Hot-Blooded Italians. Sharon Kendrick

      But she wasn’t pushing him away, was she? He could sense, almost smell Emma’s desire for him—but then he had always been able to read her like some long and erotic book. At least until the relationship had withered away to such an extent that they could hardly bear to look one another in the eye, let alone touch one another….

      Until that very last time. Just before she had walked out of the door into the blazing Roman heat—he had caught her to him and had begun to kiss her and she had kissed him back, angrily and with more passion than she’d shown for months.

      He remembered rucking up her little skirt and pushing aside her panties and pushing into her: doing it to her upright against the wall, where she stood. Remembered her gasping her orgasm in his ear. And then, ignoring her protests that she would miss her flight, he had carried her up to their bedroom. To the bed they had not shared for weeks—and had spent that one long, last sleepless night imprinting himself on her body and her mind. Pulling out every sensual skill he had ever learnt and using them on her almost ruthlessly as she had moaned with pleasure and regret.

      Dio, he was getting hard now just thinking about it. Too hard.

      ‘Emma,’ he ground out, and this time his lips didn’t brush hers. They crushed them beneath his as ruthlessly as if they had been fragile rose petals beneath a hammer and as she gasped her fingers came up to wind themselves in the tousled thickness of his hair, just the way they used to do.

      ‘V-Vincenzo,’ she stumbled out, but the word was blotted out by his kiss—their kiss, because her moaned response surely made her a willing participant as she found herself blown away by the power of his touch.

      Was it that she was so starved of any kind of adult comfort or pleasure that she found herself submitting to the sweet pleasure of his lips, like a woman drowning in honey? How long since she had been kissed? Not since last time this man had kissed her, and no man had ever kissed her like Vincenzo. No man could. He used his lips to cajole and tease, to tantalise. He made her feel like a woman. A real woman.

      Emma moaned as he deepened the kiss in a way designed to have her melting like candle-wax. He knew exactly which buttons to press—he had once told her that he knew her body better than he knew his own—and no one could deny that. But with him it had always been more than technique. It had been helped along with love. At least for a while.

      Love.

      Mockingly, the word flew into her mind—for where did anything even resembling love feature in this slick seduction of his?

      She twisted in his arms. ‘Vincenzo…’

      Reluctantly, he raised his face from hers, looking down into the dazed dilatation of her eyes—the blue of their rims barely visible, so dark were the pupils which glittered back at him. Her lips were parted, begging to be kissed, and even as he watched the tip of her tiny little pink tongue—which he had tutored to bring him so much pleasure—circled around the parted provocation of her dry lips. She wanted him, he thought with grim satisfaction. She had never stopped wanting him. He moved his hand to rest it with proprietorial carelessness on one knee and felt it tremble. Should he slide it up slowly beneath her dress, to touch her searing heat and make her moan again?

      ‘What is it, Emma?’ he asked softly.

      ‘I…I…’

      ‘Do you want me to touch your breast? Your beautiful breast?’

      His other hand grazed negligently over an aroused nipple and it felt as if it were scorching her skin—even though she was covered by her dress—and Emma only just managed to bite back a startled yelp of pleasure. She felt as if she were standing on sensual quicksand—one false step and she would be submerged.

      And then she stiffened. Had she imagined the faint buzz of her phone which was buried at the bottom of her handbag? She’d switched it to silent but left it on vibrate—so was she imagining that she could hear it? That her friend was trying desperately to get through to her to tell her that Gino was sick, or crying or just wanted his mummy.

      Gino.

      She had come here today—spending money she could ill afford on an expensive train ticket—in order to ask her estranged husband for a divorce. So what the hell was she doing in his arms, letting him kiss her, letting her body begin to flower beneath his practised touch? This was a man who despised her—he had made that quite plain.

      Despite the screaming protest of her senses, she jumped up from the sofa and immediately felt dizzy, but at least she was away from his dangerous intoxication. Hiding her despairing expression, she walked over to the vast window—scarcely noticing the amazing view outside as she leaned back against the glass for support and forced herself to look him in the eye once more.

      ‘Don’t do that again, Vincenzo,’ she said huskily. ‘Don’t ever do that again!’

      ‘Oh, come on, cara,’ he taunted silkily. ‘Never is a long, long time—and you enjoyed that just as much as I did.’

      ‘You…you forced yourself on me!’ Emma accused, but to her fury he simply laughed.

      ‘If that was force, then I’d love to see you capitulating,’ he mocked. ‘And please don’t play the little innocent with me, because it won’t work, not any more,’ he warned. ‘I know women well enough to know when they are longing to be kissed—and I know you better than most.’

      This was his territory, she reminded herself—and he was looking dark and predatory and dangerously aroused. He had the upper hand in so many ways—mentally, physically, emotionally and financially—so what was the point in pursuing an argument she wasn’t going to win? And did it really matter in the grand scheme of things whether she had surrendered or whether he had manipulated her? In the end it all came down to pride—and she had already decided that pride was a luxury she couldn’t afford. So she should forget what had just happened and get down to the important bit.

      Yet Emma knew that she was blocking out the most important bit of all. What about Gino? Now that you can see for yourself that he is the living image of his father—aren’t you going to tell Vincenzo that he has a son? But she was scared—too scared to even want to try. If she told him—who knew what would come of it? Couldn’t she just get what she had come for and think about the rest later?

      ‘Are you going to give me a divorce?’ she questioned unsteadily.

      Silently, he rose to his feet and Emma eyed him as warily as she might have eyed a deadly snake which had just been set loose in the luxurious office. But to her surprise and fury he didn’t come anywhere near her, instead went back behind his desk and appeared to check the screen of his computer! As if she had been a brief interlude—already forgotten—and he was now concentrating on far more important things!

      ‘Are you?’ she repeated.

      ‘I haven’t decided, because, you see, I’m still not sure about your motives for wanting one. And you know me, Emma—I like to have all the available information at my fingertips.’ He looked up, his black eyes narrowing thoughtfully. ‘You’ve told me that it isn’t because you want to marry another man,’ he mused. ‘And I believe you.’

      ‘You do?’ she questioned, taken aback.

      ‘Sure. Unless you’re planning on marrying a eunuch,’ he observed sardonically. ‘Because you kissed me like a woman who hasn’t had sex in a very long time.’

      Emma blushed. ‘You’re disgusting.’

      He laughed. ‘Since when was sex disgusting? I’m being honest, that’s all. So if it isn’t a man, then it must be money.’ He saw the automatic jerk of her body and knew he’d hit the spot. ‘Ah, yes. Of course it is. My guess is that you’re broke,’ he continued softly. ‘You dress like a woman who’s broke and you have the general appearance of somebody who hasn’t been taking care of herself. So what happened, Emma? Did you forget that you were no longer married to a billionaire but forgot to curb your spending?’