Кристина Холлис – Claimed by the Italian: Virgin: Wedded at the Italian's Convenience / Count Giovanni's Virgin / The Italian's Unwilling Wife (страница 21)

Refusing to dignify that piece of malicious spite with a response, Lily turned away, feeling sick at what the other woman had implied. To her huge annoyance she found herself swept into the centre of the room by another of Paolo’s cousins.

Dancing was the very last thing she wanted to do. She wanted to escape the noise, the pointed questions and speculative looks, the pervasive scent of the banks of flowers that seemed to be everywhere. Switch her mind off and stop fretting over this horrible situation. Just for a little while. Just until she found the strength she’d need to tell her great-aunt and Fiora the truth.

And the wretched man was actually pawing her! The crudities he was murmuring in her ear disgusted her, and as she tried to pull away his hot, heavy hand slid down to her waist and hauled her into him. The aftershave he must have drenched himself in made her feel as if she were about to throw up.

‘Beat it, Orfeo!’

Never had Lily been so glad to see Paolo. Her anger with him for putting her in such an unenviable situation vanished like mist in the sunlight.

She felt weak with love, totally debilitated with longing, her mind—what was left of it—in so much turmoil she felt as if her brain had been boiled!

She wanted so much to be with him, accept his proposal. But she knew she couldn’t. Mustn’t.

Her knees shook as he slipped an arm around her shoulders, and, trying to stiffen her already tottery resolve, she took a moment to remind herself that given what she knew about him—what appeared to be general knowledge—marrying him would be self-destructive madness.

Yet Paolo Venini looked as if he would tear the younger man into pieces, limb from limb. Outrage had darkened his eyes to blazing ice. Looking up into his hard, rivetingly handsome features, she felt her eyes well with feeble tears.

‘Don’t let that lowlife upset you, cara mia,’ he urged as the younger man sloped away, tugging at his tie in red-faced humiliation. ‘If he comes within a hundred miles of you again I will kill him! Him or any man who shows you disrespect!’

Her soft mouth wobbled into a smile. Almost she could believe him. But did that mean he was jealous? He had his faults, but she had never numbered possessiveness among them. Where his women were concerned his modus operandi seemed to be to take what he wanted for as long as his interest lasted, then throw the current female aside and forget her. Move on. Not really the actions of a man with a possessive streak.

Paolo dropped his protective arm and curved a hand around her waist. ‘Come with me, bella mia. We will escape together.’ Time enough later to take her to sit with Fiora and Edith and mention the trip to Amalfi. Right now Lily was looking stressed, and she needed to unwind. That—her well-being—was his first priority. ‘No one will miss us, and if they do they will understand the need of a newly betrothed couple to be alone together, to take time out for a few minutes.’

A danger light flashed its warning, but Lily recklessly ignored it as he guided her through the open French windows. As the cooler, soft night air enfolded them Lily leant into the strength of his lean, toned body. Needed to.

This was what she needed, she decided, on a rush of relief at having left the party behind, as he led her down a grassy path, the sound of music, chatter and laughter thankfully receding.

Tonight had been a nightmare. Her emotions all over the place. With him at her side as he’d introduced her to the guests she’d felt wired to the point of detonation, stingingly aware of every breath he took, every movement he made. When he’d left her to circulate on her own she’d felt bereft. Weak. The self-protective need to resist him fading to nothing.

Such had been her emotionally muddled state that she’d actually been on the point of searching the room to find him and tell him she would marry him. Partly for Fiora’s and Great-Aunt Edith’s sake, but mostly, she knew, because she couldn’t bear the thought of never seeing him again. Then that dreadful woman had come up to her and spilt out her spite. Spite that had a firm basis in fact, reminding her that Paolo would never love her, just use her to ease his conscience where his mother was concerned. She didn’t know how she could love a man like that. But, for her sins, she did.

She bit down hard on her lower lip, annoyed with herself. Her brain was hurting. She didn’t want to think of any of it, wanted just to close her mind and enjoy this brief period of silent tranquillity.

‘You are quiet, my Lily.’ His voice was like a caress, setting tiny shivers to sensitise her skin.

‘I’ve switched my mind off,’ she confessed.

She registered his amused, ‘Ah—that I can understand!’ just loving being this close to him. Strangely, she felt unthreatened now. He had rescued her from that pawing idiot back there, whisked her away from all those curious stares, from his friends and family probably trying to work out how plain, ordinary her had snared a guy who was so anti-marriage it was legend. Did they all think, as that creepy cousin of his had crudely suggested, that she was so fantastic in bed that he had to hang on to her? The very thought made her go hot all over.

All she wanted to do was not think of any of it, make a renewed effort to empty her stubborn mind of all those knotty problems and enjoy the silence and the solitude.

He was matching his pace to hers, not talking, his arm around her waist, thankfully keeping his mouth shut on the subject of marriage—because right now she was sure she couldn’t handle it.

His hand resting on the curve of her hip felt so right. The air was full of the gentle scent of the flowers and wild herbs of the hillside, the moonlight gleaming on the stands of silvery eucalyptus, turning the night to the sort of soft magic that talking would destroy.

Determined that nothing would come between her and this so desperately needed period of tranquillity, she didn’t protest, didn’t even think of trying to when, at the end of a path she hadn’t explored before, they came across a summerhouse festooned in climbing roses in early bud.

‘We will sit a while.’ Leading her to a wide padded bench seat that ran along the full length of the far wall, he eased her down, laid a hand against the side of her face, turning her head so that he could see her eyes in the dim silvery light. ‘I didn’t see you relax with a drink in your hand all evening. Would you like me to phone through to the house and have someone bring us champagne?’

Instinctively nuzzling into his hand, she let a smile thread her voice as she said, ‘Such decadence! Thank you, but no. I don’t need to have alcohol to relax.’ She didn’t add that being with him here, like this, was intoxicating enough. She’d been arguing with him ever since they’d met and she was tired of it. Just for a few moments—until they returned to the villa and normal battle-ready positions were resumed—she wanted to sink into this feeling of real closeness.

For some reason her answer seemed to please him. She felt him smile. Now, how could that be? Could she really be that closely attuned to him? she pondered, with a little shiver of awe.

‘You are cold?’ His voice had a strange rough edge as he turned her head towards him. Moonlight bathed them with a faint silvery glow, casting his features into harsh relief, all planes and angles, but his eyes were soft—what she could see of them before he dipped his head and used his sensual mouth to close one pale eyelid and then the other, his lips drifting down to lay a feather-light kiss on one corner of her mouth.

Without understanding how it happened, only that it had to, Lily’s lips parted as she sought his teasing mouth. She loved his kisses, and taking one tonight couldn’t be wrong—could it?

He laced his long fingers in her hair as he took her soft pink lips in a kiss that knocked out her senses, promised heaven, made her feel fully alive and yet weak with hunger for him all at the same time.

Her hands came up to cling to his broad shoulders for support, her peaking breasts pressed against the cool fabric of his shirt, and she felt him stiffen, a tremor racing through his perfectly honed body as he lifted his mouth from hers.

A tiny mew of frustration escaped her. She felt like a starving orphan, deprived of warmth and succour. Greedily, she tugged at his shoulders, reclaimed his mouth, and submitted to a surge of white-hot pleasure as with a groan Paolo took her swollen lips again and plundered the moist interior with explicit thrusts of his tongue.

Suddenly, for Lily, it wasn’t enough—not nearly enough.

Heat flamed deep in her pelvis as her restive hands moved from his shoulders to the sides of his face and down, thrusting at the parted sides of his white dinner jacket. Furiously her fumbling fingers worked at the buttons of his shirt, desperate to touch his skin, explore the warmth, the strength of his superb male body.

It wouldn’t end with just touching. Lily knew that. But her sense of self-respect, of morality, was vanquished by the sheer power of his erotic hold over her senses. And as he lifted his mouth from hers, removing his jacket with a muffled oath, then caught her to him, burying his face in her hair as he tried to deal with the fastener at the back of the halter strap, his fingers were unsteady.