This Christmas and Forever: A heartwarming anthology of billionaire holiday romances...

by Clare Connelly

  For a moment, her heart panged as she remembered the homestead she’d grown up on, it’s sprawling American colonial style, the landscaped gardens, the huge weeping elm with the old wooden swing seat her dad had restored for Sophia and Bella, and emotions logged in her chest.

  She thought of the home she’d lived in with Xavier, in those brief, early days of their marriage, so modern and enormous, so luxurious, and her heart twisted with different pangs.

  And now, she was here – a new home in the tapestry of her life – with any luck, this one would see better memories form within its walls.

  “Yes.” Just a quick agreement. “Do you live here full time?”

  “No.” He straightened, walking into the room with a panther-like grace. “It is too far from my offices. I have a place in Athens. I stay there through the week.”

  “Oh.” Her forehead crinkled. “So you’ll be away that often?”

  He came to stand in front of her, his eyes still roaming her face like she was a puzzle he wanted to comprehend. “No.”

  “But you…just said…”

  “I was not a married man before. Nor did I have a child on the way.” He looked at her as though he wanted to kiss her and she ached for that, suddenly. Of its own accord, her body swayed forward slightly, and she expelled a soft breath. “I am having my office here improved, making it easier for me to be on the island as much as possible. From time to time I will need to fly to Athens, but I won’t stay long while I’m there.”

  “Oh.” In the back of her mind, she registered the fact he was making sweeping changes to his life, but she was finding it impossibly hard to concentrate with his closeness and the intensity of his watchfulness.

  “Oh,” he repeated, but teasingly, and he smiled, and all of the sun’s warmth was caught in his smile and beamed across her soul. “Join me for a toast?” He prompted, catching her hand and lifting it to his lips, pressing a kiss against her palm.

  Her pulse trembled.

  “Apple juice?” She murmured, thinking how much she’d prefer a champagne, or something equally able to calm the nerves that were ricocheting through her.

  “I think we can manage that.” He dropped her hand but kept his smile in place, gesturing for her to follow him as he strolled through the lounge room, through double doors that led to another room, this one with an even larger balcony. Terracotta pot plants had bonsai citrus plants in each, and the fragrance of orange blossoms was mesmerizing.

  Belatedly, she saw a table had been set with a bottle of champagne and a platter of food.

  “It’s de-alcoholised,” he explained, as he moved to it and began to unfurl the top. She watched as his strong, capable hands unfurled the foil, and her body began to reverberate with a longing that was something she was beginning to get used to.

  “That was very thoughtful of you,” she said honestly.

  He threw her a look of sardonic amusement. “This surprises you?”

  She laughed at the ease with which he’d seen through her simple statement. “Yes, frankly.”

  “Your ex-husband wasn’t considerate?”

  It sobered Bella instantly. “Oh, he was. He was – is – a perfect gentleman.”

  Something like speculation sparked in Vitalo’s expression, the depths of his dark eyes swirling with questions, but he didn’t ask any of them.

  He popped the top and champagne bubbled out as with a regular bottle. When he poured it into the two flutes, she recognized the distinctive orange label of the bottle. “I didn’t know you could even buy this.”

  “It’s a special order,” he shrugged.

  “Seriously?”

  He nodded, filling her glass then his own and passing one to her. She held it, her eyes hesitant to hold his now. The wedding ring on her left hand felt strange – she was conscious of it with each movement she made.

  “Here’s to you, Mrs Katrakis,” he said, holding the glass to her. She clinked hers to it, heat warming her cheeks.

  Mrs Katrakis. The name was addictive.

  “And to you,” she said.

  “And to this little person in your belly.” He smiled as he put a hand against her stomach and her pulse fired up another notch. Perhaps he felt it, or perhaps he simply understood, because something in the air around them seemed to change, as though live-voltage had been infused into their atmosphere.

  She sipped her non-alcoholic champagne, turning to the view of the ocean. “It’s beautiful here,” she said honestly. “So peaceful.”

  “Too peaceful, at times,” he said with a laugh.

  “Is there such a thing?”

  She moved to the railing and perched her elbows on it, just as a large black bird flew across the horizon, its wings beating languidly, as though sunning itself in the dipping sun.

  “I suppose that depends on who you are and what you enjoy.”

  Not for the first time, Bella experienced a little jolt of anxiety – she knew so little about this man. How could she possibly have done something as impetuous as marrying him? And why wasn’t she more panicked by that?

  “And what do you enjoy, Mr Katrakis?”

  He moved beside her, echoing her position, his face staring out at the lowering sun. “Would you like a list?”

  She laughed softly. “I guess so. It occurs to me I know very little about the man I married.”

  “And won’t it be fun to get to know one another?” He prompted, tilting his head to look at her, and her pulse ratcheted up a notch; her blood churned through her body so fast she could hear it gushing in her ears.

  “Yes,” she said, simply, because he was right. Like a delicious piece of cake at the end of an enormous meal, she wasn’t sure she wanted to rush through this stage of their relationship – she wanted to savour each morsel of information, to digest it and taste it before moving onto the next.

  “How about you give me something small,” she suggested, sipping her drink once more.

  “Such as?”

  “Tell me about your childhood,” she prompted, thinking of something relatively benign. “Did you spend much time on the island while you were growing up?”

  He turned back to the ocean, his eyes moving across its edges restlessly. “We summered here.” Something darkened in his expression. “My mother used to bring me here.”

  “And your father stayed in Athens?”

  A muscle jerked in his jaw, as though he were grinding his teeth. “Much of the time.”

  “Working?” She prompted, her question natural.

  He was quiet for a long time, and then he turned to face her, and she felt something in his gaze, a strength and a hardness that sent a shiver down her spine, despite the fact neither seemed aimed at her. “No.”

  It made little sense- the single word answer was at odds with his tension. “No?”

  He shook his head. “My father had a different view of marriage to me.”

  And now Bella’s pulse speeded up for a different reason, as memories of the snatches of conversation with her father fired inside of her. “Did he?” The words came out shallow. Breathy.

  Vitalo said nothing.

  “Do you mean he had an affair?”

  “An affair?” Vitalo lifted a brow, and his darkness was all around him now. He was like a caged animal. “That sounds so civilized, so reasonable. No, Bella. He did not have ‘an affair’. He had a string of lovers, prostitutes, women he paid for sex at any opportunity.”

  Bella had thought her own mother’s infidelity bad enough, having seen the way it had tormented Andrew at the end, but this was so different. “Did your mother know?”

  “Yes.” He swallowed, his eyes showing his torment. “Not at first. But by the time I was a teenager, she was well aware of his predilections.”

  “Did she… did they divorce?”

  “My mother killed herself,” he said, the words clinical and cold, despite the pain he must have felt inside of himself. “She’d found him in bed with one of his lovers the day before. She got
very upset – screamed at him. I was in the room next door and I’ll never forget the sound she made – like a primal, wounded animal.” He shook his head, as if to pull himself together. “My father laughed.” The words were quiet, rich with his disbelief and disgust. “He told her she was behaving like the child she was. She took a bunch of sleeping pills that night.”

  “Oh, Vitalo,” Bella’s heart squeezed for him. “I’m so sorry. Is it possible it was an accident? That she was too upset to sleep and accidentally took a double dose?”

  “She had the whole bottle,” he said, shaking his head. “She knew what she was doing.”

  Bella’s heart broke – first for her husband and also for his mother. “Your father must have felt awful!”

  “Must he have?” Vitalo prompted, looking at Bella now with that watchfulness he employed to great effect.

  “I imagine so.”

  Vitalo sighed. “Yes. He felt guilty, I am sure of it, but it didn’t stop his habits. He brought a date to her funeral.”

  “He didn’t!”

  “Oh, not so obviously, but I knew.” His jaw tightened and he turned away from her, moving to the table and bracing his fingertips on its edge.

  “It must have been so hard for you.”

  “I moved abroad,” he said with a shrug, and when he turned back to face her, it was with an expression far more like his usual. “Studied, made a life for myself distinct from his. He died a few years after her.”

  “And you weren’t close, at the end?” She asked softly, moving to him. She wanted to touch him – it was the most natural thing in the world to physically comfort someone in distress, but something held her back.

  “That’s an understatement.”

  “Did he ever have any other children?”

  Vitalo’s eyes sparked to hers. “I can already see, Mrs Katrakis, that you have an unsettling habit of knowing exactly what to ask that I do not wish to discuss.”

  She frowned, sympathy making her lift her hand up and curve around his cheek. “You don’t have to answer me. That’s enough for now.”

  His eyes shifted to hers and her pulse throbbed through her body. She wanted him to demur, to say he was fine to answer – she wanted to know everything about him, stuff the cake theory – but he smiled, capturing her hand on his cheek, curving his fingers over it.

  “Thank you for the reprieve,” he winked. “There are far better ways to spend our wedding night, I think.”

  Her stomach swirled with the force of a kaleidoscope of butterflies. “I have no idea what you’re referring to,” she drawled softly.

  His laugh was a throaty invitation. “Then let me enlighten you, Mrs Katrakis.” He scooped down, lifting her against his powerful chest, carrying her in from the terrace, over the threshold of the lounge area. And as he moved through the house, she felt not just like he was carrying her through a building, but like he was physically moving her from her old life and into her new one. A fresh start – away from her family, her parents, her ex-husband.

  This was all new, and it was all hers.

  Chapter 5

  “IT IS YOUR TURN,” he said from behind her, the water lapping gently around them. The infinity pool was the last word in luxury. Overlooking the ocean, and despite the cool of the evening, the pool was warm, like a spa – and somehow the briskness of the air temperature only made the sensation of being submerged in the water lovelier.

  “My turn for what?” She floated onto her back, staring up at the sky – lit with mauves and the last whisper of the day. Bella had been disappointed when, instead of taking her to his bedroom and making slow, delicious love to her, he’d led her to a pool room and showed her a selection of bathing costumes – tags still attached – for her to get changed into. He hadn’t even offered to stay and help her!

  Disappointment though had quickly given way to delight – and anticipation, for she knew before the night was out she would be in his arms again, her body possessed by his in a way that she’d been dreaming of since they’d first slept together.

  “Life stories,” he said teasingly, wetting his fingers and splashing her.

  “Ah.” She straightened a little, her feet not touching the bottom, so she had to tread water. Only he swam to her and caught her body in his hands, holding her easily.

  Just when she’d thought the feeling of warm water and cool night air couldn’t get any better…! “What did you want to know?”

  He lifted a hand, brushing her hair back from her forehead. “Your first marriage.”

  “Ah.” She bit down on her lip, her mood changing. But he’d spoken about something that must have been hard for him – didn’t she owe him the same? “What about it?”

  “When did you divorce?”

  She sighed. “Several years ago.”

  “You still use his name?”

  She frowned.

  “When you came to my office, you didn’t use Howard…”

  “Oh, no,” she nodded. “I know. I … my dad died, when I was twelve. And I spent a lot of time with my godparents – the Salbatores. Xavier’s their son. I suppose, even after we divorced, I continued to feel like a Salbatore.” She smiled, on safer ground when she thought of her ex-parents-in-law. “It’s more a sign of my affection for them, than it is for Xave.”

  “So you were married and yet you never slept with your husband?”

  She should have expected that question – but she hadn’t. She froze, her expression completely unmoving. “No.”

  “That, then, is my question to you.” He ran his hands down her back, cupping her buttocks, lifting her and wrapping her legs around his waist.

  Bella chewed on her lower lip, not sure exactly how to broach that subject. It was so messy, so confusing. Half the time she could barely make sense of that period in her life herself.

  “And after you have explained this to me,” he said, huskily, “I will kiss you here,” he dropped his mouth to her throat, flicking his tongue against her pulse point there. He ran his hand to her breast, cupping it. “And here.” And then, he rolled his hips, pushing his powerful manhood between her legs. “And here.”

  A gargled groan sounded from deep within her.

  “I’m singing for my sexual supper?” she couldn’t help asking.

  “Something like this.” His eyes were hooded.

  “It’s not a big deal,” she said, finally. “Xave was in an accident. He was injured – badly. It’s a miracle he survived. His memory was impaired.” She held her breath a little, the sight of him in the hospital bed one she knew she’d never forget. “Once he was well enough to walk, we married, but he still wasn’t himself. He withdrew from me. He wasn’t interested in me and it never felt… right. Looking back on it, I see now that our marriage was never about love. Nor desire. It was convenient for him, and for me. And we cared about each other – we still do – as friends. But it was never like… I didn’t walk into a room and want to… It wasn’t like…”

  Vitalo watched her quietly, his expression giving nothing away, and then, he tilted his head forward, just far enough to brush his lips to hers. “It wasn’t like this?”

  Flames leaped in her blood.

  “No,” she agreed, moaning, as his hands found the straps of her bathers and pushed them down her arms a little. “It was never like this.”

  “He was a fool to resist you,” Vitalo said, lifting up so his eyes could bore into hers. “But I am selfishly so glad he did.”

  And then, he kissed her, he kissed her hungrily, passionately, and as though he’d die without her. He kissed her and everything in the world slid into place and she sighed into his mouth even as her hands lifted to tangle in his thick dark hair, her fingertips latching together, holding his head against hers.

  “Take me to bed,” she heard herself demand, and then laughed a little shame-facedly, her desire so strong she didn’t stop to think if she should try to hide her need for him.

  “Bed?” He drawled, striding through the water, to the
edge of the pool. Here, she could stand, and he placed her down, only so that he could strip her from the wet, black bathers she wore. He dropped them into the pool; they floated beside them, and his own briefs joined them a moment later. “Who needs a bed?” He teased, catching her at the waist and lifting her once more, wrapping her legs around his waist.

  She groaned long and slow as he drove into her, the water surrounding them, his arousal filling her, her muscles squeezing him with desperate hunger. And she lay back in the water, staring at the sky as his body thrust into her, and pleasure was like a drum, beating through her soul. His hands held her, supported her, his body pleasured her, and she existed purely for this, for him, for all that this was.

  He dropped his mouth forward, taking a nipple in his mouth, biting down on it just hard enough to send arrows of pleasure pain shooting through her body, and she made a noise of urgency, of wanting more, of needing that again and again. He laughed a little, a throaty sound of pleasure as he lifted his head and flicked the same nipple with his fingertip, hard enough to make those same little darts of sharp, searing pleasure careening through her body.

  His name rushed from her lips, a curse, a cry, an incantation; she called his name into the ancient skies, and as her pleasure built, like a wave she couldn’t – and didn’t want to – escape, he spoke to her in Greek, his native language adding another layer of magic and a sense of destiny to what they were doing.

  She lifted up, clinging onto him as the pleasure became almost too intense to bear, and his hands cupped her rear, holding her tight, digging into her rounded flesh. She clawed his shoulders; sensual madness overtook her.

  In the warm waters on the edge of his private island, on a cool autumnal evening, Bella’s pleasure broke like a storm, and Vitalo was right there with her, tipping himself into her, emptying all of himself, his body frenzied with the same fever that had filled Bella’s bloodstream.

  She slept like the dead.

  Vitalo Katrakis stared at his young wife with a bemused smile on his face. She was so still, so completely still, her lips pouted in her sleep, long lashes sweeping like two black crescents over her tanned cheeks. She had freckles, he noticed now – a tiny smattering dancing across the bridge of her nose. Her dark hair ran like a skein over the pale pillow, and he remembered how he’d fisted it in his palm the night before, when they’d finally made it to bed, holding her when she’d straddled him, taking him inside of her, moving up and down his length, her moans the most beautiful thing he’d ever heard. She’d used his body, taking his cock inside of her, stoking her own flames, driving herself to orgasm and he’d watched, fascinated, at the literal awakening of her sensuality, at the way she was discovering who she was in bed, and what she liked as a woman, before his very eyes.