by Lucy Monroe
CHAPTER SIX
TARA wasn’t exactly shocked when Angelo pulled his luxury car into a spot in front of a Frank Lloyd Wright style house positioned on a cliff overlooking a private beach not far from where they’d built their sand castle.
She’d half expected him to offer to rent a hotel room so they could shower the sand off before dinner, but the privacy and subtle magnificence of the home was beyond anything she would have envisioned.
“Is this yours?” she asked as he turned off the car.
“Yes.”
“I’m surprised you keep it considering how little time you must have for vacations.”
“I’ve found it useful in hosting negotiations with West Coast companies.”
Ah. That made sense. Seclusion and the home court advantage…both great assets to have on his side when working on a business deal.
The inside reflected the stark simplicity of Wright architecture, but the quality of both the house’s furnishings and minimalist décor pointed to Angelo’s wealth.
He led her to a bedroom with a huge plate glass window that overlooked the ocean. “You can shower and change in here.”
“Thank you.”
She watched him walk away, her feelings no more settled than they had been on the beach.
After her shower, she brushed her hair out in front of the mirror in the large en suite bathroom. She left it down, shimmering in silky waves over her shoulders, contrasting against her white dress. She’d thought this dress was more conservative than the one she’d worn the night before even though it also had spaghetti straps.
It fell to her ankles in a form fitting line that was nevertheless not clingy. However, the row of tiny buttons that began at the sweetheart neckline stopped eight inches above the hem, leaving a slit that parted when she walked. And it struck her that a man of Angelo’s temperament would see the buttons as some kind of challenge.
She bit her lip, wishing she’d brought something less in your face feminine.
Just then, he walked into the room. The lack of a warning knock said more about his sense of possessiveness than it did his lack of manners. She had a feeling the oversight had been very deliberate.
“Ready?” he asked, dressed in a pair of dark chinos and white Polo shirt that set off his dark skin while accentuating the sculpted muscles of his chest.
Talk about sexy.
She put her hands out in a stock modeling pose. “What do you think; am I ready?”
His eyes flared with blue heat as he gazed at her. “You look beautiful.”
“Thank you.” She slipped her feet into a pair of heels. “Now, I’m ready to go.”
He put his arm out and she took it, saying nothing when he casually suggested she leave her things in the room for later.
She was curious to see what his plans for the night were. After his comments before they left the beach and the way she had responded to him, she wondered if he was considering using sexual intimacy to convince her of their compatibility.
She’d made the mistake once of believing great sex meant a great relationship. She wasn’t that naïve anymore, but she couldn’t deny the surge of sexual awareness she had every time he was near, either. Even Baron had not impacted her so startlingly with his mere presence.
Dinner was fabulous and she couldn’t help thinking about how Angelo had told her that he enjoyed her company. She liked being with him, too.
As much as she wanted him, it wasn’t all about sex.
Though that was what was primarily on her mind in the confines of the car as he drove them back to the beach house.
“It’s late. Do you want to spend the night?” he asked as he pulled into the parking spot he’d used earlier.
“Wasn’t that your plan all along?” Her tone wavered somewhere between censorious and teasing.
He shrugged. “It occurred to me, but if you aren’t comfortable, we’ll drive back to Portland tonight.”
At least he was being honest.
“There are multiple bedrooms,” she said, knowing even as she made the remark that the likelihood of more than one being used was very small.
“Yes.”
“We’ll probably end up in the same one, though.”
“That is entirely up to you.”
And her libido, which was as out of control as it had ever been in her life. Even so, she didn’t want to spend what remained of the night in the car driving home and then seeing him off at her front door.
She wasn’t sure what she did want, but saying goodbye to him was not it.
“It makes the most sense to stay.”
“Excellent.” He opened his door and swung his legs out of the car. “I wasn’t looking forward to driving back across the mountains this late.”
But he would have done it if she asked him to. That was worth something. Her trust was gently building without her really realizing it.
He built a fire in the great room’s fireplace and opened the sliding glass door that led to outside. The sound of crashing surf filled the room and cold air rushed in to make the heat from the fire welcome, even though it was summer. Not atypically on the Oregon coast, it had started getting chilly the moment the sun went down.
She slipped her heels off and stretched her toes in the plush carpet before moving to stand near the floor to ceiling window beside the open door. She loved summer because of the long days and gorgeous sunsets.
This one was almost over, but it had been spectacular. The deep red and orange reflected off the water as the light faded. She didn’t know how long she stood there, how long Angelo let her simply watch out the window, but the sky faded to a deep purple and then there was nothing but black night out the window. Soon, the moon would be out, but for now, the darkness made it seem as if they were alone in the universe.
It gave her a strange feeling, one she needed to counteract, and fast.
She remembered spying a familiar game case on one of the built-in shelves. “Do you fancy a round of Backgammon?” she asked without looking to see where he was.
There was nothing but silence behind her.
She turned to see why he hadn’t answered and ran smack into his chest.
He cupped her shoulders and looked down at her, his expression doing impossible things to her insides. “I want you, Tara.”
“So, you do plan to try to convince me with seduction.” She couldn’t quite decipher the change in his expression and that made her nervous, bringing out the cynicism she’d used so many times in the past to hide behind. “Or is it the other way around? Are you hoping your proposal will smooth the way for getting me into bed? And then maybe tomorrow, or the next day, or whenever you get ready to move on, you start making noises about how maybe we aren’t really all that compatible.”
Her tone was nothing short of an accusation, her words deliberately offensive, but he didn’t get angry. In fact, he didn’t tense at all. He simply looked at her like he knew something she didn’t, something really important. Something she wanted to know but was afraid of finding out.
His mouth came down and hovered just above hers.
“You—” a barely there kiss against her lips “—are—” his tongue flicked out to taste the corner of her mouth “—going to—” another kiss, this one more firm “—to have—” again his tongue…this time exploring the seam of her lips “—to trust—” his hands landed on her hips and pulled her into intimate contact “—me.”
He tilted his pelvis toward her, leaving little doubt of the level of his arousal. Then, another kiss, this one demanding entry to her mouth while his hands rotated her hips against him. How could being pressed into such intimate contact with such blatant male sexuality feel so natural, so right?
Just like on the beach, her body reacted to his nearness as if it had found its sole home in the universe. She had no defense against something so profound.
She parted her lips on a sigh of surrender she prayed she would not regret.
His tongue took possessi
on of the heated interior of her mouth and increased the temperature several degrees. He tasted so good, better than the slice of banana split cheesecake he’d cajoled her into having for dessert. Her arms snaked around his neck and she went up on tiptoe to duel with his tongue in an ancient dance of erotic desire.
The world tilted and she realized she was being carried. She didn’t know where and didn’t much care. She was too busy trying to devour a pair of sexy, masculine lips that she thought she just might be content to lock with for the rest of eternity.
He stopped moving, bent slightly and then no light filtered through her eyelids. Even that reality couldn’t hold her attention for very long, but when he laid her down on the plush carpet, pulling his mouth from hers, her eyes flew open and she moaned in protest.
They were in front of the fire, its orange glow the only light remaining in the room. It flickered over his features like a magical ebb and flow of illumination and shadow. She lay on her back staring up at him, her heart beating wildly while her lips pulsed with the need for more of his kisses.
He came down beside her, propping himself up on his elbow. So close their bodies touched, his leg slightly covered hers, and his chest pressed against her arm.
She felt surrounded by him, completely closed in, and her breaths came in shallow pants.
“Afraid?” he asked, not sounding particularly concerned.
“You said I should trust you.”
His dark brow rose, the firelight lending a primal cast to his face. “Do you?”
“I’m working on it.”
He smiled one of his rare smiles. “Good.”
She said nothing and he brushed her face with his fingertips, leaving a trail of tingling sensation in their wake. “You are so beautiful.”
Those words had been said so many times to her over the years, they’d almost ceased to have meaning. However, he was not seeing her as a body prepared to show some designer’s creation off to advantage. He was looking at her as a lover and no man had been allowed to do that in two long years.
Even before, Baron’s appreciation of her beauty had been wrapped up in his own pride of ownership. Something she had never been comfortable with, no matter how much she had thought she loved him.
Angelo looked at her as a man looked at a woman he could not look away from, not a woman he desired to show off to others.
The words unfurled inside her with a burst of pleasure and she savored them in silence for several seconds before replying. “Thank you.” She brought her hand up to trace the chiseled features of his face and down his neck to his collarbone. “You are a beautiful man.”
The corner of his lips quirked in amusement. “I’ve never thought of myself in those terms.”
“Most men don’t.” She grinned, feeling ridiculously happy for no reason she could discern. “However, you can trust me on this. Aesthetically you are extremely pleasing. Feature for feature you have the most masculine beauty I have ever seen. And I saw a lot of beautiful men in my former profession.”
“So, you think I’m the sexiest guy you’ve ever met?”
“Yes.”
“It’s those Sicilian genes.” The smug arrogance in his voice was more amusing than annoying.
She laughed. “Both of your parents must have been devastatingly attractive people.”
“I suppose.”
“Don’t you know?”
A dark shadow crossed his features and his mouth flattened into a grim line. “Yes, but it isn’t something I’ve thought about in a long time.”
“You don’t like talking about them, do you?”
“No.”
“Maybe it would help whatever bothers you so much if you did.” She was no amateur psychologist, but she couldn’t help feeling he kept too much of himself hidden.
Said the pot to the kettle.
She almost sighed, but bit it back. She wasn’t any better than him, but she had told him more about Baron than she’d even told her mother. And she felt better for it.
He traced the neckline of her dress, allowing his finger to dip into her cleavage for a breathless second. It felt amazing, just that small touch, but she sensed they were on the verge of something more important and she willed herself not to get sidetracked by how good it felt to be next to him.
“Angelo?”
“It’s too private.”
“Even to share with the woman you want to marry?”
An arrested expression came over his features and his gaze shifted from her breasts to her eyes. “You want me to talk about them to you?”
“Yes.”
“It’s important to you?”
“I think it is.”
He sat up, looping his arms around one raised knee and ran his fingers through his hair. “I don’t know where to begin.”
“Wherever you want.” She scooted into a sitting position beside him, glad for the warmth of the fire now that he wasn’t touching her.
Her nipples peaked from the cold air blowing in through the open doorway. She didn’t want it closed however. The sound of the surf was soothing.
“My dad met my mom when he was in Sicily negotiating a contract.” Angelo’s voice was void of emotion…no remembered pleasure, no residual pain, nothing. “He fell for her like a ton of bricks within minutes of their meeting. At least that’s how he used to tell it. He went after her as only a brash young man sure of what he wants can do.”
“You wouldn’t know anything about that,” she teased.
He shrugged, not even cracking a smile at the small joke. “It’s not the same. This was love—the kind you hear about in fairy tales I guess.”
Something clenched inside her at his words.
He’d fallen silent, maybe sensing her inner turmoil.
“Go on,” she urged.
“Dad talked Mama into marrying him and returning to the states with him.”
“That sounds pretty romantic,” she had to admit. She might not believe in love and happily ever after for herself, but it sounded like his parents had certainly known what that was all about. “Were they happy?”
Pain spasmed across his face and laced his voice when he spoke. “Yes. They were deeply in love for all the years of their marriage, but Dad died of a heart attack when I was twenty. Mama was lost without him.”
“I’m sorry.”
“I was, too. She didn’t know how to run a company and I was still in school. I wasn’t ready to take over the reins.”
“That would have been hard for you.”
“Even harder when I realized what that had cost us.”
“What did she do?”
“She hired someone, a man who came highly recommended. He was brilliant and seemed to really know his business. I liked him. I worked alongside him at the company during my summer break that year. I thought he was teaching me the ropes so I could take over as soon as I graduated.” Self-disgust dripped from Angelo’s words.
“Is he the one responsible for you losing your family company?” she asked with an awful premonition.
“Yes.”
“Because he wasn’t as good as you thought?”
“Because he was a lying, using bastard who did whatever it took to get what he wanted.”
“That doesn’t sound good.”
“He seduced my mother into selling him the company at half its worth and then dumped her.”
The words hung in the air with poison still capable of causing pain. Tara could feel it. She hurt.
This guy had been worse than Baron. She shuddered at the thought. She hadn’t thought they got any slimier.
“He was ten years her junior, but it didn’t matter,” Angelo went on, his voice flat now. “She was so grief stricken, she was easy prey for him and all the while I thought he was being a good friend to her while I was away at school.”
“You blame yourself.”
“Not as much as I blame him.”
“So, he just walked away from her after he got his hands on your compa
ny?”
“Not before destroying my mother. He mocked her for believing a man a decade younger would want to marry her. He ruined her sense of honor and womanhood.” His fist hit the floor. “I thought he was my friend, but when I found out he’d been screwing my mother, I wanted to kill him.”
“You didn’t.”
“I might have. I was angry enough and there are a lot of primitive urges passed down by my Sicilian ancestors, but I was too busy dealing with her suicide.”
Horror clawed through her heart and she felt nausea well up inside. “She killed herself. Over him?”
“She still loved my dad when this monster came into her life. He used her loneliness against her and when it was over, she felt she’d betrayed Dad’s memory. She came from a very traditional Sicilian home and she couldn’t face what she’d done.”
“Did she tell you this?”
“She left a note…wanted to explain to me so I wouldn’t hate her. God knows I never hated her, but she couldn’t live with herself…with the memories, the humiliation and hell, probably the loneliness.”
“So she gave up?” At least her mom had kept fighting. No matter how many mistakes in judgment she made about men, she’d never given up and abandoned Tara.
“He killed her.” The words came out like bullets and she knew Angelo believed them implicitly.
Tara didn’t say anything. In a sense he was right, but in her opinion, his mother had let him down, too. Women got hurt all the time by men they trusted. Just look at her own mom…and her own past. His mom’s choice had been cruelly selfish toward her son, but Tara couldn’t condemn her…had no interest in doing so.
She saw immediately that Angelo’s belief he wasn’t wired for the more tender emotions came from a bone deep determination never to be at risk to them like his mother had been. His steely determination was palpable.
“Thank you for telling me.”
He looked at her coldly. “No more questions? You don’t want to know how she died or what happened to the bastard who used her so mercilessly?”
“Only if you want to tell me.”
“She took pills. They’d been prescribed by her doctor to help with the grief after Dad’s death. She went to sleep curled around his pillow and never woke up again.”
