by Sarah Morgan
And when it was over, when her body finally stopped shuddering, he cupped her face in his hands, staring down at her with a stunned look in his eyes.
‘That was—’
‘Incredible,’ she muttered and he lowered his head and kissed her. But it was a gentle, lingering kiss designed to soothe not seduce.
‘I don’t know what you do to me—’
‘You were the one doing it to me—you wouldn’t let me move.’
‘I didn’t dare.’ He caught her lower lip gently between his teeth, his eyes fixed on hers. ‘You are the sexiest woman I’ve ever met.’
‘You better not have lied about the fact we’re not overlooked or I just might turn into the most self-conscious woman you’ve ever met.’
He closed his hands around her waist and lifted her easily onto the side of the pool. ‘Let’s take a shower. I think it’s time to put in an order from the pillow menu.’ He vaulted out of the pool after her, water streaming from his bronzed, powerful shoulders.
It was impossible not to stare and of course he caught her staring. ‘Don’t do that.’ Snatching a towel from the nearest sun lounger, he pulled her to her feet and wrapped it around her. ‘I have to— I can’t think when you’re naked—’
She was about to ask why he wanted or needed to think but his hand was in his hair and he was clearly striving for some semblance of control.
‘You’re incredible.’ She could say that, surely, without freaking him out? It wasn’t what was in her heart but it was all she dared say at this stage. Apparently it was the right thing because he scooped her off her feet and carried her through to the bedroom.
‘I’ll demonstrate just how incredible—’
She giggled and tightened her grip on him. ‘You’re going to do your back in.’
‘It’s not my back I’m worried about. It’s other parts of me.’
‘Really? Because I might be able to help you with that.’ She slid her arms round his neck and pressed her lips to the damp skin of his throat. Then she lifted her head and looked around the bedroom, with its glorious views over the sea. ‘I love it here. I could stay forever.’
She felt the change in him. Felt it ripple through him as he lowered her to the ground.
‘Why don’t you take the first shower? While you’re doing that I’ll check my e-mails.’
His tone was a shade cooler. Another person probably wouldn’t have noticed but she was so tuned in to every subtle shift in her father’s moods that she sensed the change instantly.
Confused, she stood for a moment clutching the towel, watching as he strolled to the bed and pulled his phone out of his abandoned trousers.
A moment ago he’d been focused on her and now his focus was on his phone. His business. His world. He’d shut her out as clearly as if he’d closed a door between them.
And she didn’t understand it.
Selene cast her mind back to try and work out what she’d said. ‘I love you’ had stayed firmly in her head, so it definitely hadn’t been that.
All she’d said was that she loved it here so much she could stay forever. And that couldn’t possibly—
Forever.
Her head snapped up and she stared at the ceiling, wondering how she could have been so stupid. She’d used the word ‘forever’ and it had to be his least favourite word in the English language.
The fact that it had been a throwaway comment didn’t make a difference. It had triggered alarm bells and he’d backed off—withdrawn as quickly as if she’d booked the church. And now his attention was focused on his e-mails as if their steamy, erotic encounter in the pool had never happened.
Selene took a step towards him, then changed her mind and instead walked quietly into the shower and closed the door.
If she brought it up, tried to talk about it, she would just make it worse.
She understood that he was running from attachment. She understood that he kept his relationships short and superficial. She knew all that so it wasn’t fair of her to feel this sick disappointment, was it? She knew him.
Reminding herself of that, she hit the buttons on the shower. There was an assortment of expensive, exclusive bath products but she ignored them and reached for a bar of her own soap from the bag she’d packed. Relax, she thought numbly, letting the scent of it flow over her and into her. It was what she needed.
And tomorrow she’d give him some space.
Show him she wasn’t going to crowd him.
CHAPTER TEN
STEFAN lay in the dark, wide awake as she slept. She’d fallen asleep snuggled next to him and now one slender arm was wrapped around his waist and her head was buried in his shoulder as she breathed softly.
The scent of her soap—that smell that he associated only with her—slid into his brain and blurred his thinking.
He wanted to extract himself from her grip but he didn’t want to risk waking her.
The night was warm but he was cold with panic.
He shouldn’t have brought her here. He’d sent out all the wrong messages and then compounded it by not even waiting for her to undress before having sex with her in the pool.
The intensity of it made him uncomfortable. He was used to being in control, not losing control. He was used to walking away. Used to keeping himself separate. And yet here he was, his limbs tangled with hers, anything but separate.
Tomorrow, he promised himself as he stared into the darkness, when she woke he’d make some excuse. Take her back to Athens and explain he couldn’t mix business with pleasure.
Having decided on that approach, he fell asleep—and woke hours later to find the sun blazing into the room and the bed empty.
‘Selene?’ Assuming she was in the bathroom, he called her name, but there was no response. He sprang from the bed, prowled out to the terrace area and found no sign of her.
Alarm flashed through him and he reached for his phone and called hotel security, who told him that Selene had been in the hotel spa since it had opened.
Slightly unsettled by just how relieved he felt hearing that, Stefan relaxed and decided to take the opportunity to work. No doubt she was enjoying a massage or something similar and would be back shortly. Then they’d have the conversation he’d been planning. He’d emphasise that this was just fun, not anything serious, and they’d go from there.
Hours later he started to worry that she still hadn’t returned.
He was about to call the spa when the door opened and Selene walked back into the suite, wearing a pristine white uniform presumably supplied by the staff of the spa.
His eyes slid to her wonderful curves. ‘Where have you been? You’ve been gone all day.’
‘I’ve been working. Wasn’t that why we came here? Market research?’ She put her bag down on the sun lounger and slid off her shoes—white pumps that had obviously been provided along with the uniform. ‘I’ve spent the day in the spa, talking to the staff and the customers. It’s been so useful. They loved the candles, by the way, and the whole approach of exclusive seems to work for them.’ She ran her hands through her hair. ‘It’s so hot. I’m going to change out of my uniform and then take a dip in the pool.’
‘Selene—’
‘And I wanted to talk to you.’ Her hands were on the buttons of her dress and he felt heat whoosh through him.
This was it.
This was the moment when she talked about the future. Where she tried to turn today into tomorrow and the day after.
‘Selene—’
‘I felt really strange talking to them about business when they know I’m sharing your suite. It doesn’t feel professional. So I propose we end the personal side of our relationship right now. It’s been fun, but we don’t want to ruin everything.’ She poured herself a glass of iced water from the jug on t
he table. ‘Do you want water? I’ll pour you some. It’s important to drink in this heat and, knowing you, you’ve been working so hard you’ve forgotten to drink.’
‘End our relationship?’ Having planned to suggest exactly the same thing, Stefan was thrown by how badly he didn’t want to do that. ‘Why would you want to end our relationship?’
‘Because I want to be taken seriously in business and that isn’t going to happen if I’m having sex with the boss.’
‘I don’t like hearing you describe it in those terms.’
‘Why not? I’m just describing exactly the way it is.’
She drained her glass and he found himself staring at her throat. And lower.
‘It isn’t awkward and I’m not your boss. You don’t work for me. I’m simply investing in your business. It’s different.’ He wondered why he wasn’t just jumping through the escape hatch she’d opened and perhaps she did, too, because she looked surprised.
‘It’s not that different. I just don’t want things to be awkward.’
‘I don’t have that word in my vocabulary. I do what suits me and if people don’t like it that’s their choice.’ He watched as she lowered the glass.
‘I wasn’t talking about things being awkward with other people. I was talking about being awkward between us.’ She put the empty glass down on the table. ‘It was fun, but I think we should call it a day. Move on.’
‘Well, I don’t.’ Furious, almost depositing his laptop on the terrace, Stefan rose to his feet, dragged her into his arms and kissed her. Her mouth was soft and sweet and the more he tasted, the more he wanted. Desire clawed at him, brutal and intense, driving out every thought he’d had about cutting the threads of this relationship. Usually he was wary of anything that threatened his sense of purpose, but in this case she’d become his purpose. He lifted his head. ‘You’re not moving on. We’re not moving on.’
She looked dazed. Dizzy. ‘I—I assumed that was what you wanted.’
So had he. ‘Well, it isn’t.’
He wondered if ‘moving on’ meant seeing other men. The thought had him scooping her up and taking her back to bed.
* * *
He was a mass of contradictions, she thought days later as she sat across from him in the pretty restaurant that overlooked the bay and the sunset. She’d been so sure that he’d been freaked out when she’d said the word ‘forever’ and she’d intentionally stayed out of his way, giving him space, only to return and have him behave as possessively as if their relationship were serious.
She wondered if she’d overreacted. If she’d imagined it.
Candles flickered in the faint breeze and sounds of Greek music played in the background.
It felt so far from her old life. ‘Has anyone heard anything of my father?’
Stefan frowned. ‘You don’t need to be worried about your father.’
‘I just wondered. I know you’re in constant touch with Takis.’
‘Of course. He’s my head of security.’
‘And you briefed him to tell you where my father is at all times.’
‘He told you that?’
‘He didn’t want me to keep looking over my shoulder and worrying.’
Stefan hesitated and then reached for his wine. ‘Your father hasn’t left Antaxos since that night, although he did have a visit from the police.’
‘He will have seen more photographs of us together.’
‘But he hasn’t acted. He knows he can’t touch you. I won’t let him touch you.’
The savage edge to his tone shocked her. ‘You’re so angry with him. Is it because of your mother?’
‘No. My mother was an adult. She made a choice and left of her own free will.’ He frowned into his glass. ‘It took me years to see that.’
‘That must have been painful.’
‘Because I had to come to terms with the fact she chose him over my father and me? Yes, it was painful. I’d spent years planning how I could become more powerful so that I could storm the island and free her. It took me too long to realise she wouldn’t have wanted to be freed.’
That was what had driven him, she realised. He’d wanted power. He’d wanted to be able to wield whatever power he needed.
‘But you’re still angry—’
‘I’m angry because of the way he treated you.’ Slowly, he put the glass down on the table. ‘My mother had a choice. You didn’t. You were trapped there.’
His words warmed her and confused her.
They suggested he cared and yet she knew he avoided that degree of emotional attachment to anyone. She wondered if he was driven by guilt. If he was still blaming himself for exposing her to danger.
She didn’t dare hope it was anything else and she certainly didn’t dare ask him.
She was just enjoying the moment, and if a part of her wanted it to be more than a moment—well, she ignored it.
She had now. She had him.
‘But you rescued me.’ Ignoring the envious glances of the other women in the restaurant, Selene lifted her glass. ‘I can’t believe you’re giving me champagne after last time. You swore you’d never do it again.’
‘You can drink it as long as you’re with me.’ His fingertips slowly caressed her wrist and she felt his touch right through her body.
It terrified her that she felt like this. It made her vulnerable, she realised. For her, this had moved beyond fun. It was the most intense experience of her life and the thought of losing it was terrifying.
‘It seems ages ago,’ she murmured, ‘that night at your villa.’
‘A lot has happened since then.’ His eyes were on hers and then on her mouth and she knew he wanted exactly what she wanted.
‘Stefan—’
‘Let’s go.’ Without releasing her hand, he flung money down on the table and propelled her out of the restaurant, either oblivious or indifferent to the interested looks of the other diners.
He released her hand just long enough to ease his car out of its parking space and then slid his fingers into hers again and pressed her hand to his knee, driving one handed through the narrow streets. She probably should have been worried, but the only thing she could focus on was the hardness of his thigh under her hand and the firm grip of his fingers as they held hers.
Her breathing grew shallow. She tried not to look at him but lost the battle and turned her head briefly at the exact time he turned to look at her. Their eyes clashed. Their gazes burned and he cursed softly and brought the car to a ragged halt outside the hotel.
Throwing the keys to the parking attendant, Stefan strode directly to their suite.
They were barely through the door before his hand came behind her neck and he was kissing her.
Mouths fused, they stumbled back and the door slammed shut.
He braced one hand against the door, his other hand holding her face for his kiss, and she wanted it so badly, was so desperate for his touch, his kiss, his body, that her fingers fumbled on the buttons of his shirt. She tore it, sent buttons flying, slid her hands down hard, male muscle and then dragged her mouth from his and kissed her way down his bronzed chest.
She heard the breath hiss through his teeth as she moved lower. Heard him swear softly as she flipped open the button of his trousers, slid the zip and freed him.
She ran her hands over him, loving his body, savouring each moment as she took him in her mouth, first the tip and then as much of him as she could. He gave a harsh groan, both hands braced against the doorframe, as she explored him with the same intimacy with which he’d explored her.
‘Selene—’ His voice was ragged, his hands unsteady as he lifted her, kissed her hard and backed her towards the bed.
They fell, rolled, and rolled again until she was straddling him. He slid her skirt up her th
ighs, his hands urgent, his eyes dark with raw need as he wrenched her panties aside. She lowered herself fractionally, held his gaze as she paused and then took him in, took him deep, felt her body accommodate the silken power of him and saw the effort it took him not to thrust, to stay in control.
His eyes closed. His jaw tensed. His throat was damp with sweat, his struggle visible in every gorgeous angle of his sexy face, but she didn’t want him to struggle against it. She wanted him to let go of that control and she wanted to be the one who made him do it.
‘Stefan...’ She murmured his name, leaned forward and licked at his mouth, her body hot and tight around his until he moaned and caught her hips in his hands, trying to slow her down.
She grabbed his hands and pushed them upwards, locking them above his head. He could have stopped her, of course. He was infinitely stronger. But either he was past defending himself or he realised how badly she wanted to take charge because he didn’t fight her, just let her hold him there as she slid deeper onto his hard shaft.
‘Wait—you have to—’
‘Can’t wait—’ She was past waiting, or slowing down, or stopping or anything else, and so was he. When he thrust hard and deep she felt the power of it right through her body, felt the first fluttering of her own release and then his.
They exploded together, the ripple of her orgasm stroking the length of his hard shaft and taking him with her, on and on, until she collapsed on top of him, spent and stunned.
Weak and disorientated, she tried to roll away from him but he curled his arms around her and pulled the covers over them both.
‘Where do you think you’re going?’
It was the first time he’d held her like this.
