A Pawn in the Playboy's Game

by Cathy Williams

  Alessandro stepped out of his trousers, then the boxers, retrieving a condom from his wallet, although he wasn’t even conscious of doing so.

  He flicked it onto the bedside table and remained standing next to the bed, completely naked.

  He was bigger than big, Laura thought. Big all over. A broad-shouldered, powerfully built man and his erection was beyond impressive. She propped herself up on one hand and took him into her mouth, feeling him shudder with a kick of heady satisfaction.

  He arched his back and his hand pressed to the back of her head, urging her to suck him, to taste him.

  She licked and teased and played with him and his deep groans were impossibly sexy.

  When he could take it no more he tugged himself free of her eager mouth and remained perfectly still, controlling his breathing with difficulty.

  Finally, he looked down at her. ‘I have never wanted any woman the way I want you now.’

  Laura wasn’t going to analyse that. She fell back onto the pillows, legs parted, and moaned softly when he joined her.

  He kissed her slowly, taking his time, his tongue exploring her mouth, then he moved to trail kisses along her jawline. She arched up and then sighed, eyes fluttering shut as he took one nipple into his mouth and began suckling on it, lazy and thorough.

  She was drowning in sensation and it was nothing like anything she had felt before.

  This must be what it felt like to lose control utterly and completely, knowing that what you were enjoying was a one-off experience that had to be appreciated to the absolute utmost because it wasn’t going anywhere and would probably not be repeated.

  She was filled with a feeling of liberation. When he slipped his hand underneath her panties, she spread her legs a little wider and gasped as he began stroking her clitoris.

  He rubbed his finger insistently over the throbbing nub until she was pleading with him to stop. She didn’t want to come like this...

  Alessandro straddled her. Opening her eyes to gaze at him, Laura didn’t think that she had ever seen anyone quite so beautiful and she felt that she probably never would again.

  She held him in her hands but he gently disengaged her with a smile.

  ‘This isn’t just about my satisfaction,’ he murmured huskily. ‘This is about you as well...’ He leaned down to lick her stomach, which was salty with perspiration, then he moved lower until his mouth was on her panties, and without removing them he teased her until she squirmed, until she could barely stand the intense excitement building inside her, an explosion that was on the brink of detonating.

  Only then did he ever so slowly pull down her underwear, where it joined the heap of clothes on the floor.

  He liked the way she wasn’t all skin and bone. The soft roundness of her hips was an exquisite turn-on. Her breasts were abundant, succulent, and he could have stayed buried in them for far, far longer.

  He breathed in the musky, honeyed scent between her legs and then gently slid his tongue into her, finding her clitoris once more, but this time the delicate thrust of his moist tongue was a mind-blowing experience for her. She instinctively reached down, curling her fingers into his dark hair, raising her legs slightly so that he could sink his tongue deeper into her.

  She knew that she was groaning but the sounds she was making seemed to be coming from someone else, far away.

  He teased her until she was going mad with wanting him, until the only satisfaction she needed was to have him in her, and in between the groans she knew that she was pleading with him to stop, to come inside her, that she needed him...right now...

  ‘Demanding hussy.’ Alessandro reached for the condom and applied it with shaky fingers, resenting that brief interruption, that momentary parting of their bodies.

  But he needed to come inside her, too, as much as she needed it.

  Foreplay was all well and good but the tipping point had come far too close and far too often for his liking.

  He thrust long and deep into her, loving her tight wetness and the way her legs slid up and around his waist so that he could reach and cup her buttocks in his big hands.

  He would have liked to have exercised control. And he did, but he was driven to move faster, harder, and he knew that she had come when he felt her body stiffen and heard the rhythm of her breathing faster and faster, more and more breathless, until she was crying out and gasping at the same time.

  Only then, and thankfully not a second too soon, did he allow himself the ultimate release. He reared back and reached an unbelievable orgasm on one deep thrust.

  Caught in the grip of the physical, he had managed to set aside the ground-shaking conversation he had had with his father. Now, as he lay down next to her and felt the curve of her rounded body lean against him, Alessandro frowned, reliving that conversation.

  The room felt too small and he swung his legs over the side of the bed and walked restlessly towards the window.

  Laura felt a chill run through her and she sat up, pulling the quilt over her and clutching it under her breasts.

  She had enjoyed her no-strings-attached experience and this was what the comedown felt like. Horrible. They had made love and now he couldn’t even stand the thought of staying next to her in the bed for five seconds.

  Hit-and-run was the expression that sprang to mind, but there was no way she was going to start raising objections or asking for more than he was prepared to give.

  She had no idea what to say in a situation like this. She could feel a hollow emptiness clawing at her throat and she shot him a brave smile.

  Alessandro noted that brave smile and raked his fingers through his hair. He’d sated his physical needs and he knew he should walk away. He also knew that he wasn’t going to do that. Not yet. He’d had her and he wanted more.

  He also needed...for the first time in his life after sex...to do more than glance at his watch and bring proceedings to an end.

  ‘Has my father ever confided in you?’ he asked abruptly, and she was so startled at his question that she stared at him in round-eyed silence. ‘And please don’t try lying to me.’

  ‘Alessandro, I have no idea what you’re talking about.’

  ‘You and he seem to enjoy a close relationship and then throw your grandmother into the mix and we have a little circle of who knows what kind of touchy-feely confidence-sharing...’ He remained by the window, propped against the ledge, arms folded, still completely and gloriously naked.

  ‘Are you going to start accusing me of being a gold-digger all over again?’ she asked tersely. ‘Are you going to try insinuating that my grandmother and I are involved in some kind of seedy plot to take your father for everything he’s got?’ She felt tears sting the backs of her eyes. It was one thing to have a one-night stand with someone who was allergic to relationships, but it was something else to have a one-night stand and then be shoved into the firing line.

  ‘I thought you’d got past all of that.’

  Alessandro shook his head and pushed himself away from the window ledge to begin scooping up his clothes, his movements oddly lacking their usual grace.

  ‘You found a scrapbook,’ he said roughly. Jeans on, shirt on, though with the buttons undone, he moved to stand by the bed, looking down at her with brooding intensity.

  ‘Oh, yes. That. Alessandro, I don’t know what you’re talking about and you’re making me nervous, standing there and glowering down at me.’

  ‘What else might you have found that you failed to deliver to me?’

  ‘Deliver to you? Is that what you think I should be doing? Sorting through your father’s stuff and then handing over anything I think you might want to see? Even if it would be up to Roberto to do the handing over himself? Do you think I should be using this opportunity to spy on your father? See if he’s been investing in anything dodgy? Or maybe sending
money abroad because he’s been scammed by some crooks somewhere? Or maybe he’s just been hiding something you think you should know about! Because you should know everything, shouldn’t you?’

  ‘Should I?’ He walked away and sat at the little chair by her dressing table, dwarfing it with his big, muscular frame. ‘Well, it would appear not. I mean, I never knew, for starters, that my mother died giving birth to me.’

  Laura gasped and sat forward. ‘What?’

  ‘My father didn’t share that with you?’ He raked his fingers through his hair. He hadn’t meant to say anything. He had needed to lose himself in her, had thought that sex would have been enough to still the turmoil in his head. Obviously not.

  ‘No. He didn’t. I...I don’t understand. How is it that you’re only now finding out about...about your mother?’ She reached down to the side of the bed and yanked at her jumper, sticking it on and then wriggling into her underwear.

  She couldn’t remain lying down while he sat there...

  She realised now how utterly self-controlled he was now that that self-control had slipped. His expression was bleak and she just needed to hold him, touch him, but not in a sexual manner. She felt driven to be there for him, although that need barely registered as conscious thought.

  There was a little rocking chair by the window, another legacy from her childhood, and she dragged it over so that she could sit right next to him. He didn’t object when she laced her fingers through his.

  ‘What else...?’

  ‘What other revelations were aired? Now, let’s see. Oh, yes, I had a sister. She died when she was twelve. Fell from a tree, of all things.’

  ‘Alessandro...’

  ‘That’s when they decided that having another child might be a good idea. Or rather, reading between the lines, my mother thought it... Do you know something? I have no idea why I’m telling you this.’

  ‘Because everyone needs to vent now and again.’

  ‘I feel you might be confusing me with a loser.’

  ‘Are you upset with him? Angry?’ She ignored his dry dismissal of having feelings, of being vulnerable. She would have done anything to wipe the haunted expression from his face because it just didn’t belong there.

  ‘Both.’ Alessandro shot her a crooked smile. Upset. Angry. Yes, he was both those things but in time those feelings would disappear and he knew that he would be grateful for the conversation he and his father had had, the revelations that had been made.

  He was finally understanding why his father had been the remote figure in his life, how his grief over the loss of his much younger wife had somehow transferred into distance from the son he had held responsible.

  ‘I was an old fool,’ Roberto had growled, as uncomfortable with sharing his feelings as his son was, ‘but the longer time went by, the more impossible it became to remedy the damage, and in the end there was just the silence between us. Should have opened up, explained everything. Got pictures of your mother. Loved that woman more than anything in the world. Would have died for her. When you’re ready to forgive the old fool, you’re welcome to see the pictures.’

  ‘You know,’ Laura said thoughtfully, ‘he never talked about where he lived before he came here. There was always a part of himself that he kept hidden away from all of us.’ Her fingers were still linked through his. This felt like a moment in time she wanted to bottle and keep for ever and it confused her because what they had meant nothing. They were like two ships passing in the night. They didn’t have any sort of relationship. So why did she feel as though her heart was breaking when she imagined his life, growing up, when she saw the bleakness in his eyes? Why did she want to make it all better?

  Alessandro shrugged. She could feel him begin to withdraw from her and she panicked at the thought that he might resent the fact that he had confided, that she had seen him with his guard down, as vulnerable as he was ever likely to be. He was a proud man, the lion accustomed to standing alone.

  Now she knew why and she felt for him.

  ‘Did you...come here...to make love to me...because...?’

  Alessandro flushed darkly. ‘I wanted you,’ he said gruffly. ‘I don’t analyse things before that. And I should go now, before your grandmother returns home and catches me in a compromising situation with her granddaughter.’ He began buttoning up his shirt but he didn’t take his eyes from her.

  He’d never confided in anyone before but he wasn’t sorry he’d done so.

  ‘I think,’ he drawled, back to his usual self, ‘that the next time we should consider somewhere with a slightly less restricted bed.’

  Her heart soared. So there was going to be a next time...

  ‘When my grandmother bought me this bed...’ she stuck on her jogging bottoms, feeling lighter now because he wasn’t going to waltz off into the sunset and leave her behind just yet ‘...I was twelve. I never imagined I’d need a bigger one because I would one day find myself here with a guy...’

  They walked back down the stairs but before they reached the door she rested her small hand on his arm.

  ‘Are you going to be all right?’

  Alessandro looked down into her clear, concerned, green eyes and smiled lazily.

  ‘Are you feeling sorry for me?’

  She immediately removed her hand. ‘I’m sorry for both of you,’ she answered honestly. ‘For all the time you’ve lost.’

  ‘I’ll go,’ Alessandro said, in that same tone of voice that told her that the confidences were over and would not be returning, ‘before you decide that you need to give me a hug. I’ve never been one who saw the point of hugs when it came to women. So many more exciting things to do and, unfortunately for us, not quite enough time at the moment.’

  But something about the sincere sympathy in her open, honest, clear-eyed gaze got to him.

  She hadn’t been gushy in her sympathy. She hadn’t tried to plead with him to stay so that she could try to take advantage of his once-in-a-lifetime lapse in self-control. She hadn’t plied him with concerned questions and then offered some repeat sex to take the pain away or any such nonsense.

  But, then, she was in a league of her own. She wasn’t part of his London life, wasn’t dating him, wasn’t looking for anything more than what they had, which was a brief and highly enjoyable fling, the result of circumstances more than anything else. She knew his father. In many ways their lives were entwined, which was certainly a situation he had never catered for.

  And she was a fantastic lover.

  As he drove away, he felt himself harden at the memory of their lovemaking. She was responsive, eager, not trying to impress him with gymnastic skill and not making noises about meeting up soon for an encore.

  In receipt of his father’s confidences, she had been just what he had needed.

  And he knew that he wanted more of her.

  His father was asleep by the time he got home. Tomorrow they would talk again. Laura had been right when she had said that she felt sorry for both of them and the time they had wasted, the years that had raced by during which he had been ignorant of the jigsaw-puzzle pieces of his past.

  He had assumed that his father had been as remote with his wife as he had been with his son. He had been wrong. His father had been giddy with love and when he had lost her he had lost the will to carry on. Certainly, he had lost all desire to bond with the son who was a painful reminder of the woman he had loved and lost. He had buried himself in his work to the exclusion of everything else, using it as a crutch to get him through the loneliness.

  For once Alessandro went to bed without first checking his emails, making sure that everything that should be happening in his company was happening.

  * * *

  His father was already up and about by the time he hit the kitchen the next morning, and there were two black leather boxes on his sid
e of the table.

  ‘More where those came from,’ Roberto said gruffly. ‘And don’t just stand there staring at them, my boy! Open them up! Should have given them to you a long time ago.’

  Alessandro looked at his father, who was busying himself with the kettle and a mug, fetching stuff from one of the kitchen cupboards. ‘Well...’ Roberto turned around, studiously keeping his eyes averted, and waved an impatient hand ‘...what are you waiting for? Be dead by the time you make your mind up! Want you to get to know your mother. Should have done it a long time ago. Would have, but...’

  ‘Time runs away,’ Alessandro finished succinctly. ‘Don’t worry. I intend to look at all those photos.’

  ‘Forgive me, boy?’

  Alessandro had never thought he would be having this conversation with his father or hearing those words, and something deep in the core of him shifted. ‘Depends...’ he drawled.

  ‘On what, eh?’

  ‘On how cooperative you are about moving into the cottage before the greenhouse has been built to your absolute specifications...because that’s proving a little trickier than you’d expect...’

  Roberto relaxed, shot him a gruff smile. ‘I’m an old man. Not sure I can make compromises with my tomatoes and orchids. I’ll give it my best shot, though.’

  CHAPTER EIGHT

  LAURA DIDN’T KNOW what to expect when she came to the house the following morning.

  A bitter wind had got up and light flurries of snow speckled a yellow-grey sky. Winter had been strangely polite for the past few weeks but now she could feel it getting ready to make up for lost ground. It was always the way in this part of the world. No civilised, rainy, fairly temperate winters but brutal, freezing-cold ones punctuated by blizzards and dense snowfalls.

  She had left her grandmother sorting out the log pile with the radio on full blast and she was relieved that she was on her own. She needed time to get her thoughts in order.