“Damn,” she swore in a whisper, feeling a tingle at the thought of that.
Her cell phone rang. She took another sip of her wine before sitting it on the table beside her lounge and picking up her phone. A FaceTime call. She made sure her face was tear-free and plastered a smile on before answering.
“Auntie Mira!” her niece, Aliyah, exclaimed as soon as her little face filled the screen.
“Hello, ma poupée de chocolat,” she said, using her mother’s pet name for her on her niece.
“Kwesi, say hi to Auntie,” Aliyah said, placing the phone in front of him.
He reached for it and patted the screen as he smiled and laughed.
“Hello, Chocky-Wocky!” she exclaimed as his nanny held him face forward in her arms.
Aliyah joined him on the screen. “We miss you,” she said, her Afro puff covering part of his face.
Kwesi squealed and reached for it with both chubby hands.
“Arrête!” Aliyah snapped for him to stop in French.
The phone dropped as the nanny worked to free Kwesi’s grip on Aliyah’s hair. It was total mayhem and Samira knew she was homesick because even the chaos was familiar and she missed them still. Her heart swelled for the little chocolate cherubs she loved as if they were her own.
“Kwesi!” she said sharply into the phone, knowing he could hear her even if their phone was pointed to the ceiling as it lay on the carpeted floor.
Moments later Aliyah picked up the phone and her face reappeared on the screen with her one of her puffs a little deflated and her brows furrowed in annoyance. “Kwesi is bad!” she proclaimed, obviously perturbed.
Samira bit back a smile as she rose from her seat and moved to lean against the railing. People milled about the plaza, competing with the pigeons for space. The wind whipped her hair across her face. She tucked the strands behind her ears, and her line of vision fell on a bright blue taxi turning the corner and pulling to a stop a little way down from her apartment building.
“When are you coming home, Auntie?” Aliyah asked.
“Soon,” she said, about to turn from the railing.
She paused when the door to the taxi opened and a tall, broad-shouldered figure exited the rear of the vehicle. She smiled a bit thinking he reminded her of Lance.
Especially with that hat on...
Samira did a double take. Her heart pounded wildly. She leaned a little more over the railing as she looked down at the man accepting the suitcase his driver pulled from the trunk. Suddenly he looked up. She gasped and accidentally released her phone as she looked down into the face of the person who’d been her distraction for the last six months of her life. “Lance,” she whispered, her surprise making her light-headed.
“Bye-Bye, Auntie!”
Samira looked down in horror as her iPhone free-fell and her niece’s face on the screen was too far away to see her any longer.
“Shit!” she swore, thankful the street was empty as it crashed to the ground and shattered.
Samira turned and crossed the roof to reenter the penthouse. Her feet lightly slapped against the stairs as she came down them and moved across the stylish foyer to the front door. She refused to let the many questions she had about Lance’s sudden arrival in Milan overtake her. She didn’t want to make presumptions. He would have to fill in the details of who, what, when, where, why and how.
As her personal elevator connected to the penthouse opened, she looked across the ornate lobby and through the glass revolving doors just as Lance entered the building. She was a collection of raw nerve endings as she watched him striding toward her. He looked handsome in his linen shorts and matching V-neck tee with a cotton bucket hat. Her eyes missed nothing. Not one detail. It all was so familiar. And missed.
He came to stop before her and handed her the phone.
She reached for it. “Thank you,” she said.
He caught her hand in his.
She shivered from his touch as she looked up to him, imploring him for the answers to all her questions.
“You are everything I didn’t know I needed until you were gone,” he said, his thumb lightly stroking her pulse and probably feeling it race.
“Lance,” she whispered, shaking her head as if to deny him when all she wanted was to leap into his arms and kiss the night away.
“Samira.”
She looked up at him, and the warmth in his eyes was there, weakening her knees and her resolve before he even said the words. She gulped in air as the all-too-familiar breathlessness returned.
“I love you,” he said, his voice deep and seeming to vibrate with the emotion.
“I just want you to have love, Samira. All the love the universe owes you.”
She tilted her head to the side and reached up with her free hand to stroke his cheek. “You are everything I didn’t know I needed until I left,” she whispered up to him, stroking his bottom lip with her thumb. “But—”
He shook his head as he turned it to press a warm kiss to her palm.
“Do you love me?” Lance asked, his vulnerability exposed and raw.
She nodded and smiled up at him. “With every bit of my heart,” she admitted with no shame.
Her soul glowed at the relief filling his eyes, and she knew that his admission of love had been a huge breakthrough for him.
“Then it’s time,” he said.
“Time? For what?” she asked.
“To tell you everything.”
Her eyes widened.
Finally.
“Okay,” she said softly.
Lance smiled as he looked down at her feet. “You’re barefoot,” he said.
She looked down at them as well, feeling happy and nervous in his presence, as she wiggled her crimson-painted toes atop the handmade Italian porcelain tile floor. She squealed as he slipped one arm around her waist and picked her body up against him until her feet floated above the floor. She wrapped her arms around his neck, enjoying the scent of his cologne and the feel of his hard body pressing against hers. Their faces were aligned and they inhaled each other’s breaths as they stared at one another.
With no words spoken—or needed—Samira pressed a hand to his cheek as she leaned in to taste his mouth. Slowly. She savored him with grunts of pleasure as he kissed her in return with a hunger that made her heated.
“Voi due siete bellissimi insieme!”
Samira smiled against his lips before she looked over at the suit-clad middle-aged concierge looking over at them with warm eyes from his desk across the lobby. “Grazie, Agostino,” she thanked him.
“What did he say?” Lance asked, pressing kisses to her jaw.
“He said we are beautiful together,” she translated.
He looked to Agostino as well. “Grazie,” he repeated.
“You ready?” she asked when his eyes rested on her again.
“Are you?” he asked.
“Absolutely,” she stressed. “I want to know and to love all of you, Lance.”
He nodded and looked beyond her toward the elevators. “Six?” he asked.
“One for every floor, but the last one on the right is for the penthouse so it’s all mine.”
“Of course,” he said with a chuckle.
She snuggled her face against his neck and enjoyed his smell—his closeness—as he carried her with one arm and used his free hand to pull his suitcase behind him. “I can’t believe you’re here,” she whispered near his ear when they stepped onto the lift.
“I should have been here sooner. I missed you, and this is a conversation long overdue,” he admitted.
“I’m anxious to hear whatever you have to share with me.”
“I hope you still feel that way after we talk.”
She raised up to look at him. “I hope so, too,” she said, unable to be anything but ho
nest with him.
“I’m not a serial killer,” Lance drawled.
Samira arched a brow. “My instincts would have told me to stay clear of the angry man by the lake who was stacking dead bodies in his basement,” she drawled. “My gut never lies.”
The elevator doors opened. He stepped off and crossed over to the wide double doors of the apartment.
“And your gut hasn’t told you anything about me that you felt I wasn’t telling you?” he asked.
“Definitely,” Samira said, tapping his shoulders for him to release her.
He set her down on her feet. “Like?” he asked.
“Most times I felt you were grieving a loved one and thought you were cheating on them,” she said matter-of-factly, grabbing his hand and turning to lead him over to the living room.
She frowned a bit when he didn’t budge from his spot by the front door.
“I do.”
Samira turned back to him, gripping his hand tighter when she saw the grief in his eyes. “Lance,” she whispered, stepping close to him to stroke his face with her free hand.
He closed his eyes and leaned his face against her touch.
“Oh, Lance,” she sighed. “That was so cruel of me. I’m sorry it came out so flip. I’m so sorry,” she whispered up to him, with waves of hurt and self-reprimand flooding her.
He reached for her and pulled her body against his as he lightly settled his chin atop her head. “Belle was my childhood love,” he began, his hand on the small of her back. “We were friends who fell in love. We married after my first book was published, and we were happy.”
Married?
She refrained from the many questions that flooded her at the news of his marriage. Her instincts that she trusted so very much told her to let him speak. Let his words flow freely. The truth would be revealed in due time.
She closed her eyes against his chest, feeling the rigidness of his stance and wanting to lead him to the sofa but knowing the way they stood shielded the emotions he may reveal on his face from her. She accepted that, understanding the ways of a man.
“When we had our daughter, our Emma Belle, she was the highlight of our lives.”
Daughter? Was?
Samira cringed, feeling dread fill her from her toes to the top of her head. She bit her lip to keep from asking any questions, wanting his story to flow from him freely without interruption. She did caress the back of his hand with her palm.
“Three years ago, we were all in the car coming from dinner,” he said, his hold around her body tightening a bit as if bracing them both for the rest. “Our car was hit by a drunk driver.”
The torture in his voice sent a ray of true pain across her chest.
“I was the only survivor, Samira,” he said, the words broken by his emotion. “I lost my family, and I felt like I didn’t deserve to live.”
She freed his hand to wrap both arms around his chest and held him tightly as his body shook with his pain and his grief. She understood so much, and although she was happy he’d finally shared this huge piece of his life with her, she had regrets for making him relive the pain of it all. The same way the scar was a constant reminder of the tragedy for him.
There was so much to process, but at that moment her only desire was to hold him and try to love on him through his grief.
Chapter 8
One week later
“Dance with me.”
Lance looked up at Samira. He sat at a small round table in the corner of an offbeat cocktail bar in the middle of Milan that had more character than space. She wore a short sheer peach floral sundress and heels that added six inches to her height. She smoothly did a little salsa move to the Spanish music playing and extended her hand to him.
She was hard to resist. The soft smile on her face and the warmth of her eyes drew him in.
That was Samira, and he loved her.
He popped a piece of cheese from the charcuterie tray into his mouth before he slid his hand into hers and accepted her invite, amazing himself that he was willing. From the look in her eyes, he knew he surprised her as well. Right there, in a tight little space between two tables, Lance took the lead and pulled her body to him with a hand to the small of her back as he matched her mini-salsa steps with rhythm.
“You can dance?” she asked in amazement as he raised her hand and spun her before tilting her backward into a small dip.
The crowd applauded and whooped it up at them.
Lance and Samira laughed together as he lifted her upright and kissed her. She wrapped her arms around his neck as the music slowed, and they began to sway together in a spot truly no bigger than a two-foot-by-three-foot square. He forgot about the crowded hole-in-the-wall bar and got lost in her as she lightly stroked his nape with one hand and gripped the back of his shirt with the other. He still was uneasy out of his shell, but having Samira there constantly urging him to step beyond the boundaries he put around himself made it easier.
He gently lifted her up against him, and Samira looked down into his face as the crimson and blue lights of the club swirled across their bodies.
“Fai l’amore con me,” he said in the Italian command she’d taught him over the last week.
Her eyes smoldered at his request for her to make love to him. “Tutta la notte, se vuoi,” she returned, dipping her head to draw his bottom lip into her mouth.
All night long, if you wish.
Without another word spoken, he lowered her to the floor, took her hand and led her through the crowd out of the club.
* * *
Samira ran her fingers through her hair as she sat in the back seat of the chauffeur-driven company car taking her from the ADG offices to the corporate penthouse apartment. Hers had been a day filled with meetings and a few small mishaps with the Hawaii development that left her drained and in need of downtime. She smiled, thinking of Lance awaiting her as he had every day that week since his arrival.
The car pulled to a stop before the converted villa and Samira gathered her clutch and briefcase as the driver left the vehicle to come around and open the door for her. “Grazie, Signor Luca. Buona serata,” she said to the elderly man, thanking him and wishing him a good evening.
Samira looked up, and just as he had been every evening when she arrived, Lance was in the rooftop garden looking down awaiting her arrival. She smiled up at him, her heart already pounding in anticipation.
“Sei innamorato,” Luca observed.
You are in love.
She looked at the elderly man, who was shorter than her by several inches. “Sì, proprio così,” she admitted to very much so being in love.
“Un cuore felice è meglio di una borsa piena,” Luca said.
A happy heart is better than a full purse.
She smiled at him. “Questo è molto vero,” she said, agreeing that that was very true.
He glanced up at Lance and then back at her. “Vivi con passione. Ridi di cuore. Ama profondamente.”
“Live with passion. Laugh out loud. Love deeply,” she said, translating his words.
“Sì. Sì,” he said. “Buonanotte, Signorina Ansah.”
“Good night,” Samira said in return before turning to cross the pavement and enter the building.
With a smile and wave to the concierge, she hurried across the lobby to her elevator. The ride was thankfully quick. The front doors were already open, and she dropped her purse and briefcase on the table by the door as soon as she entered.
Lance awaited her, bending to press a kiss to the corner of her mouth before turning to walk back to the living room. “I finished ten pages on the new book today,” he said, sitting on the sofa and picking up his leather-bound notebook and pen. “I’m hoping to finish this scene before we head out for dinner.”
At her silence, he finally looked up, and his eyes widened.
&n
bsp; Samira stood before him nude except for her heels, having undressed as she followed him into the room. She came over to him and pushed the notebook beside him onto the sofa before motioning with her hand for him to remove his pants.
He did.
She straddled his lap and stroked his inches to hardness as his hands came up to grip her soft buttocks. Rising up, she grasped the sides of his face and kissed him as he guided his length inside her with one swift and deep upward thrust. And then another. And another.
“Yes,” she gasped, letting her head fall back and feeling the edges of her hair tickle the top of her buttocks.
He moaned in pleasure, easing one hand up her back and guiding his mouth to her breasts to suckle one of her taut brown nipples.
Samira gripped the back of the sofa and rolled her hips against him, sending her core up and then down his inches and causing the hard and thick base of it to strike against her clit, driving her toward a climax. She craved it. The release. The explosion deep inside. Getting lost in pure pleasure.
She needed to come. With him. On him.
As the first white-hot waves washed over her, she cried out. Rough and loud. She didn’t care. Lance held her body close, suckled at her nipples wildly, stroked deeply inside her and joined her in euphoria with a moan that rumbled deep in his chest.
They pursued that high without a care to their fast-pounding hearts and sweat-soaked bodies, drawing it out for long, aching moments that were mindless—the moments countless—until they were sated, drained and spent.
* * *
The last two weeks in Milan had been some of the best moments of his life. Exploring the city and getting lost in the abundance of art and history with Samira at his side, savoring foods rich in flavor, absorbing beautiful landscapes as she leaned her body back against his, or even just resting in her apartment after she got off from work and they shared their days with each other.
Christmas with the Billionaire ; A Tiara for Christmas Page 11