Page 236 of Modern Romance November 2024 5-8

Marcello turned his face from her. He could not turn off the rest of his senses.

Water sloshed and, as much as he tried to think about anything else, all he could see in his mind’s eye was the illuminated figure in the bath tub rising slowly to her feet.

He’d had to brace himself before entering the bathroom knowing it would be impossible to avoid Victoria’s nakedness. And so it had proved. Her wet hair, part covering her breasts, had contrasted strongly with the luminescence of her skin. A mermaid come to life. A siren leading a man to danger...

‘Can I borrow your hand while I step out, please?’ she whispered.

Everything inside him contracted sharply then pulsed in a rush. He had to tighten his grip on the phone before he could force the steps needed to reach her side.

Closing his eyes, he reached out to her and did his damnedest to banish the image of Victoria in full, curvaceous naked bloom. It was futile. One glance had etched in his retinas. Even with only the dim torchlight, that one glance had been enough to see that the soft down of hair between her legs was the same beautiful shade of red as the hair on her head.

Dio, his blood had never pumped so hard.

The tips of their fingers connected. Electricity crackled through his skin and deep into his loins.

The silence as their hands clasped together was so complete he could hear the individual droplets of water run off Victoria’s naked skin and splash back into the bath.

The loudest sound, though, came from the drum of his heart beating in his ears.

The heat of the water had opened her pores. His lungs opened to breathe in the scent clinging to her. A scent that should be masculine but on Victoria’s skin became something distinctly feminine. Distinctly Victoria.

Awareness and desire had never thrummed so deeply, and he clenched his jaw tighter than he’d ever clenched it before in an effort to control it. Never in his whole life had he fought such a war with his own body.

Never in the entirety of her life had Victoria been so conscious of the skin that wrapped her body, aware that it was a living, breathing organ in its own right. It was breathing in Marcello, her hidden Adonis. Only the hand holding her so securely had emerged from the shadows but she could feel the substance vibrating from his own cloak of flesh.

Pulses thrashing wildly, she lifted her leg over the bath.

The floor was lower than anticipated and the extra depth as her foot searched for hard floor caught her unawares and she wobbled, would have fallen into an ungainly heap if Marcello hadn’t wound an arm around her waist to steady her. A moment later he’d lifted her out of the bath.

The phone slipped from his hand at the same moment both her feet made contact with the floor. She had only a dim awareness of the clunk it made because in an instant her thrashing pulses ran out of control and she lost the ability to think coherently.

The towel she’d wrapped around herself had slipped to her waist and she was pressed against Marcello, pressed so tightly her breasts were squashed against his hard chest. His hands were flat against the small of her naked back, the pads of his fingers biting into her flesh.

And she was clinging to him. One hand was holding his shoulder, the other gripping the side of his waist. The pads of her fingers were biting as hard into him as his fingers bit into her.

Blood zoomed through her in a rush, its heat fizzing and throbbing through her skin, deep into her bones and into the places kept secret even from herself. Helpless to do anything else, she lifted her face.

The light from the phone on the floor arched upwards and suffused them both in the spotlight of its glow. Marcello’s chiselled jaw was as rigid as his body holding her so securely and yet so stiffly. His eyes, though, locked straight onto hers. If she’d had any air left, the emotion and hunger contained in them would have knocked it out of her.

An age passed before his nostrils flared and he expelled a short but heavy breath. It danced over her forehead like a caress.

‘Walk away, Victoria,’ he muttered raggedly, his stare continuing to burn into her.

She rose onto her toes without thought.

His eyes became hooded, his breathing even heavier. One hand dragged slowly up her back. ‘Walk away. Walk away now.’

Shivers racing down her spine at the pleasure of his touch, unable to tear her stare from his, she slowly slipped her fingers beneath his T-shirt. His warm skin was smooth. Heavenly.

His eyes closed as if in prayer. His other hand moved, fingers sliding beneath the fallen towel to clasp her bottom. His stare fixing back on hers, he made a barely perceptible twist of his hips and clasped her tighter.

She gave a short gasp as the towel fell to the floor and his hardness pressed into her naked abdomen.

‘Walk away, Victoria,’ he urged hoarsely even as he pressed his thigh between her legs to drive his hardness tighter against her and his taut, pained face inched closer. ‘Walk away...’ his mouth was so close his hot breath soaked into her lips ‘...before it’s too late.’

Desire pulsed through the very fabric of her being and, her hand now palming the back of Marcello’s neck and her fingers tugging at the dark hair at the base of his skull, it was all she could do to stay on her feet. All those long months of pretending to herself...lying...that Marcello meant nothing more to her than the man who paid her salary had been blown away. She’d wanted him from that very first meeting, when he’d walked into her then boss’s office with an arrogant swagger she would have hated him for if he hadn’t captured her gaze with those blue eyes flashing a twinkle that had made her insides melt.

His procession of lovers...she’d hated them all because deep down she’d been jealous of them. All of them. It had made herburnto imagine them in his bed, and, whatever happened now, she would always feel that irrational burn of jealousy. But now she would know it for what it was. Pandora’s box had been opened and she could no more keep its contents contained than she could stop the tides from turning.

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