A crash of thunder echoed around the ancient walls of the square, and suddenly the rain was falling harder. Breaking off the kiss, he cupped her face in his hands and gazed at her in agony. Standing there in the pouring rain, with her thin chemise clinging wetly to her body, she was like an orphan of the storm. With a thick groan of anguish he realised that after she had tried on the dress she hadn’t bothered to put her bra back on, and the glorious fullness of her breasts was as clearly visible through the transparent cotton as if she had been wearing nothing at all.
Suddenly he knew that he wanted her more than he’d ever wanted anything in his entire life.
She had heard the sound he made, and understood its meaning. Biting down on her swollen lip, she looked into his eyes and saw the torment he was suffering. Slowly, wonderingly, she reached up and, with a fingertip, swept aside the dripping lock of hair that was falling over his forehead, then brushed her lips against his in a gesture of acceptance and invitation.
His breathing was shallow and fast, his eyes almost black with the urgency of his need, and he gave another strangled groan. As a fork of lightning zig-zagged above them he took her hand and they began to run across the square, splashing through the puddles.
When they reached the other side Eve glanced back and gasped. ‘The dress!’
The shiny crimson carrier bag was still standing where he had dropped it in the middle of the square.
‘Leave it,’ he growled, pulling her on.
He stopped at a huge wooden door. Dazed and disorientated with desire, Eve had no idea how they had got there, knew only that as Raphael pulled her up the steps and fitted a huge key into the lock she felt almost dizzy with the intensity of her craving for him.
They stumbled inside, her lips already seeking his before the door had even closed behind them. As it slammed shut they fell against it, mouths hungrily devouring what they had waited so long to taste. In the sudden quiet after the noise of the storm outside, Eve surrendered completely to the torrent of her own voracious longing. Spreading her arms out wide against the door, she arched her back in ecstatic submission, thrusting her breasts against the muscular wall of his chest, loving the exquisite agony as her peaked nipples rubbed against the layers of thin wet fabric that separated their flesh.
As their clothes began to dry a little on their heated bodies, another kind of wetness was flooding her from within. She ground her pelvis against him, feeling the unbearably enticing hardness of his arousal. Her fingers ached to reach for the belt of his trousers, but some sadistic instinct for prolonging the pleasure made her keep her hands pressed against the wall, until she felt she might scream with anticipation.
In the dim, underwater light of the hallway he tore his mouth from hers just as a spectacular flash of lightning illuminated his face. His expression was tortured, haunted, lost, and he pressed the heels of his hands into his eyes. ‘Eve, I—’
She didn’t wait to hear any more. While thunder shook the ancient casement windows some primitive animal instinct overtook her, making her reach out for him and grab the collar of his shirt. Pulling him roughly to her, she only had time to murmur three words before his mouth crashed down onto hers again.
‘I want you.’
This time she was in control. She pushed herself away from the door and felt her legs part, her body curve towards his. His hands cupped her buttocks, caressing her, holding her against him, so that the throbbing of his desire merged with her own hot, pulsing need.
Blindly she felt for his belt, feeling the honeyed surge within her as her fingers found it and began to work on reaching their goal. Swiftly, deftly, she flicked the end of the belt out from its restraining loop, and was just about to undo it completely when his hand closed over hers.
‘Not here.’
His voice was harsh and ragged. Placing a hand beneath each thigh, he scooped her up so that she was still facing him, straddling him, her eyes level with his. As he carried her effortlessly up the wide, sweeping staircase her gaze didn’t flicker from his for an instant. And all the time her hands were very slowly undoing the buttons of his shirt. Freeing each one, she trailed a feather-light fingertip down his bare skin to the next, until they had reached the top of the stairs and only the button of his jeans remained.
His steps faltered as he felt her fingers work it open. Her turquoise eyes were hooded and opaque, and for a second her eyelids fluttered closed as her fingertips met the silken tip of his erection.
She felt the shudder ripple through his body, and he sucked in a shivering breath. Roughly applying his shoulder to the nearest door, he pushed it open, and in a couple of strides had crossed the room and laid her down on a bed.
There was something goddess-like in the way she rose up on her knees in front of him to finish what she had started. The storm continued to rage around them, but her face was perfectly composed, only the spreading darkness in her eyes and the swollen, rosy moistness of her parted lips betraying her hunger. With her eyes still fixed on his, her fingers moved downwards, and her lush mouth curved slowly into a sensual smile.
Button fly. The game could continue. Inch by devastating … ravishing … exquisite … inch, her caressing fingers moved down his throbbing hardness.
Clenching his fists against the unbearable pleasure, Raphael’s groan was lost in an ear-splitting crash of thunder as he pushed her back onto the bed. Shrugging off his unbuttoned shirt, he closed his mouth over hers as his hands found the zip of her trousers and tugged them down over her knees, then turned their attention to her top.
The buttons were tiny. There were hundreds of them. And he didn’t have her patience.
‘Take it off!’ he rasped.
She did as she was told, lifting her arms and wantonly wrenching the thin cotton top over her head in sudden desperation to be free of everything that restrained and separated them. As she did so Raphael drank in the sight of her slender body arching upwards, the delicate ridges of her ribs beneath the pale caramel of her skin, the gorgeous heaviness of her exceptional breasts. Unable to resist her any longer, he bent to brush his lips against one hard, thrusting nipple, then parted his lips to take the deep pink bud into his mouth.
A sharp shock of ecstasy quivered through her. She cried out—a high, keening sound of longing which echoed through the murky rooms of the silent palazzo.
Raphael raised his head to look into her eyes. In the purple storm-light his face was mask-like, inscrutable, the intensity of his response concentrated in his dark, glittering eyes. With swift, savage movements he stripped off the remainder of his own clothes and reached out to grasp her hips.
She was so wet. Almost deranged with the strength of his need for her, he ran his thumbs softly along her swollen, secret folds, marvelling at the liquid silkiness, loving her eager sweetness. He was hanging onto his self-control by the finest gossamer filament, and he knew that in a few more seconds he would be lost.
As he entered her he felt her tense suddenly. Looking into her eyes, he saw that her wanton confidence of a moment ago had gone, leaving a naked vulnerability that made the adrenalin surge within him.
‘Eve,’ he breathed. ‘Oh, Eva …’
‘Don’t stop,’ she sobbed. ‘Please, Raphael—please, just keep—’
She gasped, unable to finish, as he gathered her into his arms and lifted her up. He positioned himself on the edge of the bed and she found herself sitting astride him, in exactly the same way as she had last night on the terrace. But this time she could feel him deep inside her, filling her in every possible sense.
With infinite tenderness he cradled her in his arms and began to rock her. Gently at first and then, as the shadows cleared from the deep pools of her eyes, she picked up the rhythm herself, added to it an urgency of her own. Instinctively she found herself putting her hands on his shoulders, moving to take some of her weight onto her knees, giving her more freedom to tilt her pelvis towards him, taking him deeper and deeper into her with each blissful thrust.
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nbsp; Their eyes met and locked. His were filled with an emotion that she couldn’t read but wanted desperately to understand. She let herself fall into their dark, troubled depths and he wrenched his gaze from hers, buried his face in her neck, breathing her in, tasting the delicious dampness of her flesh. The sensation of his lips on the sensitised skin of her shoulder and the taut column of her throat seemed to travel like quicksilver straight down into the molten core of her, adding a spark to the smouldering heat between her thighs.
Just when he thought he could hold off the moment of sweet release no longer, he felt her stiffen and grow still in his arms, then cry out in joy and surprise.
The pleasure he got from hearing that sound was indescribable. Even his own blissful, earth-shattering climax a second later couldn’t beat it.
In the aftermath of the storm the air was cooler. As the sweat dried on their exhausted bodies Raphael felt Eve shiver, so without letting her go he tugged back the layers of crisp sheets and slid between them.
They lay in silence, their limbs entangled, his head resting lightly against the silken pillow of her breasts while one hand softly caressed the hollow of her waist. The sense of deep peace that had overtaken him as their lovemaking had reached its climax was already beginning to ebb away as the implications of what had happened hit home.
He’d written her off as an unscrupulous journalist, out to do a kiss-and-tell exposé. He’d kept her with him because he didn’t trust her. Because he was supposed to be protecting her.
And now he knew that her innocence was for real. And he had failed her. He was supposed to be protecting her, but he’d been so carried away by his own lust that he hadn’t even managed to use a condom.
A tide of guilt and self-loathing swept through him.
‘You should have told me.’
His voice was just harsh whisper, and her hand, which had been running through his hair, suddenly stopped its rhythmic stroking. ‘Told you what?’
‘That you were a virgin.’
‘Would it have made any difference?’
He sighed heavily. ‘Of course. Of course it would.’
His words cut into her like sharpened blades, until the ornate plaster cornicing she had been staring at on the ceiling above the bed disappeared in a blur of tears.
That was what she had been afraid of. To him what had just taken place between them was obviously just a casual encounter. Had he known she was a virgin he would have felt under too much pressure to make it into something more. She blinked hard. It was bad enough that he had found out she was pathetically inexperienced without her burdening him with childish emotional outbursts as well.
‘I didn’t tell you because it isn’t important.’
‘I would have been more … gentle. And gentlemanly. I’m sorry.’
‘I thought you said no more apologies?’ She gave a laugh that sounded almost like a sob. ‘Or were you fishing for compliments? You were perfect. It was …’ She hesitated, lost for words, unconsciously caressing him again as they were both overwhelmed by remembered sensation.
Languidly she ran her fingers through the silky length of his hair, watching it fall back onto her skin, starkly black against the creamy white of her breasts. Every now and again she caught a glimpse of silver glinting in the dark mass. This tiny, unexpected sign of vulnerability touched her unbearably.
‘You’re going grey,’ she said softly, singling out one pure silvery strand.
Sitting up, he gave a bleak laugh. ‘Of course I am. I’m old. Too old for you.’
‘Says who?’ Behind him her voice was achingly tender. ‘Your mother was the same age as me when she married your father, and he was a lot older than her. Fiora told me.’
She felt him stiffen. ‘Come on,’ he said abruptly throwing back the sheets. ‘We have a ceremony to attend.’
‘Well, I hope the designer gene has been passed down. Because since we left the dress in Saint Mark’s Square, all I have to wear is this sheet.’
Buttoning up his jeans, trying not to think about the delicious circumstances of their unbuttoning, he looked at her and was caught off guard for a moment by her astonishing beauty. Her golden hair was tousled, her skin a warm honeyed apricot against the white of the sheets, and her aquamarine eyes shimmered with the afterglow of passion, and what looked like tears.
‘I don’t doubt you’d carry it off beautifully,’ he commented sardonically, walking towards the long wall of built-in cupboards. ‘But fortunately you shouldn’t have to.’ Throwing open one pair of doors, he revealed a row of dresses in a kaleidoscope of colours.
From the bed, Eve gasped.
‘Whose are they?’
‘My mother’s. I don’t think she’ll be needing any of them tonight, though,’ he added with a twisted smile.
While Raphael went back downstairs to find their luggage Eve wound the sheet around herself and moved over to the wardrobe. The luxurious fabric of the countless dresses caressed her fingers, and the faint, unmistakable fragrance of gardenia drifted up from their silky folds. An image of the beautiful, laughing woman in the photograph came back to her, and she felt the sting of tears behind her eyes again. How could Raphael bear to look in here?
She started as he came back with the bags.
‘Have you found anything?’
‘No. I mean—yes. But there’s so much … I wouldn’t know where to begin.’
Her heart ached for him as he began to rifle through the rails. Not a flicker of emotion showed on his face.
‘Nothing black or red. Or grey. I don’t want you looking sophisticated. I’d much rather you looked like yourself.’
He pulled out a selection of dresses in beautiful shades of dusky pink, duck-egg blue, pistachio-green and ivory, and threw them down onto the bed. ‘Try these to start with.’
‘They’re gorgeous.’ She picked up the pink one from the top of the pile, touching its lacy hem with awe. Behind her, Raphael was busy unzipping his battered leather flight bag and shaking out his dinner jacket, so she took advantage of his preoccupation to drop the sheet and slip into the dress.
‘There are probably shoes in there somewhere as well,’ he said, without turning round.
With the dress still unfastened at the back, she bent to look in the bottom of the cupboard. Sure enough there were rows of shoes arranged neatly on racks—some of them in boxes, some in soft drawstring bags, some just swathed in tissues.
‘How come everything’s still here, just as she left it, after all this time?’ she asked, taking out a perfect pair of fifties-style slingbacks in palest pink satin.
Raphael shrugged. ‘My father didn’t want to get rid of them. I guess it was easier to store them here than move them.’
‘He must have loved her very much.’
‘Not at all. It was the dresses he loved. Most of them are his own designs.’
The bitterness in his voice made her wince. ‘Oh, Raphael, no! Surely that’s not true? He must have loved her!’
Raphael had put the large, square black case he had brought with him from Florence on the bed, and now he snapped it open. Eve couldn’t see what it contained, but it looked sinister-like a gun case. She realised she didn’t feel remotely concerned.
I trust him with my life, she thought matter-of-factly. It doesn’t make sense, but I can’t help it.
‘He never showed any signs of it. I don’t think he ever stopped trying to change her into something she wasn’t.’
‘What was she like?’
‘Sweet. Funny.’ His fingers faltered for a second as he realised who else that description fitted, but he didn’t stop what he was doing or look up. ‘She couldn’t help but laugh at the absurdities of the fashion world, which my father always says drove him mad. To him, fashion is an extremely serious matter.’
‘Why did he marry her, then?’ Eve asked as, holding the pink dress up at the front, she slipped her feet into the slingbacks. Reaching backwards to slip the straps over her heels, she heard the mechani
cal whirr of a camera shutter. So that was what the case contained. Startled, she looked up—straight into the lens.
‘Wh-what are you—?’
‘When I see something beautiful I want to photograph it.’ His eyes were narrow and unsmiling as he looked at her, then he raised the camera again and continued. ‘She was the daughter of a duce—Italian aristocracy—and she was very lovely. She was his muse—’ he said the word scornfully ‘—before she was his wife.’
He was lying on the bed, propped up against the pillows, his face obscured by the bulk of the camera. Breaking off for a moment, to adjust something on the long zoom lens, he glanced up at her suddenly. ‘Put the blue one on now.’
She did as she was told, stepping quickly out of the pink dress, still in the delicate satin shoes. The camera whirred on.
‘Go on,’ she prompted gently.
‘From the start she was a target for the paparazzi. Beautiful young heiress married to celebrated designer—paparazzi heaven. But she hated it. She was young, shy, insecure—completely unsuited to the role he thrust her into.’
Totally absorbed in what he was saying, Eve slipped her arms into the blue dress. Without attempting to fasten it, she turned to look in the mirror, giving Raphael a perfect view of her bare brown back. He fired off a quick succession of shots, hoping to capture the way the late-afternoon light was casting a soft halo around her hair and turning her skin to gold.
She looked at him over her shoulder as she took the dress off again, picked up the green one from the pile and unzipped it. ‘So what happened?’
‘He couldn’t see how much she hated it. Publicity is everything to him. He couldn’t see how bloody awful it was for her—how hounded she felt. It got steadily worse after I was born, because she tried even harder to avoid it then—for my sake—which just made her an even more tempting target. Then one day she took me to the dentist. As we came out there were a couple of paparazzi who started hassling her, calling out, taunting her to get a shot. It really got to her. She stepped out into the road to get away from them.’
Latin Lovers: Italian Playboys Page 45