“I do not see you suffering from a surfeit of tact.”
“Actually, I’m not usually this bad either. But what can I say—you bring out the worst in me. Though I figure if I can dish it, I’d better be able to take it.”
“Is that right?”
She nodded. “I can take care of myself.”
“So you keep insisting.”
The light had faded gradually, as they drove out of the city. Now they turned up the drive to the villa. Though her attraction for him had added a piquancy to their sparring, with her mind engaged in their discussion, Calia had been able to shove aside the physical immediacy of their attraction. But now, as he parked the car and turned to face her, she was struck once again by the full force of his sexual potency.
She swallowed, her throat suddenly dry. She could just make out his neutral expression in the fading remnants of twilight. For a few, suspended moments, they watched each other in silence, and all of Calia’s uncertainties returned.
“Well?” His voice, thick with dark promise, cut through the hungry tension of the moment. “It is your decision, Calia.”
Hearing that voice, feeling the tight pull of his magnetism, Calia could feel her doubts slipping away. She wanted Gio just as much as he wanted her. It wasn’t as if she hoped to have a relationship with him. Would it really be so terrible to indulge in this urgent desire?
They would be having sex, not making love, so why not enjoy it for what it was? Calia nodded, an unconsciously sensual smile spreading across her face. Enjoy the experience, then walk away without regrets.
In the fading light, she saw the answering gleam of his grin, before he bridged the distance between them, cupping her face in the curve of his palm. Their lips met and the electricity of the contact swept away any lingering doubts. Calia leaned into him, into the sensation, her body responding to the chemistry that had been fizzing between them all evening.
Finally, he broke away. Calia dazedly noticed that it was now completely dark and he was a shadowed outline, close enough for her to feel the heat of his skin against her own. Only then did she realise they were still sitting in his car, embracing over the parking brake and gearshift, like randy teenagers.
“We should go inside,” she murmured.
“My thoughts exactly.”
Then he touched her again, and suddenly her lips were against his, hungrily accepting the thrusting heat of his probing tongue. This time, it was Calia who managed to pull away before she lost all sense of herself.
But even as they made their way into the villa, Calia’s senses were completely swamped by her awareness of him. The taut, predatory grace of his movements. The sexual intensity in his eyes when he glanced back at her. The spicy, masculine smell of his skin, that her body already associated, inextricably, with Gio. She was only dimly aware of their surroundings as she followed him through the house. Her flesh yearned towards his, yearned to continue what they had begun in the car.
She barely noted that he had closed his bedroom door behind them—but even before he had finished turning around, she knew the precise moment he pushed aside all other thoughts, returning his full attention to her.
And she was ready for him.
The heated trails left by his fingers, as he ran them up her thighs with feverish urgency, momentarily eclipsed the fact that he was pushing up her dress. As soon as she realised what he was doing, she grabbed the fabric herself, pulling it up and over her head in a swift, urgent movement. His eyes darkened and he let out a groan as he pulled back briefly to survey the expanse of her bared flesh, her breasts perched high and firm in the confines of her bra, the intimacy of her womanhood still concealed by the silky scrap of fabric between her legs.
But she didn’t allow him time for further observation, instead beginning her own campaign to divest him of his clothes. Her fingers clumsy with the urgency of her need, she began unbuttoning his shirt. He helped, eventually tossing it aside with abstracted carelessness. She ran caressing hands over the hard, golden contours of his chest, reveling in the feel of his muscles, even as she feasted on the sight of them. Then, he leaned into her, pressing his mouth against hers, his tongue plunging between lips that she opened eagerly to receive him.
She moaned at the hard strength of his hands, unclasping her bra, before sweeping across the curve of her back with a rough sensuality. She barely noticed when he began moving forward, forcing her backwards—she was too caught in the excitement of pressing her mouth against his, exploring his depths with her tongue as her hands moved over the muscled hardness of his back.
And then, she was being lowered backwards, onto pillowed softness. His bed.
He straightened a moment, watching her, his predator’s eyes dark with desire, until she gasped his name in protest.
Then, he was with her again, his tongue tracing whorls of tingling moisture across the surface of her skin, beginning where the line of her neck met her shoulders. He paused at each breast, giving each of them their due, as he alternately coaxed and caressed her nipples with his teeth and tongue, not leaving them until they were hardened nubs of sensitivity.
She gasped as he moved down, down. She felt his thumb slip into the waistband of her panties, and she raised herself so that he could pull them down.
He gave her a playful lick, sending a jolt of pleasure through her body as her own moisture heated and burned between her thighs. “I want you now, Gio!” she groaned, writhing with her need for release.
“Dio lo aiuta! I am ready for you,” he muttered, straightening.
She watched him, her vision hazed with pleasure, as he bared the magnificence of his erection. She let out a long moan, reaching down to guide him into her depths. He slid inside with a silky effortlessness.
“Cielo dolce, how you are wet for me.” He began moving inside her, and Calia echoed his rhythm unconsciously, her pleasure escalating to an unbearable pinnacle, before exploding into a thousand shards. She barely heard the mingling of their cries—she knew nothing but the shattering power of their shared release.
When she returned to her senses, it was to find her limbs still entwined with Gio’s, and her body heavy with a voluptuous fatigue. He turned his head to look at her with languid eyes, his expression smugly sated. Calia could hardly blame him. She felt the same way.
“Wow,” she sighed.
“I could hardly have put it better, myself.”
Calia allowed herself to glory in the afterglow for several more moments, but even as she did so, the second thoughts began rushing in. She shifted, and with groan, Gio rolled off her. She sat up.
“I should go back to my room,” she began, but he shrugged.
“What is the rush?”
“Larissa…“
“… knows that we are both adults. She will respect our privacy.” He shifted into a more comfortable position on what Calia now noted was a king-sized bed, then patted the place beside him. “So. Sleep. Be comfortable. There is no hurry.”
With a gradual awareness of the full extent of her abandon starting to seep in, Calia looked at him dubiously, suddenly wanting some distance from the power he had over her. “Isn’t it usually the woman who wants to sleep together afterwards, while the guy tries to figure out how he can get away?”
He made a dismissive gesture. “I like to have my women in easy reach when they spend the night with me.”
Calia shook her head. “Do you even know how arrogant you sound?” When he didn’t bother to answer, she sighed. “I guess it’s more that you just don’t care.”
“How is arrogance relevant? It is what I like.”
“I’ll bear that in mind if ever I should choose to become one of your women. But for the moment, I think I’ll be going back to my room.”
“Now you are in a snit.”
She gritted a smile at him. “Not at all. I’m simply clarifying my position. We slept together. It was great. Now it’s over. End of story. If you’re wanting someone who’ll roll over and spread wheneve
r the whim strikes you, I’d suggest you keep looking.”
He tilted his head as he regarded her, clearly unfazed by her heated rebuttal. “You cannot tell me that you were not blown away by what we just did. That you wouldn’t want to share that kind of intimacy again.”
“In theory, sure. But in practice, I think it’s a little more complicated than that.”
He raised an eyebrow. “In what way?”
She shook her head, before turning away from his compelling gaze, which dared her to deny that she had been swept away by their shared experience. Instead, she concentrated on gathering up her clothes. “I don’t know. I have to think about this, Gio.”
She didn’t bother with her underwear, instead just slipping the dress on in preparation for returning to her room. Her hand was poised on the doorknob when his voice stopped her.
“You will think about it, and then you will talk yourself out of what could be an enjoyable experience for both of us. Haven’t we discussed this already? You have made your own expectations clear, and I think I have done the same, have I not?”
She nodded, letting her hand drop. “Yes. Yes you have, Gio. But still…” she trailed off, only just able to acknowledge, even to herself, that she hadn’t nearly gotten her fill of him. Already, some part of her was starting to regret her own insistence upon leaving, when really she wanted to join him on the bed. To sink into sleep and be wakened by his tantalizing caresses.
Was there really anything wrong with being within easy reach of him—so that he could, at any time, guide her into that maelstrom of pleasure, more intense than any she had previously experienced?
“Still, what?”
His question sliced into her thoughts and she glanced over at him. He watched her with an air of amused curiosity. As if he had no doubt at all that he’d be able to bring her around to his way of thinking, sooner or later.
And that’s what scares me. Because, damn the man, he was right. She could too easily be persuaded to return to him. She was three-quarters of the way there already.
But the thing that really triggered the alarm bells was the sneaking fear that she could become all too dependent on his lovemaking. The idea of developing any kind of attachment—even if it were purely sexual—to a man like Gio, scared the hell out of her.
She gave him a cool smile. “I really enjoyed that, Gio. But why don’t we quit while we’re ahead?”
He sat up at that, his expression darkening. “Quit while we are ahead?” He spoke with an edge of scorn. “I did not get to where I am today—did not bring my family’s fortune back from the edge of bankruptcy—by quitting while I was ahead.”
“Well bully for you. But I think we should look at this as a one-off kind of thing. It was amazing, yes. And it was probably something we both needed, to alleviate the tension between us—” except that it didn’t feel alleviated at all—it actually felt more urgent than ever “—but now it’s done, and we can each move on. I’m sure you have many women who are eager to be whatever you want them to be. I’m just not one of them.” But even as she said it, the thought of such females triggered a hot surge of possessiveness that shocked her with its intensity.
“They do not interest me at the moment. It is you I want.”
The admission took her breath away—and it was almost enough to change her mind. Before she could respond, he spoke again, his expression sardonic,
“So I ask myself, what is stopping you? Do you worry that I will start wanting more than you are willing to give? Because it will not happen.” His eyes narrowed as his gaze raked over her. “Or are you afraid that you will start wanting more from me?”
Calia glared at him, hating his perspicacity. “Don’t kid yourself,” she scoffed, hoping she sounded more plausible than she felt. “What more could I possibly want from you? Additional pejorative comments about women, perhaps? Or maybe the endless joy of knowing that the man I’m involved with—albeit superficially—has no respect for me simply because I’m female?”
A flash of impatience crossed his face. “Why is this even an issue?”
Calia let out a hard breath, angry, but also filled with a sense of vindication. They really were completely incompatible—and this was exactly the kind of reminder she needed. “That you should even ask the question just goes to show that we’re from two different planets. So let’s keep it that way, shall we?”
And, having retreated to firm ground, Calia left his room, pulling the door closed behind her.
CHAPTER FIVE
Calia spent a restless night trying not to think about how Gio had felt, inside her, against her. Surrounding her. But the exciting, spicy masculinity of his smell clung to her skin, a distracting reminder that challenged her resolve to walk away from any further intimacies.
She finally fell asleep sometime after five in the morning.
When she awoke, she lay in her bed for several moments, straining her ears for any indication that Gio might still be in the villa, even though a quick check of her watch showed that it was well past eight o’clock. No doubt, he had already left for work.
Feeling a little ridiculous, Calia carefully scanned the corridor outside her room before tiptoeing along the hall to the bathroom. But, she couldn’t help herself. She didn’t want to have to face him quite yet.
Some time later, freshly showered and feeling somewhat restored, Calia walked into the dining room, her daypack over one shoulder. Larissa greeted her with a smile.
“You slept well, yes?”
Calia grinned back. “I did, thanks. And I actually wanted to ask you for the address here—so the credit card company can send me my replacement cards.”
“Si, si. Of course.” As Larissa searched for a pen and paper, she continued speaking, “Gio has already left for the work, but he told me he would be back by no later than three. He will take you into the city then, to the office where you will get your… what is the word… the tickets you can trade for money when you travel?”
“Travellers’ cheques?” Calia had only brought a couple of them, just in case she ended up in some truly remote locale where her bank card and credit cards wouldn’t work. Though they wouldn’t give her enough to pay for both food and accommodation in Rome, they would at least yield enough spending money to cover her sightseeing expenses over the next few days.
“Esattamente. The travellers’ cheques. The office is a place in the city.”
As Larissa jotted down the villa’s address, Calia glanced at her watch. It was barely nine o’clock. She shook her head. She wasn’t about to spend the whole day languishing about the house, waiting for Gio to give her a ride into town. Who knew when she’d be in Italy again?
“I can just take a bus, Larissa. Gio shouldn’t have to come all the way out here just to take me back to the city. I have the address. If you can give me directions or show me on the map, I’ll find my way. No problem.”
Larissa regarded her dubiously. “I do not think Gio will be happy with this.”
Calia wasn’t so certain—her way would save him some considerable inconvenience. Surely that couldn’t be a problem for him.
And besides, she wasn’t going to be the one responsible for cutting short Gio’s negotiations with the Frenchmen, just because he felt obliged to ferry her into town on a mission she was perfectly capable of performing alone. She made a dismissive gesture. “Don’t worry about that. If you give me the number, I’ll call his office and leave a message, so he knows that he won’t need to leave work early, just for me.”
Larissa continued to look doubtful, while Calia continued, her tone persuasive, “It’s all right, Larissa. I really don’t mind. I’m quite happy following my own program. I’ll make a sightseeing trip out of it.” She dug through her daypack until she found her guidebook. It had a rough map of the city in the Rome section. “Here. You can show me where to go. It’ll be fine. And frankly, it’s what I’d prefer.”
“Well, if you’d really prefer that…”
“I real
ly really would,” Calia replied with a grin.
Larissa shook her head, returning Calia’s smile. “I swear, you are so different from Gio’s usual women.”
So much for Larissa minding her own business. But the comment amused Calia.
“I’m relieved to hear it.” She held out the book, open to the map of Rome. “So, where should I be going? Oh, and here’s the address.” She indicated the scrap of paper on which she had jotted down the information before tucking it into the “Rome” section of the book.
Larissa glanced down at the page, then shook her head. “No, no. That is not enough detail. Is too small, too little part of the city.” She bustled off, and returned with a fold out map. Using that, she showed the route Calia would have to take from the nearest subway stop. She also handed Calia a small book of coupons. “These are the metro tickets,” she said, indicating the book, before launching into an explanation of the intricacies of how to validate and use the tickets. “So, I will have my husband take you to the nearest metro stop.”
“He doesn’t have to…” Calia began, but Larissa waved the protest away.
“You will not argue about this. I insist.” She spoke so firmly that Calia knew it would be no use trying to dissuade the other woman. So instead, while Larissa bustled off to cook the sumptuous breakfast she insisted on preparing, Calia made a few calls—first to the credit card company, and then to Gio’s office.
Fortunately, Gio’s secretary spoke reasonable English, and so Calia was able to make herself understood with little difficulty—though she did find herself wondering if the other woman’s husky voice and earthy accent translated into a correspondingly sexy persona.
What sort of secretary would someone like Gio hire to work as his personal assistant?
With an impatient frown, Calia shoved the thought aside and instead concentrated on consulting the map and guidebook, so that she could plan her sightseeing for the day.
Between the lineup and the paperwork, the process of getting her travellers’ cheques replaced stretched into the early afternoon. But, she eventually emerged triumphant, having also cashed them in so that she could buy her own book of metro tickets and pay the hefty admission fees to the sites.
Her Roman Holiday Page 7