by Maisey Yates
Her breasts were always a little full for her petite frame, but now they just made everything she wore seem indecent. The swimsuit was an extreme example of that.
She tried to ignore her reflection in the mirror, tried not to focus on her pale flesh spilling over the midnight fabric of the miniscule top. Sighing, she grabbed a towel and wrapped it firmly around herself, hiding her new, extra-lush curves and her burgeoning tummy, before padding down to the large Olympic-size pool.
Thankfully the pool area, like the rest of the villa, and the rest of the island, was extremely private. Large flowering bushes had been planted around the perimeter of the pool, just high enough to guard against curious eyes, but low enough to leave the view of the ocean visible.
Alison slid beneath the surface of the water, sighing as its coolness washed over her heated skin. She began to swim laps, reveling in the chance to burn off some of her restless energy. To let her mind go blank so that she could just forget about Maximo, even just for a moment.
When she reached the edge of the pool she gripped the cement lip, wiping the droplets of water from her face.
“You swim well.”
A sensual shiver shot through the length of her body. Would that voice never stop affecting her this way? Would she ever be able to just find Maximo’s presence…boring? Every day?
She looked up, her eyes widening as she took in the muscular legs, partially revealed by his board shorts, and, her eyes widened further, the broad expanse of his well-defined chest.
“Thank you,” she said tightly, swimming away from that end up the pool and moving to the ladder that hung over the side. “I was on the team in high school.” She climbed out of the water and grabbed her towel quickly, trying to cover the acres of bare skin that were on display thanks to her ridiculous swimsuit.
She turned to face him and her eyes were immediately drawn back to his superbly masculine chest. Good Lord, but he was one hot man. All hard muscle with just the right amount of dark chest hair sprinkled over his golden skin. Just enough to remind her how much of a man he was. As if she needed reminding. What she needed was to forget.
“So you swam in high school?”
She nodded, sitting on the lounger chair that was positioned beneath a palm tree shading the patio area. “I did a lot of things in high school. Swimming. The debate team. I worked on the school newspaper. Anything and everything to earn extra credit.”
“Let me guess…you had a 4.0 GPA?”
She shrugged. “I was capable of it so anything less would have been a failure. I needed to earn scholarships so that I could go to school.”
“Your parents didn’t offer to pay for your schooling?” He crossed his arms over his chest, the motion creating a fascinating play of muscle that she was powerless to look away from.
“My mother couldn’t have afforded it. When my…” She didn’t know why she was telling him anything, and yet it seemed so easy to talk to him. She wanted to talk to him, wanted to keep him there with her. She cleared her throat. “When my father left things became difficult for us financially. My mother didn’t have the means, or the drive, to earn a living for us.”
He lowered his dark eyebrows and rubbed a hand over his jaw, his skin rasping against the black stubble that was starting to grow. “Your father didn’t pay child support?”
“We didn’t even know where he was. He walked out the door one day and never came back. I haven’t heard from him in fifteen years.”
“That must have been hard.”
“Yes. It was harder for my mother, though. She just kind of self-destructed after he left. Kimberly was gone, and then Dad was, too, and she just didn’t seem to have it in her to keep going. So she sank instead. She nearly took me with her.”
He sat in the chair next to hers and leaned close, the musky scent of him teasing her senses. “Is that why you’re so independent?”
“I had to be. People aren’t going to take care of you—they’re going to take care of themselves. I just learned that at an earlier age than some. But I survived. I made my own way. My own success.”
“But there is no shame in accepting help from others.”
“That’s quite something coming from you. When was the last time you accepted help?”
A slow smile curved his lips. “I can’t remember.”
“I didn’t think so.”
“But some people need more help than others,” he said, a shadow passing over his face for a moment.
“I don’t believe that. Some people wallow rather than moving forward.”
“Is that what you think? That your mother should have tried harder?”
She nodded emphatically. “Yes. That’s what I think. You can’t just self-destruct because somebody leaves you in the lurch. It’s never a good idea to depend on someone like that. You become so accustomed to leaning on them that you get weak, and then when they leave, when they fail you, you won’t be able to stand on your own anymore because you’ve lost all of your own strength. And everybody fails at some point.”
His eyes darkened. “Yes. And some damage is irreparable.”
“Yes,” she said softly, thinking of the void left by Kimberly, by her father and then, even though she’d still been there physically, by her mother. “That’s why I don’t need people.”
“Don’t you?”
“No. I earn my own living. I’ve achieved my goals on my own, without help from anyone. I don’t do need.”
“Neither do I,” he said, his voice growing thicker, deeper. “And yet, something about you…” He took her hand and placed it on his bare chest, the heat of his skin singeing her fingers, his heartbeat raging against her palm. “Something about this feels a lot like need.”
She sucked in a breath. She couldn’t deny it. Her own body was on fire with response to his. Her heart pounding in time with his, her nipples beading, aching, slick moisture dampening her core.
“That’s why we can’t,” she said bleakly, trying to pull her hand away, but he gripped it with his, held it tightly against the hard wall of his chest.
“And you think if we deny it, that it will go away? Has it faded at all in the past three weeks for you? Because I have been spending all of my nights dreaming of you. Of making love to you, touching your soft skin, thrusting into your beautiful body.”
Heat coursed through her and she knew her cheeks were bright red, but not from embarrassment. Well, not only from embarrassment, although his frank description of what he wanted to do with her was a little bit beyond her experience level. But the heat was from desire, the fierce pulse of it that pounded through her and made her limbs feel weak, made her feel as if she could be reckless. Like she could grab what she wanted with both hands and forget that such a thing as consequences even existed.
He leaned in, his mouth covering hers, his tongue parting her lips expertly. She didn’t hesitate. She opened to him, let her tongue tangle with his, wrapped her arms around his neck so that he could kiss her harder, deeper.
His hands deftly worked at the knots on her bikini top and before she realized what was happening the fabric had slipped away, leaving her breasts bare to him. She arched against his chest, the slight dusting of hair that covered his skin lightly abrading her nipples. The coarse friction sent a wave of sensation washing through her body, making her internal muscles clench in anticipation of his touch. His possession. She squirmed, trying to find some way to alleviate the hollow ache that was slowly taking over her body. She knew it wasn’t going to work, that whatever she did, even if it brought her to orgasm, wasn’t going to satisfy her. Because she wasn’t going to be satisfied until their bodies were joined together, until he was filling that void.
He lowered his dark head and she watched, completely spellbound as he sucked one pink nipple into his mouth, his tongue working the sensitized tip. She let her head fall back, let a loud moan escape her lips. She was past the point of caring about what noises she made, past the point of caring about anything except for t
his. Maximo. His touch. His wicked mouth doing such wonderful, shocking things to her.
“You’re so beautiful,” he said thickly before lowering his head and drawing her other nipple into his mouth. He released her, laving her with the flat of his tongue before scattering kisses over her breasts, her collarbone, down to her belly button and back up again.
She was on fire, dying for him, all remnants of control long since thrown out the window. She couldn’t think when he was kissing her. Couldn’t plan. Couldn’t do anything except revel in the things he, and only he, could do to her.
Would it have been like this with any man? If she had given someone the chance sooner would they have lit her body on fire, too?
No. She knew that instinctively. She didn’t need a vast amount of experience to know that this wasn’t everyday garden-variety attraction. This was something much hotter, something much more lethal. And she was willingly partaking in it, even knowing how potentially deadly it was.
She felt the hard evidence of his arousal against her thigh and she moved her hand down, pressed her palm against his firm length and squeezed him gently.
A short curse fell from his lips and he captured her mouth again, bucking his hips against her hand, his control obviously as shredded as her own. She squeezed him again and she reveled in the low growl that rumbled in his chest. Always before when she’d imagined being intimate with a man, she’d imagined it meant giving him power over her. But what she hadn’t realized was just how much power she would have over him.
She moved her hand over the length of him, not quite able to believe just how thick and hard he felt. She hadn’t realized that men could be so big. And yet, there was no fear with that revelation, only a sensual thrill that rushed through her, making her feel light-headed, breathless.
Dimly Alison registered the chirpy tones of a cell phone. Despite the interruption, her hands continued to roam over him, to explore him, the everyday sound not quite able to penetrate the fog of desire that was totally clouding her ability for rational thought.
“Che cavolo.” Max swore and jumped away from her as though her touch burned him. He moved to the table where he’d placed his mobile phone and answered it in rough Italian, his chest rising and falling harshly with his breathing, the aggressive jut of his arousal pushing visibly against the thin fabric of his shorts.
Alison’s heart was pounding hard in her ears. Very slowly she started to come back to reality. She could feel the heat of the sun, the salt breeze…hear seagulls screaming at each other down on the beach. She had just about made love with a man outside. Correction: she had been in the process of making love with him even if they hadn’t been quite to the point of actual intercourse. And any of the household staff members could have come out and seen them, caught them in the act.
She crossed her arms over her breasts, acutely aware of her nudity. Before it had seemed freeing, so nice not to have anything between her and Max. Now it just seemed embarrassing. She didn’t feel sexy anymore. She just felt bare, exposed.
She fished her swimsuit top from beneath the chair and turned her back to Maximo, who was still engaged in his phone conversation, tying her top back on with shaking hands, her clumsy fingers taking twice as long to get herself covered again. She picked up the towel and knotted it fiercely at her breasts, craving all the cover she could get. She took advantage of Maximo’s distraction and sneaked quietly back into the villa. She was not hanging around for another postmortem on an aborted make-out session.
More importantly, she wasn’t going to risk being there if he wanted to pick up where they left off because, despite the healthy dose of humiliation she was suffering from, she wasn’t certain she would be able to resist him.
Chapter Nine
MAXIMO got off the phone with the casino manager and cursed. Not because the problem at the casino hadn’t been easy to solve—that issue had been handled in only a few minutes—but because of the unsatisfied desire that was still raging through him.
He couldn’t believe he’d almost had sex with Alison outside by his pool, with all of the speed and finesse of a very horny schoolboy. He had never, ever lost control with a woman like that before. He had always taken time when romancing a woman. Selena had never wanted it any other way. She had always needed candles, a dimly lit room. He had always spent at least an hour arousing her body before he’d even considered taking things to their natural conclusion.
But with Alison there had been no romance, no candles. He’d been ready to plunge into her without a full five minutes of foreplay. And what foreplay there had been was clumsy, driven by an intense need, not any kind of skill or consideration. He didn’t know this part of himself; the part that only Alison seemed to be able to bring out in him.
He was a man who prized his control. He always thought things through, always led first with his mind before jumping into action. And yet, Alison, his beautiful, bewitching fiancée, the woman who was pregnant with his child, robbed him of his ability to think coherently.
It was the unknown that was causing his body to respond this way. It had to be. He had desired her from the first moment he’d seen her and every night since then he’d dreamed of her, her smell, the touch of her soft hands, and the wet press of her lips over his body. There was no way the fantasy would live up to the reality, though, because it never did.
He needed to take her, to know once and for all what her desire for him would taste like, know what it felt like to be inside her, know what sounds she would make when he brought her to completion. And once the mystery was solved, the edge would be worn away. It had to be.
He couldn’t wait anymore. He wanted her, and he knew for certain that she wanted him with the same ferocity, that she was just as hungry as he was. And he wasn’t going to allow her to deny it any longer.
Alison scrubbed the chlorine from her skin and wished she could wash away the imprint from Maximo’s touch half as easily. No such luck. Even with the scalding water from the shower coursing over her body, she could still feel the impression of where his hands had touched her, teased her, where his mouth had seared her. She shivered despite the heat and shut the water off.
During her shower she’d decided that she wasn’t ashamed of what she’d done with Max. She was entitled to sexual pleasure if she wanted it. And that was a massive admission in and of itself. She was embarrassed, though, because she’d totally lost track of time and place, and anyone could have walked right up to them and she would have been much too lost in what they were doing to notice. Maybe Maximo, with his stable of previous lovers, was sophisticated enough to deal with something like that. He could probably turn it into a saucy anecdote and laugh about it with his sophisticated friends. Not her, though. She just didn’t have the experience for that, which just went to prove how out of her league Max was.
Ashamed as she was to admit it, she’d looked him up when she’d been on the computer in the office, and she’d seen the kind of women he’d had in his life. Even before his marriage to the supernaturally lovely Selena, he’d had a very high taste level where his girlfriends were concerned. All of them were high-profile models, actresses, socialites, and all of them had been tall, thin and gorgeous. They weren’t the kind of women to run and hide from sexual attraction. They were the kind of women who would pounce on it and tame it, take what they wanted and enjoy doing it.
She realized that she was clenching her fists so tightly that her knuckles were white and she slowly released them.
She’d never considered herself a coward. On the contrary, she’d always been prideful about how brave she thought she was. Brave and sensible. Sensible enough to protect herself, keep herself from coming unraveled and completely dependent on someone. Brave because she’d gone out and learned to stand on her own feet, made things happen for herself.
And she’d been the biggest, delusional idiot.
She’d been a coward. She hadn’t dealt with anything. She’d completely walled off a portion of herself so she woul
dn’t have to deal with all of the complications that might result from a relationship.
She’d denied any sort of desire for companionship, totally squashed her sexuality, and all the while she’d been congratulating herself for being so strong. It wasn’t strength that had led her to do those things, it was fear. And that was a bitter pill to swallow. She wasn’t much better than her mother. It was just that her general wariness was preemptive rather than a response to something that had happened to her. The result, however, was much the same. Oh, she might not subject everyone to lengthy, vitriolic speeches about men and how you couldn’t trust them, but she carried that belief inside of her. If she wasn’t careful it was going to poison her.
It had to change. She was crippling herself. Ironic, since she’d always been so terrified that losing a lover would do that to her, and she’d done it to herself.
She wasn’t ready to rush headlong into falling in love, but maybe…
Maybe she could fulfill her desire for Max. Those women in the magazines, the women who had dated Max before his marriage, knew that sex wasn’t love. Knew it and reveled in it. They didn’t suppress that part of themselves, not like she had done for so long.
She exited the bathroom and went into her connecting bedroom, sinking onto the bed, holding her towel tightly around her naked body. She was such a hopeless case for Max that even the rough abrasion of the terry cloth over her bare skin was turning her on.
It had always been easy to act aloof around men. She hadn’t really wanted any of them. There had been a few times when she’d really liked someone, felt a kind of bitter melancholy over not pursuing anything serious with them. But this, what she felt for Max, was a consuming hunger that was with her all the time. A spark that smoldered in her belly, ready to burst into flame when Max so much as looked at her.
The fact that they were engaged to be married, that they were having a baby together, was the biggest thing holding her back. If she could just indulge in a fling with him, one night of passion maybe, just so she could experience it, so she could exorcise this thing that had flared so strongly between them, then she would more than happily jump into bed with him.
