by Lucy Monroe
“Whatever you like.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
She leaned over and took the tie off the bed. “Will you let me tie your hands?”
It was a fantasy she’d had for a long time.
Angelo had gone completely still. “You want to tie me?”
“Um…yes.”
“Why?”
“I want to know you trust me.”
“And your trust?”
“If I didn’t trust you, I would not have agreed to marry you.”
“I could say the converse is true.”
“You could, but we both know it’s not.”
“We do?”
“Yes.”
He eyed her for so long, she thought he was going to refuse and she was getting ready to drop the black tie. She wouldn’t push it. She wanted him and he wanted her and really, she couldn’t blame him for being a little leery about her request. It wasn’t exactly your average wedding-night foreplay. He didn’t understand what motivated her—she needed to know he trusted her. Baron had never trusted her, because he knew how untrustworthy he was. He always had to be in control.
“Do you want my hands in front or in back?”
Her head snapped up at the question, her mouth dropping open in wonder. “You don’t mind?”
“I trust you, stellina. Do what you like.”
He was so darn strong…even acceding to her wishes, she sensed that he was still in control here.
“B—” She had to clear her throat. “Behind you please.”
He turned around, his trousers undone and hanging low on his gorgeous hips. Admiration and warmth flowed through her at his acquiescence.
“There aren’t a lot of men who would be confident or trustworthy, therefore trusting enough to let their lover do this,” she whispered.
“Not just a lover. You are my wife.”
She smiled. “Yes. Your wife.”
She pulled his wrists together and tied them, securing it with a bow. It would be very easy for him to undo it, but the illusion of his helplessness was more exciting than anything she’d ever done. Because it was accompanied by a very real faith in her.
She gently turned him back around and finished taking off his clothes. When she was done, she looked her fill at the incredible male perfection before her.
“The other night…”
“Yes?”
“You said if I kissed you there…” She nodded toward his erection. “You would lose control and come inside me.”
“Yes.”
“Can I kiss you tonight?”
“Yes.” This time the word came out more a growl and the hard male flesh in front of her bobbed its agreement.
She dropped to her knees and began her exploration with her fingertips. Velvet encased steel. There was no other description that she could think of for how it felt in her hands. She curled her fingers around him, caressed the full length and he groaned.
“Does that feel good?”
“You know it does.”
“For me, too.”
“I’m glad.”
She nodded and then leaned forward to press a chaste kiss to the very tip. He smelled so good, she nuzzled him, inhaling a fragrance unique to him that affected her every bit as powerfully as his earlier caressing had.
Then she tasted him and he made a noise like a bitten back shout. She wanted to hear him really shout and set about making that happen, using her hands and lips and tongue. His body shuddered and he tilted his pelvis toward her, making his need more than clear.
“You have to stop,” he said in a hoarse voice that told her more about how much he’d been holding back than anything else.
She tilted her head back and looked up his beautiful body to his face. Sweat had broken out on his brow and the flush of arousal had darkened his skin.
“Do I?”
“Yes.”
“And if I don’t want to?”
His arms moved and then the sound of a silk bow tie whispering to the carpet could be heard. “I will have to make you.”
She would have grinned, but she was too excited and her mouth was too busy trying to suck in much needed oxygen. He understood her game exactly.
He had trusted her enough to give her control and put him in a pseudo-submissive position, but he was also strong enough to take charge when she needed him to.
“Come up here.”
“I can’t.”
“Why?”
“My legs won’t hold me,” she admitted, knowing the only reason she was upright was because she was kneeling.
She felt dizzy even in this position.
He reached down and lifted her under her arms, his big hands clasped around her ribs. He lifted her all the way until their mouths were parallel and then he kissed her.
She curled her arms around his head and tried not to faint from a wave of love so profound, she almost drowned under it.
This man was perfect for her in every way. Of course she loved him and it would be okay. He was worthy of her love.
He laid her on the bed and removed the pretty white underthings she’d worn just for him.
When she told him so in a husky voice unrecognizable to her, he smiled.
“You’re welcome to wear them again, but tonight, I don’t want anything between us, even provocative bits of lace.”
She agreed. She wanted nothing between them, either, not even the barrier of unspoken love, but that was one thing she could not remove.
She’d gone that route before, admitting her love and leaving herself vulnerable. She was married to this man. She had all the time she needed to show him it was safe to love her, too, that she wouldn’t leave him voluntarily like his mother had done or involuntarily like his father had done.
He made love to her then, starting off gently, but rapidly moving to a passion and urgency that left her sated and exhausted in the middle of the huge king-size bed.
Afterward, he wrapped himself around her and they slept in each other’s arms, only to awaken twice more in the night to make love again.
Angelo woke to the smell of coffee and the yeasty aroma of cinnamon rolls. He stretched, feeling more depleted than he ever had from the toughest Aikido session. Remembered pleasure made him groan as he opened his eyes, looking for his new wife.
Tara smiled at him from where she was lifting silver lids from the dishes on a room service cart. “I ordered breakfast.”
“It smells delicious.”
“I thought after last night that we both could do with sustenance.”
“Wore you out, did I?”
“You made me hungry anyway.” She winked saucily and he was reminded of her surprising friskiness the night before.
There had been something important to her about tying his hands and he’d worried when he untied them, he would be failing her, but she’d liked that part, too.
A charming, enigmatic, surprising creature was his wife. No wonder Baron had not wanted to let her go. The thought sent a shaft of annoyance through him and he dismissed it.
She’d never be Baron’s again. Tara was his now. That was all that mattered.
Angelo clasped his hands and stretched his arms, then tilted his head from side to side, working the kinks out. “I am hungry, too, stellina.”
“Then come have some breakfast,” she said breathlessly.
He looked at her and found her beautiful brown gaze riveted to his body. “Ahh…but that isn’t what I’m hungry for.”
She blushed delightfully and laughed. “That’s all that’s on offer at the moment. We need fuel. Or maybe you don’t,” she amended, looking at where the sheet tented from his body, “but I do. Have pity, Angelo, and come eat with me.”
He shook his head, laughing in a way he could never remember doing with a former lover, as he got out of the bed.
She was scandalized when he came to the table naked, but almost fell off her chair with laughter when he conceded to her modesty by tossing a napkin do
wn over his lap.
They bantered and made love for the rest of the morning, never leaving their suite until they had to depart for their scheduled take-off time at the airport.
Tara was both obviously thrilled and sweetly nervous when he informed her they were flying to Sicily so she could meet his family.
“Finally.”
Tara looked up from her laptop. “Finally what?”
They’d been in Sicily for three weeks, but it hadn’t all been honeymoon and sexual intimacy. When she had expressed concern over her career, Angelo had been quick to offer her a dream job and set her up with her own mini office on the opposite side of the study from him in his villa.
She’d never lived or worked in such an opulent setting. What other junior manager worked at a desk that was an original Chippendale and slid her pumps off under said desk to curl her toes against genuine Italian marble? Not to mention having a staff of servants available to care for her every whim?
Was it any wonder she adored Angelo? He spoiled her rotten and every day, her love grew. She was starting to wonder if she really needed to hold back the words until he said them first.
Their relationship was unlike anything she had ever known before and he made it obvious he saw her as an equal, not a woman to be manipulated into being what he wanted.
Her husband’s voice had been so filled with satisfaction when he spoke that she wasn’t surprised by the look of triumph on his chiseled features.
She smiled at him. “You look like you just bought another company.”
“How well you know me.” That seemed to give him as much satisfaction as whatever news he’d just gotten. “I haven’t, but I’m about to.”
Something about the way he said it made her pause.
“What company is it?”
“One I’ve wanted for a very long time.”
“You’re taking down the guy who seduced your mom into selling him the family company, aren’t you?” She didn’t know how she knew, just that she did.
A strange light glittered in his eyes. “Yes.”
“How?”
“He’s gotten cocky. He never thinks his schemes can fail, but he’s wrong.”
“In what way?”
“His father-in-law leads a group of investors that make up the bulk of his financial house of cards. Once they withdraw their support, his highly leveraged company will be worse off than a lame duck on the first day of hunting season.”
She shivered at the analogy. “Why would his father-in-law remove his support?”
“His daughter has finally wised up to what a bastard the guy is and is filing for divorce.”
Just like Baron’s little oil heiress…only Baron said he was divorcing her, but she was willing to bet it was the other way around. Unless he’d found a richer prospect. Considering the fact he’d called, trying to see her, she doubted it.
Anyway, Baron wasn’t who she needed to be focused on right now.
The strange intensity emanating off of her husband was far more interesting to her. “That makes you happy?”
“Hell, yes. I helped to make sure it happened.”
A chill skittered down her spine. “What do you mean?”
“The guy had affairs.”
“That kind of man would.”
“I took advantage of the fact.”
“How?” Then she latched on to his meaning. “You made sure his wife knew about the other women?”
She felt slightly nauseous at the prospect. Angelo’s capacity for ruthlessness was way beyond what she had ever guessed at.
“Yes.”
“That was cruel.”
“Do you really think so?” His eyes darkened with strong emotions, one of them unmistakably anger. “Wouldn’t you have preferred to know what kind of bastard Baron Randall was before getting so involved with him?”
“Sure, but that’s different…a wife is already involved. She loved him.”
“And he would keep hurting her if she didn’t face the truth. They could have had children before she woke up to what kind of man he is.”
“You can’t justify such cold behavior with that kind of reasoning. You didn’t tell her about him for her sake, you did it for yours.”
“I didn’t tell her anything.” He got up and came to lean against her desk. “I made sure she found out through friends, that there was always someone there to comfort her as each new layer of his sleazy behavior was revealed. If my mom had found out the same way, she would have been saved a lot of humiliation and might be alive now.”
She wished that were true, but chances were, there had been clues that his mother’s lover was an evil man, whoever he was. Just as there had been clues to what kind of man Baron was. Things she’d ignored for the sake of her love.
“I had friends around me when Baron did his public rejection campaign and trust me, it didn’t make it any easier to bear.”
“You don’t know that. You didn’t have to face the other.”
“No, I didn’t, but I did learn that friends can be worse than strangers, or even enemies.”
“Do you really think a wife is better off not knowing of her husband’s infidelity?”
“No, that’s not what I meant at all.” But she could see how it sounded like it. “It just bothers me that was part of your revenge against him. I pictured you taking over his company, not laying waste to his personal life.”
“No man deserves to be ruined as much as this guy. I’ll never forget my mom’s sobbing, hysterical confession, or her deep shame and guilt because of what she’d done. His cruelty killed her. You can’t get more personal than that.”
And it had left Angelo in a world where business and vengeance ruled and love had no place. No wonder he was so ruthless, but he couldn’t go on being that way. If he learned to love her, would he soften…at least a little?
“He didn’t give her the pills,” she pointed out.
“No, just the reason for taking them.”
“That could have been as much about her grief over your father than over what this guy did to her. She made the choice, Angelo.” She hated saying it, but he couldn’t spend the rest of his adult life hating this other man.
A heart full of hate had no room for love and she needed his love.
“Why are you defending him?” he asked sounding both confused and strangely wounded by her words.
“I’m not.” She laid her hand on his thigh in comfort. “I’m trying to make you see reason.”
“In what way?”
“Revenge can consume you and I don’t want you consumed.” She pleaded with him with her eyes, hoping he would read the message there and heed it.
He gave her one of the slashing smiles she’d come to adore. “Don’t worry, it’s almost over and the only thing that consumes me lately is when I get to make love to my beautiful wife next.”
“I want that to be true.”
“It is. Believe me when I say I spend a lot more time thinking about you than anything else.”
That was a huge admission and she gave it the response it deserved, standing up to kiss him with all the passionate love beating in her heart.
CHAPTER TEN
“TARA?” They were naked, snuggled against each other on the oversized reading chair in the far corner of the study with their legs entwined and stretched out on its matching ottoman.
Angelo had responded to her kiss with flattering enthusiasm, locking the door and then proceeding to demonstrate just how much he thought about her during the day.
She nuzzled his hair roughened chest. “Mmmhmm?”
“Why was your breakup with Randall so public?”
The languorous aftermath of their lovemaking dissipated like the steam on a latte. This wasn’t something she’d talked about to anyone, even her mom. It had hurt too much.
He rubbed her back soothingly. “I’d really like to know.”
“At first, it wasn’t. Baron told me he was getting married, but that he wanted to keep our
relationship going.”
“You said no.”
“Right. Up to this point, everything had been pretty low-key between us media wise. The apartment we shared was in the suburbs, we didn’t do high profile dating. I thought I was safe from the paparazzi and their blood sniffing.”
“Something had to happen to change that.”
“It did. I had a couple of friends, or at least they were women I thought were my friends, from the modeling community. They sold the story of my affair with Baron, along with some embellishments, to the press after his marriage was announced. When it became obvious he’d been sleeping with me while courting her, he had to do damage control.”
It was Angelo’s turn to go stiff, his palpable fury enveloping her. “Painting you as his sexpot mistress who wouldn’t listen to the word no, was it?”
“Yes.” She sighed, the pain of her friend’s betrayal and Baron’s willingness to destroy her good name to protect himself only a dull ache, but still there as a reminder to what a naïve fool she’d been. “It hurt so much.”
“Because you loved him?”
“Because both he and my so-called friend betrayed me, devastating my life and for what?”
“Money?”
“Right, but it didn’t do any of them all that much good. The two models are working fifth string trunk shows and hardly living the high life. Baron’s divorcing his wife. Their betrayal didn’t take them as far as they expected it to, I bet.”
“What?” His hold on her tightened and he went on before she could answer his question. “How do you know about Randall’s divorce?”
“He called me.”
“He called you?” Angelo’s fury was incandescent now. He sat up, pulling her up so he could see into her face. “Why the hell didn’t you say something?”
She frowned at his over the top reaction. “I didn’t think it mattered.”
“Of course it mattered.”
“No. It didn’t. Listen, Angelo, Baron might have some idiotic notion about renewing ties, but I wasn’t interested.”
“You told him no.”
“Do you think I would be married to you if I hadn’t?”
“What else did he say?”
“He warned me off you as a matter of fact.”
Angelo looked a little gray around the edges and she thought that was sweet.