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A black frown scored his hard features at her mocking tone. ‘I thought a few home truths at this point will help to keep this relationship honest.’
‘Honest?’ Natasha almost hyperventilated on the breath she took. ‘What you’re really doing here is letting me know that you expect to control even my thoughts!’
Impatience hit his eyes. ‘I do not expect that—’
‘You do expect that!’
Leo raked out an angry sigh. ‘I will not have Rico’s name thrown in my face by you every five minutes!’
Natasha swung round on him in full choking fury. ‘I did not throw his name at you—you battered me with it!’
‘That was not my intention,’ he returned stiffly.
Twisting on the seat, she glared at the glazed partition. ‘You’re no better than Rico, just different than Rico in the way you treat people—women!’ she shook out with a withering glance across the width of the seat. ‘Since we are driving along here like a presidential cavalcade, your loathsome arrogance is one fault I will let you have, but your—’
‘Loathsome—again?’ he mocked lazily.
It blew the lid off what was left of her temper. ‘And utterly, pathetically jealous of Rico!’
Silence clattered down all around them with the same effect as crashing cymbals hitting the crescendo note and making Natasha’s heart begin to race. She could not believe she had just said that. Daring another glance at Leo, she could see him looking back at her like a man-eating shark about to go on the attack, and now she couldn’t even breathe because the tension between them was sucking what was left of the oxygen out of the luxury confines of the car.
He reacted with a lightning strike. For such a big man he moved with a lithe, silent stealth and the next thing she knew she was being hauled through the space separating them to land in an inelegant sprawl of body and limbs across his lap. Their eyes clashed, his glittering with golden sparks of anger she hadn’t seen in them before. Hers were too wide and too blue and—scared of what was suddenly fizzing in her blood.
She had to lick her suddenly very dry lips just to manage a husky, ‘I didn’t really m-mean—’
Then came the kiss—the hot and passionate ambush that silenced her attempt to retract what she’d said, and flung her instead into fight with lips and tongues and hands that did not know how to stay still. His breath seared her mouth and a set of long fingers was clamped to the rounded shape of her hip, her own fingers applying digging pressure to whatever part of his anatomy they could reach as their mouths strained and fought. The motion of the car and the fact that they were even in one became lost in the uneven fight. She wriggled against him. His hand maintained its controlling clamp. She felt her fingernails clawing at his nape and the rock-solid moulding of his chest so firmly imprinted against his shirt.
He loved it. She caught his tense hiss of pleasure in her mouth and felt a tight, pleasurable shudder attack his front, the powerful surge of his response making itself felt against the thigh he held pressed into his lap. Then his hand was sliding beneath her skirt and stroking the pale skin at the top of her thigh where her stockings did not reach. If he stroked any higher, he was going to discover that she was wearing a thong and she increased her struggle to get free before he reached there, lost the fight, and a quiver of agonising embarrassment sent her kiss-fighting mouth very still.
‘Well, what do we have here?’ he paused to murmur slowly, long fingers stroking over a smoothly rounded, satin-skinned buttock and crippling Natasha’s ability to breathe. ‘The prim disguise is really beginning to wear very thin the more I dig beneath it.’
‘Shut up,’ she choked, eyes squeezed tight shut now. She was never going to wear a thong ever again, she vowed hectically.
He removed his hand and her eyes shot open because she needed to know what he was going to do next, and found herself staring into his mockingly smiling face. The anger had gone and his lazily, sensual male confidence was firmly back in place.
‘Any more hidden treasures left for me to discover?’ He arched a sleek, dark, quizzing eyebrow.
‘No,’ Natasha mumbled, which made him release a dark, husky laugh that shimmered right through her as potently as everything else about him did.
Then he wasn’t smiling. ‘OK, so I am jealous of Rico where you are concerned.’ He really shocked her by admitting it. ‘So take my advice and don’t bring him into our bed or I will not be responsible for the way I react.’
Before she could respond to that totally unexpected back-down, he was lowering his head again and crushing her mouth. How long this kiss went on Natasha had no idea, because she just lost herself in the warm, slow, heady promise it was offering.
The car began to slow.
Both felt the change in speed but it was Leo who broke away and with a sigh lifted her from him to place her back on the seat. Lounging back into the corner of the car, he then watched the way she concentrated on trying to tidy herself, shaky fingers checking buttons and pulling her skirt into place across her knees.
‘Miss Prim.’ He laughed softly.
Lifting her fingers to smooth her hair, Natasha said nothing, a troubled frown toying with her brow now because she just could not understand how she could fall victim to his kisses as thoroughly as she did.
‘It’s called sexual attraction, pethi mou,’ Leo explained, reading her thoughts as if he owned them now.
Her profile held Leo’s attention as it turned a gentle pink. If he did not know otherwise, he would swear that Natasha Moyles was an absolute novice when it came to sexual foreplay. She ran from cold to hot to shy and dignified. She was not coquettish. She did not flirt or invite. She appeared to have no idea what she did to him yet she was so acutely receptive to anything that he did to her.
And she made him ache just to sit here looking at her. It was not an unpleasant condition; in fact, it had been so many years since he’d felt this sexually switched on to a woman, he’d believed he had lost the capacity to feel anything quite this intense.
Gianna had done that to him, scraped him dry of so many feelings and turned him into an emotional cynic. But his ex-wife was not someone he wanted to be thinking of right now, he told himself as he focused his attention back on this woman who was keeping his senses on edge just by sitting here next to him.
‘We have arrived,’ he murmured, using the information like yet another sexual promise to taunt her with, then watched her slender spine grow tense as she glanced beyond the car’s tinted glass to catch sight of the twin iron gates that guarded the entrance to his property.
Natasha stared at the gates as they slid apart to their approach. All three cars swept smoothly through them, then two cars veered off to the left almost immediately while theirs made a direct line for the front of his white-painted, three-storey villa.
Rasmus was out of the car and opening Leo’s door the moment the car pulled to a stop at the bottom of the curving front steps. Leo climbed out, ruefully aware that his legs didn’t feel like holding him up. Desire was a gnawing, debilitating ache once it buried its teeth in you, he mused ruefully as he turned to watch his driver open the other passenger door so the object of his desire could step out of the car.
She gazed across the top of the car up at his villa with its modern curving frontage built to follow the shape of the white marbled steps. Light spilled out of curving-glass windows offset in three tiers framed by white terrace rails.
‘I live at the top,’ he said. ‘The guest suites cover the middle floor. My staff have the run of the ground floor… what do you think?’
‘Very ocean-going liner,’ Natasha murmured.
Leo smiled. ‘That was the idea.’
Rasmus shifted his bulk beside him then, reminding Leo that he was there. Leo glanced at him, that was all, and both Rasmus and the driver climbed back in the car and firmly shut the doors. Then the car moved away, leaving Leo and Natasha facing each other across its now-empty space. It was hot and it was dark but the light from the building lit up the two of them and the exotic scent of summer jasmine hung heavy in the air.
Natasha watched as Leo ran his eyes over her suit and the bag she once again clutched to her front. He didn’t even need to say what he was thinking any more, he just smiled and she knew exactly what was going through his head. He was letting her know how much he was looking forward to stripping her of everything she liked to hide behind.
And the worst part about it was that her insides feathered soft rushes of excitement across intimate muscles in expectant response.
When he held out his hand in a silent command that she go to him, Natasha found herself closing the gap between them as if pulled across it by strings.
CHAPTER FIVE
NO MAN had a right to be as overwhelmingly masculine as Leo did, Natasha thought as the feathering sensation increased as she walked. With his superior height, the undeniable power locked into his long, muscled body and that bump on his nose, which announced without apology that there was a real tough guy hiding inside his expensively sleek billionaire’s clothes.
He turned towards the house as she reached him, the outstretched hand becoming a strong, muscled arm he placed across her back, long fingers curling lightly against her ribcage just below the thrust of her breasts.
Antagonism at his confident manner began dancing through her bloodstream—fed by a fizzing sense of anticipation that held her breath tight in her lungs. Walking beside him made Natasha feel very small suddenly, fragile, so intensely aware of each curve, each small nuance of her own body that it was as close as she’d ever come to experiencing the truly erogenous side of desire.
Inside, the villa was a spectacular example of modern architecture, but Natasha didn’t see it. She was too busy absorbing the tingling sensations created by each step she took as they walked towards a waiting lift.
Once she stepped into it she would be lost and she knew it.
So that first step into the lift’s confines felt the same to her as stepping off the edge of a cliff. The doors closed behind them. She watched one of Leo’s hands reach out to touch a button that sent the lift gliding smoothly up. He still kept her close to him, and she kept her eyes carefully lowered, unwilling to let him see what was going on inside her head. The lift doors slid open giving them access into a vast reception hallway filled with soft light.
The very last thing Natasha wanted to see was another human being standing there waiting to greet them. It interfered with the vibrations passing between the two of them and brought her sinking back to a saner sense of self.
‘Kalispera, Bernice,’ Leo greeted smoothly, his hand arriving at Natasha’s elbow to steady her shocked little backwards step.
‘Good evening, kirios—thespinis,’ the stocky, dark housekeeper turned to greet Natasha in heavy, accented English. ‘You have the pleasant flight?’
‘I—yes, thank you,’ Natasha murmured politely, surprised that she seemed to be expected, then blushing when she realised just what that meant.
Bernice turned back to Leo. ‘Kiria Christakis has been ringing,’ she informed him.
‘Kiria Angelina?’ Leo questioned.
‘Okhi…’ Bernice switched languages, leaving Natasha to surmise that her ex-future mother-in-law had left a long message to relay her shock and distress, going by the urgency of Bernice’s tone.
‘My apologies, agape mou, but I need a few minutes to deal with this.’ Leo turned to Natasha. ‘Bernice will show you where you can freshen up.’
His expression was grim and impatient. And despite his apology he did not hang around long enough for Natasha to answer before he was turning to stride across the foyer, leaving her staring after him.
‘Leo…?’ Calling his name brought him to an abrupt standstill.
‘Yes?’ He did not turn around.
Natasha was tensely aware of Bernice standing beside her. ‘W-will you tell your stepmother for me, please, that I am truly sorry ab-about the way that—things have worked out?’
His silent hesitation lasted longer than Natasha’s instincts wanted to allow for. Beside her, Bernice shifted slightly and lowered her head to stare down at the floor.
‘I l-like Angelina,’ she rushed on, wondering if she’d made some terrible faux pas in Greek family custom by speaking out about personal matters in front of the paid staff. ‘None of what happened was her fault and I know she m-must be disappointed and upset.’
Still, he hesitated, and this time Natasha felt that hesitation prickle right down to her toes.
Then he gave a curt nod. ‘I will pass on your message.’ He strode on, leaving her standing there feeling…
‘This way, thespinis…’
Feeling what? she asked herself helplessly as Bernice claimed her attention, indicating that she follow her into a wide, softly lit hallway that led off the foyer.
Bernice showed her into beautiful bedroom suite with yet more soft light spilling over a huge divan bed made up with crisp white linen. Dragging her eyes away from it, Natasha stared instead at a spectacular curving wall of glass back-dropped by an endless satin dark sky.
Bernice was talking to her in her stilted English, telling her where the bathroom was and that her luggage would arrive very soon.
Luggage, Natasha thought as the housekeeper finally left her alone. Did one hastily packed canvas holdall classify as luggage?
Dear God, how did I get to be standing here in a virtual stranger’s bedroom, waiting for my luggage? she then mocked herself, and wasn’t surprised when her gaze slid back to that huge divan bed, then flicked quickly away again before her imagination could conjure up an image of what they were going to be doing there soon.
Heart thumping too heavily in her chest, Natasha sent her restless eyes on a scan of the remainder of her spacious surroundings, which bore no resemblance at all to Leo’s very traditional Victorian London home. Here, cool white dominated with bold splashes of colour in the bright modern abstracts hanging from the walls and the jewel-blue cover she’d spied draped across the end of the bed.
Needing to do something—anything—to occupy her attention if she didn’t want to suffer a mad panic attack, she walked over to the curved wall of glass with the intention of checking out the view beyond it, but the glass took her by surprise when it started to open, parting in the middle with a smooth silent glide—activated, she guessed, by her body moving in line with a hidden sensor.
Stepping out of air-controlled coolness into stifling heat caught her breath for a second, then she was dropping her purse onto the nearest surface, which happened to be one of the several white rattan tables and chairs spread around out there, and she was being drawn across the floor’s varnished wood surface towards the twinkle of lights she could see beyond the white terrace railing, while still trying to push back the nervous flutters attacking her insides along with the deep sinking knowledge that she really should not be doing this.
A city of lights suddenly lay spread out beneath her, looking so glitteringly spectacular Natasha momentarily forgot her worries as she caught her breath once more. She’d been aware that they’d climbed up out of the city on the journey here from the airport, but she had not realised they’d climbed as high as this.
‘Welcome to Athens,’ a smooth, dark, warm velvet voice murmured lightly from somewhere behind her.
She hadn’t heard him come into the bedroom, and now tension locked her slender shoulders as she listened to his footsteps bring him towards her.
‘So, what do you think?’
His hands slid around her waist to draw her against him. ‘Fabulous,’ she offered, trying hard to sound calm when they both knew she wasn’t by the way she grew taut at his closeness. ‘Is—is that the Acropolis I can see lit up over there?’
A slender hand pointed out across the city. When she lowered it again, she found it caught by one of his.
‘With the told quarters of Monastiraki and the Plaka below it,’ he confirmed, taking her hand and laying it against her fluttering stomach, then keeping it there with the warm clasp of his. ‘Over there you can see Zappeion Megaron lit up, which stands in our National Gardens, and that way—’ he pointed with his other hand ‘—Syntagma Square…’
The whole thing turned a bit surreal from then on as Natasha stood listening to his quietly melodic voice describing the night view of Athens as if there were no sexual undercurrents busily at work. But those undercurrents were at work, like the tingling warmth of his body heat and the power of his masculine physicality as he pressed her back against him. She felt wrapped in him, trapped, surrounded and overwhelmed by a pulse-chasing vibration of intimacy that danced along her nerve-ends and fought with her need to breathe.
‘It is very dark with no moon tonight but can you see the Aegean in the distance lit by the lights from the port of Piraeus.’ She had to fight with herself to keep tuned into what he was saying. ‘After Bernice has served our dinner I will show you the view from the other terrace, but first I would like you to explain to me, pethi mou, what has changed in the last five minutes to scare you into the shakes?’
‘Leo…’ Impulsive, she seized the moment. ‘I can’t go through with this. I thought I could but I can’t.’ Slipping her hand out from beneath his, she turned to face him, ‘I need you to understand that this…’
Her words dried up when she found herself staring at his white-shirted front. He’d taken off his jacket and his tie had gone, the top couple of buttons on his shirt tugged open to reveal a bronzed V of warm skin and a deeply unsettling hint of curling black chest hair.
The air snagged in her chest, the important words—this will be my first time—lost in the new struggle she had with herself as her senses clamoured inside her like hungry beasts. She wanted him. She did not understand why or how she had become this attracted or so susceptible to him but it was there, dragging down on her stomach muscles and coiling around never before awakened erogenous zones.
‘We have a deal, Natasha,’ his level voice reminded her.
A deal. Pressing her trembling lips together, she nodded. ‘I know and I’m s-sorry but—’ Oh, God. She had to look away from him so she could finish. ‘This is too m-much, too quickly and I…’
‘And you believe I am about show my lack of finesse by jumping all over you and carrying you off to bed?’
‘Yes—n-no.’ His sardonic tone locked a frown to her brow.
‘Then what do you expect will happen next?’
‘Do you have to sound so casual about it?’ she snapped out, taking a step back so her lower spine hit the terrace rail. Discomforted and disturbed by the whole situation, she wrapped her arms across her front. ‘You might prefer to believe that I do this kind of thing on a regular basis, but I don’t.’
‘Ah,’ he drawled. ‘But you think that I do.’
‘No!’ she denied, flashing a glare up at him, then wished she hadn’t when she saw the cynically amused cut to his mouth. ‘I don’t think that.’
‘Good. Thank you,’ he added dryly.
‘I don’t know enough about you to know how you run your private life!’
‘Just as I know little about your private life,’ he pointed out. ‘So we will agree to agree that neither of us is without sexual experience and therefore can be sophisticated enough to acknowledge that we desire each other—with or without the deal we have struck.’
‘But I haven’t,’ she mumbled.
‘Haven’t—what?’ he sighed out.
Too embarrassed to look at him, cheeks flushed, Natasha stared at her feet. ‘Any sexual experience.’
There was one of those short, sharp silences, in which Natasha sucked on her lower lip. Then Leo released another sigh and this one kept on going until it had wrung itself out.
