Irresistible sensation seized her in a tempestuous flood. He said her name and she moaned a response, locked to him in wild arousal. In thrall to his sexual energy, her excitement soared to a dizzy high. His desire for her was unquenchable, energising. She was all liquid heat and craving. Caught up in a delirium of spellbinding pleasure, she arched her spine and cried out at the height of release. Melting waves of delight followed and left her rocked to the core of her being over the strength of what she had experienced.
‘I think I’m going to like being married,’ she whispered blissfully, both arms wrapped round him as she hugged him tight with instinctive affection.
An ocean of love and forgiveness was washing round Kathy’s heart. She breathed in the musky perfume of his skin and sighed with contentment. He pushed her hair off her brow and kissed her and studied her with slumberous dark-as-night eyes fringed by spiky black lashes. Just looking at him she felt weak. ‘You were right,’ she added, feeling that just this once a small compliment might be due. ‘You don’t need instructions.’
The silence lingered and she wondered what he was thinking about. Grazia? The idea and the name came at her out of nowhere and dropped like a giant rock on her floaty feelings to crush them flat. Wasn’t it odd that he hadn’t even asked what Grazia had said to her the night before? He was certain to have thought about Grazia after seeing her today, Kathy reasoned uneasily. He was only human, but she didn’t want him to be only human, and she definitely didn’t want him thinking about his former fiancée and soon-to-be-ex-sister-in-law.
‘Were you madly in love with Grazia?’ Kathy asked abruptly, and she was so horrified by the nosy question that had simply leapt from her brain to her tongue that she almost cringed in front of him.
Sergio released his hold on her and sat up. ‘What do you think?’
On the might-as-well-be-hung-for-a-sheep-as-a-lamb principle, Kathy added with equal abruptness, ‘Did you speak to her today?’
His jaw line squaring, Sergio groaned out loud. ‘No, I think she was only in the building for about ten minutes.’
Her face burning at what might or might not have been an unkind allusion to the incident with the red wine, Kathy muttered, ‘She mentioned that she’s divorcing your brother.’
Sergio shot her a sudden shuttered glance. Lean, extravagantly handsome features sombre, he vaulted out of bed. ‘I need a shower.’
‘And you’re the guy who’s going to change and share things with me?’ Kathy flung, cut to the bone and wishing she could shut up—but quite unable in her sense of humiliation and abandonment to make herself shut up.
‘Madonna diavolo—not stuff like that!’ Sergio countered without hesitation.
The bathroom thudded shut. Lesson one, don’t mention Grazia, Kathy reflected unhappily. Even after eight years there was unfinished business there. But grilling him like a silly jealous schoolgirl had scarcely been the subtle route to take. She wished she had kept quiet. She wished she hadn’t spoiled that lovely precious moment of closeness with prying questions. And over and over again she kept on seeing that hard, closed look on his face.
Ten minutes later, Sergio emerged, black hair slicked back, a towel wrapped round his lean hips. ‘Come here, amata mia.’
Kathy dealt him an aggrieved look while simultaneously admiring his incredible physique. ‘No, I’m sulking,’ she confessed from the depths of the four poster.
‘Wouldn’t you like to cool off in the pool?’
‘I can’t swim,’ she admitted stonily.
Sergio could not hide his surprise. ‘Okay. But you’ll be safe with me.’
Kathy wondered if there would be shallow steps at one end on which she could sit, because she was very warm and the prospect of cool water on her overheated body was extremely tempting. She hovered between a desire to make him suffer, hurt pride and acceptance.
‘I have champagne on ice waiting downstairs.’
‘I’m really not into all that vintage stuff,’ she told him huffily. ‘You’re never going to educate my palate.’
‘I also have your favourite Swiss chocolate.’
Sergio had saved the best and most seductive offer for last. Her taste buds salivated. As he had discovered one night at the hospital when she had been too afraid to leave Ella to eat, she simply adored chocolate. Her head flipped over, light green eyes arrowing across the room. ‘All right—but there is a ground rule. You are not allowed to touch me.’
‘Let’s see who surrenders first,’ Sergio murmured lazily.
Six weeks later, Sergio guided Kathy into a room at the palazzo. As instructed her eyes were tightly shut. He spun her round to heighten the tension.