never go back on a deal, Piper. Ever.’ A firm and sharp edge speared into his words, and if they’d been discussing anything else she might just have fallen for it. ‘I needed to know about your father’s illness. It’s the sort of detail a loving fiancé would know.’
‘Very well.’ She flounced away from him, desperate to reinstate the distance between them. She couldn’t deal with the scent of his aftershave invading her senses, the heat of his body so very close to hers, and definitely not his dark penetrating gaze, watching her so intently. ‘What do you need to know?’
‘When did he die?’
Piper closed her eyes briefly and took a deep breath, not sure she could do this now, but acutely aware that what he said made sense. If they were to look like a newly engaged couple he had to know at least something about her.
‘The night I met you in London was the first anniversary of his death.’ She lifted her chin and looked into his eyes, unwittingly sending him a challenge to ask more. A challenge he took.
‘So you used the attraction between us as a way to escape?’ He visibly stiffened before her, his whole body becoming rigid and his dark eyes almost fusing her to the spot.
‘Yes,’ she stated boldly, still ashamed at the way she’d needed to rebel against everything she’d stood for, every moral she’d been brought up to believe in. The only problem now was that she could see why her mother had insisted they both move to London. To keep what little of her family she had left together. Wasn’t she herself about to throw her life into this man’s hands for the sake of her unborn child?
‘Why me? Had you planned this outcome all along? This unexpected pregnancy?’
He flung his hands up in a gesture of frustration and turned away from her, giving her time to recover. But any recovery was short-lived. The next time he looked at her angry sparks glittered in his eyes.
‘Was that why you didn’t insist on contraception?’
‘No!’ she gasped, and stepped back away from his anger. ‘I thought you were telling me it was taken care of.’
He moved towards her and she took another step back until she met the coolness of the wall behind her, finding strength in it.
‘Did you perhaps know who I was that night?’
‘I had no idea who you were, and if I had I would never, ever have left the party with you.’ Angered by her silly notions of fate having brought them together, on that night of all nights, she met his fury head-on. ‘I can’t do this any more.’
He moved menacingly closer. ‘What can’t you do?’
His voice had deepened, his accent heightened, and the look in his dark eyes of anger blending with veiled passion made her heart thump so hard it almost hurt.
‘This pretence,’ she flung at him, unable to unlock her gaze from his or stop the pounding of her heart.
‘And what pretence would that be, cara?’
‘The...the engagement.’ She stammered the words out as he moved a little closer, those sexy eyes looking deep into her soul, as if finding the answer she couldn’t even give herself.
‘I think you mean the cold indifference you have adopted since you arrived in Rome.’
‘It is the only way to get through this charade.’ She hated it that her voice gave her away and turned into a whisper, that his close proximity was starving her of the last remnants of stamina and strength she had left after the last few hours.
‘But it is not all a charade—is it, mia cara?’
He touched her face, the contact of his fingers on her skin so soft, but she couldn’t stop the deep breath being dragged from her. And she hated the satisfaction which played on his lips and sparked in his eyes. She hated him and yet she wanted him. Badly.
‘Of course it is.’ Her breathing was impossible to control and she drew it in deep and hard as he looked down to her neck, where he must surely see her pulse beating wildly, and then to her breasts, which rose and fell with each deep breath. ‘You mean nothing to me.’
‘Don’t lie.’
The intensity in his eyes sent a spiral of hot need flooding down through her, right to the very heart of her femininity.
‘Or I may have to prove you wrong...prove how untrue that is.’
‘Don’t you dare!’ she gasped in shock, while inside a traitorous voice called, I dare you to.
The glint in his eyes fired with desire and she knew exactly what he was going to do. He was going to kiss her—and she wanted him to. She wanted to feel his lips on hers, to taste him and so much more. But that wasn’t the deal they’d made. The deal they’d made had been on paper only, was one that meant they would have nothing physical to do with each other and certainly nothing emotional.
‘Never challenge me, Piper. I always accept—and I always win.’
‘Not this time.’ She glared up at him, more angry at her own reaction to him than at his boast of always winning.
‘So...’ His brows rose suggestively and he placed the palm of one hand on the wall, leaning over her so that his face was so close she only needed to lift her chin and her lips would find his. ‘The challenge still stands, no?’
‘No...’ She dragged the hoarse whisper out, hoping for resolve but knowing she sounded more as if she’d dissolved.
‘And if I kiss you will it do nothing to you?’
‘Of course it won’t. There is nothing between us.’ Thankfully that declaration had sounded more convincing.
‘Are you quite sure, cara?’
His palm spread across her face, the pad of his thumb caressing the line of her lips, and she hated the way her eyes closed and the sound of her breath was ragged and uneven before a soft sigh slipped from her.
Why should she fight it? Whatever it was that had exploded between them in London was still there. She wanted to experience it again, to lose herself in the moment of oblivion. She wanted him—and didn’t having what you shouldn’t want get things out of your system?
* * *
Dante braced his arm against the wall as he looked down at Piper. His thumb tingled from sliding it over the lips he ached to kiss. He hadn’t slept with a woman since that night in London, telling himself he was too busy, but now he knew it was because he’d still wanted Piper. Somehow she’d crossed over the usually impenetrable barriers around his emotions and now, after spending a week with her, he had to accept the truth. He still yearned for her and there was only one way to deal with such needs. Sate them.
He looked down at her. Expectancy was in those luscious green eyes. She wanted him as much as he wanted her. The hot, sultry passion which swirled in her eyes matched that which spiralled deep within him. Pure carnal lust. Just as it had been the night they’d come together so explosively in London. A night which had changed his life in more ways than he’d anticipated since she’d dropped her bombshell news that morning in his office.
