‘They’ll be the first to understand. They think this is a love match and they’ve been trying to brainwash me into the joys of married life for far too long... They’ll be over the moon when I tell them that we have to escape for some private time because we can’t get enough of one another... I can already hear the violins in the background...’
Little will they expect that this is just a pretend game, and that this so-called need for private time will just be about sex, Alexa thought, with the sort of cynicism she’d never thought she had.
‘And your brother’s making a big effort to come over... I was quite looking forward to meeting him, maybe going to one of the local art galleries while you were busy during the day...’
Theo burst out laughing. ‘Daniel and art don’t go hand in hand. I think it stems from the fact that an art teacher once told him when he was a kid that he would be doing the world of art a service by staying as far away from pencils and paintbrushes as he could...’
‘Whereas you...?’
‘I was smart enough to work out that if I couldn’t paint anything remotely realistic then I’d paint whatever the hell I wanted and call it abstract... It worked... I’ll message my brother—tell him to skip the meet-and-greet detour and head directly to the cruise ship he wants to buy...’
‘So we go to New York,’ Alexa said slowly, ‘spend a week there...after which we should both be over this...this...situation between us. Then we return to Italy as a happy, platonic couple and serve our one year’s penance before walking away from one another...’ She forced a bright smile to her face. ‘You’re right, of course. Enjoy one another for a few days...get this inconvenient attraction out of our system...and once that little hiccup’s dealt with we’ll be able to...to look at one another without any stupid awkwardness...’
Since that was pretty much what Theo had had in mind, he was a little unnerved to hear it stated so bluntly.
‘Enough talking...’ He tilted her head and when she arched back kissed her neck, worked his way to her breasts and then levered himself up and stared down at her flushed face. ‘Now I’m going to give you a little lesson on taking charge...’
He did.
She touched him as he had touched her. She straddled him and worked her way meticulously down his body, loving every inch of muscle and sinew under her exploring hands. She marvelled that her shyness had evaporated. Something about the way he looked at her, with a sort of lazy, lingering, heated intensity, stripped her of her inhibitions and invested her with self-confidence she’d never known she possessed.
When she took him in her mouth and heard his throaty groan a heady sense of power invaded her.
There had been moments in her adult life when she had thought about her virginity. She had never been bothered by it, but there had been a nagging worry that when the time came she would be so nervous that she wouldn’t be able to enjoy the experience. Sex would have become a big thing she had built up and would fail to deliver on the night.
The only consolation in that scenario had been the certain knowledge that the guy she fell in love with would be someone kind, thoughtful and patient enough to guide her slowly.
As she felt this big, arrogant, sinfully good-looking man shudder as she continued to caress his erect sheath with her mouth and her tongue a thought flew through her head, as lightning-fast as quicksilver...
He might not be a shining advertisement for kind, thoughtful or patient, but he has been kind and thoughtful and patient with me...
The roughened feel of his thighs under her fingers as she continued to arouse him with her mouth took her own physical response to a level she could barely control, and she drew back from her lingering exploration so that she could rub herself against his erection.
Theo was having to take long, even breaths to keep his control in place. He opened his eyes and inhaled sharply as he looked at her astride him.
With one hand firmly on his erection, she flung her head back as she moved her body sensuously against him. Every shudder of pleasure was reflected in her soft moans as his hardness played against her clitoris.
Her long hair was in utter, sexy disarray and her generous breasts bounced as she moved like ripe fruit, gently shaking, too succulent to pass up.
He tugged her towards him so that those breasts were closer to his mouth, and as she knelt over him, still enjoying his erection against her, eyes still shut, breathing still coming and going in little gasps and groans, he flicked his tongue over one engorged nipple and then stilled her slightly so that he could suckle more thoroughly on it.
Hands on her slender ribcage, he carried on pleasuring himself at her breasts until neither of them could handle the build-up any longer.
They were so hot for one another—but she was still cool enough to fumble through his wallet and extract his last condom, which she took her time stretching over him.
Theo was riveted in a way he had never been with any woman by the sight of her voluptuous nakedness...the satiny smoothness of her shoulders and the soft paleness of her skin in such contrast to the perfect circular deep rose of her nipples.
His feeling of absolute possession was second to none, but he easily explained that away by the fact that she had come to him a virgin.
He was going to enjoy being her teacher, and she was showing all the signs of being an A class student...
Who knows? he thought, before his mind emptied of all thought and the primitive responses of his body took over. Maybe a week might not be quite long enough after all...
LYING ON THE BED, Alexa drowsily watched Theo, sitting at the desk in the hotel bedroom, wearing only his boxers, frowning at whatever he was looking at on his computer.
Their last night in Manhattan.
She couldn’t quite believe how fast the time had flown since they had left The Hamptons. As predicted, Bob and Felicity had not been at all fazed at their early departure.
‘Completely understand!’ Felicity had carolled. ‘It’s been a while—hasn’t it, Bobby?—but I can still remember what it was like to be young and in love...!’
Alexa had had to inwardly admit that she and Theo were certainly giving the impression of two people who couldn’t keep their hands off one another, and she could understand how that might have led to the misconception that they were in love.
How ironic that now, when there were no reporters around, furiously snapping pictures, the physical contact between herself and Theo was one hundred per cent genuine.
Every time she glanced at him her imagination took over, and she remembered what it felt like to have those hands all over her body and his mouth kissing every enthusiastic inch of her.
They had checked into the penthouse suite which had originally been booked for them—the adjoining room was now redundant—but, frankly, they could have been anywhere in the world. Any hotel in the world. Just so long as there was a bed, because they spent an inordinate amount of time making love.
For a couple of hours every day Alexa had insisted on going out on her own, so that Theo could work.
‘I can work perfectly well with you around,’ he had drawled, in the sort of dark, persuasive voice that had made her almost but not quite revise her determination not to submerge herself entirely in him. ‘In fact I find I work better, because I can touch you whenever I need a break...’
This was just the sort of heady flattery that she knew could so easily go to her head. It was the stuff she loved hearing—just as she loved hearing him tell her how desirable she was, how irresistible, how he couldn’t see the bed without wanting her in it, naked and pressed up close to him.