Page 4 of Crowned For The King's Secret

Vic wondered what tonight was about for Sandro, who claimed this was something he didn’t do, when a man like him could have any woman he wanted, with his imposing height, which made her feel strangely small and safe, and his powerful build. Broad shoulders, strong biceps hinted at under the sleeves of his shirt. Thick, dark hair swept back from his high forehead. Eyes so deep and blue a person could happily drown in them...

Those butterflies in her belly began whipping about again as the door to Sandro’s suite closed with a quiet snick behind her. His presence was so close goose-pimples sparkled down her spine. Her heartbeat raced. Thrilled, terrified, she couldn’t be sure but she’d embrace any emotion after the numbness of her past life. Vic rubbed her thumb against the ring finger of her left hand, where her wedding ring had sat. Once a mark of ownership, all that remained now was a strange sensation of emptiness, of finally being free.

‘You keep doing that,’ Sandro, said, nodding to her left hand. His voice deep, warm, with the barest hint of an accent. She craved to immerse herself in the sound as if she were sinking into a freshly drawn bath. Washing herself clean of the taints of the past. Learning how to live again. ‘Is it recent?’

‘Yes, but I don’t want to talk about it.’ Her deceased husband wouldn’t occupy any more of her thinking time, not when there was living to do. She’d been dead inside long enough. The corners of Sandro’s full, tempting mouth tilted in the hint of an empathetic smile.

‘I understand.’

Once, she would have said nothing but she refused to silence her voice any longer. Silences were liminal spaces where darkness and dreadful secrets hid. She cocked her head and met Sandro’s vibrant gaze.

‘You don’t want to talk either.’

It wasn’t a question. She knew deep in her heart that tonight was as much about running from reality for him as it was for her. His shoulders rose and fell as a long breath eased from him.

‘I find that everyone has their cross to bear. It’s no use comparing the wood and the nails.’

Something about that statement seemed distant, almost like a reflection. Then it was as if he shook himself out of the moment. Sandro walked to a side table and held up an empty crystal flute in long, elegant fingers. ‘Would you like some champagne?’

She shook her head.

‘No, I don’t want to be numb.’ She’d been numb for too many years already. ‘I want to feel what it’s like to be alive.’

‘I can help you with the living,’ he said. Sandro’s words were weighted, like a stone dropped into a pond. He put down the champagne flute, walked towards her with a fluid gait, his long legs closing the space between them.

‘I need to kiss you,’ he said, his pupils wide and dark. ‘Get my hands on your skin. Taste every part of you.’

His voice was rough and raw, and it lit something inside her that she’d thought long dead, now burning wild and insistent.

Desire.

‘What are you waiting for?’

He cupped her jaw, the palms of his hands hot against her skin. Dropping his head till his mouth grazed across hers, her lips tingling at the touch. She melted into him as he took her slowly. Their tongues touching. The kiss slick and lush and indulgent. She slid her hands up his powerful chest, resting there. In her fantasies she could imagine his heart beating fast in his chest, matching her own. He broke the kiss for a moment.

‘Do I feel real now?’

‘Oh, yes.Yes.’

‘I told you.’

He reached out his hand and swept the hair over her shoulder with a gentle brush of his fingers against her neck. His mouth soon followed, his breath gusting warm across her tingling flesh. Slow, soft kisses that lingered. The tip of his tongue touched her skin, tasting her as he’d promised.

Where else would that tongue of his seek out before the night was over? His beautiful, full lips skimming every part of her. She needed itall.

Something changed then, became more insistent. She moaned as he pressed himself into her. His body so hard and uncompromising, his arousal obvious, yet his touch a gentle contrast. Slowly breaking down the bricks of a wall she had built so high, so carefully, that she wasn’t sure what she’d remake of herself once this night was done.

‘Please,’she whispered.

He swung her into his arms as if she weighed nothing. Cradled in his embrace like a bride on her wedding night. Desired, cherished, as Sandro strode through the suite to a room lit with low lights from a lamp in the corner. He carefully set her down at the end of the bed, reaching out with long, elegant fingers to slip one tiny button at the front of her blouse through a loop. Then another, and another. Was that a tremor in his fingers? She trembled herself, almost mindless with need, with a desperate emptiness that she hadn’t realised she’d held on to for most of her life. One that she needed him to fill.

It was if she were burning alive. Burning for him. His nostrils flared as her blouse parted over her breasts and a rumble came from him. Deep, primal. He took her left breast in his palm. Teasing, toying with her nipple through the lace of her bra. It tightened in pleasure, the lightning shock of it spearing between her legs. Her breaths gusted out of her in short pants. She moaned.

‘So beautiful. So responsive.’ Sandro stepped into her body, his lips at her neck again, murmuring against her skin. ‘Close your eyes. Enjoy.’

‘If I close my eyes, I’ll fall.’

‘I’ll catch you.’

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