Annabelle sucked in her breath as Stefano cupped her face with his large hands. The feel of his palms, rough and calloused against her soft skin, caused a tremble down her body.
“All other women fade into shadow beside you,” he said. His dark eyes seared her. “I want you, Annabelle. And I intend to have you. I will seduce you slowly, bit by bit, until you cannot resist me. Until you are mine. In my bed. At my pleasure.”
Her heart was hammering in her throat. Swallowing, she lifted her chin. “Many men have tried, Stefano—tried and failed.”
“But I will not.” His fingertips brushed her skin and it felt like the hot breeze of summer after a long winter. His thumb stroked her sensitive lower lip, and her whole body shuddered with repressed need.
Stefano lowered his head until it was inches from hers, and she closed her eyes, even as her body trembled for flight.
“Soon I will show you, querida,” he whispered huskily against her skin, his breath warm against her hair. “Soon, I will show you the depths of the fire inside you.”
She felt his hands on her skin, felt his powerful body against hers, and her knees went weak. She sagged in his arms as warmth and the exquisite anguish of desire flooded her body.
She could not resist … could not….
Then one of Stefano’s fingers brushed lightly over her raised scar. The effect was electric. She heard the harsh echo of a man’s voice.
You’re ugly beneath that make-up, Annabelle. A hideous monster. No wonder your mother overdosed on drugs when you were a baby. No wonder your father tried to kill you.
With a choked gasp, Annabelle ripped away from him.
“Never,” she spat out. Her eyes glittered at him in the moonlight. “I don’t care how charming or sexy or powerful you are. I’m no man’s one-night stand.” She lifted her chin. “You’ll never have me, Stefano. Never.”
CHAPTER FOUR
STEFANO SAT UP STRAIGHT in his bed.
For a few seconds, he stared across his empty bedroom, looking at the slanted moonlight on the wall. It was still the middle of the night. Had he heard a noise? Or just imagined it?
He held still for a minute, listening; but when he heard only silence, he lay back against his pillow with a disgruntled sigh.
I’m no man’s one-night stand.
After Annabelle had stomped off the terrace last night, leaving him standing there alone, Stefano had been shocked. He’d never been refused by a woman before—and in such a way!
You’ll never have me, Stefano.
Why was he failing? What had he done wrong? He’d been so close to taking her in his arms and kissing her senseless. He’d thought he read her body’s signals correctly. He’d seen the flush of desire on her skin and the deep yearning of her eyes in the moonlight. Cupping her face in his hands, touching her soft skin, he’d felt her tremble. Even her words had confirmed what he’d already known from her body: she thought he was charming. Sexy. Powerful. In short, she’d been putty in his hands.
Then she’d run away from him, practically sprinting in those two-inch heels.
Scowling, Stefano tried to straighten the cotton sheets twisted around his feet. He generally rose early in the morning, taking the rhythm of sunrise and sunset for his work on the ranch. He only made exceptions when he had been up all night making love. But the exception had not been required.
Never.
Irritated by how much her words bothered him, Stefano plumped his pillow, turned on his side and tried to get comfortable. After her rude rejection, he’d gone to bed early, but it had taken him a long time to fall asleep. Now … he looked at his clock—2:00 a.m. And his mind was already filled with the way she’d mercilessly crushed his pride. How she’d exposed his arrogance for what it was—unfounded.
He set his jaw. She was even infiltrating his dreams. He’d awoken when he imagined he’d heard her scream. Clearly it was only his own injured pride that was so shocked by her rejection that—
Then he heard it again.
Annabelle was screaming.
He leaped to his feet and raced barefoot down the hall in only his boxer briefs, his feet slapping against the cool tile floor. Cold fear gripped his heart as he pushed open her door and ran across the darkened room to the four-poster bed.
He found Annabelle asleep, her eyes squeezed shut, as she twisted and turned on the mattress. Her fingers clutched the white blankets, her body tense. In the shadowy darkness of the room as she gave a sudden heartbreaking cry.
“Annabelle,” he said urgently. Sitting on the bed beside her, he gripped her shoulders.
“Annabelle! Wake up!”
With a gasp, she opened her eyes. Her gaze was wide, terrified. Then she saw him and burst into tears. Not quiet, ladylike tears, either, but great gulping sobs.
Stefano felt his throat go tight. He pulled her into his arms.
“Shh,” he whispered, stroking her hair, comforting her like a crying child. “You had a bad dream, but it’s over. You’re safe. You’re safe.”
He repeated those words over and over as she clutched him like a life preserver that would save her from drowning in the cold ocean.
She held him tight, weeping against his bare shoulder.
As Stefano held her, he looked down at her in the dim shadows, unable to clearly see her face pressed against his chest. “What did you dream?” he asked in a low voice. “What happened?”
She clutched him closer, her fingers pressing against the bare skin of his back. When she spoke, her voice was sodden and muffled. “I don’t want to talk about it.”
Seeking to comfort her, he reached for the small light on the nightstand. But her arm whipped around him, quick as a flash to turn it off.
“No light,” she choked out.
No light? He frowned, looking down at her head. “I only want to chase away your fears. Whatever dark terrors filled your night, querida,” he whispered, stroking her soft hair, “they cannot hurt you now. Not while I am here.”
He felt her tremble. “Thank you,” she whispered almost too softly to hear.
He held her for a long time; he did not even know how long. As the thin slant of moonlight slowly moved across the far wall, she gradually relaxed in his arms. Her breathing became steady and even. But still she held him tight, like a desperate child.
He could hardly believe this was the same woman who’d so coldly pushed him away just hours before. Where were all her vaunted defenses? Where were her armored walls?
He breathed the scent of her hair. She smelled like apples and sunshine with a hint of soap. And she felt even better, soft and womanly and warm. She was wearing only a button-down pajama top of thin cotton and—he groaned when he felt the brush of her bare thigh against his—no pajama pants.
They were both half-naked. Holding each other on her bed. In the dark.
His body tightened with need.
No! Stefano set his jaw. He’d come to comfort her, to make sure she was safe, not to seduce her when she was defenseless. Not to take advantage of her weakness like a coward! He took a deep breath.
“You are safe now, querida.” He kissed her temple softly, over the sweaty tendrils of her hair. He started to push away. “I will leave you now, to your sleep …”
“No!” The cry seemed to come from her heart as her hands pulled him back to her. Her lovely, delicate hands. He could feel the stroke of her fingertips against his naked skin, against his back and hip, pulling him against her on the bed. Where he wanted to be. He nearly groaned.
“What are you asking of me?”
For a moment, she did not answer. Then she said in a low voice, “I want you to stay with me while I sleep. Please … won’t you?”
He wanted to tell her no. He wanted to leave her and return to his bed, far away from the temptation she offered. Madre de Dios, he was only a man.
But her request had been timid, almost fearful, as if she were already bracing herself for his inevitable refusal. As if she expected some cutting reply,
and yet her need was so great she’d had no choice but to ask, anyway.
How was it possible that such a beautiful woman, an international star of photography, a wealthy girl from an aristocratic family, could sound so timorous and pitiable when asking for the merest human kindness?
Stefano exhaled. Swallowing, he put his head down on her pillow. Stretching out his long, lean body, he pulled her down beside him. He wrapped his arms around her, pulling her against his chest, and tried to ignore the feel of her soft, plump breasts beneath his arms. He closed his eyes, willing himself not to notice the feel of her sweetly curved backside pressing back against his groin, with only thin cotton fabric separating them. He took a deep breath.
“Go to sleep,” he whispered against her hair. “I will watch over you tonight. I will keep you safe.”
And he did. For hours. He held Annabelle, listening to the rise and fall of her breath as she slept. He breathed in the scent of her hair, their heads on the same pillow. He held her body in the darkness, caught between the need to protect her and the agony of not making love to her.
He’d never slept all night in bed with any woman. Even Rosalia, the subject of his youthful infatuation sixteen years ago. He always left a woman’s bed after he was done making love to her. He’d never slept with a woman like this. As Stefano held Annabelle in his arms, listening to her rhythmic breath, even in his torment of sexual need he found himself lured into a strange sense of peace. Of home. He closed his eyes.
“Stefano.” Annabelle suddenly turned around in his arms, wrapping her arms around him. She clutched him closer to her naked, nubile body as he tasted the sweetness of her skin, suckling her breasts as she moaned his name in bed.
He woke from the sensual dream with a start, realizing his hands had started to reach for her breasts in reality.
Maldita sea. He sucked in his breath, wiping his forehead as he glanced out the window. He was overwhelmed with relief to see the first pink curls of dawn appearing over the eastern horizon. Morning, at last. Thank God. He looked down at Annabelle. She was turned in the opposite direction, curled up with a pillow clutched in her arms. He was unable to see her face but knew she was asleep by the soft rhythm of her breath.
The night of torture was over.
He had passed his test.
Carefully, Stefano moved away from her, rising from her bed. He stared down at her for a moment, then fled on silent feet back to his own bedroom and the cold shower he sorely needed.
After toweling off and putting on clean jeans and a white T-shirt, he went downstairs to the kitchen. It was dark. Even Mrs. Gutierrez wasn’t up yet. Making himself a breakfast of dry, slightly burned toast rather than wake the elderly housekeeper, he gulped down a taza de café drunk so black and hot it burned his tongue.
Grimly, he went outside.
The world was still quiet and dark in the hush of dawn. He went to the old stables and took a deep breath of the saddle soap, horse sweat and clean hay. He was desperate to start work, determined to grind out his body’s tension through hard labor. Annabelle.
How on earth had he managed to sleep nearly naked in her bed all night without touching her?
He exhaled. He’d wanted to kiss her and never stop, and yet … she’d been so bewildered, so frightened by her dream. More than making love to her, he’d wanted to protect her and keep her safe. He’d never felt this way about any woman.
Annabelle was so strong. And yet, vulnerable. Almost. innocent.
What dream could have possibly affected her so horribly?
Stefano looked around the old stables. The ancient stalls had been meticulously repaired. The tools and equipment that were always carefully put away in their place had been cleaned and brought to shine. He grabbed a pitchfork and furiously shoveled piles of fresh hay, putting his back into it.
He thought again of how she’d sobbed after her dream, how she had refused to tell him about it, how she hadn’t even allowed him to turn on the light.
He paused, leaning on his pitchfork.
Perhaps he was making a mistake, getting involved with Annabelle Wolfe. His instincts were starting to warn that an affair with her would not be light. Or simple. Or easy. All the things he usually insisted upon in a brief relationship.
But she intrigued him. Her cold exterior was just armor to protect her vulnerable heart. She might be from an aristocratic English family, he thought, but she was nothing like the rest of her class.
As a boy, Stefano had once envied wealthy men such as his father’s employer, who bought and sold horses and lavish estates, and could change other people’s lives on a whim. It had taken Rosalia and her father’s long-ago betrayals to teach Stefano how artificial and heartless those people truly were. Now, he despised the cold, glittering world of the international jet set. He stayed away from the cities and the racing circuits where the upper crust traveled, and only had to endure their company once a year.
His annual polo match and gala raised money for his charitable foundation. Important.
Valuable. But, oh, how Stefano dreaded it. Just a few days more.
He exhaled, shoveling another pile of straw, and pushed his thoughts back to a more pleasurable topic.
How many lovers had Annabelle had? Not many, surely. She was too prickly for that. And she could certainly afford to be choosy. So how many men had she invited to her bed? Less than ten? Less than five?
Stefano scowled. It irritated him to think of Annabelle with other men. Hypocritical of him, surely, since he’d taken so many lovers himself. He could barely recall half of the women he’d made love to, any more than he could remember satisfying other physical needs over his lifetime. Sex was a physical need like any other. He couldn’t remember every single blanket he’d used in winter, every glass of wine he’d drunk or every bite of food he’d eaten. Why would he remember every woman who’d warmed his bed?
But if he ever made love to Annabelle. He shuddered. That he knew he would remember.
But would he have her?
You’ll never have me, Stefano. Never.
So she’d said. But training horses had taught him to pay attention to nonverbal cues. And in many ways body language was the same for women as horses. The way her eyes wouldn’t meet his. The way she skittered from him, backing away. The way she resisted his touch. The way she seemed to tremble—and if he drew too close, the way she would lash out. Whatever she said with her words, he could read her body as clear as day.
Seducing her was going to be far more challenging than he’d thought. But he would not fail. Could not.
Stefano heard a noise and looked up. Through the stable window, he saw a shadow and recognized Annabelle’s slim figure silhouetted against the gray-and-pink dawn.
Strange. He’d once thought of her color as gray, but now he realized he’d been wrong. She wasn’t like winter twilight at all. Annabelle was a January dawn. Cold, brittle—and yet with a pale mist curling upon the edges, soft pink promise like a whisper, wistfully dreaming of spring.
My work is all that matters. It is all I care about, she’d said.
Madre de Dios, that a woman like Annabelle should think such a thing!
He wanted to free her from that tight self-control. He wanted to see her smile, give her joy, hear her scream with pleasure—
“Oh.” With an intake of breath, Annabelle stood blinking in the stable doorway. Her blond hair was pulled back in her regular tight chignon, and she wore a soft pink linen pantsuit and plain, sensible shoes. She pulled her camera down from her face. “I didn’t expect you to be up so early.”
“I couldn’t sleep.” He looked her over, relishing the image of her slim body. “Not after I left you.”
“Oh. Right.” She bit her lip. “About last night. Thank you for staying with me. I’m rather embarrassed by the whole thing …”
“Don’t,” he said sharply. “You had a bad dream. It happens to everyone at times.”
Turning away with an unintelligible mutter, Annabe
lle lifted her camera and snapped pictures of the wood-slatted ceiling, of the horse in the closest stall, of the dust motes floating in the air from the first light of sunrise flooding through the open door.
The camera was her protection, Stefano suddenly realized. It was her mask.
“Put the camera down,” he said.
“I’m almost done,” she replied, taking pictures of the well-swept wooden floor. “Then I’ll leave you alone.”
“I don’t want you to leave me alone.”
Reluctantly, she lowered her camera. “I did have a question.”
“Sí?”
She pressed her lips together. “I wondered. if there was any reason you left my bedroom this morning,” she said finally. “If you … saw something … that made you leave.”
He stared at her. “I left because of you.”
She looked up at him, her lovely face stricken. “You did?”
“I wanted you so badly it almost killed me not to touch you.” He gave a low, self-mocking laugh. “It was a new skill for me to learn, sleeping next to a woman I desire without seducing you. By dawn, my self-control was almost entirely lost.”
“Oh.” The creamy complexion of her cheeks turned the color of roses. “That was very … gentlemanly of you.”
He snorted. “I’m no gentleman. But I know you did not ask me to stay in your bed last night for sex. You needed comfort. So that is what I gave you.”
She lifted her eyes. “Thank you,” she whispered.
He broke eye contact deliberately. He looked at her clothes. “Another elegant suit.”
She looked down at her designer pantsuit in pale pink, then lifted her chin. “I always wear a suit. I’ve dressed like this in the Gobi Desert,
Tahiti, everywhere. Why should I treat Santo Castillo any differently?”
“You might prefer jeans and a cotton shirt for the hard work we do here,” he said frankly. “I could send for some new clothes for you in Algares.”
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