She angled her head as she surveyed his frowning expression. ‘And winning is everything to you, isn’t it?’
‘I don’t play polo to lose.’
‘What about life?’
‘That too.’
Daisy acknowledged that with a thoughtful nod. ‘Which is why you don’t invest in relationships, right?’
His lip curled mockingly again. ‘Is the psychoanalysis part of the deal or is that a bonus?’
Daisy ignored his sarcasm as she tilted her head like a dealer assessing a unique work of art. ‘You love your brother and you loved your father, but you hold your mother at arm’s length, as you do all women. Your relationship with her is on your terms, not hers. You have attachment issues. Textbook case, in my opinion.’
Two lines of tension ran from his nose to his mouth. ‘If you want your four days of fun then maybe you should keep your opinions to yourself.’
‘Fair enough.’
His brow was deeply furrowed. ‘That’s it?’
‘What?’
‘You’re going to do what you’re told?’
Daisy gave him an innocent-as-pie look. ‘Sure. That’s what you want, isn’t it? You only sleep with women who don’t stand up to you—correct? They’re not allowed to have a mind or opinions of their own. You just want their body, not their intellect. I can do that. Mind you, four days is about my limit, though.’
He let out another curse as he thrust a hand through the thickness of his hair. ‘You are un-effing-believable.’
The sound of his phone ringing from the desk where he’d left it broke the silence. Daisy watched as he snatched it up and barked out a curt greeting. She couldn’t hear the conversation but his expression went from dark and stormy to a slowly spreading smile that made the corners of his eyes crinkle attractively.
He ended the call and slipped his phone in his trouser pocket, sending her a glinting look. ‘It seems there might be some fringe benefits for me in this crazy scheme of yours after all.’
‘Oh?’
‘That was one of the big time sponsors I’ve been chasing for months. He wouldn’t play ball. Until now.’
‘Why now?’
Luiz took her hand and entwined his fingers with hers, drawing her a step closer to his tall hard frame. ‘Because up until now he thought I was a reckless playboy who would bring nothing but disrepute to his precious company’s name. But a tweet’s just gone out about us being a couple.’
Daisy could feel the electric zing of his touch racing all the way to her armpit and beyond. ‘You mean he’ll back you now? Because of me?’
His eyes shone with triumph. ‘Apparently one of his goddaughters goes to your school. She’s not in your class but he’s heard nothing but praise for you. He figures if you’re involved with me then I must be worth backing. This is exactly what I need to win the Argentine Open Championship.’
‘Why do you need his sponsorship? Don’t you have plenty of money of your own?’
‘It’s not about the money,’ he said. ‘It’s the show of confidence in my ability I’m after. Look at the top sportsmen and women in golf and tennis or skiing or snowboarding or whatever. Their sponsors build their image. They brand it. The better your brand, the more confidence people have in your talent. That show of confidence boosts your own. It feeds off it.’
Daisy was pleased for him but she could see the pitfalls even if he couldn’t. ‘What are you going to say to your sponsor when we break up at the end of the week?’
She could almost see the cogs of his brain ticking over. His triumphant expression faltered momentarily before he beamed her a confident smile. ‘We can always extend our fling. It’s only a month till the Grand Slam.’
Daisy frowned at him. ‘Aren’t you forgetting something? I live in London. I have a job to go to. I’m only here now because the girls wanted me to come to Vegas with them for half-term break.’
‘The Argentine Open is on the first Saturday in December,’ he said. ‘I could fly you over for it.’
It sounded wonderfully exotic. A trip to Buenos Aires, all expenses paid. A box seat to see one of the most talented polo players in the world battle it out for the ultimate crown. It would be something to remember when she was just another suburban wife and mother trying to juggle work and family.
‘But what about the other three weeks?’ she asked.
‘The sponsor is based in London so I’ll be back and forth,’ he said. ‘We can meet up often enough to keep the press from thinking anything’s amiss.’
Daisy ignored the red flag that warned against spending too much time with the wickedly charming Luiz Valquez. She had asked for four days and now she had the chance to have four weeks. She’d wanted a walk on the wild side, hadn’t she? This was her chance to make it one to remember. ‘OK. You’re on.’
He took her by the shoulders and pressed a blisteringly hot kiss to her mouth. Daisy leaned into him, unable to help herself from responding with burgeoning passion. He only had to touch her and she erupted into flames. She could feel the heat rushing through her veins, sending electric sensations through every cell in her body.
His hands cupped her face, his fingers splaying out over her cheeks as he deepened the kiss. His tongue played cat and mouse with hers, teasing and taunting hers to fight back. She flicked her tongue against his, doing her own little teasing routine, delighting in the way he groaned in the back of his throat and brought his pelvis hard against hers. She felt the hard ridge of him, the pressure of his blood building as his desire for her escalated. She stroked her hands down over the taut curve of his buttocks, bringing him in closer so she could feel the imprint of his erect flesh on hers.
His hands left her face; one went to her left hip, the other to the zip at the back of her dress. He rolled it down, exposing her spine from the base of her neck to the crease at the top of her bottom. He slid his hand over her skin, discovering every one of her vertebrae in turn. His touch evoked a delicious shower of reaction, especially when he came to the curve of her bottom. She immediately tensed her buttocks, hoping he wouldn’t think her fat.
‘Relax for me, querida,’ he whispered against the skin of her neck.
‘I’m not good at getting naked with people.’
He sent his tongue over her top lip and then her bottom one in a barely-there caress that made her lips sing with delight. ‘You were pretty relaxed about it last night.’
Did he have to remind her? ‘Yes, well, I was apparently off my face, which would have helped.’
He eased back to look at her with a slight frown. ‘You’re embarrassed about your body?’
What was he implying? That she had something to be embarrassed about? The cruel chant of one of the mean girls at boarding school rang in her ears: ‘Lazy Daisy…Fat Daisy’. Not a natural sportsperson, Daisy had used every excuse in the book to avoid playing team sport. A sudden increase in weight during puberty had made her ashamed of her body, a shame she had never been able to shed. Even though she was more or less average weight for her height and build, there was still a mean girl’s voice in her head that taunted her every time she stepped in front of a mirror. ‘Let’s put it this way. The only catwalk I’ve been anywhere near is my neighbour’s moggie stalking a bird in the garden.’
There was a smile in his eyes as he slid his hand underneath her knickers, exploring her curves with the warm palm of his hand. ‘Did he catch it?’
‘The bird? No, I stepped in before it got to bloodshed.’
Still holding her gaze, he sent his finger down the crease of her bottom, a shamefully erotic caress that triggered a firestorm in her core. ‘You have a beautiful body.’
‘I wonder how many times you’ve used that line.’
His slight frown reappeared. ‘I mean it, querida. You have a womanly figure. Curves in all the right
places.’
‘My breasts are too small.’
‘Says who?’
Daisy felt a rush of heat as his gaze went to the modest cleavage he uncovered as he slipped her dress from her shoulders. She stopped breathing altogether when he slowly traced his finger over each upper curve of her breasts that were pushed up by her lacy bra. He touched her nipples through the lace, which somehow intensified the sensation. The lace abrading her erect flesh made something deep and low in her belly roll over.
‘So beautiful.’ He brought his mouth to her right breast, kissing the cupped flesh until she was writhing with the pleasure of it. He did the same to the other one, stroking his tongue over the exposed curve. Her breasts were tingling all over. She could feel them swelling inside the cage of her bra, peaking against the lace cups as if desperate to get out so they could feel his mouth and lips and tongue directly.
As if reading her mind, he deftly unhooked her bra and it fell to the floor along with her dress. She was standing in nothing but her knickers and her heels and for once in her life she couldn’t give a damn. He made her feel beautiful with his dark lustrous eyes roving over her form as if he wanted to eat her alive. Everywhere his gaze rested burned and tingled. Everywhere his hands touched made her flesh shiver and dance in delight.
But she couldn’t have him doing all the touching and caressing.
Daisy wanted to touch and caress him. To devour him. She started on the buttons of his shirt, undoing them one by one, leaning into him to press a kiss to the hot musky satin of his skin. She used her tongue to anoint him. Little stabs. Little flicks. Little licks. Feeling thrilled as he sucked in a breath as if her ministrations excited him like no other.
She slid her hands over his rock-hard pectoral muscles, exploring his flat male nipples with her fingertips, pressing a moist kiss to each one, following it up with a hot swirl of her tongue.
‘You’re a dangerous woman,’ he growled against her neck, taking a nip of her sensitive skin like a wolf did to control an overly amorous mate.
Daisy felt something wild and primitive inside her break free. She stepped up on tiptoe and put her mouth to his neck, taking a section of his flesh and biting down just hard enough to feel the tension of his skin. She released it to sweep her tongue over the spot, lulling him into a false sense of security before she bit him again.
He swore playfully and came back at her with a bite on her breast that was just shy of painful. Pleasure exploded like firecrackers under her skin.
But he wasn’t done yet.
He sucked her nipple into his mouth. Gently pulling on it with his hot wet mouth, drawing on it until she was hovering in that tantalising place somewhere between pleasure and pain. He moved to her other nipple, rolling his tongue over it, circling it, teasing it, and then gently sinking his teeth just enough to pinch the flesh.
Daisy pressed her burning pelvis against the scorching heat of his. Rampant need was crawling all over her skin, making her breathless and mindless in her pursuit of ultimate pleasure. Never had her body felt more electrically alive. Never had it ached with such relentless want. Never had she been so desperate to come apart. The tension was like a pressure cooker inside her body. Building. Building. Building.
He slid his hands back over her buttocks, cupping her to his body, letting her feel the outline of his arousal. ‘I want you.’
‘I want you too.’
He walked her back towards the nearest wall, hooking his fingers into her knickers, but somehow in the haste to get them off his fingers tore through the fine cobweb of lace. He glanced at them ruefully, a frown pulling at his brow. ‘Sorry.’
‘It’s fine.’ Daisy kicked them away with her foot. ‘Now, where were we? Oh, I remember. We were doing something about all these clothes you’re wearing.’
She proceeded to tug the tail of his shirt out of his trousers. But suddenly his hands came down and stalled her. ‘Wait,’ he said, breathing heavily.
She raised her brows in surprise. ‘What for?’
He stepped back from her and pushed one of his hands through his hair. His gaze went back to the tiny scrap of torn lace on the floor at his feet, his brow furrowing tighter as he bent down to pick them up. He handed them to her, his expression now inscrutable. ‘I’ll buy you a new pair.’
What did she care about a silly little pair of chain store knickers when her body was screaming for release? But then a host of self-doubts flooded her system. It was like throwing a bucket of ice cubes on her nascent sexual confidence. She wasn’t like his usual conquests. She wasn’t catwalk-skinny. She wasn’t beautiful enough for the likes of him. She gathered what remnants of pride she could and set about getting back into her dress and bra, all the while conscious of him silently watching her, still with that unreadable expression on his face.
‘Was it something I said?’ she asked after a painful silence.
‘No.’
‘Something I did?’
‘No.’
‘Something I didn’t?’
‘No.’
Daisy pushed her lips out on an expelled breath as she smoothed down her dress. ‘You really know how to leave a girl hanging.’
‘I’m sorry.’ His hand went through his hair again, this time from front to back, leaving it all sexily tousled as if he’d just got out of bed. ‘I’m not used to doing things this way.’
‘Which way is that? We’re both adults who are attracted to each other. What other way are you talking about?’
He drew in an audible breath before slowly releasing it. ‘You’re a virgin, for one thing.’
Daisy wrinkled her brow in a frown. ‘What’s that got to do with it?’
‘Having sex for the first time can be an intensely emotional experience.’
‘Was it for you?’
He frowned as if the thought was ludicrous. ‘No, not at all.’
‘So why should it be intensely emotional for me?’
He looked at her for a moment without speaking, his eyes surveying every feature on her face as if she was a complicated puzzle he couldn’t quite figure out. ‘It’s different for women. It’s harder for them to separate their emotions from the physicality of sex. Especially the first time.’
‘How many virgins have you slept with?’
‘None that I know of.’
‘So how can you speak with such authority?’
He let out another long breath. ‘Look, I don’t want you to get hurt, OK? You’re a good girl, and in my experience good girls and bad boys don’t mix.’
Daisy wasn’t sure what he was saying. Was he saying their fling wasn’t going to go ahead after all? Disappointment felt like a weary ache in her bones. ‘So what happens now?’
He rubbed at his shadowed jaw before dropping his hand by his side. ‘We’ll hang out together as planned.’
‘And what about sex?’
‘I think it’s best if we leave sex out of it.’
Daisy blinked. ‘No sex?’
A tiny muscle beat a one-two rhythm at the side of his mouth. ‘No sex.’
She ran her tongue over her lips, wondering why he was suddenly baulking at the idea of becoming intimate with her. Surely this wasn’t just about her looks. He had been as turned on as her just moments ago. She had seen and felt the evidence with her own eyes and hands. Was it the thought of the time frame that was putting him off? He was used to one-night stands. He didn’t have relationships with women. He had hook-ups. Quick, temporary transactions that involved their bodies, not their minds or their emotions or, indeed, his. ‘So, let me get this straight… You want me to pretend to be your lover until after the Grand Slam but we’re not going to have sex?’
‘Correct.’
‘Will we kiss?’
The muscle near his mouth started beating again. ‘If th
e occasion demands it.’
‘What occasion might that be?’
‘A public one.’
‘Oh, right. Silly me. I thought maybe you’d want to kiss me because you found me irresistibly attractive and just couldn’t help yourself.’ She scooped her purse off the coffee table and slipped her knickers inside and clipped it shut. ‘Let’s not forget you were the one to give me the biggest come-on in the nightclub.’
‘I’m doing this for you, Daisy.’
She clutched a hand to her heart theatrically. ‘For me? How incredibly sweet.’
He gave her a black look. ‘Don’t be like that.’
She pressed her lips tightly together as she studied him. ‘Is this because of my father?’
‘He’s got a right to be worried about you. You’re a loose cannon.’
Daisy decided right then and there she would show him just how loose she could be. He might want to keep things on a platonic level but she had other ideas. She wanted her holiday fling and she wanted it with him and no one—not even his newly invented moral code—was going to stop her. ‘I’m going back to my hotel to get my things.’
He reached for his room key. ‘I’ll come with you. The press will be—’
‘No, don’t do that. I’ll meet you back here in ten or fifteen minutes.’
A frown was beetling his brows. ‘I might as well come with you and wait until you’re ready.’
‘Erm, I don’t think so.’ She gave him a cryptic little smile. ‘Edward might not like that.’
His frown deepened. ‘Who the hell…? Oh…’
Daisy lifted her hand in a cheery fingertip wave. ‘See you in fifteen.’
CHAPTER SIX
LUIZ CAUGHT HER before she got into the elevator. Thankfully, the press had moved on now they had their story. And what a story it was. How had he ended up in this melodrama? One act of chivalry and he was in so deep he didn’t know whether he was coming or going. Well, he definitely hadn’t come, but it had been a close shave. Closer than he cared to admit.
THE VALQUEZ SEDUCTION Page 7
