Elizabeth Power - Blackmailed For Her Baby

Confusion registered in her emerald eyes as he steeled himself to draw away from her. What was he thinking of? Could he not do without this added complication right now?

‘Since it was your clear intention to wind up in someone’s bed tonight,’ he none the less felt compelled to taunt softly, ‘perhaps you should make it mine? I can give you pleasure if that’s what you’re so hungry for, Libby. And I think I can guarantee you more satisfaction than you’d have found in the arms of that drunken lout who was here just now.’

Libby couldn’t move—couldn’t think—aware only of one long, tanned finger making light, sensuous circles over her bare shoulder and the tap, dribbling into the sink, that someone must have used and neglected to turn off properly.

All she could focus on was what Romano—her late husband’s brother and the man she despised—was suggesting, while her brain made unwilling comparisons with the man who had been there earlier. Romano Vincenzo wouldn’t force himself on a woman the way Steve Cullum had. He wouldn’t need to. He would be subtle, using his voice and his lips and hands with such articulated skill…

Reminding herself again of just who he was, head dropping back against the doorjamb, she was determined not to let him see how much his suggestion had fazed her. Heart pounding in her breast, her temples throbbing from her headache and her outlandish response to him, somehow she managed to query pointedly, ‘Are you propositioning me?’

His smile was without warmth. ‘And wind up in the same bitter-sweet trap as my brother?’

So he wasn’t. He was only playing with her, she realised. Weighing her reactions—which had probably been behind the reason for that kiss—just to see how easily he could get his brother’s scheming little widow into his bed! And she had fallen into his trap! Even if he had been more than a little out of control himself. Those black eyes still glinted with hot primal desire, yet behind it burned open hostility too.

With a surprising degree of force she pushed at the arm that was blocking the doorway and got herself out of his disturbing sphere, catching his soft laughter as she wrestled with the fact that even touching him like that gave her a whole host of unwelcome responses to deal with.

‘We’ll leave the day after tomorrow.’

His change of subject was so abrupt that it unbalanced her for a moment, shaken as she was from the shaming way she had responded in his arms.

‘What?’ Swinging to face him, she couldn’t stop herself wondering what woman wouldn’t fall victim to his dark attraction. Even now his stark masculinity was making her stomach muscles curl like brittle leaves.

‘I gathered from that comment you made about ringing me that you have decided to heed my request and come back with me. Or am I being naïve in presuming that you’ve even allowed it any headroom with so much else going on in your life?’

An angry retort sprang to her lips, but wisely she bit it back. It would have been futile anyway, she told herself on a frustrated little sigh.

Wearily she said, ‘Yes, I’m coming.’

‘Good.’ He strode away from her, turning in the doorway to assess her; her bright, dishevelled hair, the dark half-moons under her emotion-strained eyes and her cheeks, which she knew were flushed from more than just a pounding headache. ‘Get a couple of good nights’ sleep. I wouldn’t want my nephew to see any remaining traces of the good-time girl in his mother.’

Tight-lipped, Libby swung away from him, her arms clutched tensely around herself to stem the urge to hit him rather than take any more of his jibes.

‘And cara…’ the endearment was so out of character at that moment and so sexily soft, she thought she was imagining it as she turned round with her arms still locked around her and met the cruel mockery on his lips. ‘…turn off that tap.’

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