‘I didn’t get you anything.’
‘You gave me you...unforgettably,’ Nikolai growled, flipping open the box for her in his impatience and lifting out a three-strand pearl necklace with an elaborate emerald and diamond clasp.
‘My word...’ Ella stroked a wondering finger over the gleaming iridescence of the perfect pearls. ‘It’s really beautiful.’
Nikolai clasped the necklace round her throat. ‘Their purity reminded me of you.’
‘I’m not pure... I’m not perfect...nobody needs to be perfect,’ Ella declared in a rush, thinking of the secret she was holding within her body, fearing his reaction more than ever because, the happier she became, the more she feared a potential fall.
‘You’re a lot more pure and perfect than I will ever be.’ Nikolai pushed the tangle of bronze-coloured hair back behind her small ears and tipped up her chin to kiss her again.
The heat inside her claimed her again faster than she could’ve believed. It was as though her body were programmed to his. A muscular, hair-roughened thigh slid between hers as he rested her back on the pillows again and everything below her waist tingled with awareness.
‘I want you so much,’ she whispered helplessly.
‘And you’re going to get me. Over and over and over again,’ Nikolai husked hungrily against her swollen mouth.
Ella stroked the long, thick length of jutting virility against his stomach, no longer nervous, no longer unsure. He wanted her every bit as much as she wanted him and knowing that set her free and filled her with happiness.
‘If you do that I won’t last.’
Ella reared up and pushed him flat. ‘Oh, stop with the threats, Mr Drakos!’ she told him, laughing down at him.
Nikolai could never remember laughter along with sex but he liked it. He liked it even more when he pulled her back down again and reinstated supremacy because there was no way he would allow her to call the shots in bed. He felt strange, almost giddy, and he wanted to smile and he wondered what was wrong with him. His little hummingbird of a bride was changing him and he knew as he looked down into her hectically flushed, laughing face that there was no way he was ever going to willingly hand her over to another man.
‘I want this night to last for ever,’ she murmured against his chest, drunk on the smell of his skin.
‘For ever is a big challenge,’ he husked, rocking his hips against hers, letting her feel the hardness of him, sending a wanton thrill of naked hunger shooting through her veins.
‘It wasn’t a challenge,’ she protested as he touched her where she most needed to be touched and she jerked and whimpered, defenceless against the surge of need controlling her.
He eased over her, rearranged her to his satisfaction, slowly surged in and she shut her eyes tight, every nerve screaming for the satisfaction only he could give. Inch by agonising inch he entered her and when he was finally fully seated she loosed a sound of pleasure she couldn’t hold back. She could feel how damp, how ready she was and his sheer strength as he lifted her up to him, muscles bulging in his forearms, left her weak with longing. He slid back and then plunged, his speed picking up. Excitement detonated inside her and she wrapped her legs round him. As she bucked he pinned her to the mattress and thrust into her fiercely with a primal grunt of pleasure. It went on and on and on until she was sobbing with excitement and the band of tension at the centre of her body was tightening and tightening. Release came in a rush of feral fire, lighting up every nerve and skin cell, and she cried out, her nails raking down his back in an ecstasy of pleasure.
She was dizzy with lingering joy when she recovered enough to be aware of her surroundings again.
‘I’m flattening you.’ He dropped a gentle kiss on her brow and released her from his weight to turn over.
Flatten away, she almost told him, until her attention was grabbed by the tattoo on his shoulder. Yes, it was a winged goddess, but incongruously a tiny rainbow and the head of a unicorn peeked out from below one wing. ‘A rainbow and a unicorn?’ she queried, tracing the design with a curious fingertip.
Nikolai went rigid and flipped back to face her, dark eyes grim in his lean, strong face. ‘To remember my sister...the fairy-tale things she liked,’ he confided with a reluctance she could feel.
‘That’s sweet...when did she...?’
‘Five years ago.’ His rich, dark drawl had gone all gravelly. ‘I don’t want to discuss it.’
‘OK,’ Ella said lightly, although it wasn’t OK in any way and his reserve hurt.
Did you really think being married to Nikolai was going to be all rainbows and unicorns? she asked herself irritably. He wasn’t going to have a personality transplant overnight and suddenly begin sharing his every innermost thought and feeling. Obviously he still felt the loss of his sister deeply and he wasn’t ready to talk about it yet. That was all right. She didn’t have to blunder in where angels feared to tread, did she? She didn’t have to know everything about him...did she?
Love was a hard taskmaster, she conceded then, running a tender fingertip over the hard line of his tense mouth before giving up on that approach and rolling away from him to climb off the bed. ‘I’m still wearing my boots,’ she noted in wonderment.
‘I like them,’ Nikolai told her in a driven undertone.
‘I knew you would...but my feet are hurting now,’ she admitted, sitting down by the table with the flowers to take the boots off and noticing the envelope sitting there unopened. ‘Oh, you haven’t opened this yet. It must be from whoever sent the flowers.’
Sitting up in the bed, Nikolai tensed again as she dug out the card. ‘Dido and Dorkas Drakos...the flowers are from your great-aunts!’ Ella exclaimed with satisfaction. ‘You’ll have to go and look them up now.’
‘I hate to rain on your parade but I met them years ago when I was having this place renovated,’ Nikolai admitted abruptly.
‘You didn’t mention that,’ she said in surprise. ‘Were they friendly?’
‘Very...but it seemed a bit too late in the day to get sucked into the family circle when I had spent most of my life alone,’ he admitted stiffly.
‘When did they first find out that you existed?’ she pressed.
‘When I inherited from my grandfather.’
‘Then you can’t blame them for not being around when you were younger,’ Ella pointed out squarely. ‘We should go and visit...see how it goes.’
Nikolai rolled his eyes and said nothing. Meeting his relatives would make her happy and it would cost him nothing. He knew she was keen to give him family roots on Crete. She couldn’t grasp that he had lived most of his life without such ties and that they meant a great deal less to him than they did to her. He had learned a lot in his first ten years at the hands of totally detached parents.
A little hurt by his discouraging silence, Ella went for a shower. As she stepped out of the cubicle, however, he stepped in.
‘Do you want some supper?’ Nikolai enquired when he wandered back into the bedroom clad in the twin of the dark towelling robe she had found hanging in the bathroom.
‘Is there anything available?’ Ella asked, knowing that he wasn’t much better at cooking than she was. At home she had looked after her father when he’d needed care and had generally taken over his jobs, keeping the garden and lighting the fire, while Gramma had presided over the kitchen. There had never been any need for Ella to learn how to cook.
Nikolai gave her an amused appraisal. ‘I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised.’
Ella was bemused when she heard dogs barking somewhere nearby. Nikolai opened the bedroom door and Rory and Butch charged in