The fact that this wasn’t simply a calculated statement. The fact that the strange creature in front of him had bewitched him in some way.
That she had compelled him to give her books, of all the ridiculous things. A new one every day because he passed a shop on his way home from work, and he thought of her every time he did. Because she wanted to learn and he wanted her to.
And, Dio, what he would teach her tonight.
“You haunt me,” he ground out, losing hold of the carefully scripted line of compliments that he had put together moments before, going off into the dark parts of himself, where he could scarcely see an inch in front of him, much less guess at what might come out of his mouth next. “My dreams,” he said, the words rough, “and every moment I lay in bed not dreaming because I’m thinking about you.”
Her entire body was shaking like a leaf in a storm, and he felt nothing but triumph. His vision was a blur, a haze of everything but Esther. His mind blank of everything except what would happen in the moments immediately following this one.
She would say yes. She had to.
She pulled away slightly, and he wondered if he had gone too far. If he had been too intense, if he had been too honest.
He made a decision then.
He took firm hold of her arms and dragged her forward, closing the distance between them and claiming her mouth with his own. He wrapped her up in him then, folding her in his arms, gripping her chin tightly as he braced her firmly against him and forged a new, intimate territory between them.
He had kissed her before. But not like this. This wasn’t a show for the people around them. It was not designed for cameras. And it wasn’t designed to end here.
It was a beginning. A promise. A precursor of what was to come. An echo of the act that he intended to follow.
As he thrust his tongue in and out of the sweet, hot depths, as he felt her moan and shake beneath him, he knew that he had won. Because if he could reduce her to this—reduce them both to this—here in the presence of all these other people, then there would be no resisting him once he had her alone.
His father would be angry. Because Renzo had not taken this opportunity to forge new business deals as he had promised. But his father had no idea about the other war that was being raged. The war to keep Esther close, the war to defend the family that was growing inside her even now.
It took all the strength that he possessed to pull away from her. To keep himself from pushing her into the nearest alcove, shoving her dress up her hips and taking her then and there. Claiming her. But that would only further the cause of satisfying his desire. It would not further the cause of seduction.
He doubted if Esther had ever been taken up against a wall in a public place. And he also doubted if she would find that overly romantic.
As much as his body didn’t care, the rest of him had to. He managed to find his focus in that. And when he turned back around and saw his daughter standing at the back of the room chatting with friends and taking no notice of what had been happening with him—why would she? She had no idea who he even was—it brought him crashing down to reality with an extreme sense of purpose.
“Come,” he said.
She blinked. “We haven’t been here that long. We came all the way to New York for this.”
He laughed, every jagged thing inside him brought to the surface because of what had happened tonight stabbing through him. “No, cara. I came all the way to New York for you. To seduce you. To have you.”
She looked shaken by that, her dark eyes filled with confusion. “You could have had me in Rome,” she said finally, her tone muted.
“But I will have you here,” he said, smoothing his thumb over her swollen lower lip. “With this city in the background, on that big bed in a beautiful hotel. In this place that you’ve never been before, where no other man has ever had you. And I swear to you, you will never forget it.”
She looked away from him, hesitating for a moment as though she were about to say something. But then, she didn’t. Instead, she simply nodded and took his hand.
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