Cinderella's Scandalous Secret

by MELANIE MILBURNE

  ‘If you kiss me it will only complicate things...’ Her voice was just shy of a whisper.

  Rafe slid his other hand along the creamy curve of her cheek, her skin petal-soft against his palm. The need was thrumming deeply inside him like the background hum of a microwave. ‘That doesn’t sound like a no. I want to hear you say it. Tell me you don’t want me to kiss you.’

  Her eyes were luminous, shining with the same need he could feel barrelling through his body. ‘Why are you doing this?’ Her eyes flicked from his mouth to his gaze and back again.

  Because I still want you. Rafe’s hand moved in a slow glide from the base of her spine to the back of her head, sinking into the silky softness of her cloud of curls, his fingers massaging her scalp the way she had loved so much in the past. ‘What am I doing, cara? Hmm?’

  ‘You’re making me want you.’

  ‘And that’s a bad thing?’ Rafe asked, meshing his gaze with hers, his body so hard with need it made thinking difficult. He was going on instinct—primal instinct that drove his blood through his veins at breakneck speed. Swelling his tissues into a hotbed of longing that called on every bit of willpower he possessed to keep in control. Had he ever wanted a woman more than Isla? It was like a tornado in his body, rampaging through him until he could think of nothing but sinking, plunging into her tight wet warmth.

  She pressed her lips together so firmly they went from red to white. But as soon as she released them they flooded with blood and he ached to cover them with his own. ‘I’ve spent the last three months trying to forget about you, Rafe.’

  Rafe sent a finger along the underside of her cheek to the base of her chin. ‘Were you successful?’

  Her eyelashes came down to half-mast, her hands leaving the front of his shirt to pull his head down so his mouth was within a breath of hers. ‘No. Damn you. Not at all.’

  He had dreamed of this moment for the last three empty and lonely months. It was all the invitation he needed. He closed the distance between their mouths and let the fireworks begin.

  * * *

  Isla had told herself she was prepared for Rafe to kiss her. He’d kissed her so many times before so she should have known what to expect. But as soon as his mouth came down on hers an explosion erupted in her body. Desires and needs she had almost forgotten about leapt to life like embers stirred into dancing flames and shooting and darting sparks. His lips moved against hers in a drugging kiss, slow and sensual, his hard lower body pressed against hers in such an erotic contact it made her legs unsteady. Electric pulses shot from her mouth to her pelvis, his masterful kiss tingling every cell of her flesh into throbbing life.

  He deepened the kiss with a commanding stroke of his tongue against the seam of her mouth, and she opened to him like a flower opening to the first hot blast of spring sunshine. How had she survived months without this magical madness rushing through her body? How had she survived the feel of his arms around her body, holding her as if he never wanted to let her go? She wound her arms around his neck, desperate to keep his mouth clamped to hers. Desperate to feel alive again. Desperate to feel the storm of ferocious attraction pounding from his mouth to hers.

  No one kissed her like Rafe did. His kiss was like a potent drug she had lived too long without. Now she had tasted his lips again, she was addicted all over again. Powerfully, dangerously addicted. His lips continued their sensual exploration, his tongue dancing with hers with such exquisite and mesmerising choreography it caused a swooping sensation in her stomach. Isla pressed herself closer, more than a little shocked at the sounds of pleasure and encouragement she was making but unable to stop herself. She wanted this. She wanted him. She had never stopped wanting him.

  His hand came up to cradle one side of her face, the other pressing in the small of her back, holding her close against his growing erection. Feeling the extension of his body, his unmistakable desire for her, feeling him, ramped up her own need until she was practically grinding her pelvis against him to get closer.

  His hand slid up to her hair, his fingers splayed at first and then clutching at the strands with just the right amount of tension. The sort of tension that made every hair on her head shiver at the roots, every cell in her body shudder in reaction and her self-control roll over and play dead. How could she resist this man? How could she resist the feelings he and he alone evoked in her? Passion hot and strong and irresistible. Passion that made her forget about everything but the biological need of their bodies. The passionate need to unite their bodies in the most primal way of all to trigger a tumultuous storm of blissful release.

  Suddenly the kiss was over.

  Rafe pulled away from her as if a director on a movie set had suddenly called ‘cut’. His expression was masked, although his eyes were bright and his pupils wide as bottomless black pools. ‘So, at least that’s something that hasn’t changed.’ The was a note of triumph in his voice that made her wish she hadn’t been so responsive. So transparent. So wanton. Again. Why did she have zero resistance to him? Why?

  Isla moved a few steps away, swishing her hair over one shoulder in a gesture of nonchalance she was nowhere near feeling. ‘What time are we leaving tomorrow?’ A subject change was her only way of restoring some of her dignity. She couldn’t help feeling he had engineered that little kissing session to prove he had the upper hand when it came to self-control. But hadn’t she always been out of her league where he was concerned? He was sophisticated and suave and she was riddled with shameful secrets.

  ‘Mid-morning. I’ve allowed some time for you to sleep in.’

  She sent him a spearing glance. ‘Alone?’

  A dark gleam entered his gaze. ‘I will leave that up to you to decide.’

  CHAPTER FOUR

  ISLA WOKE EARLY the next morning to find the space beside her in the bed hadn’t been slept in. The sheets were smooth and crease-free, the pillows showing no indentation of Rafe’s head ever having rested there. Had he gone out? She had been so tired she hadn’t registered any sound of him coming or going in the suite once she’d closed her eyes the night before.

  She got out of bed and padded out to the sitting room of the suite and found Rafe asleep in one of the sofa chairs, his long legs stretched out in front of him and crossed at the ankles. He looked a bit worse for wear—his shirt was open to the middle of his chest and crumpled and half out of one side of his trousers. His jaw was richly peppered with dark regrowth and his hair was tousled as if his hands had gone through it a few times. There was a book, open and face down on the floor, as if it had tumbled from his lap while he had drifted off to sleep.

  Isla was reluctant to disturb him but she felt a twinge of guilt that he had spent the night sleeping in a chair rather than share the bed with her. His gallantry was not only unexpected but strangely touching.

  He suddenly opened his eyes as if he sensed her looking at him. He uncrossed his ankles and pulled his legs back closer to the chair and ran a hand over his face, the sound of his palm moving across his stubble loud in the silence.

  ‘How did you sleep?’ He smothered a yawn and stood and stretched his lower back by placing his hands on his hips and leaning backwards slightly, not quite disguising a wince.

  ‘Clearly a bit better than you,’ Isla said. ‘Why didn’t you come to bed?’

  He dropped his hands back by his sides and gave her a rueful smile that made something in her chest ping. ‘I didn’t trust myself to keep my hands off you.’

  Isla felt betraying warmth spreading through her cheeks so bent to pick up his book rather than encounter his gaze. She hadn’t trusted herself not to drift into old habits—reaching for him in the middle of the night, snuggling up against his back, her arms around his waist, her legs entangling with his. Her hands exploring his... She snapped the book closed and placed it on the nearest surface. ‘I’m sorry you had such an uncomfortable night. I was so tired I probably wouldn’t have no
ticed if you had joined me.’

  ‘Wouldn’t you?’ His eyes met hers in a challenging lock that made her inner core contract.

  The silence seemed to buzz with a host of erotic memories.

  Isla couldn’t stop her gaze from drifting to his mouth, her tongue sneaking out to moisten her suddenly parchment-dry lips. She was aware of him following the betraying movement, his eyes darkly hooded, the subtle change in his breathing signalling his own attraction. She brought her gaze back up to his. ‘You don’t strike me as the sort of man to touch a woman when she’s expressly told you not to.’ Her tone fell a little short of starchy schoolmistress and leaned more towards I want you to kiss me.

  Rafe came over to her and tucked a wayward corkscrew curl back behind her ear. His touch was light and tender and it made every cell in her body cry out for more. He knew all her pleasure spots, all her erogenous zones, all her vulnerabilities. All her needs. And how pathetic her self-control. ‘I would find it a lot easier not to touch you if I didn’t think you wanted me. But you do, don’t you, cara? You haven’t forgotten how good we were together, sì?’

  His hand cupped her cheek as if he were cradling a ripe peach he was trying not to bruise, his thumb moving back and forth in a slow caress. Isla couldn’t disguise her delicate shiver of reaction in time. She placed her hand on his wrist, fully intending to push him away, but instead her fingers curled around the tanned strength of his arm. His skin was warm and the black masculine hairs on his wrist tickled against her skin. His eyes were as dark and mysterious as a deep forest, flecks of leaf litter brown and lichen green fringed with ink-black lashes framed by prominent eyebrows above.

  ‘This is like a game to you, isn’t it?’ Her voice didn’t come out quite as reproving as she would have liked.

  ‘The fact that you’re carrying my child is not a game to me, Isla.’ His tone had a deep note of gravitas and a frown pulled at his forehead. ‘Nor is the fact that we still feel something for each other.’

  This time she managed to summon enough willpower to step back from him. She folded her arms across her body, sending him a cool stare. ‘If I wasn’t pregnant and we’d run into each other again, would you have offered me what you’re offering now?’

  Something flickered at the back of his gaze. He gave a rough-edged sigh and pushed a hand through the thickness of his hair. ‘An affair maybe, but probably not marriage.’

  ‘So, I was fling material but not wife material.’ Isla didn’t say it as a question but as a statement. A confirmation of all she believed about herself. Beliefs that had been reinforced throughout her childhood.

  You’re not good enough.

  ‘Marriage wasn’t something I was actively seeking,’ Rafe said. ‘But things are different now.’

  ‘But I’m not different. I’m the same person I was five months ago.’

  His eyes cruised over her abdomen. ‘Not quite the same, mio piccolo. You are pregnant with my child. That is a game-changer.’

  * * *

  A few hours later, they arrived at Rafe’s Liberty style villa situated in the borough of Mondello in Sicily, the site of a popular white sand beach. In spite of her travel weariness and conflicted feelings about coming with Rafe to his home, Isla couldn’t help feeling thrilled to be back where she had spent some of the happiest weeks of her life. Their time together here had shown her a world she had never been part of before. A world she had barely realised existed. Not just the glamour and riches he took for granted, but the sensual world of his lovemaking. She had spent her days sketching and painting or exploring the sites while Rafe worked, and then in the evenings he had devoted his entire attention to her. And the last couple of weeks Rafe hadn’t worked at all. He’d cancelled all his engagements and spent the whole time with her. No one had ever made her feel so special, so desired, so fulfilled.

  However, the sensual idyll had been slightly tainted for her by the presence of Rafe’s housekeeper, Concetta. Isla had never been able to relate to the older woman, who seemed to wear a perpetual frown of disapproval but, interestingly, only when Rafe wasn’t around. Isla found her sly and surly and sneering but Rafe would never hear a bad word about her. Isla had tried to talk to him a couple of times about his housekeeper’s behaviour towards her but he’d always laughed off her concerns and told her Concetta was old-school Sicilian—a little guarded and formal with newcomers. On reflection, Isla wondered if he couldn’t be bothered back then to do anything about Concetta’s behaviour because he knew his relationship with her had an end point, as all his relationships had in the past.

  How would the housekeeper take the news of Isla’s pregnancy? Had Rafe told her? And how would she react to the news of Rafe’s intention to marry the mother of his child?

  ‘Do you still have Concetta working for you?’ Isla asked once they had entered the refreshingly cool foyer of the villa.

  ‘Sì, I am still here. He hasn’t fired me yet but who knows?’ the housekeeper said, approaching from further inside the villa. Concetta was a spritely woman in her late fifties who moved as quickly and efficiently as her acerbic tongue. She had black button eyes and weathered features and wiry salt and pepper hair pulled back tightly into a bun at the back of her head. Isla had never seen a hair out of place on the housekeeper’s head and suspected not one strand would dare to escape its rigid confines. Concetta was dressed all in black and her deep frown reminded Isla of a pernickety schoolmistress about to dress down a recalcitrant pupil. And eagerly looking forward to it.

  ‘It’s nice to see you again,’ Isla said, trying to inject some authenticity into her tone.

  ‘Hmph.’ Concetta swept her gaze over Isla’s swollen belly, her thin lips pursing. She swung her gaze to Rafe. ‘Are you sure it’s yours?’

  Rafe’s mouth tightened and he spoke to the housekeeper in a rich Sicilian dialect that Isla couldn’t understand. But the message was loud and clear, for Concetta raised her eyebrows and, with another insolent flash of her gaze at Isla, turned and stalked out in the direction of the kitchen, further inside the villa. Even the sound of her retreating footsteps seemed to contain an insulting rhythm. I. Will. Get. You. For. This.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ Rafe said, turning back to Isla. ‘Concetta can be a bit difficult but she’ll soften up over time. Our news has been a shock to her, that’s all.’

  Isla arched a sceptical eyebrow. ‘And you want to marry me? Seriously? I can’t see her accepting me as your wife any time soon. She’s never liked me. Not that you listened when I tried to tell you how awful she was to me at times. I can only imagine what juicy insults she’ll save for me when you’re not around.’

  His expression hardened and he closed the front door with a definitive clunk. ‘She will have to accept you or find some other employment.’

  Isla folded her arms and cocked her head. ‘Tell me something... Was she rude to all your other lovers? No wonder your relationships only lasted a matter of a week or two.’

  Rafe’s gaze shifted away and he shrugged off his lightweight jacket and hung it on a black wrought iron coat stand. ‘I haven’t brought anyone here before you. I mostly hooked up when I was away on business. It made it less...complicated.’

  Isla stared at him in shock. ‘What? No one? No one at all?’

  He turned with an unreadable expression on his face. ‘This is my home. My private sanctuary. I don’t like sharing it with strangers.’

  ‘Nor, apparently, does your housekeeper.’ Isla’s tone was deliberately wry to disguise how unsettled she was by his revelation about his past. What did it mean? Why had he brought her here? What had it been about her that had made him relax his rules and have her stay for almost two months as his live-in lover?

  An enigmatic smile suddenly tilted one side of his mouth. ‘I know what you’re thinking.’

  Isla did her best to keep her expression neutral. ‘Oh? Do tell.’

  He came to s
tand in front of her, close enough to tuck a wayward curl back behind her ear. His touch sent a wave of shuddery longing through her and it was all she could do to stand there as still as one of the marble statues in the grand foyer. His hazel eyes roamed her features, lingering for a pulsing moment on her mouth. The atmosphere became charged with electricity—a pulsing energy that made every pore of her skin lift in heightened awareness.

  ‘You’re wondering why I brought you here, sì? Why you and no one else.’ His voice was low and deep, a gravel and honey combo that made the base of her spine tingle like fine sand was trickling between her vertebrae.

  Isla glanced at his mouth and disguised a swallow. His fingers found another tendril of hair but this time he wound it around his finger, gently tethering her to him. A silken bond that made her scalp prickle with delight and her inner core tug and tighten.

  ‘I know one thing for sure—it wasn’t because you fell madly in love with me.’ She aimed for a light tone but somehow ended up sounding bitter.

  A small frown tugged at his forehead and he slowly unwound her hair from his finger, tucking it behind her ear as he had done previously. ‘No. It wasn’t that... But then you weren’t in love with me, or has that changed in the last few months?’

  Isla screened her expression with cool indifference. An indifference she was not so sure she felt. Had ever felt. She wouldn’t go as far as saying she was in love with him—it was too threatening to lower her guard to that degree. Loving someone gave them the power to hurt you and hadn’t she been hurt enough? ‘Of course not. No offence or anything. I’m sure plenty of women before me have fallen deeply in love with you and paid the price for doing so.’