‘They might not have a room,’ she said.
His eyes gleamed. ‘We could try.’
Of course, they did have a room and Nicole felt like a naughty schoolgirl as Rocco handed over his credit card and was given a key. And crazily, she found herself wishing she were wearing her wedding band, which was the only piece of jewellery she’d kept from her marriage. She wondered what the staff thought of customers who came for lunch, then booked themselves a room. Did they think she was Rocco’s mistress and he was about to spend an illicit afternoon with a woman who wasn’t his wife? And wasn’t it ironic that somehow she seemed to fit that role much better? She’d made a much better mistress than she had a wife, she reflected.
The ride in the elevator was conducted in a breathless kind of silence, mainly because of the presence of a middle-aged woman who was decked in diamonds and carrying a small white dog in her handbag. But Nicole honestly didn’t think she would have dared go anywhere near Rocco even if the elevator had been empty. She was in such a heightened state of excitement that she suspected a single touch would have had her clawing at him like a wildcat. Greedily taking what she could from him in the certain knowledge that after Sunday she would be saying goodbye for ever.
After what felt like an eternity, the lift came to a halt and Rocco swiped the key card with a hand which wasn’t quite steady. Their room was opulent, with silken drapes and Persian rugs. The walls were decorated in soft shades of grey and the air heavily scented with freshly cut crimson roses. But the décor was nothing but a secondary feature because the moment the door closed behind them, they started pulling at each other’s clothes.
‘Rocco...be careful,’ she breathed as he tugged impatiently at the zip of her sundress. ‘If you tear it, I don’t have anything else to wear—’
‘Then I’ll send out for a replacement,’ he drawled as the white dress pooled to her ankles and he briefly lifted her up so she was free of it. ‘There are plenty of shops close by.’
It was an arrogant assertion and Nicole’s heart sank as she acknowledged that this was the way he operated. You ripped a woman’s dress off and then you bought another. And she realised something else, too. That whatever his love-life had been since their marriage ended—Rocco wouldn’t stay celibate forever. Of course he wouldn’t. One day he would be renting a post-lunch room with someone else like this and ripping off her dress.
But that uncomfortable realisation was banished by the practised touch of his fingers as they skated over her quivering flesh. With one-handed dexterity he unclipped her bra and let the lacy garment fall to the ground, his lips immediately locking around her nipple and making her moan softly. He was undoing the belt of his trousers as Nicole began unbuttoning his shirt, her fingers sliding eagerly over the silken warmth of his bare chest. The only sound she could hear was the growing intensity of their laboured breathing until the final piece of clothing was removed and they were both naked.
Impatiently, he threw aside the silken cushions and laid her on top of the bed, stretching her arms above her head as if she were some kind of ancient sacrifice. And didn’t it feel a bit like that, as he licked at her nipples before turning his attention to the hollow of her navel? It felt primitive and exciting and somehow inevitable. Nicole held her breath as his tongue traced a sinuous path to her parted thighs, at last flickering over the gloriously aroused bud until she was brokenly pleading for him to stop teasing her. She wanted him. All of him. She wanted him inside her.
‘Can’t you wait, piccolo?’
‘No!’ she gasped.
‘So I see.’ His laugh was low and exultant as he stroked on a condom and his hard body came down on top of hers.
‘Rocco!’ she moaned, tilting her hips towards him, and suddenly he was making that first deep thrust which filled her and the lips she’d opened to cry out her pleasure were being silenced by the hungry pressure of his kiss.
Nicole had never experienced anything quite so intense. Was that because for the first time she really felt like his equal—a lover who knew how to please him? Who could meet him on his own terms instead of being the unlikely mistress or the doormat wife? Her head thrashed wildly against the pillow as he drove into her and very quickly tipped her over the edge. Her body started convulsing and almost immediately she felt Rocco bucking inside her as he gave that shuddered groan she recognised so well. His body warm and spent, he collapsed against her, his heart pounding against her damp breasts, and her fingertips automatically moved up to stroke the ruffled tendrils of his hair.
In silence they lay there and must have fallen asleep, because when Nicole’s eyes eventually flickered open it was to find her lips pressed against Rocco’s neck. The tip of her tongue edged out so that she could taste the saltiness of his damp skin. If only they could stay like this for ever, she thought dreamily. If only all the stuff which had kept them apart didn’t exist. But it did. Because this was sex. Nothing but sex. He hadn’t dressed it up or cloaked it in promises. He’d booked a room and she’d gone there willingly. And if at this moment they were equals—then maybe she should capitalise on that. Because they hadn’t quite finished that conversation of earlier, had they?
‘Rocco,’ she said, her finger tracing a slow path along the darkened stubble at his jaw.
‘Mmm?’
‘Can I ask you something else?’
There was a trace of post-coital indulgence in his voice but also the merest note of warning. ‘If I say no, will that stop you?’
‘No.’
‘I didn’t think so.’ He rolled away from her. ‘So what is it now, Nicole?’
If only she’d had time to prepare—like when you went to see the doctor and were supposed to write down all your symptoms on a piece of paper in case you forgot them. As it was, the words came stumbling out in an unplanned rush. ‘When you told me earlier that you are the kind of man who hurts women, I wondered...well...’ She stared at the stillness of his profile. ‘Do you know why?’
‘I don’t hurt them,’ he corrected, his voice growing cool. ‘I am simply unable to meet their expectations, which are always predictable.’
She arched her brows but deep down she knew what was coming. ‘Oh?’
‘Women want love,’ he said softly. ‘And I don’t do love.’
‘Why not?’
He flexed and unflexed his fingers, the burnished skin looking very dark against the rumpled white sheet.
‘Because I can’t,’ he said at last. ‘I’m like someone who was born with no sense of smell—wave a rose underneath my nose and you’d be wasting your time. I don’t feel the stuff which other people claim to feel. That’s just the way it is. Blame it on the way I was brought up, if you like. Perhaps you have to witness something in order to experience it and there was no real love in our house—at least, not between my parents. Their marriage was based on duty, rather than joy.’
‘I see,’ said Nicole slowly, trying to absorb what he’d told her. Had he fallen into a familiar pattern when he’d married her, because that too was based on duty? Was that why he’d written her those letters insisting she came back—because he’d felt he had to? ‘So they weren’t happy?’
‘Not with each other, no.’
‘But they never considered divorce?’
‘With three children to consider?’ Rocco’s mouth hardened. ‘No way. And divorce at that time would have been frowned on, especially in that part of Sicily. I guess all their simmering resentment had nowhere to go and was one of the reasons why they lived life so dangerously.’
She shifted her weight slightly, so that she was propping herself up on her elbow. ‘What do you mean, dangerously?’
He turned to look at her and Nicole thought she caught a flash of vulnerability in his eyes, but it was gone so quickly she might have imagined it.
‘They got their kicks out of high-risk stuff,’ he said. ‘I gather it’s a guilt-free way of getting your adrenal buzz, rather than breaking your marriage vows. They opted for dangerous spor
ts rather than infidelity. You know, the kind of activities which make your insurance premiums shoot up. Sky-diving, heli-skiing, free-diving—you name it, they did it. When my father crashed the speedboat it was profoundly shocking but, on some level, I realised I’d been waiting for something like that to happen for a long time.’
Nicole held her breath, unwilling to say anything which might shatter the fragile atmosphere. She wondered why he’d never told her any of this before. Because they’d never had that kind of relationship. They’d been about to split up when she’d discovered she was pregnant—and after that, everything had been about the baby. Even after their marriage they’d never confided in one another because their compartmentalised lives had never seemed to overlap. It was only now, when their relationship was almost over, that Rocco seemed prepared to reveal something of the real man behind the successful mask he presented to the world. Too little, too late, she thought—but that didn’t stop Nicole’s heart from going out to him.
‘Oh, Rocco,’ she whispered. ‘I’m so sorry.’
His voice was dismissive. ‘I don’t want your pity.’
‘It isn’t pity. It’s compassion.’
‘Whatever you call it, I don’t want it. It all happened a long time ago and I think we’ve done this subject to death, don’t you?’ He stifled a yawn and glanced at his watch. ‘We’d better order a car to pick us up.’
Nicole registered the dismissive note in his voice and realised what he was trying to do. He was deliberately changing the subject. Telling her in no uncertain terms to keep her pity and her comfort to herself, but Nicole wasn’t done. Not yet. She licked her lips. ‘Just one more question.’
This time he made no attempt to hide his impatience. ‘This is getting tedious, Nicole.’
‘I need to know something else, Rocco, and this may be the last chance I get to ask it. Was salvaging your personal reputation the real reason you brought me out here?’
In the muted grey light of the upmarket room, his sapphire eyes looked very startling. ‘I could probably swing the deal without you by my side,’ he said slowly. ‘Let’s just say your presence was a precautionary measure.’
‘And that’s all?’
His eyes met hers. ‘Originally.’
‘And then?’
He shrugged. ‘Once you got out here I realised there was something unfinished between us.’
Her heart pounded. ‘You mean sex?’
There was a pause before he nodded. ‘Se. That’s exactly what I mean. It has been a long time since I’ve been intimate with a woman.’ He met the question in her eyes. ‘Not since the last time I had sex with you, if you’re interested.’
‘I’m not,’ she said breathlessly, and wondered if he could read the lie in her voice.
‘It seemed a pity to deny something we both wanted,’ he continued thoughtfully. ‘You were always the best lover I’d ever had and I wanted to know if you were as good as I remembered.’ He gave an odd kind of laugh. ‘And you are. But that’s all it was—lust, fired by curiosity.’
‘You certainly don’t pull your punches, do you, Rocco?’
‘Don’t ask questions if you can’t deal with the answers,’ he said as she got out of bed and turned her back on him.
But as he watched her getting dressed, Rocco was aware of a sudden feeling of frustration. He’d thought sex would mean closure—a satisfying finale to their doomed marriage. Yet somehow it hadn’t worked out like that. It had ended up being about more than the physical. It had given her the courage to ask him stuff and her questions had made him open up. Made him tell her things. Feel things. Things he didn’t want to feel. His mouth hardened as he reached down the side of the bed for his phone, closing his eyes to blot out the sight of Nicole pulling a pair of white panties up over her smooth, pale thighs.
Nicole hooked her bra in place, trying very hard to stop her hands from trembling and trying to ignore the fact that Rocco was speaking in rapid French on his phone and acting as if she wasn’t even there. She felt like some kind of hooker he’d brought to an anonymous hotel room, and even the revelation that there had been no other woman since their split wasn’t enough to calm her ruffled senses. She had been a fool. No two ways about it. She had been there for the taking and he had taken her. His unfinished business, as he had described it.
But for her?
For her it felt as if he’d picked her apart and left all the ends unravelled, so that she was left aching and wanting more. Pulling on her white sundress, she tried to smooth out some of the creases. More of him. Why hadn’t she realised that physical intimacy would take her to a place where it wasn’t safe to go? All that hard work she’d done on herself to try and forget him was all for nothing because right now she felt as vulnerable around Rocco as she’d ever been.
And she still had to endure some wretched cocktail party on his fancy yacht.
Nicole’s cheeks were burning as she walked through the lobby in her crumpled white sundress, aware of the doorman’s faint and knowing smile. And as she stepped out onto the sun-drenched pavement she realised that Rocco still hadn’t kissed her.
CHAPTER NINE
SMALL WAVES SLAPPED rhythmically against the side of the craft and, on the shoreline, distant lights glittered like scattered diamonds. Standing on the deck of his luxury yacht, Rocco Barberi surveyed the guests who were drinking champagne and chattering, wondering why he felt like a spectator at his own party. Fresh oysters and tiny blinis heaped with caviar were doing the rounds, and below deck one of the dealers from the famous nearby casino was demonstrating card tricks to accompanying squeals of disbelief. The party had the indefinable buzz of being a success—and Rocco had just been presented with the succulent cherry which would sit on top of the cake.
A short while ago, Marcel Dupois had taken him aside to say they were satisfied with his offer for the company, and saw no reason for any further delay. Rocco sensed that a deal could be concluded as early as next week and he should have been toasting his own success and looking hungrily to the future, just as he always did.
So why was he feeling a distinct lack of enthusiasm about putting together a new deal?
Why the hell was his temper feeling so damned frayed?
He knew why. The evidence was right there before his eyes. Nicole, wearing a close-fitting scarlet dress—a colour he’d never seen her in before—which apparently she’d made herself, just as she’d made the white sundress he’d torn from her body earlier that day. A Nicole who once again had everyone eating out of her hand with a sunny display which was in marked contrast to her distinctly cool mood once they’d left their hotel room.
Had she been angry with him for being so frank with her this afternoon? Her chilly attitude towards him had seemed to suggest as much. As soon as they’d arrived back at his house she had excused herself, saying she needed to get ready—and during the drive here she’d spent the whole time playing with her mobile phone, and acting as if he weren’t there.
Yet the moment they’d set foot on his yacht she had blossomed into the vivacious beauty who was drawing the eye of everyone at the party. Heads turned as she walked by and he found himself wondering if people could detect her natural sensuality, as if what they’d been doing straight after lunch was manifesting itself in her glowing appearance. His fingers tightened around the rail, because now he was bitterly regretting having told her things. Things about his parents. About not knowing about love. Things she didn’t need to know.
Annelise Dupois was tapping him on the arm. ‘Oh, but she is so charmant,’ she said, her gaze following the direction of his to where Nicole was standing, her mahogany curls illuminated by a soft golden light overhead so that she looked like a dark angel. ‘My husband and I were just saying what a lucky man you are, Rocco.’
And for once in his life, Rocco couldn’t think of a thing to say. Was it lucky that Nicole had somehow acquired the power to make him feel stuff he had no desire to feel? His mouth hardened.
‘I un
derstand you and your wife have been estranged?’ Javier Estrada chose just that moment to break into his thoughts—the Argentine’s apparently innocent question belied by the spark of interest in his black eyes, which was setting Rocco’s teeth on edge. He knew the South American tycoon’s reputation as a ruthless womaniser and had no intention of giving him the green light where Nicole was concerned. Things might be almost over for them, but he was damned if he would stand by and let a man like Estrada salivate all over her.
‘Not any more. We are in the process of reconciliation,’ Rocco answered coldly, not caring that it was a lie.
‘Pity,’ murmured Estrada, and it was as much as Rocco could do not to have him ejected from the boat. Better still, to heave him into the dark waters himself!
But he strode away from him just as a pretty waitress extended her tray of champagne and Rocco waved an impatient hand. He didn’t want food, or drink, or to dance to the sound of the string quartet which was entertaining people at the far end of the vast deck. All he seemed capable of doing was thinking about the woman he had married and wondering if he’d taken a temporary leave of his senses when he’d demanded she accompany him this weekend.
He hadn’t expected her to be so...
He shook his head. That was the trouble. He had entertained zero expectations where Nicole was concerned. Even when he’d discovered that his desire for her was as potent as before, he’d thought some long-overdue sex was all he needed. It had seemed a simple solution to vent his frustration and get the wife who had deserted him out of his system—all in one neat swoop. His mouth twisted. It just didn’t seem to be working out that way. He wondered how he could have made such a bad call and how this whole weekend could have turned into something else. Something he hadn’t bargained for. He felt as if Nicole was stripping away layers of himself, leaving him raw and revealing a side he’d always kept hidden. How had that even happened? he asked himself furiously. But really, he knew.
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