she felt as if she was being sucked into a whirlpool of clawing, desperate need.
With the wall at her back, his body had more leverage against hers. She felt the hard ridge of him against her belly, the pounding heat of his blood surging through his veins in primal response to his need to mate. She felt the urge too. It was beating inside her like a primitive tribal drum, the walls of her feminine core quivering in anticipation of the delicious friction of his commanding possession.
His mouth was like a naked flame against hers. His kiss was scorching her but she returned it with matching heat, her tongue darting and diving in a cat and mouse game with his. His hands slid up her body and cupped her breasts, gently but possessively, his thumbs claiming her erect nipples as his own to pleasure, to caress and to tease into submission.
Bronte arched up against him shamelessly. She wished she could rip her clothes off in one movement to feel his warm masculine hands on her bare skin. She tugged at his shirt, pulling it free of his trousers, sliding her hands up his chest, her fingers exploring the hard musculature that had delighted her so much in the past. She felt the hard, flat nubs of his nipples and the scratchy dusting of masculine hair over his chest. He was in every way possible a man: strong and capable, lean but hard muscled, fit and virile, potent and irresistibly sexy.
His mouth moved from hers to her breast; the hot moist feel of him caressing her made her spine turn to liquid. She made a soft sound in the back of her throat, something between a whimper and a gasp.
‘I have dreamed of doing this,’ Luca said throatily. ‘Touching you, feeling you respond to me. No one else has ever turned me on quite like you do.’
It was just the reminder Bronte needed that she was not the only one he had been with and she was certainly not going to be the last. He had worked his way through a glamorous array of women since he was a teenager. She had known of his playboy reputation when she first met him but somehow hadn’t been able to resist his seductive charm. She was older and wiser now. And she had responsibilities. Ella was her most important one. There was nothing she would not do to protect her baby girl. Denying herself this was a sacrifice she had to make. For now, at least, until she could find a way out of the honey trap Luca had lured her into.
She let her hands drop from around his neck, her eyes meeting his. ‘I can’t do this, Luca,’ she said. ‘Not here. Not like this. It’s… it’s too soon.’
His eyes seared hers for an endless moment, a muscle working in his jaw as he fought to control his rampant desire. ‘Remember our deal,’ he said.
Bronte slipped out from his arms where they were propped against the wall either side of her head and put a little distance between their bodies. She struggled to get her breathing to steady, difficult when her pulse was fluttering like a hummingbird inside her veins.
‘Deal?’ she asked with a scornful look. ‘Don’t you mean the bribe you put on the table, Luca? Money for sex.’
‘That is rather a crude way of putting it,’ he said.
‘It’s the truth, though, isn’t it?’ she asked. ‘You want to turn me into a whore. You open your wallet; I open my legs. That’s the so-called deal, isn’t it?’
A nerve ticked like a pulse at the side of his mouth. ‘Don’t cheapen yourself like that, Bronte.’
Bronte gave a choked laugh that was just shy of hysteria. ‘You tell me not to cheapen myself when you have insulted me more than any other person I know.’
He drew in a breath and moved across the room, standing at the windows that overlooked the shimmering lights of the city below. Bronte saw the stiff set to his broad shoulders, the straight spine and the long legs standing slightly apart.
She longed to go to him and wrap her arms around him, to take whatever he was offering, but she knew in the end it would only lead to further heartbreak. How could she ever trust he wouldn’t walk out on her again? She would not survive it a second time. It had nearly done her in the first time. It had only been the responsibility of Ella that had made her come to her senses and grow up—and grow up fast. But, even so, it was tempting. Oh, dear God, it was tempting. To feel his arms around her one more time, to have him hold her as if she was the most precious thing in the entire world. How she had dreamed and longed for one more time with him over the last two years.
‘Fine,’ he said after a long moment, his voice sounding hollow and empty. ‘You are free to go.’
Bronte felt her heart give a little start. ‘But I thought—’
He turned, his dark eyes hitting hers. ‘Go, Bronte. Before I change my mind.’
She swallowed and took a hesitant step towards the door, but then she remembered her clutch purse was sitting on the sofa. She glanced at it but, before she could move, he stepped forward and picked it up.
He came over to where she was standing and handed it to her. ‘This is all wrong, isn’t it?’ he said.
She rolled her lips against each other, not sure if he wanted an answer or not. Of course it was wrong. It was wrong for her to still want him, no matter what terms he laid down. It was shameless of her, needy and pathetic and desperate, but that was what he reduced her to. No man had ever made her feel so desperately in need. No man had made her heart ache with an indescribable longing. No man had made her want to throw herself at him in spite of everything.
She had to leave.
She had to leave now, before he saw how close she was to offering herself for further hurt. She had to leave before these minutes alone turned into an hour or two of stolen pleasure that, just like in the past, would trick her too-trusting, too-romantic mind into thinking they had any sort of future.
‘I have handled this all wrong,’ he said again with a rueful tilt to his mouth. ‘I should have called you first, given you some warning, perhaps. Maybe then you would not be so wary of me. You would have been better prepared, sì?’
‘Why didn’t you?’ she asked in a scratchy voice.
One of his broad shoulders rose and fell. ‘I wanted to see your instinctive response to me, not a rehearsed one.’
Bronte gave him a disdainful look. ‘You make it sound like some sort of social experiment.’
His eyes stayed on hers: dark, tempting, fathomless. ‘I would like to see you again, cara,’ he said. ‘Tomorrow night. No strings this time. No threats or bribes or blackmail, just two people having dinner together. If you like, we can pretend we have met for the first time.’
Bronte chewed at her lip, torn between temptation and uncertainty. Was this some sort of set-up? What if he still wanted to pull the financial rug from under her feet? ‘The rent thing…’ she said. ‘I don’t have that sort of money. I think you know that.’
‘Forget about the rent,’ he said. ‘I don’t want you in my bed because you have no choice in the matter. I know you will come to me, Bronte. It is inevitable. I knew that as soon as I walked into the studio.’
Had she been that transparent? Bronte wondered. ‘You are deluding yourself, Luca,’ she said with a proud hitch of her chin. ‘You mistook surprise for something else.’
His knowing half-smile travelled all the way to his eyes. ‘So beautiful,’ he said, trailing a slow-moving finger down the curve of her cheek.
