Because she used to wear her hair flowing down her back like that when she’d been seventeen, when he used to run his fingers wonderingly through the lustrous thickness, as if it were pure, spun gold, blending into the pillow they’d made of the hay bale. He thought about just going to bed and leaving her there—except that she’d wake up cold and uncomfortable and she wouldn’t be able to work unless she was properly rested. At least, that was what he convinced himself was his motive as he began to move towards her. As he glanced down at the table he could see she’d been drawing grids and a big triangle, around which different letters were scattered so that it looked like one of those mathematical equations he’d thankfully been spared due to his lack of schooling. Right in the centre of the page the letter M was written, with a big red circle around it and a series of question marks beside it.
‘Emily?’ he said softly.
‘Alej!’ Her eyelashes fluttered open and she stirred, rubbing her fist over her eyes. ‘Sorry. I must have fallen asleep. Obviously.’ She yawned. ‘What time is it?’
She flicked him a heavy-lidded gaze and once again he felt his heart contract, because hadn’t she looked at him like that plenty of times before, in that sleepy, trusting way? Those times when she’d made him feel he could conquer the world. That everything she needed, he could provide for her. But his body had been the only thing she’d wanted, he reminded himself savagely. And maybe it still was.
‘It’s still early,’ he said evenly.
‘Oh.’ She struggled up into a sitting position. ‘Is the party over?’
But Alej didn’t want to make polite small talk. He didn’t want to pretend he felt nothing as he looked down at her blonde and ruffled beauty. ‘Were those other men you left me for as good as me, Emily?’ he questioned suddenly.
‘I’m sorry?’
‘You heard me.’
She blinked at him and he could see a faint colour begin to wash over her pale cheeks. ‘What on earth has brought all this on?’
‘Seriously. I want to know. Were they as big as me? Did they make you come as easily as I did?’
She was frowning now, half in confusion and half with something else. Something which made her tongue slide out of her mouth to moisten her lips. ‘Alej. Are you out of your mind? What on earth has brought all this on? Stop it,’ she whispered.
‘But you don’t want me to stop it, Emily. You never did. That much hasn’t changed.’
His green eyes were burning into her, making her skin feel as if it were on fire, and Emily knew she should get straight off that sofa and head for the sanctuary of her bedroom. But somehow she couldn’t seem to bring herself to move—because the trouble was that he was right. She didn’t want him to stop—she wanted him to carry on talking dirty to her all night long and looking at her in that hungry way, as if he wanted to ravish her. The blunt sexual boasts were turning her on, as she guessed they were supposed to, and the warning narrative spinning around her head wasn’t strong enough to withstand the increasingly urgent demands of her body.
And suddenly Emily had no real desire to fight them. Why would she when she’d been living without physical contact for so long? When most times she felt more like a piece of stone rather than a flesh-and-blood woman. Had abstinence brought her any pleasure or felt even a little bit worthwhile? No way. It had served only to make her isolated—but then, she’d always felt like that. She’d always been the person on the outside who was looking in. The daughter who was nothing but a burden to a socially ambitious mother and then the stepdaughter who had got in the way. Alej had been the only person who had ever made her feel as if she mattered.
He was smiling now. That slow killer smile which always used to get her. She hadn’t been able to resist it then and it seemed she couldn’t resist it now.
Feeling like someone caught up in a dark spell, Emily obeyed the Argentinian’s wordless command, and opened her arms to him.
‘GUAU!’ THE WORD escaped from Alej’s lips like a murmured curse as he sank on top of Emily’s soft and eager body and felt the first contact of her breasts. He could feel the hard thrust of her nipples pinpointing into his chest as he pulled her closer, his hands sliding down to reacquaint themselves with her legs. Blood pooled into his groin as he stroked her thighs through the soft cotton of her yoga pants.
‘Alej,’ she moaned as if she was asking him a question, but he didn’t press her to elaborate because it was pretty obvious what she wanted—judging from the urgent way she was circling her hips against the rocky pole of his erection like some kind of wildcat on heat.
Once again the thought of another man doing this to her filled him with a blind rage but, ruthlessly, he drove it from his mind. Because anger and jealousy would detract from his purpose and all he needed to think about was this one thing. Of losing himself deep inside her and riding her to fulfilment. Ridding himself of this damned fever which had lain dormant inside him for too long and been brought to a head when he’d seen her standing with the Argentinian sun bouncing off her blonde hair and her arms around a mangy horse’s neck.
He’d thought that time might have diluted his reaction to her and when he saw her again he would feel nothing but indifference. But he had been wrong. Badly wrong. Because every night since that recent meeting he had dreamt of her. Had imagined doing this to her. Touching every inch of her curvy frame and then plunging into her tight wetness—long and hard and deep. He wanted sex and nothing more, but first he needed to assess whether she wanted the same.
‘Que quieres?’ he demanded roughly.
She shook the head which was slumped against his shoulder, as if words were beyond her, but Alej asked again. He needed to ask it, even if the idea of her refusal was unendurable. But he would endure it. Hadn’t he endured more than most men would have to face in a lifetime? Reaching to turn her face towards his, her shuddered breath warm against his fingers, he asked again, this time in English. ‘What do you want, Emily?’
‘You!’ she burst out, as if an inner floodgate had opened inside her. ‘I want you!’
It felt like a triumph, but only a momentary one because the exquisite ache between his legs was warning Alej that he needed to keep his wits about him or this would be over too quickly. Already he wanted to explode like a teenage boy on his first time and that wasn’t going to happen, for he had waited too long to squander a single second of this.
His mouth found her neck, the tip of his tongue trailing a feather-light path along its surface, which quickly had her wriggling with pleasure. His groin bucked as she circled her hips against him with urgent hunger, which made his heart race. He had forgotten just how responsive she was. How her receptive body thrilled to just about anything he did to her. Maybe that was because the two of them had taken foreplay to a whole new level and then redefined it. There had been long months of denying themselves that final penetration and when they had...
Against her neck, his lips hardened.
When they had...
Bitterness rushed through him but he forced himself to shelve it because nothing was going to detract from this. He could feel her moving against him, turning her head towards his face in silent plea. She wanted him to kiss her, he knew that. But he didn’t want to kiss her—at least,