He moaned softly, throwing his head back as she closed her lips around him, pressing him firmly against the roof of her mouth as she began to suck. Soon he wouldn’t be able to stop himself, Iannis realised as his hips flexed convulsively. She was a Siren, a water sprite. She had bewitched him, Iannis Kiriakos, to whom control was everything—in every area of his life.
‘Stop,’ he managed huskily. ‘Stop, Charlotte! Stop now!’
She ignored him.
When was the last time anyone had disobeyed him? Could he recall a single incident? Much as he wanted her to continue, catching sight of Charlotte’s tangled, salt-clogged hair, Iannis knew his need to pleasure her was greater. She was the most dangerous and the most infuriating woman he had ever known. But she drew other feelings from him too, and it was these that made him reach down and bring her to her feet.
‘Did I do something wrong?’
Wilful, strong, and yet so very fragile, Iannis thought as he drew her into his arms. ‘No,’ he admitted, wishing things could be different between them, ‘you did nothing wrong. You did everything right.’
Charlotte gazed up, wanting to believe him. ‘So, why—?’
He rested one finger over her swollen lips, making a sound he might have made to a child. But then he replaced that finger with his lips and all Charlotte’s concerns dissolved into sensation. His lips were firm and insistent, and he teased the seam of her lips apart with lazy passes of his tongue, then took her, plunging deeply and slowly into the moist darkness of her mouth.
Her hips moved convulsively to provide a warm cradle for his erection, and the touch of his naked body against every inch of her torso, even through the thickness of her clothes, was all it took to tip her over the edge so that she cried out in surprise as the violent spasms claimed her.
Iannis supported her, bearing her weight when her legs gave way and lifting her off the ground to deepen his kiss for the duration of her climax.
‘You greedy girl,’ he murmured softly when it was all over. ‘Did I give you permission for that?’
His voice was low and teasing, and he felt so strong, so wonderful against her. She never wanted him to let her go, never wanted the moment to end. And the way he was looking at her—his gaze penetrating, warm and amused—she wanted that look to last for ever. ‘I’m sorry, I—’
He cut her off with his finger again and made the same soft sound as he let her go. ‘Where’s the shampoo?’ he said, looking around.
‘Shampoo?’ Charlotte mumbled, still mesmerised, still lost in the aftermath of sensation.
‘The shampoo,’ Iannis repeated. ‘In here?’ he enquired, opening a cupboard on the wall.
Charlotte managed to whisper, ‘Yes,’ her gaze following Iannis, drinking him in, relishing the sight of him.
‘Conditioner?’
‘Conditioner?’ A croak seemed to emerge from her throat of its own accord.
‘Yes—you know,’ Iannis said wryly. He ruffled his own hair, then, seeing the state she was in—how reluctant to emerge from the erotic trance into which he had placed her—he raised his shoulders in a shrug and shook his head.
‘Shower,’ she managed to whisper.
Iannis checked, and then came back to her.
‘I hope you have a good water tank or we’ll be taking a cold shower,’ he observed dryly.
The water was still running, Charlotte realised, coming to. ‘Oh, no!’
‘No matter,’ Iannis said. ‘We have more than enough heat between us, and to spare. Come,’ he said, beckoning to her. ‘Come to me, Charlotte.’
Charlotte raised her arms for him and Iannis eased her top over her head. The old swimming costume felt tight across her straining breasts. She had never seen her nipples so erect.
‘Magnificent,’ Iannis remarked, following her gaze. With both his hands he very lightly cupped her breasts, and with an even lighter touch scraped his thumbnails very slowly around the base of the insistent peaks before taking them in a firm grip through the worn fabric and tugging on them.
Charlotte gasped and threw back her head as the pleasure lapped over her, but Iannis removed his hands immediately.
‘Not again,’ he warned. ‘I won’t allow you to lose control again.’
As he dropped a kiss on her shoulder Charlotte felt his beard-roughened face scrape against her tender neck and shuddered with delight. Then she felt him nudging her a little, and realised that he had already loosened her shorts and pushed them down over the swell of her hips.
Tilting her chin up, he made her look at him. Very lightly he touched her lips with his tongue… teasing her, Charlotte realised, when he stopped and held her away from him. It made her long all the more to press against him, to feel his erection pressed hard against the cushion of her belly.
Were her eyes as dark as his? They seemed to control her without the need for words. She lost herself willingly in the deep black pools of light, groaning in response when he slipped the straps of her costume down from her shoulders and then, with torturous delay, brought it down inch by lingering inch over her sensitised body.
It was like unpeeling the most delicious, the most succulent fruit, Iannis mused, freeing Charlotte from the shabby costume. Her shoulders were sun-kissed and her arms felt like silk. And her breasts—He stopped, unwilling to draw the costume lower until he had feasted his eyes on them. They were full and proud, the nipples tip-tilted in a way he had rarely seen. They seemed to challenge him in a way he had never experienced before. Revenge was sweet, indeed, he conceded, feeling his senses soar as he dipped his head to kiss her again. But as he deepened the kiss, making it slow and languorous, he knew his lust for revenge had subsided. The urge to bring her pleasure had overtaken everything else.
‘Come,’ he murmured, ‘it is time for me to serve you now.’
Was this what love felt like? Charlotte wondered. Iannis was a magical lover—she didn’t want to think beyond that; she only wanted him to take her on an erotic journey where there were no secrets, no holding back.
He led her under the shower and washed her hair, and when he had finished with that he took the sponge and gently washed every inch of her body.
‘Can I wash you now?’ Charlotte said when he had finished.
He looked at her, saw how her eyelashes were long and thick and clogged with water. The look she was giving him was so open—cunningly contrived to put him off guard? But he didn’t want to believe that. He wanted one night—one night of love before he must confront the reality of her betrayal. Was that so much to ask? Iannis wondered, feeling his senses soar as he stared into her eyes.
‘Soon,’ he murmured, kissing Charlotte’s eyelids gently when she begged him again.
But she took the sponge from his hand and refused to give it back to him. ‘I won’t be denied.’
‘I can see that,’ he murmured, dropping a kiss on her neck.
He had a body the mythical gods would have envied, Charlotte mused as she lavished care over every toned, tanned inch. Iannis possessed a frame of heroic proportions; his muscles were hard and clearly defined. Yet he wasn’t over-built, and nor was he weatherbeaten, as she might have supposed him to be due to his work. He was perfectly proportioned, deliciously bronzed, and with just enough body hair to draw attention to his masculinity without concealing it…
‘Seen