“Somewhere there is.” She trailed one finger down his breastbone and over the ridges of his stomach.
His erection pressed against his zipper, and he sucked in his breath, still and waiting.
But not yet. Not yet. She smiled a Mona Lisa smile, and walked her finger back up to touch his lips.
“You’re a tease. I hope I survive the night,” he said hoarsely. “And if I don’t, well . . . what a superb way to die.”
“A man with a sense of humor. More than that, a man with a sense of humor about sex.” Tilting her head back, she laughed aloud with joy. “I didn’t know such an animal existed.”
“What kind of animals have you known?”
Oh, no. They weren’t going to have this discussion. Not now. “The zipper,” she reminded him.
“The zipper,” he repeated. He explored the back seam on her dress, trying to find the elusive pull.
“It isn’t there. Of course not. I’m desperate, and the damned zipper is hidden.” Hooking his finger in the neckline, he tugged lightly. “I don’t want to tear your dress.”
“It doesn’t matter. I won’t ever wear it again.” She had never meant anything as much as she meant that, and she smiled at the success of her plan to chop Alan from her life in a grand—and expensive—gesture.
“You smirk like a cat with a canary feather drooping from its mouth.” Taking her chin, he held it until she looked at him. “About whom are you thinking?”
So. She had to tell him something. “My ex-fiancé.”
“Ah. That explains . . . so much.” He projected charm, demand . . . seduction. “Think of me instead.”
“That’s very easy to do.” She gave in to curiosity, and her hands dropped to his belt. She unbuckled it, then tugged it free of the belt loops. Taking her time, she loosened the button, then dragged the zipper down.
Her knuckles dragged across his erection, and she felt his heat through two layers of cloth.
When their flesh touched, she was alive as she had never been in her life. . . . What would it be like to experience that heat inside her? The anticipation was so great that every inch of her felt exposed, nervy, anxious . . . craving.
He watched her from beneath lowered lids, and again that sensation of danger lapped at her. He wanted her so badly his breath raised and lowered his chest in painful increments. He had red along his cheekbones, and his hand hovered over the top of hers as if he wanted to grab it and force her compliance right now. Yet still he waited, a powerful man yielding to her wishes.
Flirting with danger, she discovered, had a piquancy of its own.
His pants sagged on his hips, and she slid her fingers inside the waistband of his shorts. Her fingertips brushed lower and lower, not really seeking . . . tormenting. When at last she brushed the tip of his erection, he braced himself against the sofa and closed his eyes to better absorb the pleasure.
Watching him accept her servicing was a potent aphrodisiac. In a breathy voice, she said, “I think you’d better locate my zipper pretty soon or I’ll tear my dress off.”
“I thought you’d never ask.” He ran his fingertips over her neckline, barely touching her skin, leaving a thread of sizzling flesh behind. He found the zipper on the side, and it slithered down with a faint hiss.
She was so tight with tension, so sensitive with euphoria, the slick silk seemed to abrade her skin. Her nipples ached and she could barely breathe.
He slid the material off her breasts like a man unwrapping his most anticipated Christmas present.
The cool air whispered across her nipples. With a faint sense of dread, she watched Roberto’s expression. After all, Alan had complained about her breasts—they were too abundant, the nipples were too large, too rosy, too sensitive. . . .
Roberto groaned aloud, and dipped his head to lick her as if she presented him with flawless diamonds set in pure gold.
His tongue, rough and expert, created sensations so intense her fingertips tingled with the need to stroke him.
Placing her palm on the side of his head, she turned his face up to hers. His skin burned beneath her hand.
He had a fever, and she’d given it to him.
She was young. She was beautiful. She had gifts men would kill for. That Roberto would kill for. Turning his head, he kissed her fingers and banished the cold that had possessed her since she landed in Chicago. He made her heart dance, her blood warm. His perfect body exuded power, and she controlled that power.
She exulted in her supremacy. “Watch,” she said.
With her hands on her hips, she slinked out of the silk dress.
He observed, his lips slightly parted, as she revealed her body to him.
She kicked the dress away.
He groaned aloud. “Bella, bella! You are . . . so beautiful. So beautiful!”
She had brought a flush to his cheeks, a flame to his dark eyes.
And except for a lacy bit of a thong and her stiletto heels, she was naked, more naked than she’d been in her whole life. She wanted to cover herself with her hands, but how ridiculous was that? The die was cast.
He stood. With a grin that bared his straight, white teeth, he dropped his pants to the floor and stepped out of them.
She waited, breathless with anticipation. Tickling her brain was the memory of her first sight of him at the party. Would she be as amazed now?
He pulled down his underwear.
The answer was simple, succinct . . . and anything but short. He was a big man, and nothing about him disappointed. His belly rippled with muscle, his hips were tight, his thighs bulged like those of a man who rode and rode hard. . . . She took a long breath and wondered if she could bear it if he rode her hard.
Or if she could bear it if he didn’t.
“Tell me, cara. Tell me if I please you.”
His glorious voice and exotic accent masked, for an instant, the meaning of his words. Then she realized—he wanted her approval. This magnificent man didn’t assume anything about her. He was taking the time to find out, and to have him at her mercy intoxicated her.
She placed her index finger on her tongue, then slid it, wet and warm, down the ridge of his thigh. “You please me very much.”
Without art or deliberation, he shed his shoes and socks. He slid her thong down her legs without disturbing her shoes, then held the tiny, lacy thing in the air and examined it with a smile that both mocked and worshipped its brevity.
Dropping it, he placed his knee between her legs, bent over her, touched her throat, slid his fingers down her breastbone and her belly. He swirled his thumb around her navel, then kissed it . . . and thrust his tongue inside.
The spark he sent through her made her arch off the couch.
And he laughed softly. She almost thought he laughed in Italian.
Scooping her legs up in his arms, he went down on her.
The first brazen touch of his tongue made her fight him. She wasn’t used to such intimacy . . . or the concentrated rush of passion that hit her like a runaway train.
But he paid no attention to her struggles, holding her for his ministrations until she fought not for freedom, but for passion. His tongue shredded her composure, left her without masks, without defenses, teetering on the edge of control. He pushed, and orgasm ripped through her.
She writhed. He encouraged. And she soared beyond restraint, in the freedom of knowing her joy pleased him, enthralled him.
When she finally finished, she found him on top of her. He let her feel his weight, and she reveled in it.
Everything was so different than it had been with Alan. Alan sulked if she made suggestions, backed away from acts he considered disgusting, defined by anything that gave her pleasure. Roberto was bigger, broader, taller, tougher . . . she didn’t worry about breaking him. She could say nothing, do nothing that would hurt his ego. He was so sure of himself. . . .
She wanted to be sure like him.
Taking his shoulders, she looked into his eyes. In her most commanding
tone, she said, “On the bottom, mister.”
He laughed, a short, pained gasp of amusement. Slipping his hands underneath her, he flipped them.
Suddenly she found herself dominating a man who gladly gave up supremacy. She lifted herself above him, looked down at him, saw him watching her from beneath lowered lids. He smiled, a slight, challenging smile, and she responded with all her competitive spirit. She placed one stiletto on the floor, then the other.
“Don’t hurt yourself,” he said.
It was a taunt, a challenge.
She smiled back at him. “Don’t worry. I was in ballet and gymnastics. I’m very . . . limber.”
He closed his eyes as if absorbing the implicit promise into his mind and his body. When he opened them, she could see the painful anticipation that held him in thrall. And she proceeded to show him a side of herself she never knew existed.
8
Brandi’s cell phone rang, a silly little tune, waking Roberto from a pleasurably exhausted doze to the full light of morning. Late morning, by the looks of the sunshine beaming in through the skylights.
She lifted her head off his shoulder and looked toward her purse with an expression that was a mixture of helpless affection and annoyance. Touching Roberto’s chin, she smiled wryly. “I have to get this.” Sliding out from under the covers, she grabbed her phone and flipped it open. “Hi, Tiffany. I know, I should have called you with a report on the party.” She was talking fast, making excuses to someone who had the right to know.
Tiffany . . . she hadn’t mentioned a Tiffany.
Of course, the two of them hadn’t done a lot of talking.
Interested, Roberto lifted himself up on one elbow.
Brandi stood bathed in the sun, gloriously naked and unselfconscious. Strands of gold hair tumbled around her shoulders. Her breasts were superb, with full pink nipples that had almost hummed when he touched them. She was tall, not some tiny fragile thing he had to worry about crushing, with legs that wrapped around his waist and a body that lifted to his, demanding her due.
“Good for Uncle Charles,” Brandi said. “Yes, it was fabulous. Important people, lots of reporters, great clothes. It was worth moving to Chicago for, even with the frozen pipes and no Internet.”
He lifted his eyebrows. She’d just arrived in Chicago? “I wish you could have been there. You would have loved it.” She listened. “Did he? Well, Uncle Charles is right. If I do say so myself, I was gorgeous.”
Roberto lifted his thumb to her.
She grinned back at him. Whereas last night she had been unsure in her sexuality, today she was confident.
He had done that.
“No, Alan was busy.” Brandi turned toward the window.
Alan. The ex-fiancé. Roberto didn’t know what the hell difficulty Alan had had realizing what a treasure he possessed, but Roberto was grateful to the idiot. If not for him, Roberto wouldn’t have spent a night of decadent pleasure in Brandi’s arms.
He looked at her left hand, the hand that held the phone. There was a pale mark and an indentation where she’d taken off a ring. So the engagement had only recently terminated. Yesterday, perhaps? That would explain so much.
She looked out across Lake Michigan, then glanced down. Down the fifty-eight stories to the ground. She stared as if mesmerized, then suddenly, hastily, she paled and backed away.
Roberto recognized the symptoms. His mother was like that—not really afraid of heights, but not willing to look down. She had gone up in the Tower of Pisa, but the whole time she had kept her hand on her heart and her eyes on the horizon.
Brandi unzipped her bag. “I didn’t stay at Uncle Charles’s. I was tired and I left early.”
So whoever this Tiffany was, Brandi wouldn’t confide in her. Didn’t tell her where she’d spent the night, or with whom.
“But I wish you could have seen the Romanov Blaze.” She rummaged in the bag. “It’s so big. I never heard for sure, but I think it’s probably fifty carats—”
Brandi had a good eye. Forty-eight point eight carats.
“—with a sparkle and a purity that would tear your heart out. It’s a beautiful clear color, violet almost, with a fire in its heart.” She pulled out a thin, long strip of sheer rose-colored material. “No wonder it’s called the Blaze.” She slipped one arm into it, then the other.
Roberto realized she was putting on her robe . . . if that transparent wrap with lace inserts could be called a robe. The winter sunshine beamed down on her from the skylights, penetrating the material, hinting at her outline and giving her skin a rosy glow.
Or was the glow the result of his lovemaking?
“Uncle Charles has a great house. The refinished foyer is gorgeous.” She walked into the sitting room and lowered her voice.
Roberto had good ears and a healthy interest in hearing her end of the conversation.
“Say . . . Mother? Did Uncle Charles tell you anything about me?”
Mother? Roberto sat straight up. She had had to answer her mother’s call, of course. That was good. But she called her mother by her first name?
“No?” Brandi kept her voice perky. “I was just trying to get a feel for how he really felt about hiring me.”
Hiring her? Roberto leaped out of bed and walked to the doorway. This woman who looked like a model or a socialite or, for God’s sake, a high-priced call girl, worked for Charles McGrath?
As a secretary. Please, as a secretary.
“There seemed to be some resentment among his employees about me.” Another pause, and while she stood beside the desk, she caressed his laptop with one elegantly polished finger. “Well, because they think I got the job because we know him or because of my looks, or both. Yes, I know, Mother. I don’t undervalue myself.” Her voice contained a snap that surprised him.
If he had ever spoken to his mother in such a tone, she would have smacked the back of his head.
“Graduating magna cum laude from Vanderbilt Law was enough to get me into all the top firms,” Brandi said. “But the other employees don’t have to be fair, do they? Especially when they haven’t worked with me yet.”
She was an attorney. A newly hired attorney with the best grades from one of the top law schools in the United States.
But . . . but . . . her sapphires were large and real, and her gown was couture. She had said she would never wear it again. That kind of careless disdain for something so expensive always signified that there was money in the family.
Not that a wealthy background precluded her own success, but wealth coupled with her looks meant she shouldn’t have that drive to get to the top . . . and he was being a presumptuous ass. He’d had the advantages of a privileged background and a handsome face, and in his thirty-two years, he’d done well for himself. Very well for himself.
And when life had brought a reversal of fortune, he had done what he must to find his way back. Right now he was paying the price, but it would be worth it.
Yet Brandi worked for McGrath and Lindoberth.
He looked away from her. He had to look away from her. He needed to think, and that was impossible when she stood silhouetted against the windows and all her peaks and valleys called to him.
Had she known who he was when she beckoned him? She’d known his name. Of course she had to know the cause of his celebrity. His picture had been in all the papers.
But apparently she’d just moved to Chicago. If she’d been unpacking, if she’d had no water, if she had no Internet, it was possible she hadn’t heard about him. Perhaps the gossip at the party hadn’t reached her ears. Assuming that was all true, and that she wanted her job at McGrath and Lindoberth, then last night had been a hell of a miscalculation—on both their parts.
Should he tell her?
What good would that do?
The damage had been done.
They couldn’t go back.
So why not enjoy themselves and pay the piper when the time came?
Was he making this decision out of log
ic or desire? As she said good-bye and shut the phone, he slowly paced toward her. It didn’t matter. Nothing mattered . . . as long as he could have her one more time.
He caught her around the waist from the back. “I would like to extend my invitation to remain here for the weekend.”
He felt her spine straighten. She was going to say no.
But he had powers this piccola tesora could barely imagine.
He opened her robe, then ran his hands down her thighs and up to linger on the golden fluff of hair that barely concealed her lips.
She caught her breath.
Bending his knees, he pressed himself against her, and whispered in her ear, “I haven’t shown you what I can do with my . . . tongue.”
“Yes . . .” She cleared her throat. “Yes, you have.”
“There’s more. So much”—he slid his tongue along the shell of her ear—“more.”
She wasn’t easy. She tried to think about it. About her resolve to take only one night for herself. “I have to unpack,” she said faintly.
“So you can go to your cold apartment with the frozen pipes and work to finish unpacking—the unpacking that you can easily do next week—or you can spend the time with me being warm and bathed and pampered . . . and loved.” He opened her to his fingers and tenderly explored her, touching all the right places, making her melt against him. “I can show you such pleasure as you’ve never imagined. You’ll be insensible with joy. You won’t be able to stop smiling. Come, cara, be mine for one more day.”
Her phone rang again, a series of sharp rings. She still held the phone in her hand, but she looked at it as if she didn’t understand what she should do. Then she shook her head as if coming out of a daze and lifted it to her ear.
Accidenti! He had almost had her.
“Hi, Kim. Everything’s fine. Yes, I did.” She listened. “I know you didn’t, but you were wrong. It was everything I could have wished. In fact”—she cast a long, even look over her shoulder at him, a look that teased and revealed—“I’m going to have to call you back on Monday, because I’m spending the rest of the weekend with him.”