Margaret Mayo - His Virgin Bride - The Fiorenza Forced Marriage / Bought - For His Convenience or Pleasure? / A Night With Consequences

‘No.’

‘Pity,’ he said. ‘I think we could be dynamite together. Fire meets ice, that sort of thing.’

‘I think any woman with half a brain would give you a wide berth,’ she said. ‘You won’t commit, you’re incapable of falling in love and you don’t want kids. For the thinking woman you’re a very bad deal, Rafaele.’

He gave her a bone-melting smile. ‘But I make up for it in other ways. Even thinking women like hot sex, do they not?’

Emma hated that she blushed so readily. ‘I can’t speak for other women, but personally I would rather share my body with a man who treats me as an equal, not as a sex object.’

‘I do not see you as a sex object, Emma. I just think we could be really good together.’

‘Oh, yes, but for how long?’

He gave a could-mean-anything shrug. ‘I am not one for setting time limits,’ he said. ‘Physical attraction has its own timetable.’

‘Yes, but in your case it lasts about as long as the life cycle of a flea,’ she said. ‘Or maybe even a gnat.’

He gave a low chuckle of laughter. ‘You are so damned cute. I bet you do not even know how long a gnat’s life cycle is.’

Emma tried to purse her lips, but somehow it ended in a lopsided smile. ‘You’re incorrigible. You really are.’

He picked up her hand again and brushed his lips over the back of her knuckles, his dark-as-midnight gaze holding hers. ‘But you like me anyway, right, mio piccolo ?’

Emma didn’t answer but the words seemed to ring in the silence all the same: I like you. I like you too much .

CHAPTER SEVEN

THE drive back to The Villa Fiorenza took only a few minutes, but Emma suddenly found she didn’t want the evening to be over. Rafaele had relaxed over dessert and coffee, chatting to her about his work as a share trader, telling her some amusing anecdotes about some of the people he’d met and the places he’d visited. She knew she was being a fool for letting her guard down around him, but for some reason the cold breath of common sense couldn’t seem to penetrate the warm mantle of complacency that had settled around her in his company.

As he led the way to the front door of the grand old house Emma could smell the pungent clove-like scent of night stocks from the massive herbaceous border running along one side of the property. The purple and white pendulous blooms of sweetly scented wisteria hung in a fragrant arras from the trellis on one of the walls, and the melodious twinkle of the wind chimes hanging in the summer house carried over the garden on the slight breeze, setting an atmosphere that was as intoxicating as a mind-altering drug.

‘Why don’t we take a nightcap out to the arbour?’ Rafaele said once they were inside. ‘It is too nice a night to be indoors.’

‘That sounds lovely,’ Emma said, wondering if he had somehow read her mind. She had been thinking how nice it would be to sit out in the garden, breathing in the fragrant air and looking up at the peepholes of stars and planets in the dark blue blanket of the sky.

A few minutes later she followed him out to the summer house, minus her heels, the soft, slightly damp carpet of the springy lawn tickling the soles of her bare feet.

Rafaele handed her a cognac and patted the swing seat beside him. ‘You look like a nymph or a sprite,’ he said with a smile.

Emma returned his smile with a warm one of her own. ‘I love nights like this,’ she said, curling her toes as she sat on the seat next to him. ‘I love the sounds and smells of a garden late at night. It’s like another world out here.’

He placed his foot against the frame of the arched doorway to set the swing in motion. The gentle rocking motion brought their bodies closer together on the seat. Emma could feel the strong length of his thigh within a breath of her own, her shoulder brushing against his upper arm. Her skin tingled as he laid his left arm over the back of the seat, his fingers within touching distance of the nape of her neck. It would be so easy to turn and face him, to reach up and stroke her fingers over the lean planes and angles of his face, to explore the contours of his sensual mouth.

‘You have not touched your cognac,’ he said, looking at the glass she was cradling in her hands.

‘I haven’t got much of a head for alcohol,’ Emma confessed. ‘The wine we had at dinner has already addled my brain.’ And my common sense , she thought wryly as she placed her untouched glass on the nearest ledge.

The long silence was measured by the sound of crickets chirruping in the background, the soft plop of a frog landing in the lily pond sounding like a distant gunshot.

Rafaele turned to look at her. ‘Did you ever bring my father out here?’ he asked.

Emma couldn’t read his expression, his face was in shadow, but she sensed tension in the question. ‘Yes…a couple of times,’ she answered. ‘He found it peaceful and the fresh air was good for him after being confined indoors for so long.’

Another silence slipped past.

In spite of the darkness Emma could feel the slow burn of his gaze as it held hers. ‘What are you thinking about, Emma?’ he asked.

She self-consciously tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear. ‘I was thinking how we’re probably going to be eaten alive by mosquitoes,’ she said with a rueful tilt of her mouth.

The white slash of his smile cut across his shadowed face. ‘Or what about gnats?’

She screwed up her mouth at him. ‘Do gnats bite?’

‘I am not sure,’ he said as he set his glass to one side before turning back to face her.

Emma sat very still as he lifted his hand to her face, his index finger tracing over the curve of her top lip. She couldn’t breathe; she couldn’t even speak, so mesmerising was his feather-light touch. She watched as in slow motion his head came down, his mouth so close she could feel the warmth of his breath skating over her lips. She sucked in a sharp little breath as his lips pressed against hers, once, twice, and then the third time with increasing pressure.

His mouth was like a brand, searing her lips with the imprint of his, stirring her senses into a frenzy of heady excitement. The first slow and yet determined stroke of his tongue against the seam of her lips sent her pulse skyrocketing, the rasp of his masculine jaw with its stubbly growth against the tender skin of her face making her feel utterly feminine in a way she had never felt before.

He explored every corner of her mouth in a leisurely fashion, the drugging movements of his mouth on hers making her forget all about her reasons for not getting involved with him. Desire began to pulse hot and strong in her veins with each thrust of his tongue against hers, the erotic promise in his kiss unmistakable.

His teeth nibbled at the fullness of her bottom lip in tiny, tantalising tug-and-release bites that made her legs turn to water. Her feminine core melted, she could feel the dew of desire anointing her intimately, her breasts swollen and aching for the attention of his hands and lips and tongue.

He pulled her to her feet, her legs hardly able to keep her upright as his mouth lifted off hers to blaze a fiery trail of kisses along the sensitive skin of her neck, each hot blast of his breath inciting her need of him to fever pitch. She was melting in his arms, discovering a passionate facet to her personality she would never have believed had existed until now. Where was her self-control? Where was her level-headedness and cool composure? They seemed to have been swept up in the conflagration of her senses under the sensual mastery of his touch.

His lower body ground against hers, leaving her in no doubt of his arousal. It was thick and hard against her, making her body tremble all over with a clawing need for fulfilment.