the terrace to rest her elbows on the stone balustrade. The night air felt cool on her hot face but her heart was still beating painfully hard. When she allowed her mind to rerun her conversation with Dante she wanted to die of embarrassment.
She could not continue to work for him now. It would be too awkward. It was bad enough that she had spent the past two months mooning over him like a lovesick teenager, but the realisation that he had known about her infatuation was so humiliating. First thing tomorrow she would hand him her resignation, she decided. And then she would phone Gaspard Clavier and discuss the possibility of working at his new restaurant in St Lucia.
Her mind was whirling as she took a long sip of her drink. Behind her, she heard the sound of footsteps striding across the terrace, and she stiffened.
‘I’d go easy on the punch, if I were you. I overheard a waiter telling a guest that one of the ingredients is limoncello,’ Dante murmured.
That explained why her head had started to spin when she’d come outside into the fresh air, Rebekah thought ruefully. The Italian lemon liqueur had a high alcoholic content, but she hadn’t noticed it mixed into the fruit punch.
‘Well, as this is my fourth glass, I’m probably tipsy and you can have a good laugh when I make a fool of myself.’
The moonlight threw his chiselled features into sharp relief and accentuated the sensual curve of his mouth. Rebekah hated herself for the physical pang of longing that made her tremble. She tore her gaze from him. ‘Although, actually, I don’t need alcohol to make me act stupidly,’ she said miserably.
Dante frowned when he saw the faint quiver of her lower lip. ‘What’s the matter?’ he demanded, catching hold of her shoulder to prevent her from walking away from him. ‘Are you angry because I admitted I find you attractive?’
It was not what Rebekah had expected him to say. She had been certain he would taunt her about her awareness of him.
‘I’m concerned it will make it difficult for me to carry on working for you,’ she mumbled.
‘I’m not a savage brute at the mercy of my hormones,’ he said drily. ‘I’m capable of controlling my libido.’ He lifted his hand and brushed her hair back from her cheek, his eyes narrowing speculatively on her flushed face. ‘Although it would help if you stopped looking at me like you’re doing at the moment.’
Was it the sudden sensual roughness of his tone that brought Rebekah’s skin out in goose-bumps or the hard glitter in his eyes that caused the ache inside her to intensify until it consumed her?
She bit her lip. ‘How am I looking at you?’ she whispered, and did not recognize the husky voice as her own.
‘Like you want me to kiss you.’ Dante gave a low laugh when she did not deny it. He stared into her incredible violet eyes, watched them darken as her pupils dilated and read the invitation she could not hide. But he also glimpsed a faint wariness that made him hesitate.
He recognized there had been an undercurrent of sexual awareness between them for weeks, long before she had taken his breath away by wearing an evening gown that revealed her hourglass figure. But he had determinedly ignored his attraction to her—partly because he preferred not to get involved with a member of his staff, but also because he had sensed a vulnerability in her that had made her off-limits. Yesterday, at the christening party, he had glimpsed an expression in her eyes that he could not forget. He suspected that she’d had her heart broken by the guy in Wales, but if she hoped he could fill an emotional void inside her she would be disappointed. Bitter experience had taught him that life was a lot simpler without emotions to screw it up.
But, as he’d watched her dancing tonight and noticed the attention she had received from other men, he had felt an unexpected surge of possessiveness that had prompted him to stride onto the dance floor and pull her into his arms. She had been on his mind all day and she had even disturbed his concentration while he had been in court representing a client. Now, as his gaze lingered on her soft pink lips, he could not control the rampant desire that surged through his veins.
She must be drunk, Rebekah thought wildly, because Dante could not be looking at her with raw sexual hunger blazing in his eyes, as if he wanted to ravish her mouth with his own. Dear heaven, how she longed to be ravished. But she must be sensible. She was always sensible.
‘Of course I don’t want you to kiss me … Oh!’ Her tremulous denial faded away as he lowered his head and slanted his mouth over hers.
His lips were firm and demanding, ruthlessly crushing her faint resistance with a mastery that made her tremble. He traced the shape of her mouth with his tongue before teasing her lips apart to dip between them, taking the kiss to another level that made her head spin and her body tremble.
It was the most erotic experience of Rebekah’s life and far exceeded the fantasies she’d had of being kissed by him. She had no thought of denying him. How could she when she was utterly captivated by the smouldering sensuality of his kiss? Instead, she responded to him helplessly, parting her lips so that he could plunder their sweetness. She heard him groan and mutter something in Italian beneath his breath. He slid his hand down to the base of her spine and pulled her hard against him, and the feel of his rock-solid arousal nudging her pelvis sent molten heat flooding through her veins.
Swept away by the sheer intensity of feelings Dante was arousing in her, she lifted her hands to his shoulders and clung to him, wishing that the magic would never end. But at last he eased the pressure of his mouth until it was a gossamer-light caress before he broke the kiss.
Rebekah stepped back from Dante and swayed unsteadily. He frowned, remembering she had been unaware that the fruit punch she’d been drinking all evening contained alcohol. He did not believe she was drunk, and he was convinced she had known what she was doing when she had responded so ardently to him. But once again he was struck by her vulnerability and he was not comfortable with the idea that he might have taken advantage of her while she was off her guard.
‘I need to take you home,’ he said roughly.
The sound of his voice should have brought Rebekah to her senses but she seemed to be in the grip of a wild madness that drove all sensible thoughts from her head. The fierce gleam in Dante’s eyes told her that the kiss they had just shared had not assuaged his desire. He wanted her, and the knowledge was empowering, liberating. For the first time since Gareth’s devastating betrayal she felt like an attractive woman instead of the grey shadow she had become.
Perhaps the full moon suspended like a huge silver disc above them really did have mystical properties. All she knew was that tonight she wanted to take back charge of her life. For weeks she had fantasised about making love with her gorgeous, sexy boss. Why not, for one night, turn the fantasy into reality?
‘When we get home, do you plan to kiss me again?’ she whispered.
The moment the words were out she was shocked that she had been so bold. Dante seemed equally surprised and his gravelly voice was thick with sexual tension.
‘Do you want me to?’
She stared at his hard-boned, beautiful face and her heart thundered.
‘Yes.’
Dante caught his breath as desire jack-knifed through him at Rebekah’s unguarded reply. He had told himself he must end this madness, but his chef, who he had thought of as prim and a little prudish, was excitingly unpredictable. She knew as well as he did that if he kissed her again the fire smouldering
