скачать книгу бесплатно
She gave a shrug and reached for another strawberry, focussing on picking off the stem rather than meeting his gaze. ‘We have what you might call a strained relationship,’ she said. ‘But then he told you how difficult I was when you had that cosy little chat together, didn’t he?’
‘That really upset you, didn’t it?’
‘Of course it upset me,’ she said, shooting him a hard little glare. ‘He’s good at swinging the jury. He oozes with charm. No one would ever question his opinion. He’s the perfect husband, the perfect father. He doesn’t show in public what he’s like in private. You don’t know him, Angelo. You don’t know what he’s capable of. He’ll smile at your face while he has a knife in your back and you’ll never guess it. You don’t know him.’
The silence that fell made Natalie feel horribly exposed. She couldn’t believe that she had said as much as she had said. It was as if a torrent had been let loose. The words had come tumbling out like a flood. A dirty, secret flood that she had kept hidden for as long as she could remember. Her words stained the air. The contamination of the truth even seemed to still the sweet sound of the tweeting birds in the shrubbery nearby.
‘Are you frightened of him, cara?’ Angelo asked with a frown.
‘Not any more,’ she said, giving her head a little toss as she reached for a blueberry this time. ‘I’ve taught myself not to let him have that power over me.’
‘Has he hurt you in some way in the past?’
‘What are you going to do, Angelo?’ she asked with a woeful attempt at scorn. ‘Punch him on the nose? Rearrange his teeth for him? Give him a black eye?’
His gaze became very dark and very hard. ‘If anyone dares to lay so much as a finger on you I will do much more than that,’ he said grimly.
A piece of her emotional armour peeled off like the sloughing of skin. It petrified her to think of how easily it had fallen away. Was this his plan of action? To conquer by stealth? To ambush her by making her feel safe and secure?
To protect her?
‘You know, for such a modern and sophisticated man, deep down you’re amazingly old-fashioned,’ she said.
He reached for her hand. ‘You have no need to be frightened of anyone any more, cara,’ he said. ‘You’re under my protection now, and you will be while you’re wearing that ring on your finger.’
Natalie looked at her hand in the shelter of his. The sparkling new wedding band and the exquisite engagement ring bound her to him symbolically, but the real bond she was starting to feel with him was so much deeper and more lasting than that.
And it secretly terrified her.
She pulled her hand out of his and took one of the rolls out of a basket. ‘So, what’s the plan?’ she asked in a light and breezy tone. ‘How are we going to spend this non-honeymoon of ours?’
His eyes continued to hold hers in a smouldering tether that made the base of her spine feel hot and tingly. ‘How long do you think you’ll be able to keep up this ridiculous pretence of not wanting me?’ he asked.
She gave a false-sounding little laugh. ‘You had your chance last night and you blew it.’
His eyes smouldered some more. ‘I was very tempted to call your bluff last night.’
Hot, moist heat swirled between her legs as she thought of how dangerous and reckless her little taunt had actually been. Was that why she had issued it? Did some subconscious part of her want him to take charge and seduce her?
‘Why didn’t you?’ she asked with a little lift of her brow.
‘I don’t like being manipulated,’ he said. ‘You wanted me to take the responsibility away from you. You don’t like the fact that you still want me. You’ve taught yourself not to want or need anyone. It bugs the hell out of you that I stir you up the way I do, doesn’t it?’
Natalie tried to push her emotions back where they belonged, but it was like trying to refold a map. She pushed back from the table with a screech of the wrought-iron chair-legs against the flagstones. ‘I don’t have to listen to this,’ she said, slamming her napkin on the table.
‘That’s right,’ he said mockingly. ‘Run away. That’s what you usually do, isn’t it? You can’t face the truth of what you feel, so you bolt like a scared rabbit.’
She glowered at him in fury, her fists clenched, her spine rigid. ‘I am not a coward.’
He came to where she was standing, looking down at her with those penetrating eyes of his. She wanted to run, but had to force herself to stand still in order to discredit his summation of her character.
‘How long do you think you can keep running?’ he asked. ‘Hasn’t anyone ever told you that your feelings go with you? You can’t leave them behind. They follow you wherever you go.’
‘I don’t feel anything for you,’ she said through barely moving lips.
He gave a deep chuckle of laughter. ‘Sure you don’t, Tatty.’
She clenched her teeth. ‘Stop calling me that.’
‘How are you going to stop me?’ he asked with a goading smile.
She stepped right up to him and fisted a hand in the front of his shirt. ‘Stop it, damn you,’ she said, trying to push him backwards. But it was like a moth trying to move a mattress.
His dark gaze mocked her. ‘Is that really the best you can do?’
She raised her other hand to slap him, but he caught it mid-air. ‘Ah-ah-ah,’ he chided. ‘That’s not allowed. We can play dirty, but not that dirty.’
Natalie felt the stirring of his erection against her, and her body responded with a massive tidal wave of lust. The erotic pulse of his blood thundering against her belly unleashed a deranged demon of desire inside her. She lunged at him, pulling his head down by grabbing a handful of his hair so she could smash her mouth against his. He allowed her a few hot seconds before he took charge of the kiss and pushed through her lips with the sexy thrust of his tongue, claiming her interior moistness, mimicking the intimate possession of hard, swollen male inside soft, yielding female.
She tried to take back control but he refused to relinquish it. He commandeered her mouth with masterful expertise, making her whole body sing with delight. One of his hands drove through her hair to angle her head for better access as he deepened the kiss. His other hand found her breast and cupped it roughly, possessively. Her flesh swelled and prickled in need, her nipples becoming hardened points that ached for the hot wet swirl and tug of his tongue. She moved against him, wanting more, wanting it all.
Wanting it now.
Her hands dug into his taut buttocks as she pulled him closer. He was monumentally aroused. She felt the rock-hard length of him and ached to feel him moving inside her. Her inner body secretly prepared itself. She felt the dewy moisture gathering between her thighs. She felt the tapping pulse of her blood as her feminine core swelled with longing. She didn’t think she had ever wanted him so badly. She was feverish with it.
Her heart raced with excitement as he scooped her up and carried her indoors. But he didn’t take her anywhere near a bedroom. He didn’t even bother undressing her. He roughly lifted her sundress, bunching it up around her waist, and backed her towards the nearest wall, his mouth still clamped down on hers. He didn’t waste time removing her knickers, either. He simply shoved them to one side as he claimed her slick, hot moistness with one of his fingers.
She gasped against his mouth and he made a very male sound at the back of his throat—a primal sound of deep satisfaction that made all the tight ligaments in her spine loosen. He tortured her with his touch. Those clever fingers got to work and had her shaking with need within moments. She clung to him desperately, her fingernails digging into his back and shoulders as he made her shatter into a million pieces. She sagged against him when the first storm was over. She knew there would be more. There always was with Angelo. He was never satisfied until he had completely undone her physically.
She reached for the zip on his trousers and went in search of him. Her fingers wrapped around his pulsing steely length. He felt hot and hard and heavy with need. She blotted her thumb over the bead of moisture at his tip and a sharp dart of need speared her. He wanted her as badly as she wanted him. Hadn’t it always been this way between them? Their coupling had always been a frenzied attack on the senses. Always fireworks and explosions. Always a mind-blowing madness that refused to be tamed.
He pulled her hand away and quickly applied a condom before pressing her back against the wall, thrusting into her so hard and so fast the breath was knocked right out of her. His mouth swallowed her startled gasp as he rocked against her with heart-stopping urgency.
The pressure built and built inside her again. The sensations ricocheted through her like a round of rubber bullets. It had been so long! This was what she had craved from him. The silky glide of his hard body, those powerful strokes and bold thrusts that made her shiver from head to foot. Her body was so in tune with his. Everything felt so right, so perfect. Her orgasm came speeding towards her, tightening all her sensitive nerve-endings and tugging at her insides, teasing as it lured her towards the edge of oblivion. She cried out as it carried her away on a rollercoaster that dipped and dropped vertiginously.
She was still convulsing when he came. She felt him tense, and then he groaned out loud as he shuddered and quaked with pleasure, his breathing heavy against her neck where he had pressed his face in that last crazy dash to the finish.
It was a moment or two before he stepped away from her. His expression was impossible to read as he did up his zip and tucked his shirt back into his trousers. Natalie felt a pang for the past—for a time when he would smile at her in a smouldering way, his arms holding her in the aftermath as if he never wanted to let her go.
She quickly suppressed that longing, however. She pushed her dress down and her chin up. ‘Was that playing dirty enough for you?’ she asked.
His dark, unreadable eyes held hers. ‘For now.’
She felt a delicious little aftershock of pleasure ripple through her as his gaze went to her mouth. Was he thinking of how she’d used to pleasure him with it? He had done the same to her; so many times she had lost count. There had been few boundaries when it had come to sex. She had learned how to enjoy her body with him, how not to feel ashamed of its needs and urges. He had opened up a wild, sensual world to her that she had not visited since.
She moved away from the wall, wincing slightly as her tender muscles protested.
His expression immediately clouded with concern. ‘Did I hurt you?’
‘I’m fine.’
He put a hand around her wrist, his fingers overlapping her slender bones, his thumb stroking along the sensitive skin. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I shouldn’t have taken things so fast. I should’ve taken my time with you, prepared you more.’
She gave him a nonchalant shrug and pulled out of his hold. ‘Save the romantic gestures for someone you didn’t have to pay for.’
A hard glitter came into his eyes. ‘Is this really how you want our relationship to run?’ he asked. ‘As a point-scoring exercise where we do nothing but attack each other?’
‘If you’re unhappy with how our relationship runs then you have only yourself to blame,’ she said. ‘You were the one who insisted on marriage. I told you I’m not cut out for it.’
‘I wanted to give you the honour of making you my wife,’ he said bitterly. ‘But clearly you’re much more comfortable with the role of a whore.’ He took out his wallet and peeled off a handful of notes. Stepping up to her, he stuffed them down the cleavage of her dress. ‘That should just about cover it.’
Natalie took the notes out and tore them into pieces, threw them at his feet. ‘You’ll need far more than that to get me to sleep with you again.’
‘You’re assuming, of course, that I would want to,’ he said. And, giving her a scathing look, he turned and left.
CHAPTER SEVEN (#ulink_3d259f05-fa5f-5eb4-b64b-9ac888ac805a)
NATALIE spent most of the day in her room. She heard Angelo moving about the villa but she refused to interact with him. She was determined to avoid him for as long as she could. Hunger was a minor inconvenience. Her stomach growled as the clock moved around but still she remained resolute.
It was close to eight in the evening when she heard the sound of footsteps outside her door, and then a light tap as Angelo spoke. ‘Natalie?’
‘Go away.’
‘Open the door.’
She tightened her arms across her body, where she was sitting cross-legged on the bed. ‘I said go away.’
‘If you don’t unlock this door I swear to God I’ll break it down with my bare hands,’ he said in a gritty tone.
Natalie weighed up her options and decided it was better not to call his bluff this time. She got off the bed, padded over to the door, turned the key and opened the door. ‘Yes?’ she said with a haughty air.
The lines that bracketed his mouth looked deeper and his eyes, though currently glittering with anger, looked tired. ‘Can we talk?’ he asked.
She stepped away from the door and moved to the other side of the room, folding her arms across her middle. She didn’t trust herself not to touch him. Her body had switched on like a high-wattage lightbulb as soon as he had stepped over the threshold. She could feel the slow burn of her desire for him moving through her. Her insides flickered with the memory of his possession. It was a funny sensation, like suddenly stepping on an uneven surface and feeling that rapid stomach-dropping free fall before restoring balance.
‘Are you all right?’ he asked.
She sent him a chilly look. ‘Fine, thank you.’
He drew in a long breath and then released it. ‘What happened this morning … I want to apologise. What I said to you was unforgivable.’
‘You’re right,’ she said, shooting him another deadly glare. ‘And, just for the record, I don’t forgive you.’
He pushed a hand through his hair. Judging from the disordered state of it, it wasn’t the first time that day he had done so. ‘I also want to apologise for being so rough with you.’ He swallowed tightly and frowned. ‘I thought … I don’t know what I thought. Maybe I didn’t think. I just wanted you.’ His eyes darkened as they held hers. ‘I have never wanted anyone like I want you.’
Natalie’s resolve began to melt with each pulsing second his eyes stayed meshed with hers. She felt the heat of longing pass between them like a secret code. It was there in his dark as night eyes. It was there in the sculptured contours of his mouth. It was there in the tall frame of his body, pulling her like a powerful magnet towards him. She felt the tug of need in her body; she felt it in her breasts, where they twitched and tingled behind her bra. And, God help her, she felt it rattle the steel cage around her heart.
‘Apology accepted,’ she said.
He came to her and gently cupped her right cheek in his hand, his eyes searching hers. ‘Can we start again?’ he asked.
She gave a little frown. ‘Start from where?’
His mouth curved upwards. ‘Hi, my name is Angelo Bellandini and I’m a hotel and property developer. I’m an only child of wealthy Italian parents. I help to run my father’s arm of the business while working on my own.’
She gave a resigned sigh. ‘Hi, my name is Natalie Armitage and I’m an interior designer, with an expanding sideline in bedlinen and soft furnishings.’ She chewed at her lip for a moment and added, ‘And I have a fear of flying …’
His thumb stroked her cheek. ‘How old were you when you first got scared?’
‘I was … seven …’
‘What happened?’
She slipped out of his hold and averted her gaze. ‘I’d rather not talk about it with a virtual stranger.’
‘I’m not a stranger,’ he said. ‘I’m your husband.’
‘Not by my choice,’ she muttered.
‘Don’t do this, Natalie.’
‘Don’t do what?’ she asked, glaring at him. ‘Tell it how it is? You blackmailed me back into your life. Now you want me to open up to you as if we’re suddenly inseparable soul mates. I’m not good at being open with people. I’ve never been good at it. I’m private and closed. It must be my Scottish heritage. We’re not outwardly passionate like you Italians. You’ll just have to accept that’s who I am.’
The touch of his hands on her shoulders made every cell of her skin flicker and dance in response.
‘You’re much more passionate than you give yourself credit for,’ he said. ‘I’ve got the scratch marks on my back to prove it.’
Natalie felt that passion stirring within her. His body was calling out to hers in a silent language that was as old as time itself. It spoke to her flesh, making it tauten and tingle all over in anticipation. She wished she had the strength or indeed the willpower to step back from his magnetic heat, but her body was on autopilot. She pressed closer, that delicious ache of need starting deep in her core.
His mouth came down towards hers as hers came up, and they met in an explosion of sensation that made the flesh on her body shudder in delight. He flooded her senses with his taste—mint and male, heat and primal purpose. His tongue darted and dived around hers, subjecting it to a teasing tango that made her spine shiver and shake like a string of bottle caps rattling against each other. Heat pooled between her legs as he moved against her, the thickened length of him exciting her unbearably. She rubbed against him wantonly, desperate for the earth-shattering release that he alone could give her.
He pulled back slightly, his breathing heavy. ‘Too fast.’
‘Not fast enough,’ she said and, pulling his head down, covered his mouth with her greedy one.
His hands worked on her clothes with deliberate attention to detail. She squirmed and writhed as he kissed every spot of flesh as he gradually exposed it. She tugged his shirt out of his trousers and with more haste than precision got him out of the rest of his clothes. She ran her hands over him reverentially. He was so strong and so lean, his muscles tightly corded, his skin satin smooth all but for the sprinkling of masculine hair that went from his chest in an arrow to his swollen groin. She stroked him with her hand, loving the feel of his reaction to her touch. She heard him snatch in a breath, his eyes glittering as she gave him a sultry look from beneath her lashes.
‘If you’re going to do what I think you’re about to do then this show is going to be over before it gets started,’ he warned.
She gave him a devil-may-care look and shimmied down in front of him. ‘Then I’ll just have to wait until the encore, won’t I?’
‘Dio mio,’ he groaned in ecstasy as she took him into her mouth.
She used her tongue and the moistness of her saliva to take him to the brink. She would have pushed him over, but he stopped her by placing his hands on either side of her head.
‘Enough,’ he growled, and hauled her to her feet.
He carried her to the bed, laying her down and covering her, with his weight supported by his arms to avoid crushing her. His mouth took hers in a searing kiss as his hand caressed her breasts and that aching secret dark place between her thighs.
