesday, she received a beautiful posy of freesias, their luxurious scent filling the whole office. ‘Not a gift,’ he’d sardonically written on the accompanying card, ‘but a hello because I will not have time to call you today. And I wanted to remind you to keep tonight free. It belongs to me. L.’
She smiled at his sarcasm, grimaced at his arrogance and inhaled the lovely perfume of the flowers as if she were inhaling that subtle spicy scent of him.
‘Who’s L?’
She hadn’t heard Josh come in the room, and jumped when she found him leaning over her, blatantly reading the card. ‘An—admirer,’ she said, and quickly shoved the card away. She didn’t want Josh to know about Leon. Things between the two men were strained enough as it was.
Cassie, it seemed, had gone into hiding. And Josh, for all he tried, could not find out where she was and was therefore blaming Leon. ‘The man’s no fool, I’ll give him that!’ Josh had grated bitterly after spending hours trying to locate Cassie. ‘If she’s with him then he’s managed to secure himself the safest lay in town!’
‘Josh!’ Jemma had gasped. ‘That’s a terrible thing to say!’
He’d muttered something beneath his breath, scraped an angry hand through his straight blond hair then stormed back into his own room.
When Leon picked her up on Wednesday night, her first question was, ‘Have you seen Cassie?’
His frown was genuine enough. ‘No,’ he said. ‘Why should I? Aren’t you ready?’ he then
demanded impatiently, glancing at her white towelling robe than pointedly at his watch, poor Cassie firmly dismissed. ‘The table is booked for eight. I dislike being late.’
Reassured about Cassie, Jemma then forgot all about her when another concern leapt into her mind. The one which meant leaving him alone with Trina while she finished getting ready.
By the time she joined them, you could have cut the air with a knife. Leon was standing by the window, his elegant back in its beautifully cut dark silk suit an arrogant wall of dismissal. Trina was seated hot-faced on the sofa, glaring fiery daggers at him. Jemma took one look at them both and bit down anxiously on her bottom lip. Leon was a sophisticated man of the world, and not the kind you gave moral lectures to. She didn’t want Trina spoiling this for her.
‘I’m ready,’ she murmured nervously.
He turned, his eyes darkening as they ran over her. She was wearing black tonight, figure-hugging silk jacquard black with a halter-neck that left her shoulders bare and fastened like a dog-collar around her slender neck. It was fashionably short, revealing more than enough of her long, slender legs. And she’d put up her hair, tying it in a topknot then teasing down some wispy tendrils to soften the shape of her face.
She knew she looked good. But under his expert eye she was severely on the look-out for any hint of criticism. What she actually saw made her blush warmly as she turned away to collect her bag, only remembering what the back of the dress did when she heard his indrawn gasp.
In fact, the dress did not have a back. It hugged her breasts and skimmed down the sides of her ribcage to her waist, but other than that she was naked.
‘Want to borrow my black wrap?’ Trina offered in an odd tone of voice which had her glancing sharply at her. It was then she realised that the offer had not been made out of the goodness of her heart, but as a taunt to the man who was staring at Jemma in a way that increased her anxiety. Had she gone too far? Was the dress too revealing for his taste?
Passion Becomes You Page 5