Page 11 of Bound By The Italian’s 'I Do'

As Gianni had yet to spend any real time in his new yacht, it was quite surreal to be given a tour of it by the great pretender. Everything had been designed with his input. The fact all the entertainment, from the casino to the movie room, was confined to the main deck was deliberate, and when they reached the games room with the full-size snooker table he couldn’t resist raising a querying eyebrow. He suspected that when those heels were removed, Issy would reveal herself to be much shorter than she carried herself. Snooker was by no means a man’s game but it helped to be able to see over the table. ‘You’re a snooker player?’

‘Some of my guests like to play,’ she neatly deflected. ‘I’m not known as the hostess with the mostest for nothing.’

He grinned. She might be a con woman but beneath the high-society persona she was playing for all its worth he thought might lurk a woman who was genuinely fun. ‘Want to play?’

‘And miss out on the sunshine? We can play when the sun goes down.’

‘You’re not going to return me to shore before you turn into a pumpkin?’

Her dimples appeared—a sign he was starting to recognise meant she was genuinely amused. ‘Want to swim?’

‘Does that mean I get to go on your slide?’

Stepping closer to him, she picked a speck of flint off his polo shirt and huskily said, ‘That all depends.’

He rested a hand on her hip. The gap between them was so small he could feel the heat of her hot body. ‘Depends on what?’

Her teeth grazed her bottom lip and her eyes gleamed. ‘On where we anchor, of course.’ A smile lit her face and she tugged at his hand. ‘Come on, I want to swim before we eat.’

Issy discreetly checked her watch as she removed it. The meeting in London would be well under way. Casually, she placed the watch with her phone on the table and made sure not to react when Gianni placed his own watch and phone next to them, then added his wallet to the pile.

She just needed to keep him off that phone until the moment to get rid of it presented itself...

Pondering on how to dispose of it dissolved when Gianni pulled off his polo shirt.

Suddenly she was overcome with the need to fan herself. Dear God in heaven, that body...

That thought dissolved too when his hands went to the button of his canvas shorts.

Her mouth ran dry.

It hadn’t occurred to her until that precise moment that Gianni hadn’t brought anything with him other than what was laid on the table.

The zip went down. Eyes locked on her face, his hands went to his hips and he tugged the shorts down.

Issy caught a glimpse of thickened hair at the base of his abdomen...at his groin...before the shorts fell to the floor and, with the hint of a wink, he casually pulled up the swim shorts he was wearing beneath them to a more modest level.

‘Do you have sun cream?’ he asked.

‘Sorry?’ she croaked.

‘Sun cream. You know, the stuff you cover your skin with to stop you burning and hopefully prevent you from getting a melanoma?’

Pull yourself together!she shouted at herself.You’ve seen his body before, many, many times.

But, dear God in heaven, it was one thing to see that body on a laptop screen and quite another to see it in the flesh.

No picture, however talented the photographer, could do that body justice. Or that face.

‘Yes.’ That was better. More normal. She pulled a smile to her face and took out the expensive sun cream from the bag that had cost her two weeks’ wages, and handed it to him. She was struck, not for the first time, by the size and strength of his hands, and fresh tingles zipped through her skin and veins to imagine those hands...

To imagine those handswhat? Touching her?

Had she already had too much sun? Because she was fast starting to think her brain had become addled. There was no reason on earth for her to imagine that, just like there’d been no reason on earth for the heat that had pulsed through her when she’d picked at the imaginary fleck on his polo shirt a while ago, or for that heat to deepen in her most intimate part when his hand had rested on her hip and only the sheerness of her sarong had been a barrier between their flesh. No reason for that moment when anticipation had thrummed through her at the thought of his firm lips closing on hers.

Issy had a job to do. This man was her enemy. If her body was developing signs that could be mistaken for attraction then she had to rise above them. No way it was attraction. No way Jose.

‘Would you do my back for me?’ he asked once he’d finished slathering every inch of his limbs and torso.

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