Page 27 of Innocent's Wedding Day with the Italian

‘Not particularly. I wouldn’t know what to do with it, but you’re welcome to give it all to me and see if that makes me believe you magically developed feelings for me beyond lust.’ This was better. Now she felt in control of herself. The pulse in her brain had quietened to a low beat, the panic lessened to a thrum.

A gleam came into his eyes, lighting his whole face with a lascivious magnetism that sent liquid pooling deep in her pelvis where the aftereffects of their lovemaking still gently buzzed.

Dropping his voice and leaning his face even closer to hers, he murmured sensuously, ‘Ah, so you believe now that I wasn’t faking my desire for you?’

The liquid contracted into a throb. Loosening her hold on his finger to spear their hands together, she had to swallow the moisture that had suddenly filled her mouth to speak. ‘You proved that very well, thank you, and if you want to prove all the things you spouted about how your feelings and stuff were true by giving me all of Claflin Diamonds then feel free. Maybe I’ll turn into a business mogul...or maybe I’ll give the whole thing to the dog charity I mentioned earlier.’

The fingers threaded through hers tightened, the gleam in his eyes deepening. ‘Marry me and I’ll sign all of my business interests over to you and you can do your worst with the lot of it.’

Thick thrills of desire racing through her blood, Rebecca inched her face even closer. ‘Throw in the New York apartment and the jet, and I’ll think about it.’

His face tilted, his gaze drifting to her mouth. ‘You can have it all. Everything.’

Arousal had built so thoroughly in her that she could hardly speak. ‘Either you’re desperate for those shares or you really do think I’m an idiot.’

‘No,cara, just desperate to keep you in my life.’ His lips caressed hers.

She was completely unable to stop a moan escaping. Staring into his eyes was like gazing into a dark pool of lust and she knew he was seeing the same from her own stare. Her words when they came were a breathless whisper. ‘Think I’m going to have to add to your school report, “Enzo tries too hard.”’

He pulled her hand down to his abdomen where his arousal stood to attention. ‘Thisis the only thing that’s too hard.’

Her eyes widened and she instinctively wrapped her fingers around the long, thick velvet. Fresh moisture filled her mouth as it throbbed and strained at her touch.

He shuddered and clasped her hip. ‘This is what you do to me,’ he said hoarsely. ‘You can’t deny this. This is all you.’ And then he parted her lips with his tongue and delved deep into her mouth.

There was no more conversation.

When Rebecca awoke, the room was still in darkness. Beside her, face turned to hers, his hand heavy on her stomach, lay Enzo. From the heaviness of his breathing, he was deep in sleep. Her own sleep had been brief, a snatch of slumber brought about by her body’s exhaustion but which turned out to be no match for her overloaded brain. She didn’t need to look at her watch to know she’d had no more than an hour of oblivion.

She tried to take her own heavy breath to stop the prickling of tears releasing but the compression in her chest was too much. She needed air. Needed to escape this bed before the thoughts in her head and the emotions churning in her took control again.

Still trying desperately to breathe, she crept out of bed, pulled her discarded negligée over her head and quietly left the room. In the corridor she wiped the tears away and put her hand to her thrashing heart, and managed to drag a tiny amount of air into her tight airways before staggering to the room she should have slept in.

The bed she would have slept in if she hadn’t allowed her emotions to take control was still rumpled from where she’d thrown herself on it in a fit of frustrated pique. Her suitcase was still open, half the contents spilled messily around it.

Rubbing at another leaking tear, she pulled her robe out of the suitcase and slipped it on, tightening it around skin still tender and alive from Enzo’s passionate lovemaking. Just to think about that made her legs weaken.

God help her, it had been the best night of her life.

And the worst.

Self-recriminations were pointless. She’d known what she was doing, going to his bed.

But she’d never dreamed how good it would be. Not thatgoodcarried a fraction of the meaning of what it had been like. The dizzying heights he’d taken her to, again and again. The sheer exhilarating headiness of it all. If she could switch her heart off she’d be tempted to move all her stuff to his room right now, straddle him awake and demand he be her sex slave for as long as it took to slake the passion between them. Just to imagine his response to this demand made her core throb with an arousal she could hardly believe hadn’t been spent through the hours they’d passed with their limbs wrapped around each other.

But her heart could not be switched off. Each kiss, each caress, each climax, it had all pushed her further over the line of being hopelessly in love, and it was a love that would never be reciprocated. It couldn’t be. Not from him.

All these thoughts were pointless. She needed to pull herself together and stop wishing for things that could never be.

Padding quietly down to the kitchen, she didn’t even consider pressing an intercom to wake the duty member of staff to fix a drink for her. Turning the switch by the door, she blinked away the effect of the bright lights assaulting her unadjusted eyes and headed straight to the cupboard that contained the coffee. She pressed the cupboard door open and her heart jumped.

Blinking again, she reached for the rectangular box neatly placed next to the large bag of coffee beans. It was no trick of the light, and in an instant she was transported back to the very beginning when she’d accompanied the gorgeous Italian who’d selflessly changed her flat tyre into the hotel. She’d been giddy at the thought of spending an hour in his company; a spring in her step and a zest in her veins she’d never felt before. It was when Enzo had steered her past the bar to a table that she’d spotted the clear jars filled with the distinctive triangular teabags of her favourite brand in a neat row beside the barista machine. Her thoughts of having a hot chocolate had been immediately abandoned. At least five times the price of her usual tea, this was the brand she treated herself to a packet of each year for her birthday, something she had a dim recollection of telling Enzo when they gave their order. She’d been utterly thrilled to see it on the bar’s shelf, and as she’d sat there sipping it, eyes glued to Enzo’s face, she had wondered if her day could get any better.

He’d remembered, she realised, her head swimming. He must have done. She’d never even mentioned tea since that day—well, who in their right mind discussedtea?—but she knew it hadn’t been in the cupboard three days ago, the last time she’d fixed herself a drink here.

Enzo had bought it for her as a birthday surprise.

CHAPTER NINE

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