touch of his lips to hers was fleeting. She had a sensation of firm contours. Her breath sharpened, coming in rapid bursts, and instinctively her hands came out to steady herself, resting on his waist. His hands fisted in her hair, tugging her head back gently, and her eyes opened, looking straight up into golden pools flecked with green.
Oh, Lord.
Enzo was looking at her assessingly. It made Cara feel nervous, but it was drowned in the proximity of her body to his, the clamour of her pulse. After a long moment his head descended again, but instead of kissing her where she ached most, on her mouth, his lips touched the delicate skin of her temples, trailed fire down her cheeks, and down further, to where the pulse beat rapidly under the skin of her neck. His tongue tasted her skin.
She twisted her head, her mouth searching blindly for his. She wanted to feel him take her, plunder her. Wanted to feel her tongue meshed with his. She wanted it with every cell in her being…but Enzo seemed to have other ideas. Cara suddenly felt bewildered. She was unaware of the soft moan of desperation that came from her mouth.
His hands on her head kept her steady, where he wanted her. Eyes glittered fiercely down, caught on her mouth. She tingled there, in high expectation that now he’d press his mouth to hers, wanting it so badly. But then he brought a hand to her bottom and pulled her in tight against him, and she felt the bulge of his hard arousal. She gasped out loud. Kissing was forgotten as all desire seemed to pool south and centre around her groin.
Wanting to be closer, if it were possible, she slid her hands up Enzo’s back, feeling the taut muscles as they moved under the silk of his shirt. Impatiently she registered that she needed to feel his skin, and scrabbled to pull his shirt out of his trousers, moaning softly when her hands made contact with his warm, smooth back.
Enzo tipped back her head, baring her neck to his mouth again. Cara’s breath came fast and jerkily, her hips moving instinctively against his body. He pulled back, breathing harshly, a fierce glitter in his eyes.
‘You’re a witch.’
Cara shook her head, feeling dazed. ‘No, I’m just Cara…’
His eyes flashed with something she couldn’t decipher and his jaw tightened. He shifted slightly, making her feel the full extent and power of his erection. Her legs nearly buckled. In the next instant she was lifted into Enzo’s arms and he took her into the adjoining bedroom, equally sumptuous, with a king-size four-poster bed, its covers turned down invitingly.
He put her down and very shakily she slipped off her shoes, her toes curling into the thick carpet. She watched as he impatiently threw aside the decorative cushions artfully adorning the bed, and then he turned back, the glitter even fiercer in his eyes now. The only thing that kept Cara standing there so calmly was the fact that she knew his desire was mirrored in her eyes too, and all the way through her body. She knew she couldn’t turn back. This was fate. She was meant to be with this man. She felt it so surely that she didn’t hesitate for a second.
She walked up to him and lifted her hands, starting to undo the buttons on his shirt. As her hands descended and his chest was revealed, bit by bit, the tremor in her fingers got worse and worse. At the last button Enzo took her hands away and impatiently ripped it open, the button popping free and falling somewhere on the carpet unnoticed. The shirt fell to the ground and Cara looked at the bare expanse of chest in front of her. Heat suffused her face. She reached out a reverent hand and touched him tentatively, trailing fingers over his hard flat nipples. His chest surged as he sucked in a breath, and when Cara looked up his eyes were momentarily closed.
In the next breath he’d opened them, and the dynamic changed. He turned her around, lifting up the hair resting on the nape of her neck, clearly looking for a zip or some opening on her dress.
It almost hurt to breathe when she said, ‘It’s a jersey dress.’
He turned her back, his features almost comically impatient. ‘A what?’
Cara couldn’t answer. She just brought her hands to the bottom of her dress and pulled it up, over her thighs and hips, over her waist and chest, until everything was obscured and she knew he was looking at her body. She couldn’t see his reaction. But she felt it in the air. Everything went still.
Finally the dress was free of her head, and as she pulled it away she felt her hair fall down her back. She couldn’t look at Enzo, feeling unnacountably shy. She was also very aware of the functional nature of her underwear, how boring it must seem compared to how she would imagine other women might dress for him, in concoctions of lace and silk. She wore plain white cotton underwear, and if she remembered correctly these particular pants were so old they had a hole in the seam. Mortification twisted Cara’s insides as she suddenly had a reality check and an implosion of panic. Her breasts were too small, her hips too narrow. Her brother had always told her derisively she had the figure of a boy.
With her head downbent she brought her arms up to cover her chest, and immediately felt heat as Enzo came towards her and tugged them down again. Cara fought rising emotion, feeling ridiculously inadequate. She didn’t want to see pity in his eyes, disgust at her less than womanly body.
A finger came under her chin, forcing her head up. She kept her eyes closed. Enzo still held her arms away from her body, and her chest heaved with the effort to control her emotions.
‘Cara…’
It was that inflection again, making her insides melt. Reluctantly Cara opened her eyes. She steeled herself, tilting her chin in an unconscious show of dignity, and met his gaze. It was dark, unfathomable and hot. Very hot. Cara frowned. ‘But I’m…not…’
‘Not what?’ he asked gruffly, even as his eyes travelled down over her body, taking in every dip and curve, and the high, firm breasts, tips hard and thrusting against the cotton of her bra.
Cara felt wanton and aching all over. He wasn’t looking at her with disgust at all. ‘I thought…I thought you wouldn’t find me—’ She swallowed miserably.
He looked at her again. ‘Attractive?’
He shook his head and took his arms from hers, let his body do the talking. With lethal grace he opened and dropped his trousers, stepping out of them. His shoes and socks were gone, bare feet tanned and big. Cara gulped. She’d heard the waitresses at the club talking lewdly over the years about men and their anatomies and proportions. His legs were long and tautly muscled—the legs of an athlete, not someone who worked out in the gym. Her gaze finally landed on that part of him that was still hidden under snug briefs. Very snug briefs, straining with the erection they encased. With a dry mouth she watched helplessly at the mercy of her rapidly heating libido, as he pulled them down and off, wincing slightly, freeing the full extent of what looked to Cara like a massive erection.
Her eyes flew to his. Surely there was no way—?
He reached for her and pulled her towards him, all the way, until they stood thigh to thigh, chest to chest. And where Cara could feel him pressing against her, the power of his sexuality a pulsing enticement to touch, all trepidation melted away in an instant, the beat of her blood drowning it out.
He caught his hands in her hair again, seemingly luxuriating in the long, heavy strands, twisting them around and through his fingers. She reached up and pressed her mouth and lips against his neck, tongue darting out, teeth nipping gently. He tasted salty and it made her skin prickle. His chest against hers was like a huge steel wall, the muscles rippling, causing her breasts to ache for his touch.
His
