Not Just the Boss's Plaything(54)

Nothing at all.

Her lips had enchanted him, full and slick against his. And that lithe    body, those sensual curves, the spellbinding slide of her against him.    He was hard again, remembering it, as if he was still on that dark  city   street three years ago instead of in a chilly Milan night, here,  now.   And that treacherous heart he'd thought he'd trained to know  better beat   out a rhythm that made him question things he shouldn't.  Made him want   so hard, so deep, it began to feel more like need. He  bit out a   blistering Spanish curse that had no discernible effect at  all, and   rubbed his hands over his face.

Whatever this was, whatever terrible madness that was taking him over against his will and beyond his control, it had to stop.

Madre de Dios, but it had to.

* * *

Dru shivered as the cold air hit her, pulling her wrap tighter around    her and wishing she'd dressed for bed in something more substantial than    the champagne-colored silk pajamas the presidential suite's dedicated    butler had produced along with the outfit she'd worn at the dinner.    She'd been trying to sleep for hours. She'd been lying in her bedroom,    glowering at all its opulence as if the gold-and-cream Empire-style    chairs or gilt-edged scarlet chaise were to blame for her predicament.

Why had she given in to him? Why had she agreed to work through the two    weeks he'd demanded? It had been two days since she'd backed down and    she still couldn't answer herself. Not satisfactorily. Not in any way    that didn't make her hate herself more. Finally, she'd given up, and    decided to take in some fresh air.

Outside, the night was damp. The overcast sky made the darkness feel    fuller, somehow, while the city lights twinkled softly all around. It    was beautiful. Like everything Cayo touched, everything he did. Like    Cayo himself. And as cold.                       
       
           



       

She'd stayed because it was the quickest, easiest solution, or so she'd    spent the past two days telling herself. Escape from Cayo meant    subjecting herself to this and really, what was two more weeks? It had    been five years. Two weeks would fly by, and that would be the end of    it. Done and dusted.

The problem was, she knew better. On some level, she was relieved. As if    this was a reprieve. As if Cayo might come to his senses and redeem    himself-

She despaired of herself and this faith she had in him, so desperately    misplaced. She truly did. How could she trust herself to be strong    enough to walk away from him again when it had been so hard the first    time? What made her think she could really do it in two weeks' time when    she'd failed so spectacularly now?

"If you throw yourself from a height like this, I think you'll find the    Piazza della Repubblica will provide somewhat less of a cushion than   the  Adriatic," he said from the shadows, making Dru jump. She clapped   her  hands to her chest as if she could force her heart to stop its   panicked  clamoring, whirling around to gape at him as he bore down upon   her. "All  the king's horses and all the king's men, and so on."

He looked dark and brooding, and, as if to taunt her, distractingly,    impossibly sexy. He wore a luxurious-looking navy silk robe he hadn't    bothered to pull closed over the sort of male underclothes that clung    black and tight to acres of his taut thighs, making him look like a    heart-stopping combination of an underwear model and a king. Dru's mouth    went dry. It was one thing when he swanned about in his    five-thousand-pound suits. It was another when he wore what passed for    casual attire, all of which seemed to emphasize his athleticism, his    masculine grace. But this... This was something else.

This was a fantasy come to life. Her fantasy, in fact. Suddenly, she was    acutely aware that she was hardly dressed, that the silk pajamas    caressed her skin with every breath, that she felt more naked than if    she'd actually been unclothed, somehow. She felt heat wash over her,    then spread, the flush of it rolling all through her body, like his    touch.

And it didn't matter how angry she was at him, how foolish she felt or    how betrayed. In the middle of the night, on a terrace in Italy, Dru  was   forced to admit the fact that she had never truly got a handle on  just   how devastatingly attractive Cayo was, or how much it had always    affected her. Even before that night in Cadiz City.

"I didn't know you were out here," she said, and she could hear it in    her voice, that slight quaver that gave her away. That all but shouted    the things she didn't want to admit to herself and certainly didn't  want   him to know. How she melted for him, even now. How she ached in  all  the  places she wished he would touch her with those capable hands,  that   difficult, addicting mouth. Her lips, her breasts. And that  hunger   between her thighs.

It was as if the dark, or the late hour, made it impossible to lie to herself any longer.

He tilted his head very slightly to the side as he drew close, studying    her face. He'd been even colder and more distant than usual at dinner,    prompting Dru to truly question her sanity and self-respect when  she'd   found herself worrying about him. What did that say about her,  that  even  now, abducted and threatened and coerced, she took time out  from  her  righteous indignation to worry about the man who'd done all  of  those  things? To her?

Nothing good, she knew. Nothing healthy. No wonder she couldn't sleep.

"Here we are again in the dark," he said, a curious note in that deep    voice of his. His face was even fiercer in the shadows, hardly lit up at    all by the light spilling out from within, but still the dark amber  of   his eyes seemed to sear into her.

She didn't know what he meant. She felt his words resonate in her, and    the exquisite ache that followed in their wake made her despair of ever    really leaving this man, ever really surviving him.

"I didn't mean to disturb you, Mr. Vila." But her voice was a jagged    rasp of sound, and it gave her away. It told him everything, she was    sure of it. Angry, exhausted tears flooded her eyes, shaming her as much    as they infuriated her. She blinked them back, glad for the excuse to    look away from him.                       
       
           



       

He reached over and touched her, his hand hard and warm on her upper    arm. Dru froze; afraid, suddenly, to meet his gaze. Afraid he would see    all of the confusion and attraction and hurt she so desperately wanted    to hide. Instead, she pretended to be vastly interested in her hair,  of   all things, in the ponytail she'd pulled it into and then drawn to  the   side and over her shoulder. She ran her hands over it, nervously.  But  he  only moved his hand to wrap his fingers around the length of it    himself, pulling gently on the silken length, tilting her head up to    face him before letting go.

Something sharp and near enough to sweet pierced through her then,    taking her breath. Maybe this was only a dream. Maybe this was nothing    but another one of those Cayo dreams she'd wake from in such a panic in    her tiny bedsit, gasping out loud while her body ached, alone and    frustrated and wild with so much emotion she could never release.

But she knew better.

"Tell me," he said, his voice low and still so powerful, filling her up,    making her resolve and determination feel far too flimsy, far too    malleable. Making her wish she could simply be angry with him, and stay    that way. "Why do you really want to leave me?"

He didn't throw it at her. He asked. That and the damp night surrounding    them made it different, somehow. Made her look at him as if here, in    the deepest part of the night, he might be close enough to the man  she'd   believed him to be that she could actually tell him a part of  the   truth.

But she blinked again, and the heat in her eyes reminded her who he really was.