by Lucy Lambert
"Oh. My. God," I said.
Only then did Liam eat a spoonful of his. I couldn't take my eyes away from his lovely lips, and the small smile that blossomed on them as he also got a taste of heaven. "You thought I was lying, didn't you?"
"Not lying..." I said, punctuating my sentence with another irresistible mouthful, "Just maybe a touch hyperbolic."
"There's no hyperbole I know of that can describe how good this is."
Here I could practically feel my forehead sprouting a sinister pair of devil's horns. "This is so good, I don't think I need a man anymore." And then I added the visual exclamation point of spooning more of the gelato into my mouth, letting the stem of the spoon pull against my lips as I withdrew it.
Of course it wasn't true. I mean, I couldn't shake the image of his lips from my mind, or the desire to taste the delicious gelato on them. But it was so good to just let go and joke around, to tease and be teased.
I realized then that I was happy. Well and truly happy. Searching back through the recent past, I couldn't think of another time when that statement was true.
"I'll lend you and the gelato my hotel keys, if you'd like to be alone," Liam said, jingling his key ring in his pocket, giving me an unimpressed arch of one dark eyebrow.
"I don't think I can wait that long," I said, my cheeks starting to hurt from my smile, "I need it now!"
"Here, try mine," he said, sinking his spoon into one of his scoops and offering it to me. It was just as good as mine, which I offered him a taste of as well.
"Eat up, we're not done yet," he continued. "I'm not done with you yet."
If it had been up to me, I would have happily spent the rest of the day (or week, or month) sitting in that little shop and eating the best gelato in Rome. But he wouldn't let me, not with that spark of adventure in his eyes.
I left reluctantly, my stomach and tongue begging me to stay even as he opened the passenger door on the BMW for me, wondering what could possibly top that.
We didn't have to travel far to our next destination, which I got an inkling of when I began recognizing streets and facades from that night at the fundraiser when I'd gone with him back to his hotel.
It was the Coliseum, rising ancient, ragged, and somehow splendid against the surrounding buildings. We marvelled for a few moments at the sheer scale of it, at the ingenuity required to build it, at its age. I loved its hundreds of individual archways.
By this time, the sun had begun its descent into the west, forcing the buildings to throw sharp, inky shadows across the streets and fountains and squares.
And then he took me inside, pointing out the exposed passageways in the ground at the center where the ancient Romans would keep the lions and gladiators until it was time for the games.
"They would flood it, you know," I said, unable to hide my excitement, "They'd fill it with water and hold actual naval battles."
He didn't ask me how I'd come to know all of this. He must have remembered that peculiar sadness that came over me when he asked earlier, knowing it touched a nerve.
Just thinking like that threatened to send me down into a tailspin again, the awful thoughts tugging at the edge of my mind. It was a struggle to keep that levy up, to keep them from bursting into my consciousness.
Again, I found the solace I needed in Liam.
Liam looked at the rows and rows of seating, and I could see him imagining the thousands upon thousands who would come here when some rich patrician or emperor would throw the mob some entertainment.
"I find it amazing how much power lies in popular opinion alone," he said, "If you can make people love you, they'll let you do anything. Get away with anything."
I looked again at Liam's dark hair, his excellent and symmetrical facial structure. It wasn't hard to picture him in dark purple robes, laurels on his brow, watching the games from the Emperor's seat.
He was easy to like, I knew. Dangerously easy. It was no wonder he looked so successful. I bet he had plaques in his office back home proclaiming him the youngest executive to do this or that. He'd be running whatever company he worked for in no time, I suspected, with that disarming smile and that charm and the breadth and depth of knowledge I could see lurking behind his deceptively boyish eyes.
He caught me looking at him, and a sudden jag of panic shot through me as though I'd been discovered slipping a candy bar into my pocket at the checkout line. Only this time I didn't look away.
He pulled me close and kissed me again, the shock of our lips touching rocking my body leaving me breathless and trembling. I could still taste the sweetness of the gelato on him, and that only made it better.
Like all the kisses that had come before it, I didn't want this one to end.
Like all the ones before, it did.
Just as I felt his hands begin sliding down my hips, just as I squeezed handfuls of his polo shirt, his phone started buzzing in his pocket again.
"Just ignore it," he said breathily, hardly taking his lips from mine.
We tried, and we had a few blissful seconds of peace before it started buzzing again. I couldn't get rid of the nagging thoughts about distracting him and keeping him from doing what he'd come to Rome to do.
I couldn't stop imagining some irritated Italian businessman on the other end, his swarthy complexion darkening with anger and irritation with each unanswered ring.
"Just get it," I said, tearing myself away, my stomach twisting, "It's obviously important."
"It isn't. Not right now," he replied.
"Answer it, please. For me."
He studied me again, the buzzing of the phone punctuating his thoughts. Then he gave the slightest of nods and pulled the sleek and glossy cell from his pocket.
"Yes?" he said.
I heard a chirping voice on the other end. Except it wasn't the excited tones of an Italian man lambasting him for not picking up.
It was a woman. Instantly, I wanted to know who she was. Needed to know. The rationalist inside me said it was probably a business partner. A mother or sister annoyed at not being able to check on him.
The cynic, however, said it had to be a girlfriend. A wife.
"I'm with someone important right now. We'll have to talk later," Liam said. With that, he pulled the phone from his face and ended the call.
A voice inside me screamed in my skull, demanding that I ask if that was his girlfriend. But as much as I wanted to know, I also didn't. Ignorance was bliss, after all.
"Was that important? I'm sorry if it was..." I said.
"No, just someone else along with me on the trip getting impatient about a few business matters... Now, where were we?"
I wanted to believe him, I really did. Every single cue I'd gotten from Liam told me he was honest and straightforward, saying what was on his mind and damned if you didn't like what he had to say.
I knew it was ridiculous. Knew that I'd known him only such a small stretch of time, that I couldn't possibly know enough about him to make a true judgment call. But that awful, evil, mean cynical voice wouldn't stop its nagging.
But then his arms encircled my waist again, pulling me hard to him. My head tilted back automatically, following the nonverbal, instinctual clues from his body language.
He kissed me again, harder than before, like he suddenly needed me more than ever.
A few of the other tourists wandering the Coliseum had begun to notice us, and I started becoming self-conscious. But Liam didn't. He kissed me harder, as though he didn't care who saw us or what they thought.
I was jelly in his arms. Heat prickled across my skin, through my body, all of it moving to a central point inside of me. I throbbed with it.
"There's somewhere else I want to take you," he said, "It's close by."
Where could he possibly want to go now, with how we both felt? I loved seeing the city with him, but I knew both our minds were elsewhere.
"Where? The Sistine Chapel?" I said, feeling those devil horns start sprouting from my forehead at the sac
rilege of mentioning a holy place like that when I felt this way.
"No more sightseeing," he said, still holding me close. He traced the tip of his thumb along my jaw line, starting under my ear and ending at my chin so he could tilt my head back for another stolen kiss.
"But there's still so much left to see. You started me on this ride, now you're telling me to get off?"
"You're stubborn. It's cute. Let me say this in a way I know you'll appreciate: Rome wasn't built in a day; you can take more than one to see it."
"So if we're not sightseeing, where are you taking me?"
Now it was his turn to turn devilish, flashing a grin at me that would have a whole convent of nuns flushing and fanning themselves. "Come with me and find out."
Chapter 7
He took me back to the hotel, driving Italian-style. Lots of revving, honking at traffic lights. Almost reckless. However, he never seemed to lose control.
I don't know how he managed that. Once I realized where we were headed, my skin broke out in goosebumps. The furnace inside me cranked up the heat. I trembled, inside and out.
We tore through the hallway. He picked me up and slammed me against the wall next to the door to his room, even as I wrapped my legs around his waist and squeezed him against me.
"I need you," I said.
"I know."
It was an infuriating reply. Infuriating, and arousing. He turned his head to get a better look at the lock on the door, so I took the opportunity to show my impatience. I sucked his earlobe in between my teeth and bit down on it. Lightly. At first, anyway.
He sucked in a breath through his teeth, and his body went rigid against mine at the sharpness of the sensation.
Somehow, he managed to get his key card out and tap it to the lock. The electronic mechanism shot out and he kicked the door open.
We were inside, in the shadows of the entrance hall. He shoved me back against the closed door, one hand squeezing my ass hard enough for me to hiss.
"The bedroom..." I said. I begged.
"Too far."
There was a long, thin desk against one wall. It had a Tiffany lamp on it as well as a few hollow ceramic busts meant for keys and other sundries. He swept them all off with one arm.
The clattering smash of the items on the floor thrilled me, and I nuzzled at his neck.
He set me down on the edge. Then he tore my shirt off, then his own. The shadows filled all the little crevices between individual abdominal muscles. Seeing the way they tensed left my thighs steaming.
Then it was my turn to tear. I ripped his belt out of the loops and threw it down the hall. I saw the way he bulged for me, and that put me over the edge. The seconds it took to wrench his khakis open was an infinity.
But then I held him. He was hot, so hot. And he swelled and hardened and throbbed in my grip. The more I touched him, the harder he became for me. My body responded to his, also throbbing, flushing with heat, opening for him. Waiting for him.
"Emma..." he groaned, his eye squeezing shut and his head rolling back on his shoulders.
Unable to take it any longer, he shoved me back so that he could grip the waistband of my pants and panties at the same time. He peeled them off me, the touch of the cool air on my bared skin exhilarating.
Then he pulled a condom out of his pocket.
"Was that there the whole day?" I asked.
He shrugged his sexy, broad shoulders, my eyes following the way his toned muscles moved beneath his skin. "Be prepared for anything. That's my motto." His eyes twinkled with mischief and desire, and I noticed the way his pulse pounded in his throat.
Another hot tingle ran through me. "So show me what you were prepared to do."
He tore the foil wrapper and I watched him roll the condom down his rigid, trembling length. The throbbing heat between my thighs intensified. If he didn't take me soon, I'd spontaneously combust.
His desire rivalled mine, though. He pulled me closer, my ass hanging off the edge of the desk. I groaned his name when he bumped against me, found my opening, and parted my flesh around his.
I needed him so badly. I needed all of him. Right Now!
I slid my hands down the taper of his waist, revelling in the heat of his skin on my palms. I slid them down until I cupped his incredibly taut and firm ass. Just touching him there had me trembling and clenching inside. Then I pulled him forward, forced him deeper. He didn't resist. He bared his teeth as I took all of him, the hunger inside of me nearly insatiable.
He kissed me, then, his lips brushing mine and then sliding along my jaw line until I could feel the heat of his breath against my ear. "You're warm, Emma. So warm."
I loved the way he felt inside of me, the way he filled me so totally, and the way it felt so right that we be together like this.
With one quick motion of his fingers, he undid the clasp of my bra. He snaked a finger in between the cups and pulled it down, revealing more of my flesh for him.
Before it even hit the floor, he squeezed me and massaged me, fascinated by the way he aroused me, the way my nipples perked and stood erect for him.
He pinched one, the sudden jolt of sharp pain making me hiss. I relished it, that delicious mixture of pain and pleasure.
And then he started thrusting, hard and confident. My body couldn't resist. I came for him quickly, like it was my first time feeling these things.
"I love the way you feel when you come for me, Emma," he said. Then he kissed me. We went so hard that the desk kept slamming into the wall. I was sure some concierge would be coming to the door telling us to keep it down for the other guests. But no one did.
It was only the two of us.
Almost as soon as I descended from my first climax I started climbing into a second. I grabbed his bulging biceps and squeezed them, mimicking other parts of my body. My nails pushed into his skin so hard that they left little pale dimples where I'd driven the blood away.
My back arched and my body shivered, every muscle going rigid, gooseflesh bursting out across my skin as I crested the top of that second climax.
"God, Liam...!" I groaned. Concentration and pleasure mixed together on his handsome face, and he didn't slow down.
I couldn't take much more of this. Much more of him. It was too much, too good. Beads of sweat glistened on both of our bodies, trying to cool us down but unable to deal with that sort of heat.
I let my hands slide back down to his flexing ass again, feeling the power of each thrust as he gave them to me.
It was different when we felt my third climax rearing up inside of me. His thrusting grew desperate. He was so hot and hard for me that I was powerless to resist.
My heat had a similar effect on him. He groaned, his breathing ragged, the concentration on his face losing the fight to his need.
We both reached our peaks at the same time. Liam pushed forward, sinking all the way into me again. Even though I thought it impossible, when he came the heat where we joined became more intense.
We both gasped, clutching the other, trying to hold on. It lasted forever and only a few moments, somehow.
He wrapped his arms around me and held me close for a while, my cheek pressed to his bared and heaving chest. I closed my eyes, listening to the rhythmic hammer of his heart, breathing in his scent. Just being present with him while we were still joined together into one.
When we parted, the soreness set in with a vengeance. But I didn't mind. I liked it, even. A memento of our desire.
My legs were like two strands of overcooked spaghetti when I tried to stand up, resulting in me sitting back down on the desk while Liam handed me my clothes.
Although even he had trouble. His legs trembled as well, and even in the dim light of that entry hall I could see the deep flush to his skin, like a fresh tan. I had to look similar, I knew.
"You know, we could have done this back at my flat," I said, rubbing the sweat off my forehead with the back of my hand.
Liam didn't put his shirt back on, for which
I was thankful. Instead, he'd come out the bathroom with his khakis done back up. I could see the spots on his biceps where I'd pushed my nails into him.
I knew there were similar marks on that perfect ass of his, too. And that made me smile.
He saw that smile and returned it. "Maybe," he said, "But I really did want to show you the city. I'd still like to show you all the things we missed today."
For that, he deserved a kiss. Summoning what little strength remained, I stood up. My legs wobbled alarmingly, but held. He moved to catch me, but I waved him off.
Then I took his face in my hands and pulled it low, so that I could plant a good one on his forehead. I could taste the saltiness of his sweat, and couldn't help smiling at how that sweat had come to be there.
"What was that for?" he said, considering me with those deceptive baby blues again.
"For you. For being here, with me..."
"It's not exactly a chore, you know."
"I know. It's just... hard for me to explain. Just take my gratitude at face value, will you?"
"Yeah, okay," he said.
I looked for and found my one missing sock, rolled into a ball against one of the desk's feet. When I tried leaning over to grab it, my equilibrium left me, my lower back and thighs complaining, and only a sudden snatch at the lip of the desk kept me from planting my face into the expensive-looking hotel carpet.
"Just leave that stuff for now," Liam said. "There's something else I think you'll like."
For a second, I thought he meant he was already prepared for round two. "Let's hold off for a few minutes, can we?"
He frowned for only a moment before catching my drift. "No, not that. Not yet, anyway... Just come here."
Then he scooped me up in his arms and carried me through the suite, careful to step over the ceramic shards in the hallway.
He took me past the bedroom, with its huge bed and panoply of pillows, and past the kitchen and its ill-fated frittata.
We reached the bathroom and he set me down on the tile. I bit my lip, expecting it to be cold, But it wasn't. It was warm against the bare soles of my feet.
Liam chucked. "Heated floors. Incredible, isn't it?"
