Outside, dusk was falling, and the room was filled with soft shadows. Time slowed as he lowered his head and angled his mouth over hers. The first brush of his lips was gently evocative...a kiss of sweet delight as he eased her lips apart and sipped from her. His tenderness was unexpected, and she felt the press of tears behind her eyes.
Then he increased the pressure a fraction, and the kiss became a sensual feast, exquisitely erotic. He tasted her, coaxing a response from her, until suddenly his restraint snapped and he groaned and hauled her into his arms, deepening the kiss with the fierce passion that Betsy craved.
When at last he lifted his head, she stared into eyes that were molten gold and glazed with desire. ‘I have a confession to make,’ he said thickly. ‘I instructed the maid not to pack your pyjamas.’
She smiled against his lips. ‘How will I keep warm in the night?’
‘I’ll warm you with my body.’ He trailed kisses down her throat, and then lower to the swell of her breasts. ‘Shall I demonstrate?’
His hands were busy untying the straps of her sundress. He tugged the dress down to her waist and made an approving sound when he discovered that she was braless.
Her breasts felt heavy, the nipples taut and expectant as he kissed his way down her body and closed his mouth around one peak while he rolled its twin between his fingers. The pleasure he evoked with his simultaneous caresses sent an arrow of need to the core of her femininity.
Somehow her dress was on the floor, and his hand roamed over her bottom before he eased the panel of her knickers aside and rubbed his finger over her moist opening.
Her body was ready for him and her hands moved feverishly, tugging the buttons on his shirt open and pushing the material over his broad shoulders. He was a work of art, and she gloried in the firmness of his abdominal muscles. When she laid her palms flat on his chest she felt the uneven thud of his heart, and when she followed the arrowing of black hair down to the waistband of his jeans and slid his zip down he muttered something in Spanish.
‘I need you now.’
The admission was raw, ravenous, and the feral gleam in his eyes sent a shiver of anticipation through her. He shrugged out of the rest of his clothes with haste rather than grace, and his impatience snagged her emotions. She cupped his rough jaw between her palms and pulled his mouth down onto hers, kissing him with joy in her heart.
She hadn’t imagined that their passion two years ago had been out of the ordinary. Afterwards, she had been ashamed of herself for falling into bed with him so easily. But he was as irresistible now as he had been then, and their mutual desire was blazing out of control.
He lifted her up and she wrapped her legs around his hips as he carried her over to the bed. When he laid her down and stretched out on top of her, she felt the powerful muscles and sinews of his thighs, and the hard length of his arousal jabbing her belly. He tugged her panties off and skimmed his hand over the dusting of caramel curls between her legs, parting her so that he could slide one finger, two, into her molten heat.
She caught her breath as he began to move his hand. ‘I want you...’
‘Sí, I know, querida.’
‘No, I want you.’ Nothing but his full possession would ease the ache inside her.
He cursed softly. ‘The condoms are in my jeans.’ He started to move away from her, but she curled her arms around his neck.
‘I asked the doctor who sees Sebastian when he’s ill to give me a prescription for the pill.’ She flushed. ‘It seemed a good idea at the time.’
Carlos gave her a sexy smile and pulled her beneath him. ‘So there is no reason not to do this?’ he murmured, and he positioned himself over her so that the blunt tip of his erection nudged her opening. His eyes locked with hers as he pressed forward and eased his hard length into her slowly, so slowly, claiming her inch by exquisite inch.
It was better than she remembered. When she had given her virginity to him there had been slight discomfort, but now there was pure bliss as he pushed deeper and her internal muscles stretched to accommodate him. She lifted her hips towards him and splayed her fingers over his taut buttocks, drawing him deeper still so that he filled her.
‘Ah, querida...’ he said roughly, his lips against her throat.
And then his kissed her mouth, slow and sweet, and then hot and hungry as his body began to move within her. Each thrust was more satisfying than the one before, harder, faster, creating an erotic friction that drove her higher.
He supported his weight on his elbows and lengthened each rhythmic stroke. Dimly, Betsy was aware of the sound of her panting breaths...his. They moved together as one in the dance of lovers. She heard her blood pounding in her ears as it coursed through her veins, hotter, wilder. In his arms she became a wanton creature, tracing her hands boldly over his body so that he groaned.
‘Now, mi belleza.’
‘Yes.’
She quivered as he held her at the edge. His jaw was rigid, his eyes narrowed, and she felt the tension that gripped his big body. And then he thrust again, and she shattered around him, her internal muscles clenching and releasing and sending ripples of pleasure radiating from her core. He climaxed seconds after her, and his hoarse cry wrapped around her heart and lingered there long after their breathing had slowed.
He kissed the tears that clung to her eyelashes and rolled off her, drawing her against his side. ‘Dios!’ His big chest rose and fell. ‘I meant to take things slowly.’ His voice was harsh with self-recrimination. ‘Did I hurt you?’
‘No. That was...’ She was lost for words to describe the rapture of making love with him.
‘Amazing,’ he finished for her.
Betsy felt him smile against her brow as he kissed her hair, and it was that little affectionate gesture which delighted her the most. But she reminded herself to guard her foolish heart against falling for her enigmatic husband...
CHAPTER ELEVEN
‘I SEEM TO remember you promised me a sightseeing trip today,’ Betsy said lightly.
Carlos was propped on an elbow, lying on the blanket that they had spread out on the sand. His eyes roamed over her tiny silver bikini top. Since they had come to Casita Viola ten days ago he had tested the weight of her firm breasts countless times and felt the thrust of her nipples against his tongue. But, however many times he had her, he wanted her again and again.
‘I am enjoying the sight of you, querida. Although the view would be even better if you took your top off,’ he murmured, stretching out his hand and tugging at the ties.
She laughed and evaded his fingers. ‘You’re insatiable.’
‘Is that a complaint?’
Beneath his teasing, he was serious. He was sure that Betsy enjoyed their lovemaking as much as he did, but he found his desire for her was limitless. In a distant corner of his mind an alarm bell rang, but he ignored it and bent his head to claim her mouth in a lingering kiss.
He was in control, he assured himself. But he was at Casita Viola, the place he loved more than anywhere in the world, with his beautiful, sexy wife, and there was no harm in letting his guard down a little.
When he slipped his hand between Betsy’s soft thighs, she pushed against his chest. ‘Food,’ she muttered. ‘I’m going to make lunch, and afterwards we will have a siesta.’
‘I’ll hold you to that promise, querida. And later I’ll keep mine and take you to Palma. It’s a beautiful city to explore. We won’t have any time for sightseeing after Sebastian arrives tomorrow.’
‘I can’t wait to see him. I’ve missed him.’ Betsy grinned and jumped up from the blanket. ‘Although you have kept me entertained.’
Carlos watched her walk up the cliff steps to the house, admiring her pert derriere, barely covered by tiny denim shorts. The idea of a honeymoon had been a stroke of genius, he congratulated himself. These past days had been a revelation, and he and Bets
y had both been more relaxed without the strain that their relationship had been under before.
Carlos acknowledged that the main reason for his good mood was the fact that he was getting great sex regularly. As he’d suspected, he and Betsy were highly sexually compatible. Not only that, he liked being with her. She was good company, witty and funny, and he was genuinely interested in her.
He was aware that while he’d expected Betsy to leave her old life and her friends in Dorset and move to Spain, he had not had to make any sacrifices. Of course he’d had to give up his freedom, but he didn’t miss his playboy lifestyle when he had a far more meaningful life as a father. And besides, he hadn’t looked at another woman for longer than he cared to recall. Making Betsy happy had become his mission. Having a contented wife made life a lot easier than having her unhappy with their marriage arrangement, he reasoned.
After a swim in the sea, Carlos made his way back to the house and found Betsy carrying a bowl of salad outside to the terrace, where she had set the table for lunch.
‘Can you bring the wine from the kitchen?’ she called to him.
He uncorked the bottle of red wine that had been produced at a local vineyard before he followed her outside.
‘While I was looking for a clean tablecloth I found some photo albums with pictures of you when you were younger,’ Betsy said, indicating the albums on the table. ‘Do you mind if I look through them after lunch?’
‘Help yourself.’
They ate fresh prawns that Carlos had bought from a local fisherman, and then carried their wine glasses over to a corner of the garden shaded by a pergola, where vivid pink bougainvillea grew in abundance.
‘Is that you?’ Betsy asked, pointing to a photo of a small boy holding a tennis racket that was almost as big as him.
‘I must have been about three years old then. My mother introduced me to tennis at an early age.’ Carlos pointed to another photo. ‘I was eight in this one, and I’d just won an under-twelves regional championship. My mother realised that I had talent, and she hired José Vidal, who had been her tennis coach when she played professionally, to work with me.’
‘I didn’t realise that your mother was a tennis player.’
‘She was runner-up in the Spanish and French championships, and she played in London on a wild card and got to the quarter-finals. It was her dream to win the BITC, but she retired from the game to focus on her family.’
‘You must have been close to her with your shared love of tennis,’ Betsy said softly. She looked at a photo of Carlos laughing with his father. ‘It looks as though you had a strong bond with your dad, too.’
‘We were close once.’ Guilt snaked through Carlos. ‘Everything changed when my mother died.’
He could see that Betsy was curious, but he wasn’t about to tell her that he had his mother’s blood on his hands, and that was why his father had turned against him. If he admitted what he had done he was certain he would see disgust in Betsy’s eyes.
With a jolt of shock, Carlos realised that her opinion of him mattered.
‘Who is this?’ she asked, indicating a picture of a man standing next to a teenage Carlos.
‘That’s my coach, José. When I was fifteen, I was offered funding on the condition that I moved to Barcelona to train. My father ran a business in Toledo, and couldn’t uproot my sister, so I left home and lodged with José and his wife.’
‘You had recently lost your mother, hadn’t you? It must have been hard to leave your father and sister, and they must have missed you.’
‘My father wanted me to go.’
In his mind, Carlos heard Roderigo Segarra’s voice. ‘Don’t let your mother’s death be in vain. Go and learn to be a champion for her sake. It’s the least you can do to honour her memory.’
But Carlos had been prepared to give up his pursuit of the dream that had torn his family apart. ‘I’ll stay, Papà, and learn to be a baker so that I can take over the shop, like you hoped I would.’
Roderigo had actually looked horrified at the prospect. ‘My hopes died with your mother,’ he’d said bitterly. ‘I don’t want you to stay here.’
They had been devastating words to a fifteen-year-old boy, and twenty years later his father’s rejection still scraped a raw place on Carlos’s heart.
‘José Vidal was my coach for ten years,’ he told Betsy. ‘He became a father figure to me, and I trusted him. I was certain that with his support I would become the greatest tennis champion. By my early twenties I was ranked number three in the world and had already won four world titles.’
He lifted his glass to his lips and drank some wine.
‘I’ll admit that fame and glory went to my head.’ His laugh was self-derisive. ‘I endorsed several big sports brands and got paid a fortune for using a certain tennis racket or modelling a particular range of sportswear. I had money, and beautiful women flocked around me. Training took second place to living the good life. But everything changed when I got very drunk one night and fell down a flight of steps. My shoulder was broken in three places and there was significant muscle and ligament damage. The surgeon was doubtful that I would play tennis at competition level again.’
Betsy looked shocked. ‘I had no idea. You must have felt devastated, believing that your career could be over.’
It had been a bleak time in his life, and Carlos rarely allowed himself to dwell on it. Like other dark events in his past, he compartmentalised the memories and buried them deep inside him. He had no idea why he was spilling his guts to Betsy.
‘More devastating than my injuries was the attitude of my coach. José came to visit me in hospital and told me that he would no longer oversee my training. He’d read the medical reports and didn’t believe I would ever recover properly and regain my tennis ranking. As far as he was concerned I wouldn’t be a champion and earn the big money, so he dropped me in favour of another rising tennis star.’
‘That’s awful.’
There was a sympathy in Betsy’s voice that Carlos told himself he neither wanted nor deserved.
‘That’s life,’ he said harshly. ‘When I watched José walk out of that hospital room, I vowed two things. The first was that I would be a champion without his help, and the second was that I would never trust anyone again.’
Carlos stared at another photo. It was of him, his parents and his sister, who had been only ten at the time. It was the last picture of his family before his mother had died. Thinking about her made his heart grow heavy. His madre would have loved Sebastian, and her other grandson Miguel. But her life had been cruelly cut short—by him.
Carlos’s jaw clenched. He did not deserve a family after he’d destroyed the one he had been born into. He hadn’t planned to have a child, but fate had intervened and given him a son he adored. He had a wife too, although he hadn’t expected to marry.
He had married Betsy so that he could claim his son, he reminded himself. But deep down he knew that hadn’t been the only reason.
He forced his mind away from the past, aware that Betsy was looking at him with a concerned expression on her face. ‘You mentioned a siesta,’ he murmured.
‘Carlos...’ She lifted a hand and let it fall helplessly. ‘You told me that there are things I don’t understand. But how can I understand, or try to help you, if you don’t talk to me?’
‘Help me?’ He shook his head. ‘All the talking in the world won’t make any difference. There is nothing you can do.’
She tilted her chin. ‘Try me.’
He remembered how she had defended him against his father’s criticism, and was almost tempted to reveal the dark secret that festered inside him. But shame stopped him.
The silence stretched between them until Betsy gave a soft sigh and stood up. ‘I need a shower before we go to Palma.’
Carlos told himself he wouldn’t follow her. But when Betsy w
alked into the house he felt as if she had taken the sunshine with her and coldness seeped into his bones.
He did not need her. That was a ridiculous idea, he assured himself. But somehow he was standing in the bedroom and staring at her silver bikini that she’d left on the floor outside the bathroom door.
Carlos stripped off his swim shorts and stepped into the steamy shower cubicle. He paused for a moment, watching the water cascade over Betsy’s gorgeous curves, and then moved to stand behind her. He slid his arms around her and cupped her breasts in his hands, pulling her against him so that her bottom was pressing on his erection.
‘I have a surprise for you when we go back to Fortaleza Aguila,’ he murmured in her ear.
She wriggled out of his arms and turned to face him. ‘What is it?’
‘It won’t be a surprise if I tell you.’
He inhaled sharply when she dropped to her knees in front of him. Water streamed over her face and hair as she looked up at him, and her smile was like a sunbeam lighting the darkness in his heart.
‘Maybe I can persuade you to tell me,’ she said softly.
And then she put her mouth on him, and he could not control the shudders that racked him when she moved her tongue along his hard length.
That alarm bell in his mind rang again. Control was everything to Carlos, and losing control was a weakness he could not contemplate. For twenty years he had not allowed anything to touch him deeply enough so that he cared.
He told himself that he did not care about Betsy, beyond the fact that she was the mother of his son. The passion they shared was just a bonus in their marriage, and he had no doubt that in time his physical infatuation with her would settle to something less needy that he could control.
But in the meantime he threaded his fingers into her hair as he fell back against the wall of the shower cubicle and lost control spectacularly.
* * *
‘Do you want to see your surprise?’ Carlos asked Betsy as she walked down the stairs at Fortaleza Aguila. They had arrived at the house twenty minutes ago and she’d just carried Sebastian up to the nursery.
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