by Miranda Lee
‘I must. Then I have to go to the toilet and put my swimming costume on.’
He rolled his eyes. ‘And how long will that take?’
She shrugged. ‘Fifteen minutes. Tops.’ You learned to be quick when you worked on stage.
Sergio gave her a droll look as he stood up. ‘I’ll believe that when I see it. Women don’t know the meaning of punctuality. Just try not to keep me waiting too long.’ And he stalked off.
‘He’s a bit grumpy in the morning, isn’t he?’ Bella said as she finished her coffee.
Maria sighed. ‘Sergio. He has been sad since his papa passed away. But he will be better now that he come home to Italy to live. Even better when he finds himself a wife. Maybe someone nice like you, Bella. It is time you got married, is it not?’
Though somewhat startled by Maria’s unexpected suggestion, Bella could not help wallowing in the romantic fantasy of marrying Sergio for a few silly seconds. Till common sense kicked back in. No way would Sergio ever ask her to marry him. Frankly, she was amazed that he’d forgiven her enough to be her friend. Though of course that friendship now came with benefits, benefits that she’d enjoyed last night as much as him. Hopefully, she would enjoy some more of those benefits during their romantic picnic by the lake; just the thought of being with Sergio again made her head spin and her heart race.
‘Sergio isn’t interested in getting married just yet, Maria,’ she said, jumping up from the table and carrying the mug over to the sink. ‘And neither am I.’ Her interests lay elsewhere at the moment. ‘Now I’d better hurry.’
Seventeen minutes later she was sitting in the back of a rather ancient-looking wooden rowing boat whilst casting an envious glance at the gleaming red and white speedboat still sitting in the boat shed. The picnic basket was safely stowed under her seat, Sergio using a battered oar to push the boat away from the shore. He hadn’t changed his clothes, though he was now wearing sunglasses. Understandable, given the brightness of the day. And the water.
‘I think I should warn you,’ she said with slightly feigned nonchalance, ‘that Maria is trying to matchmake us.’
His expression showed this was not news to him, which perhaps explained his irritable mood. Maybe Maria had said something to him this morning before she’d come downstairs.
‘Maria is a romantic,’ he said with an exasperated shrug of his broad shoulders.
‘Most women are romantics at heart,’ Bella confessed. Herself included. Only a romantic would ever have imagined that one day she would find a man who would love her as deeply as she loved him; who would understand her and support her; who would be a great father as well as a fabulous husband. Such thinking was the stuff fantasies were made of. Fantasies and Hollywood movies.
Bella actually thought it sweet of Maria to imagine that she would make Sergio a good wife. Because of course she wouldn’t. Their sex life might be fine but that was about it.
Her sigh carried a degree of regret that life was infinitely more complicated for a woman once she had a successful career, especially one that was as essential to her as breathing. Bella might be suffering from burnout at the moment, but she could never give up performing. Singing for an audience made her soul soar in ways she could never describe. Without it, she would be a mere shadow of herself.
‘What did she say to you?’ Sergio asked as he began to row.
His impatient tone made Bella worry that she might have got Maria into trouble.
‘Oh, nothing much. Just that I would make you a good wife. Which was rather amusing. I can’t imagine a less suitable wife for you. Anyway, I told Maria neither of us wanted marriage at the moment. I hope you don’t mind my speaking for you.’
‘Not at all. I appreciate it.’
Just then a couple of jet skis zoomed past them, their wakes causing the rowing boat to rock back and forth, Bella sucking in sharply as she clung to the sides.
Sergio swore at them before apologising to Bella for his language. ‘Lake Como in the tourist season is not what it used to be,’ he told her.
‘Yes, I can see that,’ Bella said with regret in her voice. ‘But I suppose you can’t blame people for coming here. It’s such a beautiful place, especially in the summer.’
‘I blame the authorities for allowing cowboys like that to spoil other people’s pleasure. This is a place to relax. It is not a speedway.’
‘Yet you have a speedboat,’ she pointed out mischievously.
‘I do not drive it like a cowboy.’
She laughed. ‘I’ll believe that when I see it. Now where is this cove you’re taking me to?’
‘It’s a little way yet. If we stop talking I will row faster. Just admire the scenery and relax.’
Bella stopped talking but she didn’t relax. Perhaps because the scenery she started admiring had nothing to do with her beautiful surrounds but the man right in front of her eyes, his action of rowing focusing her attention on his magnificent physique and the way the biceps in his arms bulged with each stroke. It was to be thanked that she was wearing sunglasses because they let her ogle him shamelessly without being obvious. The instant and intense desire she’d felt for him yesterday by the pool returned with a rush, making her belly tighten and her nipples tingle. She could not wait to reach the privacy of this cove, the word secret suggesting that they would be unobserved there. They would be all alone...
* * *
Sergio could feel her eyes on him.
Yet he wasn’t even looking at her. He dared not. To look upon her exquisite beauty was sheer torture for him. The hat and the sunglasses didn’t help at all. He could still see her body, which was covered ineffectually by a semi-sheer white shirt and what looked like a very skimpy white bikini underneath. And then there were her legs...her very long, very bare legs. God, but her legs were something else. A dancer’s legs. Well toned yet graceful with slender ankles and shapely calves and lovely firm thighs, thighs that he started imagining wrapped around him whilst he...
Gritting his teeth, Sergio dragged his mind back from the brink of hell, kept his eyes down and concentrated on the rhythm of his rowing stroke. He was a good rower. He’d rowed at Oxford, his team of eight winning the regatta one year. Alex had been in the same team, but not Jeremy, who’d broken his leg skiing. He’d had to be content cheering from the banks of the river. Which he’d done very well in the company of his girlfriend at the time, as well as all the girlfriends of the rest of the team.
Sergio smiled at the memory. He was a devil with the ladies, was Jeremy.
‘What are you smiling at?’ Bella asked, forcing Sergio to glance up at her.
‘I was thinking of my rowing days at Oxford.’
‘It was a rather wicked smile,’ she pointed out with a knowing smile of her own.
‘I was also thinking of my friend, Jeremy.’
‘What about him?’
‘Jeremy was the resident Don Juan of the university.’
‘Isn’t that the pot calling the kettle black?’
Sergio laughed. ‘Hardly. No man alive could keep up with Jeremy when it comes to the game of musical beds. He’s now a grand master.’
‘Being a Don Juan is hardly an admirable trait.’
‘You don’t know Jeremy. There’s no malice in him. All his exes still hold him in high regard.’
‘So you don’t consider yourself a Don Juan?’
‘Not at all. I did sow some wild oats when I was at Oxford but since then my sex life has been on the conservative side. Just one girlfriend at a time.’
‘I see. And how long does a girlfriend usually last?’
‘A lot longer than Jeremy’s,’ he said drily. ‘Though I must confess I’ve had a few over the years.’
‘And you’ve never fallen in love?’
Sergio realised this conversation was getting too
close to the bone. He’d also almost rowed right past the cove.
‘Not even close,’ he said abruptly. ‘Now, if you don’t mind stopping with the twenty questions, we’re here. And this next part is a little tricky to negotiate.’
* * *
Bella had been grateful for the distraction of talking. She’d also been genuinely interested in finding out more about Sergio, the man. But once silence fell between them, she was catapulted back to her earlier state where her longing to be with him again overwhelmed all other emotions. Suppressing a sigh, she glanced around her, frowning as she realised that her mental picture of Sergio’s secret cove bore little resemblance to reality. There was no cute little beach with soft sand. Just a U-shaped inlet, the shoreline bordered by an ancient stone wall as was common around the lake. The wall was quite high; Bella not seeing herself clambering up over it from a rocking boat. Neither could she see herself swimming in the water, which looked cold and deep, not at all warm. Where they would have a picnic she had no idea, unless it was in the boat.
‘The water line is higher than when I was last here,’ Sergio said as he angled the boat round a slight bend, Bella relieved to see a set of well-worn steps carved into the wall. There was also a large iron ring bolted into the wall to which Sergio secured the boat.
‘Don’t worry,’ he said when he saw her frowning. ‘There’s a lovely little secret garden on the other side of the wall. But I don’t think we’ll be going swimming. Best leave that till we get back to the villa.’
He hadn’t exaggerated. There was a truly delightful secret garden on the other side of the wall, with soft mossy grass underneath shady pine trees and an abundance of flowering shrubs exuding a variety of scents. It was obvious, however, that the garden hadn’t been tended for some time. There was no villa nearby, that she could see. Not that she could see very far; the bushes and trees were too thick.
‘Are we trespassing on private property?’ she asked as Sergio placed the wicker picnic basket under a shady tree then reached for the checked blanket resting on the double-handled lid.
‘Possibly,’ he confessed as he spread the blanket out on the ground. ‘But we’re not doing any harm. Clearly, no one uses this place any more. Come on, I don’t know about you but I’m suddenly starving.’
Bella had to agree once he opened the basket and she saw what Maria had packed for them. And there she’d been, thinking her hunger was only for Sergio. She swiftly knelt down to help him unpack all the goodies, her mouth watering over the simple but yummy-looking food. Along with two baguettes of freshly baked bread, there was a delicious selection of cold meat and cheeses, two huge bunches of fat juicy grapes, plus a couple of sinfully fattening pastries. No wine, just a flask full of iced coffee, along with two unbreakable glasses.
By the time Bella had devoured more than her fair share, all she wanted to do was lie back on that blanket and go to sleep. Her sigh of contentment echoed against the wall as she stretched out and closed her eyes.
‘I take it you won’t be needing me this time to help you sleep?’
Bella’s eyelids fluttered upwards to find him lying on his side, watching her with smouldering eyes.
Her desire for him was instant, her drowsiness of a moment ago gone like a flash.
What to say? Bella still wasn’t totally used to this new lustful creature who’d emerged to take control of her life, and who could tempt her with the wickedest of urges.
She wanted to lie naked with him on this blanket. She wanted him on top of her this time. On top of her and inside her. Filling her, and confounding her. Taking her with him again to that place where she didn’t think, or worry, or care; where all she wanted was to wallow in the most incredible physical pleasure, followed by the most brilliant of releases.
Heat flooded her face as she sat up and started undoing the buttons on her top. He didn’t move, his gaze fixed on her as she undressed. At last she was totally naked, her clothes neatly folded on the grass, topped by her hat and sunglasses. She didn’t say a word, just lay back on the blanket and looked at him.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
SERGIO REALISED RIGHT then and there that his vow to cut back on the sex was almost impossible to keep, especially with Bella lying naked and willing in front of him. Admittedly, he’d been asking for trouble with that leading question about her needing his help to sleep. But he’d never expected her to do what she’d just done.
The exquisite beauty of her naked body was a powerful aphrodisiac, but the naked desire in her eyes was even more powerful. No man could resist the way she was obviously wanting him. Sergio certainly couldn’t.
To give himself credit, he did try, using the age-old excuse that he hadn’t brought any condoms with him.
She blinked at him, then smiled. ‘It’s okay,’ she said, her voice all soft and smoky. ‘I’m on the pill. And before you ask,’ she added, ‘after I broke up with Andrei I had every test known to mankind. All came back negative, thank God.’
Sergio didn’t need any further encouragement. Neither did he give her any reassurances about his own clean bill of health. Though he could have. Possibly should have. But he was already kissing her, kissing her and touching her, pushing her legs apart and losing himself in the hot, wet silkiness that awaited him there. Her moans brought him to the brink with a speed that forced him to abandon her for a few seconds so that he could strip off his own clothes. No way was he going to come without being inside her.
She gasped when he entered her, then groaned, her legs lifting to wrap around him, the action giving him room to slide in deeper. God, but she felt incredible, her muscles tight around him. He didn’t dare move too vigorously, knowing that he would come within seconds. So he started rocking back and forth slowly with his hips, bracing himself above her on his elbows to keep contact to a minimum. But she would have none of it, her nails digging into his buttocks, her own hips lifting from the ground to force him in even deeper. It was too much, Sergio groaning as the last embers of his control exploded into a firestorm of raw passion. When he began pounding into her like some caveman, she came straight away, crying out his name quite loudly. His own climax swiftly followed, his release equally noisy and violent.
They clung to each other like drowning people in a stormy sea, shuddering and shaking, till eventually—after what felt like an eternity—the storm passed. Bella’s legs fell limply back to the ground, Sergio levering himself up from where he’d collapsed across her.
Her eyes, when they met his, looked stunned.
‘Good God, Sergio,’ she choked out. ‘That was... That was...’
‘Fantastic?’ he suggested, using humour to hide his fear that he might be falling in love with Bella. For surely just lust couldn’t explain the emotion that had filled him when he’d held her afterwards. He’d never wanted the moment to end.
She laughed. ‘That’s one way of putting it, I suppose.’
‘It’s the only way, sweetheart.’
‘Please don’t call me that,’ she said sharply.
‘What? Sweetheart?’
‘Yes. I’m not your sweetheart.’
God, but that hurt. Oh, yes, he was falling for her all right. Damn and blast. Bella was the last woman on earth he wanted to fall in love with. The irony of the situation did not elude Sergio. His father had fallen hard for her gold-digging mother, and now he was doing the same with the daughter, who could be just as bad, for all he knew. Sergio cursed himself for being stupid enough to confess he was a billionaire. But it was too late now. The damage had been done.
‘What would you like me to call you, then?’ he asked offhandedly whilst calling himself all sorts of names.
‘Just Bella will do fine. I’m your friend with benefits, remember, not your girlfriend.’
‘True. And might I say I’ve never had better benefits.’
Yes,
this was the way to play it. Cool and casual. No way would he ever let her know his true feelings. Hell no!
Bella couldn’t understand why she was feeling so put out by Sergio’s attitude. He was only telling the truth, after all. It worried her that perhaps she was trying to put a romantic spin on her feelings for Sergio. Her mother had brought her up to believe nice girls only went to bed with men they loved. Which was why Bella had had only three lovers in over ten years. Of course, that had been long before her mother had confessed the truth about her marriage to Sergio’s father.
It was hard, though, to abandon such long-held beliefs. For a while there just now, Bella had started thinking there had to be something more between them than just sex. It seemed perverse that she’d experienced more pleasure with Sergio than she had with any of her so-called lovers. Perverse also that she should feel so bereft when he withdrew and rolled away from her. In the past, she’d always been relieved when her lover had been finished with her.
‘Is sex always this good for you, Sergio?’ she asked as he reached for his clothes.
Sergio wanted to weep. Instead, he somehow found a suitably nonchalant voice. ‘Not always.’
‘I’ve never felt anything like what just happened,’ she said.
Against all common sense, her admission thrilled him. But he dared not look at her, lest she see the light of love glistening in his eyes.
‘There’s no rhyme or reason to sexual chemistry, Bella,’ he lied as he drew on his shorts and T-shirt. ‘Sometimes it is better than others. I also suspect you haven’t been with a man for quite some time—is that right?’ he asked, finally glancing her way.
She was still disturbingly naked and made no attempt to cover herself.
‘I broke up with Andrei over a year ago.’
He already knew that, the news having made his day at the time.
‘And there’s been no one since?’
‘No.’
‘No one-night stands?’
‘I don’t have one-night stands.’
‘What? Never?’