I finally rose to my feet.
“Can I put him to bed?” Alejandro said. “At least try....”
“Sure,” I said softly. I handed him the burping cloth, then the fuzzy cuddle blanket. “But you’ll need to burp him first.”
“Um...I’m not so sure that’s a...”
“You’ll be fine.” I lifted a sleepy Miguel against his shoulder, over the burping cloth, and showed him how to gently pat his small back. Hesitantly, Alejandro followed suit, until our baby came up with a huge burp, before he softly sighed, and his eyes became heavy again.
Alejandro flashed me a look of triumph. “Ha!”
Seeing him that way, this handsome, ruthless, broad-shouldered man holding his tiny sleeping son—our son—my heart twisted. I smiled, and hoped the dim light of the nursery wouldn’t let him see how I was fighting tears.
Against everything I’d once believed, everything I’d once feared, Alejandro was an amazing father. I knew he would take care of Miguel and love him and always be there to catch him if he fell.
“Now what?” he whispered.
“Tuck him into the crib, on his back,” I answered over the lump in my throat.
Alejandro moved slowly, careful not to wake Miguel, careful to hold his head. He looked as if he were sweating bullets, like a man under the pressure of disarming a nuclear weapon, as he gently set our baby down into his crib. Leaning over beside him, I placed Miguel’s favorite baby blanket, the fuzzy one decorated with elephants, softly by his cheek.
For a long moment, we stood over the crib, watching our son slumber, listening to his quiet, even breathing. Then Alejandro lifted his head to look at me.
Our eyes locked. And what I saw in his face left me shivering beneath the open weight of his hunger. Wordlessly, he pulled me from the room, closing the door behind us.
We were alone. In his bedroom.
I stared at him, my heart pounding. “You have to know—what happened in the garden today was a mistake.”
“Sí,” he agreed. “It was.”
He was taking it a lot better than I’d thought he would. I exhaled. “So we won’t...”
My voice trailed off as, for the first time, I realized someone had been in this bedroom while we’d been bathing Miguel. My eyes went wide.
A fire now crackled in the fireplace. Candles glowed from the marble mantle. And...no, surely it couldn’t be...
Going toward the king-size bed at the center of the room, I picked up one of the scarlet, fragrant petals that had been scattered over the white bedspread.
“Rose petals?” I said dumbly. Turning, I held it up. “I don’t understand....”
He gave a low, sensual smile. “Don’t you?”
I exhaled. “You arranged this.”
“Yes.”
“But you just agreed that our kiss was a mistake—”
“It shouldn’t have happened in the garden. Or the kiss in the coatroom in Madrid, either. I wanted you. I lost control. That was the mistake.” Coming close to me, he shook his head. “But this won’t be.”
“Don’t look at me like that,” I whispered.
“Like what?”
“Like...” I licked my lips. “Like it’s all you can do to keep yourself from ripping off my clothes and sliding me beneath you...”
“Because, querida,” he said, cupping my face, “it is. I’ve dreamed of you for so long....”
“You dreamed of me?” I breathed, remembering all the nights I’d yearned for him, in hot dreams that had made me ache, only to wake up bereft and cold in the morning.
“Yes. But tonight, querida, tonight,” he whispered, lowering his head toward mine, “my dreams come true. Not for duty. Not for convenience. But for pleasure. For need.” He slowly traced his hand down the side of my body. “There’s been no one for me since you, Lena. Did you know that? No other woman I’ve wanted in my bed. Just you. And now you are mine at last—as I am yours....”
As the fire crackled in the fireplace, I saw the shadows of red and orange move across the hard edges and planes of his handsome, saturnine face.
“It can’t be true.”
He pulled me into his arms.
“Tonight,” he said softly, “will be the first night of forever.”
Trembling, I looked up into his dark eyes. I tried to think of something, anything, to send him away from me. I tried to make my body move away, to run. But it was no longer obeying me. My body knew what it wanted. What it had always wanted.
I felt his hands tighten on my back, over the fabric of my blouse, as he pulled me close.
And he lowered his head to mine. I felt the warmth of his breath against my skin. A hard, reckless shiver went up and down my body. Of need. Of desire so great it made me shake.
Because what I wanted now, though beautiful as flowers, could poison my soul, and kill my heart. Just like the oleander...
“Please,” I breathed as I felt the roughness of his jawline brush against my cheek. It was all I could do, to keep from leaning into him, kissing him, pulling him hard and tight against me. I wanted him so badly, I could almost have wept from it.
He traced his fingertip very gently from my earlobe, along my cheek, to my full, aching lower lip. “Please?”
“Please...” I tried to remember what I wanted. Please kiss me. Please don’t.
But he didn’t give me time to gather my senses. Lowering his mouth to my ear, he whispered, “You are mine. Forever and always. My pleasure. My duchess. My wife. My lover...”
“No,” I whispered. “I can’t be....”
“I forgot.” He drew back, his eyebrows an amused slash over his heavy-lidded eyes. “You said you do not want me.”
“I don’t,” I said, praying he would believe such a lie.
“I see.” He ran his hand down the bare skin to my throat. “So you feel nothing when I do this....”
Trembling, I shook my head.
“And this...” His large hand cupped my breast over my blouse, the tip of his thumb rubbing over my nipple, which pebbled, aching and taut beneath the fabric.
I couldn’t speak. I looked up at him, my lips parted, my heart pounding.
“Give in. To me.”
“But I don’t love you,” I choked out, but what that really meant was Don’t make me love you.
“I do not ask for your heart. But your body—sí. Tonight...your body will be mine.”
And he lowered his mouth to mine.
His lips were gentle, even tender. One touch, and I was proved a liar. Of course I wanted him. Of course I did.
I sighed, as his kiss deepened, became demanding, hungry. My arms wrapped around his shoulders, pulling him close.
He slowly lowered me back against the enormous bed covered with rose petals. I gloried in the heavy weight of his body over mine, pressing me deep into the soft mattress.
He pulled off my blouse, kissing down my body as each opened button revealed more of my skin. He lifted me against him, to pull off my shirt. I felt the warmth of his fingertips trailing down my naked arms, down my back. With expert precision, he unlatched my bra with a single flick of his fingers, and