brow lowered, his expression dark. “Not in my house.”
“Maximos—”
“Not in my house,” he repeated, standing in the hallway thinking the worst sort of thoughts.
Cassandra here. Cassandra engaged to Emilio. Cassandra sleeping with Emilio.
He saw red, blood-red, and happily contemplated murder. Emilio would pay. Emilio should pay. Finally. He’d committed inexcusable crimes and he’d never even been punished.
But Cassandra wasn’t intimidated and she wasn’t backing down. Instead she tilted her head, met his gaze squarely. “It was the room given to me. The room given to us,” she said, as if it were the most logical thing in the world for her and Sobato to be together.
“I’m changing your room,” he said tersely. “Sobato will stay here.”
“That’s silly. I’ve already unpacked.”
“Repack.”
She gave him a disdainful look, one that said he might be Sicilian and he might be the don of this castle, but she wasn’t accustomed to begging, and she wasn’t going to start groveling now. “No.”
And that, he thought was a most interesting answer. She’d never refused him anything before. She was a changed woman now.
“Turn around,” he said, distracted by her gaping gown, which gave him a glimpse of her full breasts. He knew her body so well, knew the shape and satin texture of the breast, the even silkier texture of the aureole and nipple. “Let me get your zipper.”
She shot him a mistrustful glance and reluctantly turned around.
Cass felt every muscle tighten and freeze as Maximos stepped close to her.
Closing her eyes, she held her breath as his hands settled on the zipper on the small of her back. She shivered as his fingers brushed her bare skin. Shivered again as he slowly drew the small zipper up. His hand followed the line of her spine, from the small of her back to the base of her neck.
“I think you got it,” she said hoarsely as his hands lingered a moment too long at her nape.
“The dress looks beautiful on you.”
Even his voice sounded deeper and the rough pitch was nothing if not sexy. The roughness strummed her nerves and desire coiled tightly in her belly. “Thank you.”
“Is it new?”
“No.” She turned, glanced up into his face, her gaze locking with his. “I’d had it for a while…just never had the chance to wear it before.”
“Because I never took you out?”
She flushed. “Because you preferred to keep me naked in bed.”
The corner of his mouth pulled but it wasn’t a smile, rather a bitter acknowledgment of truth. Their relationship had been nothing if not sexual, and Cass felt the old fierce hunger fill her now. But it made no sense. How could she still want him after all that had happened between them? How could she still want him this much?
The bathroom door abruptly opened and Emilio emerged. Cass took a guilty step backward even though she knew she’d done nothing wrong but everything was getting complicated, far more complicated than she could handle.
“I thought I heard voices,” Emilio said, one towel wrapped around his hips as he towel-dried his hair with another. “Is there a problem?”
“Possibly,” Maximos answered tonelessly. “Depends on how you look at it.”
“So what’s the situation?” Emilio draped the towel across his bare shoulder.
“Cass is moving to another room.”
Emilio shot her a suspicious look. “Why?”
“It’s out of respect for my mother. As you aren’t married yet—”
“She’s not leaving me,” Emilio interrupted. “We came together. We stay together.”
The hard mask slipped across Maximos’s features again. “Don’t worry. You’ll still see each other in the public rooms.”
“No,” Emilio stubbornly repeated. “I want her with me. She needs to be with me, too.” He turned and looked at her. “Don’t you, Cassandra?”
She opened her mouth to answer. “I—”
“She does,” Emilio finished. “Trust me.”
“I wish I could,” Maximos answered regretfully, and he sounded almost sympathetic until he crossed his arms over his chest and stared Emilio down. “But that’s not going to happen, is it?”
For a moment the two men engaged in a tense standoff while Cass let the word trust echo inside her head. There was that word again, trust, and it was obvious that broken trust was the fundamental issue here.
So what exactly had happened? And when?
“So what is it going to be?” Maximos prompted, arms still crossed and he looked like the Maximos of old—unflappable, immovable, the man in charge. “Does Cass get her own room, or do you both leave now?”
Emilio’s expression was still belligerent. “You wouldn’t throw Cass out.”
Maximos nearly smiled. “Try me.”
This was a new Maximos, Cass thought, one she’d never seen before. Until this weekend she’d only known the lover, not the dictator, although she’d sensed he lurked beneath the sophisticated veneer.
But then, of course, until this afternoon she’d never challenged his authority or provoked him. She’d blindly allowed him to make the decisions, trusting that he’d do what was right for her…for them.
Fool. She’d been such a fool in love.
Pained, Cass stirred. “I’ll pack,” she said. “I don’t have much.”
“I’ll carry your bag,” Maximos said.
“Is her room far?” Emilio asked sulkily.
“Not that far,” Maximos answered as Cass quickly slipped her shoes on and gathered her remaining personal items, tucking them back inside her small suitcase. “It’s close to my room,” he added. “Remember where that is?”
Emilio’s gray eyes narrowed. “She’s my fiancée.”
“So you’ve said.” Maximos smiled, but the smile didn’t quite reach his eyes. He turned toward Cass as she finished zipping her suitcase closed. “Ready?” She nodded. He reached for her case. “Then let’s go.”
As they walked along the upstairs hall, crossing from one wing of the palazzo to another, Maximos studied Cass’s profile.
She’d changed, he thought, changes
