Di Sione's Innocent Conquest (The Billionaire's Legacy)

by Carol Marinelli

  ‘You’re going tomorrow, Matteo. I’m here for a few more days, dismantling the car and then straight on to Monte Carlo, so it seems a bit stupid to be walking me to my room today.’

  He said nothing.

  Matteo didn’t know what to say.

  Abby was right—tomorrow at six in the morning he’d be gone and, more to the point, he had never been another’s shadow.

  Silence hung between them.

  It wasn’t a row; it was Check.

  His heart was under threat of capture and Matteo didn’t like that feeling in the least.

  ‘Good luck today,’ Matteo said but it came out in a rather forced voice.

  So, too, was hers. ‘Thanks.’

  He lay there when she had gone. Yes, tomorrow he would be back in Manhattan and, Matteo decided, he was going to go and get laid.

  It had been...

  He didn’t really want to do the math. Matteo didn’t want to admit that since their first dinner in Dubai, he’d lost interest in that half of the world population that had once been his playground.

  No, he wouldn’t be getting laid any time soon.

  Matteo knew he was lying to himself. Instead the next couple of weeks were going to be spent stressing at the thought of her in Monte Carlo with that animal around.

  He reached for the hotel phone.

  * * *

  Abby stepped into her hotel room to change into her lovely bottle-green outfit. She opened the chocolate that was on her pillow and as she popped it into her mouth she picked up the note that was beside it.

  Dear Abby,

  You need new underwear. Shall I take you shopping or can I choose?

  Matteo

  And then her phone rang.

  ‘Did you get my note?’ Matteo asked.

  She knew he was ringing to check that she’d got back okay, but it was nice that he didn’t have to admit it.

  ‘I did.’ Abby smiled. ‘You can choose.’ And then she was serious. ‘Nothing’s going to happen today, Matteo. All anyone is thinking about is the race.’

  ‘I know and I meant what I said, even if I didn’t say it very well—good luck today.’

  ‘Thanks.’

  Matteo had quite a morning in a very lavish boutique.

  A few women nudged and laughed but he cared not and amassed quite a collection, which he asked to all be wrapped and then sent up to her room. Then Matteo had lunch and finally he took himself trackside.

  The streets were packed and lined with spectators and when he finally made it to the Boucher sheds he, as always, stayed back, though Pedro stopped playing video games and came over and they chatted for a few moments.

  Abby saw Pedro was smiling at something Matteo had said, and whatever her personal feelings were towards Matteo, she was very glad to have him as their sponsor. He was very good with Pedro, unlike the sponsor they had had last year who had demanded far too much, especially before a race.

  But then, as the race commenced, there were no thoughts of Matteo, nor revenge—all Hunter was, was the car that was ahead of them.

  As were eight others.

  For the next two hours the team worked intently, working out the best refuel times. Matteo watched Abby relaying instructions and giving Pedro some insights as to the cars ahead of him.

  The Italian crowd were even more vocal than in Dubai and it was a loud, exciting couple of hours and by the last three laps Pedro had inched the car into fifth place.

  Hunter’s experience on the course showed, yet Evan pushed him hard and suddenly a roar went up as Pedro overtook into fourth.

  Matteo found that he was chewing his nails.

  And then it was into the final lap.

  He looked over to Abby, whose face was pale but she was talking very calmly to Pedro through her mouthpiece, even though she must be feeling frantic. Hunter was well ahead of Pedro, Evan was in close second; it was a battle for third and, holy smoke, Matteo thought as Pedro accelerated out of the turn, he was going to get there.

  Abby was right; this kid was a genius. The pale, sickly faced twenty-one-year-old that had climbed into the car, sure he would place last, got out a triumphant third, as the Boucher team cheered and embraced.

  And no, Matteo wasn’t on her mind right now because Abby nearly broke her neck just to get over to a jubilant Pedro.

  ‘What the hell!’ she screamed at him, her face split in a shocked smile.

  ‘She flew!’ Pedro roared back, simply elated. ‘She just took off.’

  And they were back to talking about the car as if she were a person. This third was even sweeter than placing first.

  The press conference was very different to last time. Abby and Matteo were out and stood hand in hand as Hunter droned on and on about his experience. Evan, a man of few words, just shrugged when asked his predictions for the final race.

  They were neck and neck—it could be any one of the three.

  Pedro sat with a satisfied grin.

  ‘We’ll just have to wait for Monte Carlo,’ was not just the gist but practically all Pedro said.

  Yes, it was a different type of celebration tonight.

  The Boucher team filled a gorgeous restaurant. Abby didn’t have time to change but no-one cared. She had the best squid pasta she had ever tasted and Pedro made a speech and said that she, the car, was perfection.

  It was wonderful; the party was moving on now to wild and Abby and Matteo decided to head back to the hotel but, before they did, Matteo pulled Pedro aside and had a word.

  ‘Another shopping spree?’ Abby checked but Matteo just shrugged.

  Oh, he’d been speaking with Pedro but about something rather more serious than shopping, not that he’d tell Abby that.

  Yes, things felt different tonight and as Abby and Matteo got out of the elevator at the tenth floor Matteo reminded her of their deal.

  ‘What happens when we make podium?’ Matteo asked and, because there was no one around, he reminded her what happened with his mouth.

  Hot and sexy, they were straight back to where they had been in Dubai as he kissed her up against the wall.

  Only this time there wasn’t the surprise element of his kiss, just hungry need, and she held his cheeks in her hands and kissed him back, her shoulders digging into the wall but her groin pressed hard into his.

  It seemed miles to her hotel room and so they continued to kiss while walking—a hungry, laden kiss that had them tripping over a tray the next room had left out until finally they fell into her room.

  ‘Hell,’ Matteo said as he backed her to the door, undoing the black belt and buttons on her men’s bottle-green trousers, and as he looked down he even laughed. ‘This feels wrong...’

  It felt pretty right to Abby.

  He just kissed her until they stood, breathless and facing the other and both half-dressed.

  ‘I’m not ready.’ She was panting, feeling a tease but consumed with want.

  ‘For what?’ Matteo checked, slipping his hands into her trousers and feeling her as damp as he knew she would be. He stroked her clitoris through her panties and resumed the kiss, probing her mouth with his tongue for a moment and feeling the tightening of Abby’s thighs. He pulled back his mouth but not his hand as she simmered nicely.

  Oh, Abby simmered. She wanted to, she wanted, wanted, wanted, but she was more scared of losing her heart than her control.

  ‘How about a fashion show?’ Matteo said and she glanced over his shoulder and saw for the first time all the parcels lying on her bed as his hand remained between her legs, his finger lightly stroking her and teasing her, while teasing himself, but then he removed it.

  It was do up her trousers or take them off and Abby chose the latter.

  ‘You’re quite neat, aren’t you,’ Abby commented as he picked up her shoes and trousers and threw them in the wardrobe.

  ‘A bit,’ Matteo admitted. ‘But I’ve made a lot of mistakes in my life and I’ll scare the hell out of myself if I wake up tomorrow and see them by
the bed.’

  He made her laugh.

  Matteo made her feel fine, just fine, to be wearing nothing except ugly panties and the dark green shirt.

  She opened the parcels one by one as he did the same with the buttons to her shirt.

  Some of the underwear he had chosen was the colour of summer—gorgeous lemons and pale mint greens—while others were the shades of sin.

  ‘Do you know why I chose those,’ he said, having peeled off her shirt so she was down to her bra as Abby held some dark violet panties.

  ‘Because they’re crotchless?’ Abby laughed when she poked her fingers through the hole.

  ‘Actually, I didn’t know they were,’ Matteo said. ‘I chose them because they’re not just velvet on the outside.’

  They weren’t. The inside was just as soft and hidden-seamed.

  ‘I thought they might feel nice.’ Matteo explained his thought process.

  Abby swallowed.

  ‘Put them on.’

  ‘I’m not ready to sleep with you, Matteo.’

  He just shrugged and removed her bra so that her breasts dropped that aching inch and he toyed with her nipples, stretching them out. ‘A lovely come would be nice though.’

  He said it as if he were choosing from the restaurant menu, only some things weren’t as easy as picking up the phone.

  Or were they?

  She thought of this morning—how turned on she’d been and how turned on she was now—and Abby handed herself over to him and nodded.

  Even a little come would be a miracle!

  Slut that Matteo was, the second that Abby nodded her consent he was happily stripping off and turning the heating up to rival Dubai at midday.

  And then he told her that was his intention exactly! ‘Remember that fashion show we had to sit through?’ he reminded. ‘I kept picturing you in all the underwear they were parading. Most uncomfortable half hour of my life...’ He gave her a smile that had her nearly rock on her heels as she knelt on the bed. ‘You were my Dubai fantasy—look how far we’ve come.’

  Clearly they were here for the night.

  He was almost clinical about it.

  It was a very sexy clinic she was in though, Abby thought as Matteo chose a brandy from her minibar and then lay on the bed, naked, his erection lifting off his thigh, and she took her underwear and headed to the bathroom.

  ‘Take some heels with you,’ Matteo called.

  Yes, look how far she’d come! Abby stood in the sexiest underwear in the world and added said heels. She even clipped up her hair and put on some lipstick.

  It was a game to him and that helped Abby—why, she didn’t know, but it just did.

  Maybe because it was about fun, rather than Matteo throwing in sentiments that could never be met by the cold light of day.

  And so she came out of the bathroom and as she did, Matteo remembered the shy, nervous beauty who had walked out of the elevator in a silver dress.

  That woman had gone for good now.

  Abby stepped out and briskly walked the length of the room and then turned.

  Nervous but not shy.

  ‘They walk more with their hips,’ Matteo said and took a sip from his bottle as she crossed the room. ‘That’s better, but more slowly.’

  ‘Are you going to model for me?’ Abby checked, strutting her stuff.

  ‘Any time,’ Matteo agreed and she looked at his erection and that he was playing with himself and her lips pressed together, wondering if she could ever lie there and do the same with him.

  God, it was hot.

  ‘Take off your bra.’

  Even with double velvet her nipples were sticking out, and as she took off her bra he could see the spread of colour on her chest and that her stomach was taut with desire, and he could wait no more.

  ‘Get here.’

  She nearly ran.

  To him.

  Matteo guided her so that she sat on his stomach and he poured the last of the brandy onto his hand and then rubbed it into her breasts.

  ‘The only way to drink brandy.’

  She knelt over him as he made sure there was no brandy left on the left. Abby’s thighs were shaking, her neck was arched. One hand was on her hip as the other went straight for the kill. His hand slid past her exposed clitoris, leaving his thumb there while his fingers burrowed deep inside.

  He changed breast.

  She nearly lost her mind.

  He just worked her as skilfully as she’d tune an engine. It hurt, the nicest hurt, and then he left her swollen, wet, slightly bruised breasts and his free hand started stroking himself again.

  ‘Matteo...’

  ‘I’m not going to.’

  Abby’s head lowered, just to watch them. Who was this woman, in obscene panties and loving it?

  ‘Oh...’ She just moaned as his fingers and thumb seemed to meet in the middle of a wedge of intimate flesh. He stroked her deep on the inside; he exerted pressure on the outside till her stomach seemed to meet her spine.

  And yet, she couldn’t—she let out a sob, borne of desire and frustration, and then felt as if she were choking, because everything in her tightened as Matteo started to come.

  He had felt her tip—thank God, he thought, because it was past the point of no return, but he had never enjoyed himself more in the bedroom. Or anywhere else come to that.

  Abby closed her eyes, regretting that she had no choice but to, because the feel of him hot and pulsing against her was surely a sight to be seen as everything that had been missing spasmed.

  Then she opened her eyes to the lovely sight of him pulling out the last of his come and then stroking it into her and she sank down on him rather than pull back. The intense feelings were better shared and then Abby sat back on her thighs and tried to drag in air.

  Half an hour ago, she had glimpsed what it might be like.

  Now she knew.

  ‘What does it feel like,’ Matteo asked, remembering the power of his own first come.

  ‘Better than sex,’ Abby said as he pulled her down, but to the side of him.

  He knew how to do her right.

  CHAPTER NINE

  MATTEO WOKE FIRST.

  They hadn’t had much sleep.

  The fashion show had continued until the early hours and they had pretty much done everything but make love.

  Sex.

  It felt like more than sex, even if they hadn’t.

  Whatever they had done, and they had done plenty, it had been amazing for both—oral sex had never tasted so good and Abby had just spent the last half hour before dawn, on her back, with Matteo’s fingers over hers and, yes, she would sleep easily at night now.

  But Abby wanted more than a part-time lover as her first and he respected that.

  Matteo didn’t like it but, yes, given that she had waited so long, he understood that she might want a little more than the occasional phone call, or the promise of more when he arrived in Monte Carlo.

  The easiest thing now would be to turn off the alarm, cancel the jet, kiss her awake and let her team start to work on dismantling the car, as he set to work on the walls that came between them.

  Yet he lay there, staring up at the ceiling and remembering the promise he had made a very long time ago.

  Oh, Matteo loved a gamble but as he looked over to where she was waking he knew that the stakes were too high.

  He wasn’t going to risk hurting an already damaged heart.

  ‘You have to go?’ Abby said.

  She had woken to the pensive air and guessed he was wondering how to politely kiss and leave.

  ‘I do,’ Matteo said. ‘And you’ve got a car to dismantle.’

  Abby lay listening to Matteo in the shower and she knew she’d been right to hold back.

  She didn’t regret what had happened, but it did change things irrevocably.

  There was an unfamiliar hollow feeling inside her because what had taken place last night felt very different this morning. There was little closene
ss now as Matteo came into the bedroom and quickly dressed.

  ‘If you need anything for Monte Carlo...’

  ‘We’re pretty much sorted,’ she said.

  ‘Good,’ he said. ‘Well, if Pedro wants...’

  ‘He’s going to Rome with Bernadette for a few days,’ Abby interrupted. ‘The team will all be together again five days before the race.’

  ‘I might not be able to get there until the day or so before.’

  ‘Or an hour or so before,’ Abby said.

  ‘I didn’t say that.’

  ‘You didn’t have to.’

  ‘I’ll just see what happens with work.’

  It was a horrible end to a blissful night. He went to kiss her but she just turned her face away and, in truth, he was relieved she did.

  He simply couldn’t go through the motions with Abby, even in that.

  Matteo was glad she’d insisted on no sex last night. He’d promised to sleep with her, no strings attached.

  For the first time, Matteo wondered if he’d be able to.

  It was surely better to stay back.

  * * *

  He didn’t call.

  Abby knew that he wouldn’t. Matteo was a master at setting his boundaries, and that he wouldn’t do relationships was his big one.

  Somehow she had to accept that fact.

  The circus moved on.

  Pedro and Bernadette flew to Rome for some romantic downtime while the rest of the team went straight to Monte Carlo. Usually she’d be there, overseeing the car’s arrival, but Abby had put it off.

  There were a lot of bad memories in Monte Carlo; Matteo knew that and yet, still, he did not call.

  He wanted to.

  Or rather he wanted a life that had existed before April. One where the Lost Mistresses had been just an old tale that his grandfather had told. He wanted the life he had once led back—fast paced, lots of sex, not getting off to a memory.

  Matteo was angry.

  Every time he thought of calling Abby he would pull up the image of himself and his father coming out of a casino some thirty years apart and, if that wasn’t enough of a reminder, the arrival of an email from Ellison was.

  Any progress? Abby has formally declined my invitation.