Nolan pushed his trousers over lean hips, registering the catch of her breath as they fell. Her eyes locked unabashedly on his cock and then on his eyes, full of awe. ‘Good lord, Nolan, you’re a Greek god in disguise.’
‘I am just a man.’ But there was an unmistakable rush of heat to his groin at her words, at knowing she found him pleasing to look upon. This was a promising start. Tonight, he wanted her to own every ounce of her pleasure for what it was.
He moved towards her, his hands working the laces of her gown free. ‘It’s time to level the playing field,’ he murmured, pushing the dress from her shoulders. It gave no further resistance, neither did Gianna. She was as eager to be undressed as he was to do it. She raised her arms, and he slid her chemise over her head, her undergarments over her hips, until she was naked against him, her skin pressed to his, the rise of his phallus against the soft swell of her stomach. If he wasn’t careful he would spend right now. In an effort to restore his control, Nolan swept her up in his arms and carried her back to the bed. The straw of the mattress crackled as he lay her down, as it took his weight beside her.
‘Tell me you want me.’ He kissed the sweep of her jaw, trailing a line of tiny kisses along it.
‘I want you, Nolan. You know I do.’ Her answer was a delightful hitching gasp as he drew a slow line down her breastbone. She was glorious aroused: her eyes emerald dark, her pulse strong at her neck, her sensitive skin responding to the slightest of touches.
‘Tell me where you want me. Show me. Own your pleasure, Gianna, with your words, your touch,’ Nolan cajoled, his mouth at her throat. ‘Here? Do you want me here? How about here?’ He bent to take the pink tip of a breast in his mouth, teasing it with his tongue, feeling it pebble and strain where his tongue passed. ‘Where else, Gianna? Where else do you want me to be?’
Everywhere. She wanted him everywhere, with everything at his disposal, his mouth, his tongue, his fingers, his hands, his cock—that magnificent rigid staff that had pressed too briefly against her. He made her into a wanton. She’d thought to control this, thought she could keep her desire on a leash, that she could somehow enjoy this without committing to it body and soul. If that had ever been a possibility, it was gone now. Now that she’d committed to this, there was no withholding. Nolan’s next words obliterated the prospect entirely. ‘Show me, Gianna. Show me where you want me.’
His words called her to wickedness and she did not flinch from the invitation. Tonight she could afford to be decadent. Tonight she was safe. For a few hours she could set aside her agenda. She could indulge. When would she get another chance?
Gianna drew her fingers down to her navel, issuing husky commands. ‘Kiss me here.’ He did, with the soft press of his lips, his hands bracketing her hips with gentle kneading. Her hand went lower still to the place between her legs where Nolan had wrought such pleasure once before. She touched her cleft. ‘I want your mouth here, where my nest is damp for you already.’
These were shocking words she uttered, and she could not be embarrassed about what she said, what she did, what she asked for, not with Nolan. She recognised in her boldness another sort of security. He would not let her be ashamed of her desire, of her wanton requests. He wanted her to give them free rein with her words, with her body.
He answered them with his fingers at her fold, parting, making her ready for his mouth and then he was there, finding the centre of her pleasure with lips, with the graze of teeth. She arched into him at the first contact, her hips lifting, her urgency rising in response to the lick and lave of his tongue. The more he gave, the more she wanted.
She was going to burst, wanted to burst. She cried out against the ache he built in her, until the throbbing ache simply couldn’t be borne. Only then, with her hands wrapped in his hair, her body pulsing, did he let her burst. And that made it worse. It was enough, and not enough, not tonight. Tonight, that little explosion of relief was merely a primer that drove her to the edge of a wildness not yet fulfilled.
Nolan lifted his head, his hair loose and tangled about his shoulders, his eyes dark. He was hungry, too. This had been an appetiser for them both. Gianna drew him to her, bringing him up over her body length to length, her legs parting to accommodate him, his hips hard against hers, his arms bracing his body above her, his cock pressing its invitation at the cradle of her thighs.
‘Gianna.’ His voice was strained, hoarse with the effort of holding his desire in check. ‘Are you sure? I don’t know if I can be gentle.’
She smoothed the hair back from his face, framing him with her hands. ‘Yes, I am sure.’ She was sure, too, that he could not be gentle. As a lover, it simply wasn’t in him: he was assertive, confident, driven. He’d not been gentle in the church, or on the Danieli’s big bed. Gentle would not do them any justice. This was not a mild passion.
Yet he found the right balance between the wildness that drove them and the reality—he was going to enter her for the first time. Nolan came into her with confident steadiness, moving inexorably deeper into her channel, halting his progress to let her body stretch around him, withdrawing a little to press forward once more.
Her own body picked up the thrusting rhythm of his, hips lifting once more, mouths meeting as their bodies claimed the cadence of lovemaking together. Her legs gripped his waist, her arms encircled him, nails digging into his back as the rhythm rose, speeding them towards some cataclysm. She could feel his body clench, his breath coming in hard pants, words degenerating into nothing more than grunts. This act was beyond words. Knowing his body this way, feeling his body join with hers, was an expression of intimacy far beyond any words she possessed. When the end came, brilliant and explosive, the feel of his release mingled with hers carried with it an alarming profundity.
This could never happen again. It was the first thought to surface once the bliss had passed. Not because it seemed unlikely something so extraordinary could be repeated, although Gianna did wonder, but because she couldn’t stand it. Or, more accurately, she couldn’t withstand it. This pleasure of his would bind her to him. It would be impossible to leave. This was an imprisonment far more compelling than any method of force the count had ever used. Worst of all, she’d asked for it. Take me to bed, Nolan Gray. He’d done more than that. He’d taken her to the edge of pleasure and beyond.
Gianna ran an idle hand down Nolan’s chest. He was oblivious, sleeping hard. She smiled in the dark, but it wasn’t entirely with pleasure. She was laughing at herself. She’d been so bold, never imagining she’d be the author of her own downfall. Well, that might be premature. She could control this if she set her mind to it and that control started with remembering her goals: get to Giovanni before the count; whisk herself and Giovanni off to somewhere safe, somewhere anonymous out of the count’s reach; start a new life where she wasn’t a courtesan’s daughter or a sadistic, greed-driven count’s stepdaughter.
‘Stop thinking.’ Nolan’s voice was slurred with sleepiness, but he was awake.
‘How can you tell? It’s dark and you’re barely awake.’ Gianna rolled away from him and propped herself up on an elbow.
‘Barely awake means not quite asleep.’ Nolan gave a low chuckle. ‘Your hand stopped moving on my chest, a sure sign your brain had found something else to occupy its time.’
Gianna gave his shoulder a playful punch. ‘How did you get so good at that? You know how to read people.’
‘A gambler has to.’ He played with a strand of her hair, twisting it around one finger. The question made him self-conscious, she realised. He didn’t like talking about himself.
‘Is that how you see yourself? A gambler?’ It was appalling how little she knew of him considering what they’d been through. She was hungry for any little titbit. What was his life like back in England? What were these plans he mentioned? She’d settle for anything.
He made a wry smile. ‘Does that disappoint
you? Did you hope I might be a nobleman in disguise? Prince Charming, perhaps?’
She felt defensive now. The comment was somehow demeaning although she couldn’t quite work through how. ‘No, I never thought that, nor wanted it.’ Her own tone was brisk. ‘I just wanted to know something about you.’
His eyes softened. His hand stilled at her hair. ‘I’m a gambler. That’s all. I’ve gambled my way across Europe. Gambling keeps my pockets full. I have nothing to my name except what’s in my travelling trunks. No land, no secret estates to retire to when I’m tired of wandering.’
Now, thanks to her, he didn’t even have that. All of his worldly possessions were back at the Danieli. She really was bad for him. ‘I’m sorry, that’s my fault.’ Pretty soon he was going to figure out how awful it was to be with her and she wouldn’t have to worry about how to leave him. He would leave her. She just hoped it would be after they had Giovanni.
Nolan merely shrugged, raising one of his beautifully sculpted shoulders. He traced her collarbone with a long finger that sent a delicious shiver down her spine. ‘I am always up for an adventure. Brennan will bring my trunks and your case. I’ll send word to him once we reach our destination.’ He gave her an expectant glance, his eyes asking her to fill in the details. What was their destination? Padua was only a stop to collect Giovanni.
He gave her a penetrating stare. ‘You don’t know where you’re going after Padua, do you?’
‘I’m sure something will present itself.’ Gianna hoped she sounded more confident than she felt. She didn’t know exactly where they’d go. ‘It only needs to be a place where we can have a new start.’ But part of her was starting to recognise how elusive that might be. Freedom meant running. To stay free meant being able to outwit the count. The diamonds were worth following, revenge was worth pursuing. The count would not rest and neither could she. A woman with her looks, independent means, and a blind brother would not be allowed to fade into the background of any village.
Someone would always want to know more. She would always be on the move, there would always be Giovanni to care for, which meant there would never be a husband for her, never a family of her own to settle down with because there would never be any settling down. But there could be tonight. The count and Romano Lippi were delayed in Venice, nursing their wounds. She and Nolan would have at least a half-day head start on them. Tonight she was safe. She wasn’t going to waste it, wasn’t going to let Nolan see how empty her hope was.
Gianna swung a leg over Nolan’s thighs and levered herself astride, dropping a full-mouthed kiss on his lips. ‘Enough talk, Nolan Gray. Tonight isn’t for plans, it’s for passion.’ She slipped a hand between his legs and cupped the tender sac behind his phallus. She was rewarded with a moan. ‘It’s my turn to take you to bed.’ She might be too sore to take him inside again so soon, but there were other ways to pleasure him and herself.
She slid up his body, palms running up the smooth expanse of his chest over the atlas of his muscles. ‘You’re in good shape for a gambler who sits at a card table all night,’ she said between kisses.
‘I ride. I fence. I box. I shoot and throw.’ He managed to get the words out, and she laughed against his chest, emboldened by the knowledge that her touch affected him. She sucked on the tiny points of his nipples, letting her tongue run over him as he had her.
‘All that?’ She let her hair brush his skin as she moved her attentions down his chest with a delicate caress of lips until she reached his hip bones. She looked up at him, a coy smile on her lips. ‘Shall I?’
His tongue flicked across dry lips, his response more of a groan than a word. ‘Please.’
She flashed him a wicked look and sank between his legs, her hand sliding the length of him, readying him for her mouth. He was hard and heavy in her grip, her thumb working the tender tip and its moisture. He arched ever so slightly into her hand, and she knew it was time for more. Her mouth came down on him, tasting salt and male essence. Above her, Nolan moaned, his body starting to shudder, giving up control, giving over to unleashed desire, and it drove her on. She wanted him to feel the unbearable throb of his body, pulsing with pleasure as it neared its release.
‘Gianna!’ His hoarse cry was both warning and accolade. His body tightened and then bucked in masculine relief. The sight of Nolan in climax was beautiful, private and...vulnerable. In those moments of relief, he was entirely helpless, this man who had slashed the count, who had saved her more than once, whose talents of mind and body made him seem nearly impregnable.
Yet, right now, he was without control, and therein lay the intimacy. It was in the allowing—that he had allowed her to see him at his most vulnerable, that he had allowed himself to be at his most vulnerable, a Samson without his hair. She would not allow him to be alone. She held him as he came, feeling his cock jerk in her hand full of life, feeling the warmth of his seed fill the cupped bowl of her palm.
She met his eyes, his hand reaching out to gently stroke her hair in these quiet moments. Her earlier fear returned, tinged with sadness this time. She had to leave him before she could love him. It would be too easy to stay, to easy to love him. But she would not drag him down with her. Two days, she promised herself. Enough time to get to Padua and to say goodbye before he would regret having ever met her.
Chapter Twenty
What happens next? It was the question Nolan had fallen asleep to and the one to which he awoke. It was the one that occupied his thoughts in the carriage on the road to Padua. Likely, it was the one that occupied Gianna’s thoughts, too, but perhaps for different reasons. Nolan stole a glance over the edges of his borrowed book acquired from the inn’s common area. He’d made a circumspect show of turning pages approximately every minute to create the illusion of reading, but he hadn’t read a word of his book and neither had she. Mid-morning had passed in silence, afternoon was headed the same direction.
‘Are you a slow reader?’ Nolan enquired in deceptively mild tones.
Gianna looked up, her expression defensive. ‘No, why would you think that?’
Nolan gave a nod towards her book. ‘You haven’t turned a page in forty-five minutes. Maybe you are too busy regretting last night to focus properly on the story?’
She blushed gamely and very honestly met his eyes. ‘I don’t have any regrets about last night.’
‘Then perhaps you are thinking about seeing your brother? Or maybe you are thinking about where you’ll go? Coming up with ideas where you might settle?’ Nolan pressed in benign tones. He’d done some thinking of his own last night after Gianna had fallen asleep against him. Alone, her future didn’t look promising. Had she also realised that? Was that why she didn’t know where to go next? He had some solutions, however, and he might not get a better chance to share them.
Nolan set aside his book. ‘Why don’t you and your brother come to England with me?’ He’d not planned on going home, but why not? He could see the property he’d deeded to his brother, could help his brother get their project off the ground.
Gianna gave him a sceptical stare. ‘I thought you didn’t have any property?’
‘Technically, I don’t. It’s my brother’s.’ Nolan paused. He’d never shared this project with anyone before, not even his friends. He leaned forward and took one of Gianna’s hands, worrying it with his thumb. ‘It’s a safe house and there would be a place for you, a need for you, actually. It’s a house in the country, far from a city. It’s a house for boys who come from broken homes. Maybe girls, too, but we thought we’d start with boys.’
Because he and Edward knew about broken boys, how they thought, how they saw the world, how they blamed themselves when mothers went away or died too early, how they tried to protect others with puny fists even at the expense of themselves when their fathers lashed out, how eventually they would give up trying and run away, hoping to just be lost, hoping the wor
ld would leave them alone.
Gianna gave him a considering look. ‘Where will you be while your brother and I run this home?’
‘In London, maybe Paris. I liked Paris quite a lot last spring. Wherever there are card games to be had, that’s where I will be. Boys don’t feed and clothe themselves. It will cost money to keep the place open. Money’s my job.’
‘You lied last night. You’re far more than a gambler, Nolan,’ she said softly. ‘You’re a brother, a landowner, a rescuer, a runner.’ The last was said sharply with a hint of condemnation.
‘Maybe that’s why I understand you so well,’ Nolan shot back, the atmosphere in the carriage becoming charged as they got too close to unsettled issues between them. What next? ‘What sort of existence will you have here on the Continent? Surely you’ve figured out the count will not give up if there’s a chance to reach you? You will do nothing more than move from place to place, living in hiding, living under assumed identities.’
‘I know,’ Gianna answered solemnly. ‘But I have to try.’
‘Have you thought about turning the diamonds over to the count and the money, too? Then he’d have no reason to pursue you.’ It was an abhorrent idea as soon as he voiced it. But if it meant safety and freedom, if it meant an end to living in fear, perhaps it would be tolerable. Sometimes principles were too expensive to uphold.
Gianna gave him a hard look, finding the idea as repulsive as he did. ‘Aside from the ethical consideration of letting evil triumph, what would I live on? How would I support Giovanni? Even a cottage of our own would be beyond us.’ Her eyes met his. ‘I do not wish to be a courtesan like my mother.’
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