This time it was no exploratory kiss—executed, perhaps, with the aim of helping her forget her worries for a while and relax … No. This was the full-blown, hungry kiss of a man caught in the grip of inflamed desire, and Dominique had never in her life been the recipient of such raw, passionate need.
His tongue thrust into her mouth with almost brutal command, and a heat started to burn inside her that made her shake and fear for her very sanity. Her hands reached out to steady herself against Cristiano, her fingers biting into the iron-hard flesh of his waist as her own escalating need suddenly outran any whispered caution in her head to stop this now and be sensible. It was simply heavenly to be wanted and desired this much, and Dominique started to kiss Cristiano back just as feverishly and wantonly as he was kissing her, her heart open wide and her senses more intensely alive than they’d ever been before.
Ramón had kissed her with the clumsily selfish needs of an over-eager boy, but Cristiano was without doubt kissing her like a man. And when his hand cupped her breast and he moved his thumb devastatingly back and forth across the rigid velvet tip beneath her thin summer dress, Dominique’s hips felt as if they had melted right down to the bone. Her mouth slid away from his with a soft groan of pleasure as he ground his tight, lean hips against hers, the tender flesh of her cheekbone grazing against the harshness of his studded jaw. Impinging on her besieged senses was the shocking primal evidence of Cristiano’s need, and Dominique’s legs seemed to turn to liquid rubber that could not possibly sustain her upright position for long.
‘I will lock the door,’ Cristiano whispered against her ear, brushing his mouth briefly but devastatingly across her tender lobe.
Before she could absorb the earth-shattering meaning of such a statement he left her to do just that. With the touch of a button he dimmed the lights too, and Dominique stared at him as he returned, wondering how a man as beautiful and perfect as he could possibly want an unconfident and ordinary girl like her, when he could probably have any stunning woman he wanted.
‘Everyone is busy and will not miss us for a while,’ he told her, and before she had an inkling of what he intended Cristiano slid his arm around her waist and lifted her bodily up into his arms.
Her heart was racing so fast inside her chest that Dominique seriously feared for her ability to remain conscious. Finding herself gently lowered onto a sumptuous red velvet chaise-longue that was positioned by the unlit fireplace, she stared wide-eyed and nervous up into the riveting handsome face that gazed down at her.
‘I want to make love to you … I have been thinking about it all day,’ he told her. ‘In fact … the idea has been consuming me.’
Dominique reacted purely on instinct. Reaching up, she urged his face down towards hers. The time between kisses had been far too long, in her opinion, and she was unashamedly hungry for the taste of his lips again. He had a taste like no other man she’d ever known, and it was both intoxicating and addictive.
Her delightful blue shawl slid away from her shoulders, its delicate fringe brushing against the exposed flesh of her slender arms revealed by her dress. She heard the thud of Cristiano’s shoes as they hit the floor, and a little throb of shock pulsed through her. Just before he touched his achingly seductive mouth to hers Dominique sensed the pleasure she’d been longing for about to sweep her away—as easily as some flimsy raft on a compelling sea. ‘Please don’t regret this …’ she said softly. ‘That’s all I ask.’
For a moment his avid glance stole her soul. ‘Nunca … Never!’
His seductive reply was as fervent as Dominique had hoped it would be. Arms entwined around him, she felt Cristiano’s muscular weight press her down deep into the velvet fabric of the couch beneath her. The hard, masculine warmth of his body seemed to seep into her marrow, making everything inside her tense so hard with need that she felt she might snap in two.
Shifting his position slightly, he started to touch her intimately with his hands and his mouth … exploring, kneading, tasting … and Dominique could not contain the uncontrollable tremors that were the result of his devastating sensual attention.
‘You are so soft … so incredibly beautiful,’ he whispered against her ear as his hands—which had been moving back and forth across her pelvis—finally moved lower, dragging up the hem of her dress and, with destroying purpose, cupping her through the flimsy cotton of her panties.
Even as Dominique felt her breath catch, Cristiano inserted his finger into the heat and moisture that drenched her there. Pushing her dress up further, he let his hot mouth fall upon her aching breasts contained by the simple white cotton bra, his lips and tongue giving them equal attention as his fingers worked their irresistible magic between her thighs. Dominique felt herself drowning in the erotic pleasure that consumed her like hot, licking flame ripping through a tinder-dry forest.
A harsh gasp left her throat and, captured by the sound, Cristiano diverted his attention from her breasts to her mouth, claiming it passionately as his fingers moved rhythmically faster and deeper inside her.
Learning intimately what the expression ‘seeing stars’ meant, Dominique bit down hard on her lip to try and contain her cry as she climaxed, shutting her eyes against a pleasure so wild and yet so profound that she couldn’t help but release tears.
‘Dominique? Look at me.’
Her eyes flew open again at the huskily voiced request, and her already fast-beating heart galloped even more when she saw the expression of primal need and hunger etched into the striking contours of Cristiano’s bronzed face.
‘What is it?’
‘You are crying … Is it because I caused you pain?’
His concern was such that Dominique’s heart stalled. She hurried to reassure him.
‘No. No—of course not! I just …’ Hesitating over what she had been going to say—because she did not want to refer to Ramón and the intimacy she had shared with him, which had been nowhere near as satisfying—Dominique tried to explain her feelings another way. ‘I was crying because what you—what you did gave me such pleasure, Cristiano! It made me feel a little emotional … that’s all.’
‘Do you know how much more pleasure I want to give you? I am almost in physical pain with the desire to be inside you!’ Cristiano’s voice was rough with need as he slid his hand behind Dominique’s head and angled it towards him, his voracious glance devouring every inch of her startled face. ‘But I realise this is not the place for me to join with you as I long to! Tonight … after everyone has retired and Matilde is fast asleep … I will come to you. Leave your door unlocked … sí?’
Should she come to her senses and say no? All Dominique knew was that she ached down to her very soul to have him possess her in the way he so candidly described, and to refuse him would be like denying herself vital oxygen to breathe. She wasn’t about to do any such thing.
‘All right,’ she whispered, tenderly cupping his face.
He kissed her passionately then, as if to brand her with his taste and leave her with the tantalising promise of what lay ahead in the night to come …
CHAPTER NINE
THROUGHOUT the delicious meal that had been placed before him Cristiano merely toyed with the food on his plate. It was as if some strange exotic disease afflicted him, making him feel light-headed almost to the point of dizziness. His heart raced and his stomach clenched as if it was trapped in a vice. And the symptoms were heightened whenever his gaze happened to alight on Dominique.
Dominique … the bewitching young woman that his irresponsible cousin had got pregnant and abandoned without even the most basic financial assistance with which to raise his child. The woman Cristiano had sworn to protect and watch over until such time as some other man … her future husband … took on the responsibility. The woman he now lusted after as he had lusted after no other woman before … Even his wife, God rest her soul.