This time there was no doubt he made love to her with his eyes. There was no doubt that she saw her own needs reflected in the smoldering depths of his own.
“What would that be?” she managed to ask, holding her ground because she simply couldn’t force her feet to move.
He reached for her, threading the fingers of both hands through her hair to curve over her scalp. The move was as much an anchor as a caress. She knew he meant to kiss her.
Though her mind was screaming at her to run, her body was instinctively bowing into his.
“No,” she breathed, a feeble refusal at best, but she found it difficult to do more as his mouth swept down to hers.
Not surprising, he didn’t listen to her.
That first crush of his mouth on hers sent new sensations rocketing through her. She swayed, certain she’d have crumbled if he hadn’t been holding her close.
Dio mio! He kissed her with a ravenous intensity that thrilled and terrified her, for she knew if he unleashed his sensual appetite on her she’d be powerless to stop him.
More, she’d be powerless to stop herself from surrendering to the promise in his kiss, his touch. In the strong arms that held her fast.
She slammed both hands against Stefano’s broad chest to end this madness. But instead of pushing him away as she’d intended, her palms lost their purchase on his silken shirt.
“Bella,” he breathed, holding her fast and deepening the kiss.
Her splayed fingers pressed against the breadth of his chest. He was so big. So powerful.
Touching him was like touching the sun. Sizzling, erotic heat spiraled through her.
She’d surely burn to a crisp if she stayed too close. But her attempt to push him away was feeble at best. She couldn’t think of anything but the intense pleasure engulfing her.
A low groan rumbled from him. He pulled her flush against his body without a break in the kiss that was now singing through her senses with the passion of an aria.
She wasn’t a neophyte to kissing, but she’d waited all her life to have a man make love to her with his mouth like this. This slow dueling of tongues and adoration of lips. Unchained. Earthy. Passionate.
She was awash in a froth of longing with him the center of her universe, the sun that fired her blood. Her arms slipped around him as if to anchor him close now.
Not that she needed to.
One of his hands cradled her head while the other made a long, leisurely caress that was so seductively gentle it brought tears to her eyes. She’d never been touched so emotionally before. It thrilled and terrified her, and like a moth to the flame she kept inching closer for more.
And he gave her more. Not in a bold push as she’d expected but a more languid exploration of her mouth and body—an adoration really.
His lips sipped at the corner of her mouth before he lifted his head. She groaned in protest of the kiss ending too soon and looked up into his eyes.
The glimmer of desire was fading, replaced by a harder glint that smacked of mockery. Suddenly she was all too aware of standing in his embrace, her breasts pressed to his chest, her belly flush with the flat planes of his abdomen, and the hard evidence of his desire pulsing between them.
“I want fare l’amore and so you do,” he said, gently pushing her from him and gliding a finger down her flushed cheek. “But we must return to Viareggio and our appointed dinner. Later, hmm?”
It took a moment for her dazed brain to register what he was implying. She scrambled out of his reach, hating his cool assumption that she was his for the taking now. Hating herself even more for letting this situation spiral out of control.
“No, not later,” she said. “Not ever.”
The mouth that had moved with sensuous intent on hers thinned to a hard line. The amorous glint in his eyes died, replaced with a flash of annoyance before narrowing on her.
“We will see,” he said.
She shook her head in answer, for it was pointless to argue with him.
He was a playboy, arrogantly sure of his prowess and blessed with a beautiful face and physique of the gods. He was rich and sought after and likely believed every woman he met would gladly crawl into his bed.
She’d been too awed by the sensations he’d wrought to consider he’d take her eagerness to kiss him as a sign that she wanted more. But what did she really know about seduction?
Stefano shrugged into a suit jacket, looking for all the world like a demanding tycoon again. “We must leave now.”
“Of course.”
She suffered his hand at the small of her back as he guided her out of the building. She certainly didn’t want to feel this burning pull toward him, but she couldn’t squash it, either.
Yes, the sooner they got this business over with, the sooner she and Stefano could settle into a suitable work arrangement as secretary and boss.
Then she’d count the days until Cesare returned to the helm and Stefano was nothing more than a memory.
AN HOUR later, Stefano pulled to the curb of the restaurant and set the brake. He shouldn’t have kissed her. He shouldn’t have let his hands learn the contour of her breasts, the dip of her waist, the curve of her hips.
He damned sure shouldn’t have enjoyed every second she’d been in his arms. But he had, and the only thing that soothed his pride was the fact she’d become as lost in the moment as he.
Now she sat as far from him as possible and stared pensively out the window, quiet and withdrawn, as if bitten by guilt for nearly succumbing to lust. It made the drive back to Viareggio overly long.
But then he was not of a mood to engage in chitchat, either. His own lack of control vexed him. He’d not been the one to stop. She had.
Her body had instinctively reacted to his, pressed to his and moving in a most delicious rhythm of desire. She couldn’t deny that!
But she’d come to her senses first. He’d become so intoxicated by a woman’s taste and texture that he’d lost focus. He would’ve taken her right then and there.
Her refusal to engage in an affair with him was a jab to his ego. For her withdrawal wasn’t part of the game of pursuit, the age-old attack and parry ritual of courtship that heightened desire.
This was a firm no.
Something far stronger than lust kept her from succumbing to passion. Loyalty to Cesare Marinetti?
He slid her a glance. Did she believe that when his father recovered they would resume their affair? Did she think because his papa was widowed now that she could assert herself into the role of his wife?
The very idea was galling, for this situation with Gemma smacked of another woman who’d had designs on gaining the lion’s share of Marinetti Shipyard.
Before his sister-in-law had got her claws into his brother, she’d been Stefano’s lover at university. He’d never thought to introduce her to his family. But that holiday she’d been alone with nowhere to go.
Bringing her home had been the decent thing to do. She had seen it as the opportunity to better her lot in life.
Once she had realized that Stefano’s brother was the heir, it had taken her merely a week or two at the most to seduce his brother.
Her deceit had taught him a valuable lesson, for though he hadn’t lost his heart to her, he’d certainly