Miranda Lee - It Started With A Proposition - Blackmailed into the Italian's Bed / Contract with Consequences / The Passion Price

‘Ridiculous,’ he growled, his top lip curling at the sight of her. ‘Get them off. Get everything off!’

She might have done as he ordered if he hadn’t started undressing himself, tossing aside his black leather jacket and reefing the white T-shirt over his head in a flash.

The sudden baring of his chest kept her rooted to the spot, her heart thudding as her eyes washed over him. He was leaner than he had been ten years ago—leaner, yet still utterly gorgeous.

‘Do you want me to do it? Is that it?’ he asked as he unzipped his jeans and shoved them down, taking his underpants with them.

Jordan swallowed. ‘What?’

Gino shot her a frustrated glance before sitting down on the edge of the bed and yanking off his shoes and socks.

Once totally naked, he remained sitting there, his dark eyes narrowing as they travelled up and down her tautly held body.

‘You are thinner,’ he said.

‘So are you,’ she countered, desperate to find some strength to fight the wave of weakness which was washing through her. ‘And your hair’s shorter.’

‘Is yours?’

‘No.’

‘Then take it down.’

She just stood there, willing herself not to blindly obey him, as she once had.

His dark eyes glittered. ‘If you don’t, then I will.’

Jordan’s hands lifted to pull out the pins which anchored her French pleat, her hair spilling down over her shoulders.

‘Now come here,’ he said, and moved his knees apart, drawing her gaze to those parts of his body which she’d been trying not to stare at.

Jordan stiffened. What did he want her to do?

‘Put your right foot up here,’ he said, patting a small area of the bed in front of him.

Relief loosened her frozen muscles, and she moved forward to do as he suggested.

He slipped off her shoe and tossed it aside, then peeled the short stocking down her leg, his fingers caressing her calf as he did so. Then her ankle, and then the sensitive sole of her foot.

‘Mmm,’ he said, once her leg was bare. ‘Cream nail polish on your fingers, scarlet red on your toes. I wonder if your work colleagues know the real you, Jordan? The other foot, please.’

‘And who is the real me?’ she said, struggling to keep her voice steady whilst he gave the other foot the same erotic treatment.

‘You’re a closet exhibitionist. And a sensualist.’

Jordan grimaced when he pulled her foot towards him, pressing her toes into him.

‘Rub your foot up and down on me,’ he said.

When she did, a raw groan broke from his lips.

‘You see?’ he said, grabbing her ankle and depositing her by then unsteady foot back on the floor.

She saw nothing, her mind having tipped from reality into that wildly erotic, heart-pounding world where desire ruled and pleasure beckoned.

‘Come closer,’ he commanded.

When she did, he dragged her panties down to her ankles, then bent forward to kiss her stomach.

Jordan’s belly tightened under his lips, her hands lifting to rake through his hair. She groaned when he swirled his tongue in her navel, gasped when his hands slid between her legs, whimpered when his fingers slipped inside her…

His head suddenly lifted from her stomach. ‘Don’t let go yet,’ he warned her, even whilst he continued the most intimate exploration of her body.

‘Oh, God, Gino. I can’t. I…Please…Please…’

‘Now you are the impatient one. I like that. Would you like me inside you now? Tell me how much. Tell me,’ he urged, his eyes like shining black coals as they gazed up at her.

‘Stop tormenting me,’ she cried.

‘But I find I am enjoying it. It makes me feel good to see you this desperate for me.’

‘Just do it, for pity’s sake!’

She was on the bed and under him before she could utter another word. He hooked her ankles over his shoulders, then drove into her. Deep.

‘Is this what you wanted?’ he muttered as he pounded into her.

‘Yes,’ she panted. ‘Yes.’

‘You can come now,’ he growled, just as she splintered apart in an orgasm which blew her mind even further than it was already.

Dimly, she heard him cry out, her senses no longer her own. She was lost, drowning in the heady sensation of his hot seed flooding her womb, exulting in the feel of his flesh pulsating in a rapturous tandem with her own.

It wasn’t till some time afterwards, when their bodies had finally become as quiet as the room, that Jordan’s brain kicked back into gear, her stomach somersaulting at the realisation that Gino hadn’t used any protection.

Not that this was a total disaster. She was on the pill. But her own lack of thought in that regard—and, more to the point, his—was a real worry.

‘Gino,’ she said, her hands pushing at his shoulders.

‘Yes, yes, I know. I’m heavy.’

‘It’s not that. I was just thinking…you…you didn’t use a condom.’

He levered himself up onto his elbows and stared down at her.

‘Are you saying I could have made you pregnant just now?’

‘No. Pregnancy’s not my concern. I’m on the pill.’

‘I promise you I’m no risk to your health,’ Gino reassured her. ‘Look, are you hungry? I am.’

‘I’m starving,’ she confessed.

‘The Room Service menu’s over there, on that desk. In a leather folder. Check it out while I go run us both a bath.’

‘Wait,’ she said. ‘I need to go to the loo first.’

‘I’m not stopping you.’

‘But I don’t—’ She broke off, thinking how she would have died rather than go to the bathroom in front of Chad. Yet when she’d lived with Gino they’d hidden nothing from each other.

But she wasn’t living with Gino any more, came the timely reminder. She was living by herself. An independent, grown-up woman who liked her privacy.

‘I’m sorry, Gino, but I’d prefer to use the bathroom alone.’

He stared at her in surprise, then shrugged. ‘Whatever.’

Jordan hurried, feeling slightly silly at her stance. She’d just let him touch her in very private places, let him strip her and have sex with her. Let him see her come.

Now she had suddenly gone all shy and precious with him. It seemed they couldn’t exactly take up where they’d left off after all. Ten years had gone by. She’d changed, even if he hadn’t.

Gino was waiting outside the bathroom door, totally naked, whilst she’d drawn on one of the hotel’s bathrobes.

‘All yours,’ she said, and bolted past him, not wanting to start staring again.

The Room Service menu was where he’d said it was.

And so was a plane ticket, lying next to it on the desk.

Jordan stared at it for a long moment.

Then she picked it up.

GINO found himself humming as he watched the tub fill, the bath gel having turned the water a pale green as well as providing some fragrant bubbles.

For the first time in years he felt light-hearted. And happy.

All because he’d found Jordan again.

It was as if the last ten years had been wiped away. He felt young again, and invincible. Jordan was still his woman—had been since the first day he’d set eyes on her.

She’d been working as a waitress back then, at an Italian restaurant not far from Sydney University, just across the road from the building site where Gino had been employed.

Although he’d been trying to opt out of everything Italian at that particular time in his life, the mouthwatering smell of his favourite pasta dishes had kept beckoning, and he’d finally given in to temptation and gone there for an evening meal.

Fate had sat him down at one of Jordan’s tables.

The sexual chemistry between them had been instant and electric. He’d stayed on, eating more than he needed, just so he could keep talking to the beautiful blonde waitress who hadn’t been able to take her eyes off him any more than he could her. He’d openly flirted with her, and she’d served him with a degree of attention which Gino had found both telling and seductive.