Billie surfaced from her sensual spell as her bra fell away and Gio cupped her breasts, thumbing the straining strawberry-pink peaks into swollen buds and then using his mouth, the gliding caress of his teeth and the lash of his tongue to stimulate the sensitive nubs beyond bearing. She couldn’t stay still. Somewhere in the back of her mind she knew she was going to have regrets but she couldn’t listen to them, couldn’t detach herself long enough from the scorching urgency of Gio’s passion or the staggering strength of her own increasing need.
With a skilled hand he traced the taut triangle of lace stretched between her restive thighs and an inarticulate sound of helpless encouragement broke from her lips. He ravaged her mouth with a wild, devouring kiss and her hips rose, her hands clawing in frustration down the lithe, strong length of his shirt-clad back. Wetness surged to the tender flesh that throbbed. He teased her, stroked her in a sensual torment that drove her to the edge...
‘Stop messing about, Gio!’ she suddenly gasped in stricken reproach, her body on such a high it was aching and hurting.
Unholy amusement lit up neon signs inside Gio’s head and he laughed against her mouth, recalling that she was the only woman who had ever made him laugh in bed. She was also most probably the only woman who could reduce him to the juvenile level of having sex with half his clothes still on. He blanked the thought, the barometer of his mood suddenly darkening, lean, strong face shadowing, but it was no use because he wasn’t in control at that moment, didn’t even want to be in control, simply craved the hot, wet oblivion of burying himself in her as deeply as possible.
Billie arched up and suddenly he was there, nudging against her indescribably sensitive entrance before driving his long, hard thickness into her tight channel. She cried out, flung her head back and her back arched as she convulsed around him, her cries of helpless pleasure filling the air as he angled back from her and plunged again with dominant force. The hot excitement of his every virile thrust consumed her, sending out eddying ripples of ever-growing pleasure from her womb. The pace became fast and frantic and the friction of his powerful rhythm stimulated her response to an unbearable height, and she bucked before he sent her flying into another powerful climax, ecstasy flooding every inch of her body.
Within seconds of satiation, Gio turned cold, pushing off the bed and grabbing what little clothing he had removed to head for the bathroom. He was outraged and downright unnerved by the sheer intensity of his own need. Without a doubt, Billie was special, terrific in bed but nothing more, nothing greater, for nobody knew better than Gio Letsos that any form of attachment endangered a man’s power and control. He could keep his hands off her if he had to; obviously he could exist perfectly well without her. Billie was an indulgence, not a necessity.
As he ripped off what remained of his clothes he rested his hot, damp forehead against the cold tiled wall for several tense seconds, hands coiled into tight fists of angry restraint. For an instant images from the worst day of his life reclaimed him and he broke out into a cold sweat, his quick and clever brain reacting accordingly. Wanting or needing a woman too much was weak and foolish; enjoying good sex was normal: he had just enjoyed very, very good sex.
LIKE AN ACCIDENT VICTIM, Billie sat up in the tangled and creased remnants of her clothes. She blinked and then the realisation of what had just happened kicked in and she hated herself with a virulence that literally hurt. In shock, she struggled to deal with a colossal self-betrayal. Gio would never believe she wanted to be left alone now, would he? Not when she glugged down a couple of glasses of wine over lunch with him as if they were old and dear friends and then got upset and still went to bed with him!
How could I have? Theo’s trusting little face below his mop of black curls swam inside her head. What had happened to her self-respect? She had wanted Gio with a desperate hunger that in retrospect shook her inside out. Had she missed sex that much? She fought her way into her knickers with clumsy, trembling hands. The bathroom door opened and she froze before sliding off the bed, gathering up her discarded clothing, locked in a cocoon of almost-sick mortification.
‘I didn’t plan for this to happen...’ Gio breathed curtly.
Engaged in getting her bra back on, it was as much as Billie could do to even spare a glance in his direction. She was surprised that he wasn’t sporting a triumphant smile because he had won and Gio liked to win much more than most people. It was the high-voltage combination of that essential drive, innate aggression and competitiveness that made Gio Letsos a global success.
‘Like I believe that,’ Billie framed dully while she slid into her dress because she knew how intensely manipulative and devious he could be. He used those qualities in business. She was quite sure he had used them on her and was still doing so. Conscience didn’t get much of a look-in with Gio when it came to anything he wanted.
‘Let me...’ He strode round the foot of the bed to run up her zip and she wanted to slap his hands away and scream, only that would have humiliated her even more by exposing just how much he had wounded her. ‘I didn’t plan it,’ he repeated.
‘Right, you didn’t plan it,’ Billie echoed like a well-taught parrot, pushing her feet into her shoes, wanting a shower badly but desperate to escape his presence and reach the sanctuary of her home and her son.
‘Next week you have your twenty-fifth birthday,’ Gio told her.
Billie grimaced. ‘My twenty-third—’
Gio looked back at her in bewilderment. ‘Twenty-fifth—’
‘I lied when we first met,’ Billie volunteered carelessly. ‘You said you didn’t date teenagers and I was nineteen, so I said I was two years older.’
Taken aback, Gio stared at her. ‘You lied? You were only nineteen?’
Billie nodded and shrugged. ‘What does it matter now?’
Biting back a sharp retort, Gio compressed his handsome mouth, his absolute trust in her taking a severe hit because right from the start of their acquaintance he had been disarmed by her apparent honesty. Aside of that he was less than pleased that he had taken a teenager to his bed without even realising it. It had been a much more unequal relationship than he had ever appreciated, he recognised grudgingly. He had been twenty-six years old and about a thousand years of sexual savoir faire and sophistication ahead of her.
‘Call me a taxi,’ she prompted in the strained silence. ‘I want to go home.’
‘We haven’t agreed anything yet—’
‘And we’re not going to,’ Billie interposed. ‘What just happened was an accident, a mistake...a case of familiarity breeding contempt, whatever you choose to call it. But it didn’t mean anything to either of us and it didn’t change anything...’
Billie waited for Gio to protest but the silence stretched and she was suddenly wretchedly, unhappily aware of how much that silence of agreement hurt. He had travelled from hot-pursuit mode to apparent indifference: it seemed the sex had acted like a miracle cure. And why was she surprised? She had always been surprised that Gio stayed interested in her. She had been surprised throughout their relationship, had never contrived to work out what he saw in her that he could not find in a more beautiful and glossier woman.
‘The limo will drop you back,’ Gio breathed flatly, his spectacular eyes veiled. ‘I have work to catch up on. My business team are joining me here within the hour. I’ll call you tomorrow.’
Shot from the conviction that she was being rejected to the news that once again she had read him wrong, Billie slowly shook her head. ‘There’s no point. End it here, Gio. Leave me alone. You go your way, I go mine. It’s the only sensible option after all this time.’
A sliver of dark fury shot through Gio that Billie should still feel detached enough to believe that she could easily walk away from him. This was the woman he had once believed loved