Baby By Accident(55)
Silence descended. A hard, tense silence.
“I won’t lie to you,” she finally muttered. “Not again.”
Her words barely registered over the flow of lost hope gutting the inside of him. Not until he felt her hand on his shoulder did he return to the room, to reality. Her light touch made him shudder, then stiffen. The sexual tie he’d assumed lay between them had been cut. Even now, though, he felt it, felt the strands of lust wrap around his every muscle, tighten around his lungs, jerk him into instant arousal.
But it was only him. Only him who experienced the sticky strands of the connection.
“It was mutual.” Her words were soft, quiet. Halting. As if she had to pull them out from a secret place deep inside her where he’d never been allowed.
Their effect was electric. Jerking around, he stared into her uplifted face. For a moment, he caught something, some emotion…wistfulness? Wanting?
In a flash, though, she dropped her hand from his body, stepped away, lowering her head so her fair hair covered her face.
“No.” Hope bounded forward from despondency and Vico acted with reckless intent. Before she could move any farther away from him, he held her fast in his arms. Her body stiffened, but he still felt the hum between them, the warmth of need and passion lying so close to the surface, only needing one act, one touch to be released.
He hadn’t been wrong. His dreams hadn’t been nightmares.
She’d wanted him then. And Dio, she wanted him now.
His mia dolce lifted her head. “Let me go.”
“Impossible.”
Her mouth was firm in rejection, yet within seconds it slackened under his heated command. She tasted of mint and myrrh, a cool, bitter blending of spices designed to burn into his memory and his body like a brand. Tangling her tongue with his, she let the honey taste of her flood into his soul, a dangerous mix of woman and welcome.
He staggered back, leaning on the hot glass of the window.
“Sognavo di te.” His admission of the endless dreams of her whispered on her cheeks and neck as he tasted the salt of her skin, breathed in the warm scent of lavender wrapping him with her presence.
His woman’s body was plastered so close to his he felt the beat of her heart. The beat matched the drum of his own and melded with the thumping drive of his lust pouring through his veins. Sweat broke out on his skin, sliding down his back and sides.
“Vico.” Her hands sifted through his hair, tugging him closer.
She kissed him.
She kissed him.
She initiated a kiss with him.
His soul swelled into an overflow of hot, turgid, racing sweetness. There was no way he would ever get enough of her mouth on his, her tongue on his lips, her taste on his own.
Touch. He had to touch her. Everywhere.
There was no longer any need to hold her to him. His wife leaned on him, burrowing into him like a fiery missile of need. She gave him what he wanted. The opportunity to sweep his searching hands down her elegant back, across her rounded hips, down to her perfect bottom. He used the chance well. Lifting her, he pressed her into the part of him which yelled and screamed for her every moment of the day and every second of the night.
She groaned. A husky, womanly plea.
For him.
His spirit soared. Over and under and through him. It leapt in delight and reeled in hope.
“Vico.” Her lips moved along his roughened jaw, sipped on his neck, tickled his ears.
Lust growled its approval as he lifted her into his arms. He looked wildly around for a place, any place. The leather couch was the best bet, his scrambled brain said. Too far, his body bellowed.
She landed on the desk. Her hair splayed out around her dazed, glazed face in a fan of blonde and white strands. How had her hair suddenly acquired the beauty and lushness of Paris? Her face was flushed and warm, her skin glowing with Parisian health. Her eyes no longer carried the studied frost of the past two weeks. Instead, they were pure blue, a shining blaze of joy.
Her arms rose, beckoning.
For him.
The heart, the damaged heart inside of him managed to keep pounding, keep pumping. However, it was surely ten times the size it had been mere moments ago. Surely. Vico leaned down and kissed her. Her slender hands moved along his sweating neck and tangled her elegant fingers into the long, dark curls falling around them as they came together.
His own fingers were clumsy and klutzy as he tried to finesse the pearl buttons on her shirt. He needed more skin, more of her to kiss and touch. She chuckled at his attempt, the warmth of her breath caressing his mouth.
“Let me,” she murmured.
Pushing himself off her, he stood, shivering with need as she slowly unbuttoned her blouse, revealing a pretty lace bra by slow, tortuous steps. The primitive male inside him urged him to rip and raid. Yet he managed to stifle it, forced himself to relish the moment she gave herself to him.