Page 47 of 2 Books in One Bundle
But she was sure he hadn’t found everything he wanted. He was looking for his birth family and hadn’t found them. Had accepted he never would. She suspected he wanted a real family despite his denials. He didn’t have that either. Matteo struck her as a man who was searching, and she wondered if he even realised what he was looking for.
‘You can have what you want from me. I’m not standing in your way.’
His nostrils flared. Of course, she was talking about sex, but it was fun for a moment to be held here and believe that the possibilities were endless.
‘Be careful what you offer me. You might find I take it, and I don’t have much to offer you in return.’
She wished he could see just how much he had. How kind he’d been to her. And yet she didn’t think he’d want to hear it, when it was clear there were things he couldn’t accept about himself.
She flexed against him, and his eyes darkened to the richest of warm chocolates.
‘You have exactly what I need right here, right now.’
He groaned and crashed his lips onto hers once more as she lost herself in the rhythm of his kiss.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
LOUISASATINthe warm morning sunshine on a sheltered patio overlooking the lake. She closed her eyes, relishing Matteo’s gentle touch. The way his fingers threaded through her damp hair, separating the strands so they could dry.
‘We should go inside soon; I don’t want you to burn.’
‘Just a little while longer,’ she said, breathing in the scent of lavender that drifted on the breeze, which she’d always now remember as the smell of summer. Relaxing further as he stroked down her back. If she were a cat, she might start purring.
‘It’s like silk on fire,’ he murmured as if to himself. ‘Magnificent.’
‘My family were hoping for the Bainbridge blonde.’
Matteo grunted. ‘What have I told you about anything they had to say?’
Louisa opened her eyes. Stared out across the lake, like a well of blue ink on the landscape.
‘To forget them. I do, mostly...’
Some days, the voice in her head could be persistent. Though around Matteo, the negative chatter had less power. His praise and his words tended to drown them out till they held no more irritation than a gnat she could swat away.
‘Mostlyshould becomealways. They didn’t deserve you.’
His grip on her hair gently tightened. Drawing her head back as she smiled. Goosebumps shimmered over her as his mouth descended on hers.
She opened for him. Their tongues touching, the kiss deepening. Each day seemed like a kind of miracle. A dream she didn’t want to wake from.Thiswas far better than any reality she’d ever lived in. And Louisa knew reality would have to intrude eventually, but she had time. There were no pressing deadlines. She could continue to drift in this warm, sunshine-filled fantasy for a while longer.
Matteo’s phone vibrated on the table close by, drawing her from the moment. An interruption from the world that wasn’t polite enough to stop for them. She drew away.
‘Take it. I know you have a business to run. I’ll be here when you get back.’
He smiled and it was warmer than any sunshine she might be sitting in. ‘I’ll hold you to that,’ he said as he grabbed the phone and wandered into the house.
She stood and strolled to the railings of the patio overlooking Lake Como. Little boats skipping across its surface. Louisa had never thought she could love anywhere as much as Easton Hall and its surrounds, but this came close. In the UK, everything was about the safe and familiar. Here? She wondered whether she’d love it without Matteo. Because everything about the villa was bound up in him. This patio, where they had a breakfast under the dappled shade of enormous potted olive trees. Their days filled with exploration of the lake and its surrounds. Nights filled with exploration of each other. A sense of no end date. Just a future with a person not a place...
No, that couldn’t be right. No futures had been discussed. Except he had offered to show her the world, his hotels, his retreats. His other houses.Thatwas a future of sorts. And their nights, his whispered words in the darkness, of being unable to get enough. Of more, more,more. What was that, if not a future? Her heart fluttered against her ribs. Not a sensation of dread but one of excitement, of possibility.
The sun brightened, warmer as the morning aged. Matteo would worry if she burned, so she moved to a large cantilever umbrella he’d had set up here, so she could sit under cover whilst looking out over the lake. That care, that kindness. It meant something, didn’t it?
Movement at the door drew her from her introspection. A liquid heat flooded her veins as Matteo stalked through. She couldn’t get enough of him. His power. Strength. It all made her feel safe, protected.Wanted.She mightneverget enough of him. Except...
The look on his face. Jaw hard. Eyes narrow. His body not lax and loose but strung tense like a bow. Obviously, business was not going well.
‘Problem?’ she asked.
