The Best Of The Year - Modern Romance. Annie West

my temper!’ Billie urged between clenched teeth, her facial muscles locked tight. ‘You left me in that hotel with Theo and a bunch of bodyguards and a strange nanny!’ she accused. ‘You did it deliberately because I had annoyed you. You just took off for London. What happened to your all-consuming interest in getting to know your son? You can’t just saunter in here and throw a bunch of priceless pearls at me and expect that to take the place of an apology and an explanation!’ Billie launched at him in fiery denunciation.

      ‘I have nothing to apologise for. Now that I have got on top of work, I will have far more time to spend with Theo and you after the wedding,’ Gio told her stubbornly, watching her curls bounce round her animated features, the passion flaring in her green eyes, while noting how luminous the pearls were set against her creamy skin and the firm, sweet swell of her breasts. Hunger stormed through his tautening length in an uncontrollable wave, leaving him painfully aroused. ‘I refuse to go through a wedding with you behaving like this. This is why I needed to see you.’

      Billie was silenced. Suddenly she was the one at fault for straining their relationship beyond tolerance. Wide-eyed she stared back at him, the atmosphere dense and sending a curious little quiver through her belly. ‘So...we...er call it off now and go our separate ways?’ she whispered shakily.

      Gio stared at her in rampant disbelief, his dark eyes golden-bronze spearheads of intimidation at the mere thought of her pulling a disappearing act again. ‘You’re not going anywhere without me.’

      Billie didn’t understand because that sudden shock of fear had destroyed her ability to think straight. Her heart was jumping up and down inside her ribcage like a rubber ball being bounced and making it very hard for her to breathe.

      ‘Ever again,’ Gio growled in menacing completion as he scooped her up in his arms and brought her down on the bed.

      ‘What are you doing?’ Billie gasped. ‘Gio...my dress!’

      Gio came down on top of her, almost squashing her flat. ‘Stop struggling...you’re more likely to rip something.’

      Billie looked up at him with huge disconcerted eyes. ‘Gio...we can’t...this isn’t the answer to anything.’

      Gio rubbed his mouth sexily across hers with a sensual groan. ‘It’s the only answer for me.’

      ‘You’re wrecking my make-up,’ she framed unevenly, fingertips dancing shyly through his cropped black hair, slowly dropping to frame his amazing cheekbones.

      ‘You don’t need make-up,’ Gio told her thickly.

      ‘Every bride needs make-up,’ Billie argued, trying to slide unobtrusively out from beneath his weight without shredding her dress.

      He lowered his head and devoured her mouth with a hungry driving urgency that made her every sense shift into superdrive with piercingly sweet longing. The taste and scent of him infiltrated her like a dangerous drug, blowing her control out of the water. ‘I won’t wreck the dress,’ he promised, lifting his hips to tip the bundled skirt of her gown up to her waist.

      ‘Gio...’ Billie whispered pleadingly even as her back arched and her pelvis rocked up to his without her volition.

      ‘Diavelos, Billie...I hurt,’ he ground out, his breath fanning her cheek while he shifted revealingly against her, grinding the thrust of his erection into the cradle of her thighs.

      And low down in her pelvis, deep in her feminine core a surge of moisture dampened her most tender flesh and she started to melt. ‘We can’t...we haven’t got the time.’

      ‘We’ll make time,’ he husked, yanking out his phone as it buzzed, clamping it to his ear and talking in fast Greek to a male voice that sounded both loud and agitated. ‘Our day, nobody else’s,’ he spelled out fiercely.

      Long fingers glided up her inner thigh, leaving tingles of humming energy in their wake. Her eyes closing, her head fell back on the pillows, her neck extending as her spine arched. Her heart was racing thump-thump-thump at the foot of her throat. He stroked the taut triangle of satin between her thighs and the only thing in the world for her at that moment was the stupendous high of excitement and anticipation holding her fast. With a yank, Gio dislodged her bodice sufficiently to expose a creamy breast topped by a pale pink nipple. He closed his mouth urgently to that swollen peak and a stifled gasp escaped her, eyes squeezing tight shut.

      ‘I need to know you’re mine,’ Gio growled against her throat.

      He eased a finger below her lace-edged knickers and stroked along the petal-soft folds. Her thighs opened wider in helpless invitation and when he rubbed the little bud where she was most sensitive she moaned and shifted her hips, urging him on, helpless in the grip of the savage need he could induce. He thrust a long finger into her tight, wet sheath and she jerked, on the edge of crying out until he clamped his mouth to hers to silence the sounds she was making. The rhythmic play of his fingers over her tender flesh sent ripples of throbbing excitement through her. As the tension in her pelvis rose to an all-consuming ache that was unbearable, her every muscle clenched tight and she soared to a breathless shattering peak of ecstasy while biting the shoulder of his jacket to mute the sob of release building up inside her.

      ‘Oh...’ she mumbled afterwards, her body as languorous as a floating beach ball.

      Gio’s phone was screeching in his pocket. Scanning her dreamy face, he switched it off with an unsteady hand. Strangely, although he was still taut with sexual arousal, the inner tension driving him had dissolved. He felt like himself again for the first time in four days and snapped straight into rescue mode, propelling Billie off the bed, repositioning her bodice, brushing down the skirt of her gown before urging her into the bathroom where he stared in all male helplessness at the crushed veil hanging askew, the curls positively rioting round it and the smudges of the lipstick he had dislodged.

      ‘Good grief,’ Billie groaned, catching her mangled reflection. ‘Gio, you’re a menace.’

      Gio washed with enviable cool and ran a comb through his tousled hair. A sharp knock sounded on the bedroom door and it opened the merest crack. ‘The cars have arrived, Mr Letsos. We cannot be late...’ It was Damon Kitzakis’ voice.

      ‘I’ll get your friend to help you,’ Gio breathed in sudden decision.

      Billie was in full bridal panic mode, scanning her swollen mouth and tumbled hair and veil with withering scorn. You should have said no, she told herself furiously. Why didn’t you say no? Why had she, once again, failed to call a halt? Sex had always been a slippery slope with Gio. She couldn’t keep her hands off him, she couldn’t resist his passion but she was convinced that he would respect her more if she was less spontaneous and more restrained. Yet he had received no satisfaction whatsoever from what they had done, she acknowledged in surprise as she waged a frantic war on her rebellious curls and hurriedly repaired her make-up.

      Gio reappeared in the bathroom doorway, lean, strong face taut. ‘Damon thought it best that your cousin, her children and Irene and Theo leave immediately for the church. You’re travelling with Leandros and me.’

      Billie turned from the mirror. ‘But you and your best man are supposed to arrive first.’

      ‘You can wait in the church porch for ten minutes, koukla mou,’ Gio pointed out, lustrous dark eyes gleaming with sudden amusement. ‘Why do you take all these silly little rules so seriously?’

      Billie went pink and lifted her chin. ‘I assume all brides do the same.’

      Gio closed a hand over hers and pulled her towards the lift, sweeping her off her feet before she could reach the pavement and depositing her in a vast tumbling heap of lace and chiffon into the stretch limousine waiting by the kerb.

      Billie forced a smile when Leandros Conistis looked at them both in frank astonishment. The heat of almost unbearable embarrassment engulfed her in a burning tide because she had never forgotten her one and only meeting with Gio’s best friend and the incredulous look on his face that evening