“Leo.” She swallowed convulsively and forced her legs to move in his direction. She frowned as she drew close. He was wearing a black leather jacket, black jeans, and he looked like the posterboy for James Dean bad boyishness. Which, she supposed, he really was. “You seem to have a habit of showing up on my doorstep uninvited.”
He nodded, and a muscle jerked in his cheek. “So invite me.”
She exhaled slowly, her expression pinched. “Why?”
“Because. I leave for the States tomorrow. Mexico after that.” He reached out and ran a finger over her poncho. “Where, might I say, you would fit right in.” He shrugged. “Then I’m off to Brazil. I won’t be back for a few months.”
Something like stone lodged in her chest. “So?” She forced herself to respond with a valiant shrug. “You seem to forget that we hadn’t seen each other in years before last month. Why do you think I care that you’re going overseas for a while now? Or, dare I say, forever?”
His grin was confident. He reached out and pulled her forward, pressing an arm behind her back so that he could hold her against him. “I know you.” He lifted the hem of her poncho and pressed his hands against the warm skin of her back. “You don’t want to feel like this, but you do.”
She fluttered her eyes shut, her long lashes forming thick fans against her cheeks. “Like what?”
“Like you’ll fall apart if we don’t have sex again.”
She shook her head, but she was unable to open her eyes. “You’re wrong.” And he was. It wasn’t just about sex. It was him. All of him.
“Am I?” He ran his hands down her back, stroking her skin, feeling her skin bunch beneath his gentle touch.
“You’re a bastard.”
He made a noise of assent. “Always was, though.”
“No.” She shook her head. “Not like this. Not to me.”
“Perhaps not.” He moved one hand to her chin and tilted her head forward. “I was rude about your blog. That was wrong of me. I apologise.”
Her eyes flew open. “You apologise?” She squeaked in confusion.
“I know that what you’re doing is special. That you’re incredibly talented.” He shrugged, but didn’t relinquish his hold on her. “You’re the sexiest woman I’ve ever known, but you have to realise that I sort of hate you, too.” He was staring down at her face, a small smile playing about his lips, so that his angry words didn’t immediately penetrate her consciousness.
She bit down on her lip to stop herself from reacting. “What in the world would you have to hate me for?”
“You know the answer to that. You left me. You left me, when you promised you never would.” He shrugged. “I thought you meant that promise. I believed you. That you broke it has irreparably damaged what I think of you.” He leaned closer and pressed his lips against her neck. “Which doesn’t mean there isn’t something good between us still.”
Adrenalin and desire were at war inside her. “Sex.”
“Sex.” He confirmed her worst fears. “Invite me up, Aurora. Invite me in.”
She swallowed, wishing she had more strength. Wishing she had the fortitude to deny his accusation. To set the record straight once and for all. But she didn’t.
“Yeah.” She nodded. “Fine.” And though she knew she’d hate herself for it the next morning, she allowed him to link his fingers through hers and pull her towards the exclusive high rise. There was no future for them, but the past was just about enough, anyway.
4
His hands on her body were masters of her soul. With every touch and caress, they sent a shot of need spiralling into her being; a shot of need that grew and grew and demanded fulfilment. She reached for his jacket and hungrily pushed it off his frame, seeking contact with his skin. Her mouth sought his; their tongues duelled.
“I like your Mexican theme,” he whispered, smiling against her mouth as he ran his hands over the soft fabric of her poncho. She nodded, dropping his jacket to the floor and lifting his shirt higher. As her fingertips touched his smooth skin, she let out a moan of pleasure.
“Ponchos are going to be huge this winter.”
“I’ll take your word for it,” he said with a shrug of his muscled shoulders.
She pushed his shirt up over his head and added it, like the cherry on top, to his leather jacket. His chest was rippled with muscles; muscles that led to a tapered waist and strong legs. She knew what many people didn’t completely understand. That being a top Formula One driver meant he had to be incredibly fit. That he worked out like a man possessed for hours a day, to maintain cardio strength and stamina. His muscles formed a pack on his abdominal, smooth and hard beneath her touch. She found his scar and ran her finger across it, ignoring the way her heart flipped over. The memory of that surgery was something she would carry with her forever. The removal of a piece of shrapnel from his beautiful body, and the uncertainty over whether or not it had pierced any vital organs beyond repair.
She bent down and traced her tongue over the long, faded line, unaware of the way his breath hitched as he watched. “You were so lucky,” she whispered, reaching lower and undoing his low-slung jeans. She pushed them from his waist, so that he could step out of them easily.
The last time she’d said it, he’d argued with her. Now, he nodded slowly. “I know.” Although he’d required a lot of ‘putting back together’, at least that feat had been possible. For many, it was not.
“Does it hurt?” She asked, standing and looking at him seriously, her chest rising and falling in time with her hurried breath.
He didn’t want her to see him as weak. As damaged. “No.” Though the metal pins in his body ached at times, it was a small price to pay.
She bit down on the remark she wanted to make. He was mad to pursue his racing dream, having seen what the risks could be. But it was no longer her business. Sex was one thing. The deep, star-seeking future they’d imagined they would share had shattered and broken into a million shards of misery. Having thought that their love was stronger than anything life could throw at them, she now saw the opposite. Individually, they were strong. Together, they became weakened by their love and individual needs.
And so, she lightened her tone forcibly. “I’m glad. I like your body. I especially like what it can do to mine.”
He grinned. “It’s mutual,” he promised thickly. “How the hell do I get this thing off?” He said, pulling at the poncho impatiently.
She laughed, and reached for the tie at her neck. She pulled it until it separated, and watched as he lifted it carefully over her head. She wore an almost transparent shirt beneath, with no bra. “Jesus, S.B, what if you’d lost your poncho in the middle of the street. You’re practically naked.”
Her eyes were hooded as she grabbed her shirt and slowly peeled it upwards, tossing it across the room. “Practically,” she nodded, pleased to see the way his face visibly reacted to her state of undress.
He reached around her waist and pulled her to him, whispering with a desperate intensity in her ear. “How do you do this to me?”
She ran her fingers down his naked back, cupping the firm flesh of his rear, and pressing her pelvis forward, instinctively seeking closeness. “Do what?” She asked, daring to bring her fingers forward and wrap them around his arousal.
“We are all kinds of wrong together, but I need you like I’ve never needed anyone before. How do you get under my skin like this?” Her touch was magic; he felt like he was being welcomed to heaven. He wrapped his arms around her waist and lifted her feet from the ground, carrying her through the apartment as he had done several weeks earlier. “You make me want to forget everything I am committed to, so that I can keep you prisoner in your bed for a week.”
She grinned against his shoulder. They both knew it would never happen, though. Leonardo Fontana didn’t want to walk away from the racing world for even a moment, and nothing about her was enough to lure him to do so. If what they’d shared three years ago hadn’t even caused him to rethi
nk his racing career, then nothing could.
“How about prisoner for one night?” She asked impishly, smiling against his flesh.
He grunted as he kicked open her bedroom door and tossed her onto the soft mattress. “Yes. One night.” Silently, he added the rejoinder that then, he would walk away and forget about this madness. Falling back into past habits was just about the dumbest thing he’d ever done. But hell, it felt like the best.
“These things are like a second skin,” he complained, as he tried to pull her leggings free.
She laughed, such a sweet sound, a memory of the humour they’d once shared, that he felt a kick in his gut. “They are, I know. There is nothing elegant about putting them on, believe me.”
“Suffering for fashion?” He drawled, pulling at them more determinedly, smiling when they finally gave way and began to shimmy down her long, slender legs.
“Always worth suffering for,” she agreed.
She was naked on the bed and he stood above her, so that he could admire the sight of the woman he’d once loved. They’d been together so long that he’d taken for granted how beautiful she was. How unspoiled as a lover; how desperately hungry and willing to please.
“When I first met you, I thought you were too beautiful.”
He brought his body down on hers, kissing her skin, running his hands over her, his weight a pleasurable promise on her abdomen of what was to come.
“Too beautiful?” She shook her head. “I was an awkward teenager.”
“No, you weren’t. Never awkward.” He kissed her mouth, hard, demanding what he needed and promising what he would give.
“You terrified me,” she said honestly. Her head tilted back against the pillows as he moved his mouth the sensitive flesh at the base of her neck.
“Did I?”
“Yes. You were every schoolgirl’s fantasy. Do you remember that afternoon? You’d arrived at school to pick Beatrice up. You were driving that black car…“
“My Ferrari,” he inserted automatically, taking a nipple in his mouth and flicking it with his tongue.
She made a strangled sound of assent. Her voice was thick with lust as she continued. “You emerged from the car like a true Greek God brought to life. All dark, handsome, tall, strong… you were wearing jeans and a black shirt, and you lifted your glasses onto your head and your eyes met mine. I think I died a thousand deaths. You were my first crush, Leonardo Fontana.”
He laughed, low in his throat. “Yeah, and I waited until you graduated before I told you I felt the same way. I deserved a medal.”
She lifted her legs, digging her feet into the mattress and pushing her knees skyward, silently imploring him to take her. To join their bodies together. “A moment,” he said, looking around for his jeans. “Damn it. Just… wait a second.”
“What is it?”
“Protection. In my jeans.”
She bit down on her lip. “Try the nightstand,” she said, pointing to the small table on one side of the bed.
Leonardo was relieved to find condoms in such easy reach, but he had to force himself to push down on the sharp stab of jealousy that assailed him at their discovery. How many men did she bring to her room? How many men had laid with her since him? Had there been anyone since the prior month?
It was unpalatable and he didn’t want anything to tarnish what was about to happen. “I like a girl who’s prepared for anything,” he said with a tight grin, unfurling the protection over his length.
Aurora couldn’t bring herself to confess that she’d stocked up on condoms after their last time together. That she’d hoped against hope he might come back. That despite the fact nothing about them made sense, it might work anyway.
She cried out with delight as their bodies came together, her hands gripped his back and her fingers dug into his smooth flesh with desperate intensity. “I’ve missed this,” she bit out, arching her back in an instinctive need to pull him in further and deeper, to welcome him completely to her feminine heart.
He slipped his fingers between her breasts, down to her naval, worshipping her with his reverence. “Have you?”
There was a note to his voice; a hard note, but she didn’t realise it until much later. In that moment, she was completely lost, her mind suspended to all that her body craved. Her physical being forcing her to demand and take without thinking about the future.
Without thinking at all.
Thought was not possible.
She lifted her arms above her head, reaching for a pillow, so that she could dig her fingers into it with a desperate need to somehow control what was an unwieldly wave of feeling.
He ran his fingers along her slender arms, trapping her hands where they were and letting his fingers grip her wrists firmly. He moved inside her hard, fast and in a way that he knew drove her wild. Beneath him, her face was screwed up, her eyes blinked shut, as intense feelings surged through every fibre of her being. “Please, Leo. Please.” She didn’t know what she was asking. What she wanted. What she needed. Only that her entire body was begging for a fulfilment that she knew only he could provide.
“Yes,” he seemed to answer the question anyway, moving with her, riding the wave together, and allowing pleasure to infiltrate them completely.
“I want to do this forever,” she called into the air as she felt her body splinter into a million pieces, broken apart forever by the knowledge of what Leo could do to her. “Forever.”
His response was to tip them both over the edge of the cliff, to send her spiralling with him into an unknown vortex of craving and satisfactions; need and knowledge.
Afterwards, in the darkness of her bedroom, reality threatened to intrude. Aurora wouldn’t let it. She forced herself to focus only on that moment in time. Like a bubble trapped in oil, it was seperate to everything that had come before; and everything that might come after.
She looked over at Leonardo and saw that his face was set in a brooding line, his eyes staring directly at the ceiling. Aurora pushed up on her elbow so that she could bring her face into his line of vision. “You were right.”
“Hmm?” He flicked his gaze to her, his heart contracting as her magnetic stare caught him off guard.
“There is definitely still something good about us.”
His smile was a slash across his stubbled jaw. “I’m… glad we did this.”
“Strangely, so am I.” She smiled at him, and despite what they’d shared, it was almost coy. “Do you want some pasta?”
“Dinner?” He flicked his eyebrows north. “I guess that makes sense.”
Aurora pushed out of bed, and padded naked to the back of her door. She unhooked her robe and slipped it on, then threw Leonardo one last look over her shoulder. “I don’t cook for many people. You should feel honoured.”
He didn’t know what he felt, and he certainly didn’t want to examine the sensations that were tearing through him.
“I’ll be right out.”
He took his time, in no rush to face headlong the situation he’d brought them into. When he emerged from the bedroom, and replaced his jeans, Aurora was straining pasta into a colander. The aroma of mushrooms, cream and white wine sauce filled the flat.
“I thought you didn’t touch carbs,” he quipped, coming up behind her and putting his arms around her waist. She spun around in the circle he’d created, her face screwed up in thought.
“That was only before runways, and you know that was my agency’s rule, not mine.” He had hated the restrictive diet rules. So had she. “I eat what I want now.”
“And you’re still reed thin.” He shook his head. “If only you’d known as much then, you could have enjoyed yourself a lot more.”
She shook her head. “I’m not too thin.”
He undid the robe so that he could sneak his fingers inside, to the warmth of her skin. “I didn’t say too thin. You are as you are. And you’re perfect.”
“I think you’re a little biased,” she said quietly, unable to look a
way from his dark flecked gaze.
“I’m not, I assure you. If I could find you less… appealing, believe me, I would.”
A small voice in her head was screaming at her that they were moving into dangerous territory. If she wanted to keep the bubble in the oil, she had to steer clear of insults and arguments. “My sauce is burning.”
“Huh?”
“Not a euphemism.” She grinned. “The sauce will burn. Stop distracting me.”
“Distracting you is so enjoyable though.” He kissed the tip of her nose and stepped backwards, watching with a hardening sense of pleasure as she mixed the strained pasta with the sauce and then served it into dishes.
“You might eat carbohydrates now, but you don’t eat much.”
She looked down at the two dishes, her own holding about a quarter of the quantity of food in his and shrugged. “It’s filling.”
He crossed to the fridge with the same sense of comfort and ownership he’d always had at her apartment. A sense that came from having spent so much time there. He poured two glasses of chardonnay and followed her to the lounge. They ate on the floor, on the rug near the heater.
“How did your museum thing go?” He asked, spooning some of the pasta to his lips.
“Oh!” She reached over and tapped his leg in a natural expression of excitement. “It was amazing.” She grinned. “Let me show you.” She put her bowl down and retrieved her phone. When she sat down again, it was beside him rather than opposite. She pulled her legs up to her chest and leaned close to him, as she flicked through the images. “Look at this one. Can’t you see how it’s got that sort of eighties ball gown thing happening? And look at this one.” She flicked to a dress that had a thick lace collar. “So like the late nineties trend; and before that, the pioneer outfits.”
Leonardo tried to seem interested in the pictures she was showing him, but his eyes kept lifting to her face. It was so full of enthusiasm it was practically glowing.
“You love what you do.”
“Yes.” She nodded, and put the phone down. “I must sound silly to be so excited by some old dresses, I guess.”
Clare Connelly Pairs: Warming the Sheikh’s Bed & Love in the Fast Lane Page 20
