by Sara Wood
‘Let me.’ The husky whisper rippled through her nerves in waves. His arms came around her, the pressure of his body hard and warm.
‘Don’t do that!’ she grated, squirming from the release of agonising need. She loathed herself for having these feelings for him.
‘Just cracking the eggs for you,’ he said evenly and slid each one into the centre of each piece of golden bread. Then he walked away, leaving her horribly ragged at the edges.
It was all she could do to make a show of eating. The relief when he went off to dress was like a cold shower of rain. Grimly she cleared the kitchen, listening all the time for his footfall.
When it came, she was writing menus for the week ahead. She tried not to notice how snugly his jeans fitted. Or how the black T-shirt hugged his body. Instead, she put aside her papers and coolly began to study the design books he’d brought as if he had no effect on her whatsoever.
As they discussed, agreed and discarded various options, she noticed that his fingers were gently moving backwards and forwards across the silky surface of the table. The sensuality of the movements began to seep into her almost as if he were stroking her skin. She could almost feel the pressure and as her body responded she had to bite her lip to stop herself from groaning.
The memory of his touch haunted her. The intimacy between them now embarrassed her profoundly. She couldn’t help remembering where he had touched her—and to what effect.
But she said nothing and continued with her chilly replies to his suggestions until it was time for her to go home for lunch.
He estimated how long she might stay at the hospital visiting her grandfather. After showering and shaving, and changing into a fresh cream shirt that matched his clean jeans, he drove down to her cottage, feeling angrier than ever.
The whole day had been wasted. He’d done nothing—except churn over and over in his mind everything that had happened between them.
Whatever he did, he saw the flow of her features and the lyrical language of her hands and body. Hating to be so possessed by her, seething from the challenge she presented, he vowed to break open that hard shell of hers once and for all in the only way he could. With sex.
Outside the plank door, he drew a deep breath and gave the bellpull a yank.
She’d been sunbathing. Her face was flushed and glowing, her glorious body fighting to remain decent despite the small white bikini.
‘How’s your grandfather?’ he enquired politely.
Glowering at him, she half hid herself behind the door. ‘Fractious. They’re doing tests. But his speech is still not good. He keeps trying to tell me something that’s troubling his mind and…’ Her voice cracked. ‘He—he cries when he can’t get the words out.’
‘It must be hard for you, seeing him so helpless,’ he said.
‘Terrible,’ she admitted.
And he was in the house before she could say any more. ‘Brought the design books for you to check,’ he announced, putting them down on a rickety table. Though he didn’t mention that he had his toothbrush in his back pocket as well.
She looked startled and frightened, her eyes as dark as charcoal. Yet he noticed with a catch in his breath that her nipples had become hard and erect. He groaned. She wanted him as much as he wanted her. And this time he wasn’t going to take no for an answer.
‘Thank you.’
Muted and sullen, she hunted around for a way of escape but he stood in the middle of the room and he knew she was too proud to run from him.
‘I thought you’d like to mull over what we decided,’ he said quietly, trying not to keep his gaze from straying below her neck. But he knew his desire must be evident on his face because she swallowed and licked her lips. ‘I want to be sure,’ he added huskily, ‘that you’re happy with everything.’
‘Right.’
With that breathy whisper, she absently shut the front door.
He smiled at her lazily, projecting the promise of what was to come. Her hand went to her mouth and he saw the swelling of her breasts and the lengthening of each peak.
Needing to keep cool, he wandered into the kitchen, murmuring, ‘I wonder if it’s changed since I was here. Oh, yes. It’s considerably tidier—and cleaner!’ he called back.
Anna couldn’t stand there any longer with virtually nothing on. She knew that he’d noticed what was happening to her body and despaired that it had betrayed her. He’d imagine she would lie down for him, she thought angrily. And hated him more than ever for making her so defenceless against his charms. And against her own alarming lust.
It was like being hooked on drugs. And possibly as dangerous.
‘Let yourself out!’ she cried loudly, and ran upstairs to find something—anything—to cover herself.
At the sound of his footsteps on the spiral oak stairway that led straight into her bedroom, she froze.
‘What…what are you doing?’ she squeaked.
His dark head appeared, dipping beneath the low beam. The broad shoulders. Chest, hips, legs. And now he had taken a step across the oak-boarded floor and was looking at her with unnerving intent.
‘What do you think?’
Reading his intentions, she backed away but in her panic she forgot the uneven floorboards, which dipped and swelled like miniature hills and valleys from centuries of gently shifting joists. Before she knew it, she’d fallen back on the counterpane of the big four-poster bed and Vido was hovering over her, his eyes black and gleaming.
‘This,’ he murmured, his hands pinioning her arms to her sides, ‘is an invitation I can’t resist.’
‘It’s not an invitation!’ she blazed, wriggling frantically. ‘I fell! Get your hands off me! I loathe you! Despise you—!’
‘Want me.’ His kiss interrupted her tirade, softening her briefly until she dragged her brain back into her head and struggled beneath him. To her dismay, that only dislodged her bikini top, exposing her hungering breasts to the gaze of his lethal black eyes.
‘I don’t want you!’ she whispered in futile denial. Her mouth was opening to his and she was half sobbing in her desperate attempt to remain indifferent.
‘Your body does.’ He took a nipple between his lips and sucked. She moaned and bucked beneath him.
‘But not my brain!’ Her eyes seared his with hatred.
‘It’s just sex,’ he reminded her cynically.
‘So lie back and enjoy it!’ she scoffed.
‘Why not?’ he urged.
‘Because you’re a two-timing rat like Peter and whatever you’re used to, personally I don’t like sharing!’ she jerked, wriggling like an eel.
They rolled on the bed, every contact with him a torment, every swoop of his voracious mouth causing delight and fury.
‘When,’ he growled, between repeated tugs at her horrifyingly eager breasts, ‘have I two-timed?’
Gasping, she pushed his head away and shuddered as his hands slid to her hips. ‘All your life!’ she spat. ‘As a teenager, and now. What if I rang Camilla and told her what you were trying to do right at this moment?’
He frowned. Lifted her back to the pillows and held her there, his expression uncomprehending.
‘Let’s take this in order. I never went out with more than one girl at a time when I was at school—’
‘They said different!’
‘Oh, Anna!’ he sighed irritably. ‘That was gossip. Idle chatter from man-hungry girls with too many hormones raging about. You only have their word.’
But every female sighed over him. They all wanted him. Would he really have turned them down?
‘Loads of girls said you’d made love to them—’
‘There were two—and those were some time before I dated you.’ He frowned. ‘The others made extravagant claims about me so they could be seen as part of my set. I had no desire for a string of sexual conquests. Or, rather, I had the desire but I didn’t want a cheap and unsatisfying relationship. Besides, I had no time to date at all, after my mother was sacked,’ he
added grimly.
‘You stayed out all night. That’s a fact.’
‘Yes. I went to your grandfather’s factory straight from school—’
‘I know,’ she said coldly, remembering how he’d tried to cheat his fellow workers out of their holiday savings. ‘The shift ended at eleven.’
‘And I,’ he said tightly, ‘worked the next shift through the night till early morning painting cheap and ugly models of Shakespeare’s birthplace. If you don’t believe me, I’ll show you my pay chits. And you can marvel at the pittance I was paid,’ he added with some bitterness. ‘Hell, Anna, how do you think I could spend the nights with a woman when I was bent over a workbench painting nasty souvenirs? Do you think I’d have the energy even to rush off to someone for a five-minute quickie? I was too exhausted to do anything other than drag myself to school in the mornings and fall asleep during lessons. I had to make money. I didn’t care how—and I was prepared to slave in that dump in order to do so.’
He saw the truth filter into her mind. The lowering of her lovely eyes as she realised that she’d misjudged him.
‘Was that what you meant?’ she asked shakily. ‘About doing anything to make money?’
‘Well, I certainly wasn’t planning on a loveless marriage,’ he said coldly.
She let that go, knowing for a fact he was lying. ‘Didn’t anyone at school know you were working in Grandpa’s factory?’ she demanded. ‘Is that why they were convinced you were with a woman every night?’
He scowled. ‘I wasn’t exactly proud of what I was doing.’ The hardness of his eyes made her shrink into the depths of the bed. ‘Anna, my mother brought me up to respect women. The ones who deserved respect, that is,’ he added, flicking her a sardonic glance.
‘And the ones who didn’t?’ she pursued.
‘I steered clear.’ His eyes flickered. ‘I had no wish to contract some sexual disease,’ he said scathingly and she flinched at his cutting reminder of the accusation she’d flung at him. ‘Why would I lie about this?’ he asked grimly. ‘What would be the point?’
She seemed to waver. And then her head snapped up again in challenge.
‘It doesn’t alter the fact that you’ve treated Camilla abominably!’ she cried.
‘You’ve lost me.’
‘Don’t pretend to be dense! Camilla! Remember her?’ she cried, sounding almost tearful.
‘What about her?’ he asked irritably.
Her jaw dropped. ‘You are a b—!’
‘Don’t say it!’ he hissed, his eyes glittering with anger. ‘I may be illegitimate but I don’t like it being flung in my face every time you’re feeling vindictive.’
‘You’re in a world of your own, the way you turn things so they’re someone else’s fault!’ she stormed. ‘Let me go. I’ll call her and tell her just what you’re trying to do to me!’
‘Go ahead,’ he gritted. He reached out for the phone on the bedside table and handed it to her. ‘I can guarantee she might even be pleased.’
Anna gasped. ‘What are you saying?’
He shrugged. ‘She knows there’s something that draws us together despite our dislike for one another. Camilla is a very perceptive woman and she cares about me—’
‘The poor deluded woman! She’s so dazzled that she’d share you?’ Anna flung, her eyes hot embers in her pale face.
Vido frowned. ‘Share? What the—?’ The penny dropped and he grinned, his eyes kindling as he realised what she was implying.
‘Don’t you smile at me!’ she stormed.
Laughing a little bitterly at her low opinion of him, he kissed her hard, fighting with her mouth when she tried to bite him. Such passion. It would all be for him. He groaned at the thought.
‘Anna,’ he said thickly, ‘Camilla has never found her way into my bed, let alone my heart. Since she arrived here she’s fallen head over heels for Joe.’
Anna frowned, pushing away Vido’s tormenting fingers as they caressed her breasts. No. That wasn’t right.
‘You’re lying,’ she scorned. ‘I distinctly heard you tell Camilla you adored her.’
‘I do!’ He gazed at her innocently as if that was perfectly normal behaviour. ‘It doesn’t mean we’re lovers.’
‘She calls you “darling”.’
‘And everyone else,’ he pointed out. ‘It’s a manner of speaking. But she loves Joe. Ring her. Ask.’
She had to know. And if he was lying, she thought grimly, she’d ram the phone down his throat.
‘Number.’
He dialled it for her, his hard-boned face uncomfortably close to hers, his breath whisking hotly over her mouth. When she heard Camilla answer, she suddenly felt stupid.
‘Oh. Hello. It’s Anna,’ she stumbled.
‘Darling! How are you?’ Camilla called gaily. ‘Enjoying your freedom from old prune-face?’
Anna hastily controlled a wry smile at the irreverent reference to Peter. ‘I—I wanted to get something straight,’ she said, glaring at Vido as he remorselessly kissed along her jawline.
With one hand she tried to push him away but he clasped her fingers in his and kissed her erect nipple instead. He scared her. There was anger in every line of his body.
‘Fire away,’ she heard Camilla say, somewhere in the hazy distance.
‘It’s about Joe,’ Anna jerked out, the blood coursing through her veins.
‘Darling Joe.’ Camilla sounded soft and dreamy. ‘Isn’t he divine?’
‘You—you and he… I mean…?’
‘Clever you! I’m in love with him, Anna. Madly. I want his babies. Is it that obvious?’
‘No, no.’ Anna gulped. She’d made a dreadful mistake. It seemed that all her reasons for mistrusting Vido were vanishing—except the fact that he’d stolen money from the factory workers. That was in no doubt. Her grandfather had certain proof. But…it seemed he wasn’t promiscuous or two-timing after all. Her stomach swooped. ‘Can I get this clear? You and Vido aren’t…’ Her voice tailed away in embarrassment.
‘I see what you’re getting at!’ Camilla laughed. ‘Darling, he’s all yours. I adore him of course and he adores me—naturally because I’m so adorable—but we’re not right for one another. Whereas Joe, lovely, hunky, gorgeous Joe…’
Vido took the phone from Anna’s limp hand. ‘Bye, Camilla,’ he said abruptly and put it down. ‘Satisfied?’ he muttered. ‘Because if not, you soon will be.’
She bit her lip and flushed, her eyes wide with dismay. ‘I’m sorry!’
‘More.’
She squirmed. ‘What else can I say? Everything pointed to you two being more than fond of one another. I heard.’
‘And jumped to conclusions. Again. You thought that I was the kind of guy who’d make advances to you while sleeping with another woman.’
He let his anger show. She had to know that he objected violently to her mistaken assessment of his character.
‘Yes,’ she whispered.
His mouth tightened. ‘Thanks. But one at a time, is my motto. Today, it’s you. Tomorrow, who knows?’ he sliced. ‘But you can be sure I’ll let you know when we’re finished.’
She winced. An odd pain filtered across her eyes. Of course. She couldn’t stand rejection.
‘I can only say that I’m very, very sorry,’ she husked.
‘And you will be punished.’
He thanked his lucky stars that she was sexually experienced. It made it easier. He was going to enjoy this. No strings. Just physical release at last.
‘How?’ she croaked.
Her breasts were full and thrusting forward, dark nipples aroused and urgent. He was bursting with desire but he wanted this to be different. Long and slow and deep. He let his mouth move over her breasts, his lips savouring the change from the smooth satin skin to the puckered flesh surrounding each hard, rosy centre.
‘You,’ he breathed, his voice thick with wanting, ‘are going to spend the entire evening and night pleasuring me till you can barely move for exhaustion
.’
CHAPTER EIGHT
HER entire body seemed to catch alight. Fierce fingers of delight stabbed at her and she let out a moan before she knew what she was doing.
Vido brought his mouth down on hers in a fierce kiss, the pressure of his kiss deepening the throb of her pulses deep inside, the caress of his hands gently hypnotic.
Every part of her screamed for satisfaction. And this time she meant to get it. Sinking beneath the passionate onslaught of his mouth, she felt herself drifting towards that delicious intoxication which had allowed her to surrender her inhibitions and enjoy the movement of flesh against flesh, lip over skin, teeth grazing bone.
Yes. She would have it all. Her fingers slid down to the button of his jeans. Firmly he pulled her hand away. ‘No.’
Thwarted, she frowned at him. ‘I want—’
‘It’s not what you want, Anna. It’s what I want.’ He rolled onto his back and pulled her on top of him. ‘Make love to me,’ he ordered softly.
Her eyes narrowed as anger flashed through her. But he was spiralling a finger around her breast, his mocking eyes challenging her, and suddenly she knew what she would do.
In a quick, lithe movement, she slid away. Pulling open a drawer in the tallboy, she located two silk scarves. He wanted to be pleasured. She’d do her best—with the help of the film she’d watched. And she’d end up pleasuring herself.
‘Hand,’ she ordered in a croak, helplessly aroused by what she intended.
He swallowed, hardly believing what he’d heard. Impatiently she flicked one of the silk scarves like a whip and he realised that she was serious. Eyes dark, his chest rising and falling with quick, sharp little breaths, he held out his hand. Every nerve in his body tingled. He could hardly bear the suspense.
She was tantalising. Her face had become very solemn in concentration as she tied his wrist to the post of the bed. Her small pink tongue had slipped between her lips in a sweet, endearing way that made him want to hold her tight and nestle his head against hers.
And yet he could sense the passion and tightly controlled appetite behind her serious exterior. Voluptuous in every movement as she strolled to the other side of the bed, she seemed almost as excited as he was.
