Untamed Italian, Blackmailed Innocent

She looked up at him with soft blue eyes, and he could not resist. He wrapped an arm around her waist and slid his hand through the silken tumble of her hair to tip up her face.

‘What are you doing?’ she murmured.

‘Oh, I think you know,’ he drawled huskily, and covered her lush lips with his own.

He could not let her go without kissing and tasting her just once, he told himself…

Chapter Four

STARTLED out of her lethargy as a strong arm slipped around her waist, Sally arched back in instinctive denial of the intimacy he was seeking. She glanced up at his darkly attractive face and recognised the sensual intent in his eyes. She was stunned by the sudden flash of awareness that heated her whole body. He was going to kiss her…

Her pulse began to race, and as his dark head bent she could almost feel the virile power emanating from his mighty frame. For a second she was tempted to abandon herself to what he was offering. But she knew it would be a disastrous mistake. She had no time in her life for an affair with Zac or any other man, even if she wanted one. She put her hands up to push him away, but too late…

Zac’s warm mouth claimed hers with a soft sensuality that totally confused and captivated her. She closed her eyes, her lips involuntarily parting to accept the subtle intrusion of his tongue as he deepened the kiss with a skilful, seductive passion that blew all thought of resistance from her mind.

Sally had never experienced a kiss like it. Dizzy with a sensual excitement she had never known before, she let her mouth cling to his, and eagerly, if a little inexpertly, returned the passion. Suddenly he broke the kiss, and tiny moans of regret escaped her, quickly followed by a gasp of pleasure as he trailed kisses down her throat and lower, to trace with his tongue the gentle curve of her breasts revealed by the neckline of her dress.

His hand dropped to slip beneath the fabric, long fingers edging beneath the delicate lace of her bra to cup her naked breast, a thumb teasing the burgeoning tip to send rivers of unbelievable sensation flowing through her body. His mouth returned to hers, and she was enthralled by his taste, his touch, drowning in the sea of erotic pleasure his kisses and caresses evoked. She felt the heat of his palm on her bare leg, his hand stroking up her thigh, and she trembled, the blood pulsing thick and fast through her veins. She was ablaze with sensuous hunger, with a need she didn’t understand but knew she wanted fulfilled badly.

So this was what she had been missing—this was the reason people loved sex, she thought wonderingly, and curved her hand around his neck to mesh her fingers in the silken hair of his head.

Abruptly he pulled away, and without his support Sally flopped back against the seat. Lost in a haze of sexual arousal, she murmured, ‘What happened?’

‘We have arrived at your destination. Harrods.’

His deep accented voice speared like an icicle through the emotional fog clouding her brain. She was mortified. She had not noticed the car had stopped. She glanced down and, horrified, adjusted the bodice of her dress. She looked out of the window—anywhere but at the man next to her. Finally, as the silence lengthened, reluctantly she looked back at Zac Delucca.

He was watching her, his eyes as dark as night, the remnants of desire swirling in the liquid depths.

‘Shame, I know, Sally.’ His lips quirked at the corners in the beginnings of a smile. ‘But we can continue this later. Have dinner with me tonight.’

‘No,’ she said abruptly. Sally had never felt so embarrassed and ashamed in her life. Noting her skirt had hitched up around her thighs, she swiftly smoothed it down with trembling hands. Never in all her life had a man kissed and touched her so intimately. And she couldn’t understand what had come over her.

‘Tomorrow night, then,’ he prompted.

How the hell had it happened? Sally asked herself for the second time today in the luxury of his limousine. This time it was much worse, and it was Zac Delucca’s fault again. When he had spoken of his skills as a lover she had never dreamt he meant to try and prove his statement with such explicit speed that the defensive wall she had built around herself would crumble with just one kiss…

‘Sorry, no. I am going away for the weekend.’

‘Cancel and spent the weekend with me,’ he demanded arrogantly.

Staring at him, her blue eyes widening, Sally unconsciously ran the tip of her tongue over her slightly swollen lips, where the taste of Zac still lingered. It would be so easy to say yes to a weekend of mindless pleasure instead of sadness, and suddenly she was afraid of the speed with which he had turned her life upside down. Then she realised he had been nowhere near as affected by the passionate interlude as she had been, and, given the churning in her stomach, still was!

He probably seduced women in his limo on a regular basis, and she had very nearly been his latest conquest…

She thought of her mother, who really needed her, as opposed to a man like Delucca, who certainly did not—except in the shallowest way. Zac was undoubtedly a formidable man, used to getting whatever and whoever he wanted, and he was her father’s new boss.

But then again, Sally thought, she didn’t give a fig for her father. If she offended his boss, so what?

‘That’s an outrageous suggestion and not one I would ever consider,’ she said bluntly. ‘And I promised my mother.’

‘Loyalty to your mother is an admirable trait. We can make it dinner on Monday night.’

Not only was he arrogant, he was also pig-headed, and she did not bother to reply as, to her relief, the chauffeur opened the car door. She needed to get as far away from Zac Delucca as she could, and, swinging her legs out of the car, she stood up. She hesitated and glanced back at Zac. Good manners were ingrained in her.

‘Thank you for lunch, Mr Delucca, and the lift,’ she said formally. ‘Goodbye.’ And, turning, she hurried along the street.

She did not go into the store, Zac noted as he watched her walk along the pavement. Her rear view was as enticing as the rest of her, and the reason he had eschewed good manners and not helped her out of the limousine was still causing him a problem.

‘Drive on,’ he ordered the chauffeur. Sally—or Salmacis, he smiled to himself—intrigued and also confused him.

By nature he was a decisive man. Once he decided on a course of action in both the business world and his private life he never changed his mind. Yet a certain red-haired woman had him changing his mind over and over again.

Needy was a no-no; husband-hunting was a no-no; idle little rich girl was a no-no—and he did not believe for a minute that she was spending the weekend with her mother. Partying was more her style, if the slight violet shadows under her beautiful eyes were anything to go by. He would bet on it…She wasn’t his usual type at all.

Yet, against all that, after deciding to kiss her goodbye he had changed his mind again.

As soon as their lips had met she had caught fire in his arms, melting against him, running her fingers through his hair, inflaming him further. She was the most incredibly responsive woman he had ever met, and there was no way he was walking away.

He strolled back into Paxton’s office and glanced at Raffe, who shook his head slightly. So Paxton did not know yet they were on to him. Good.

‘Your daughter and I had a pleasant lunch, Paxton. She asked to be dropped off at Harrods, though I noticed she didn’t go in the store.’

‘You know what young women are like—always changing their minds,’ he said with an ingratiating smile. ‘I gave her a studio apartment in Kensington and it is not far from Harrods. She probably decided to walk home.’

Zac knew enough about property in London to know that an apartment in the Royal Borough of Kensington did not come cheap. Sally was a lucky girl, and Paxton was looking guiltier by the minute.

Sally drove into the car park of the nursing home and cut the engine. She glanced up at the mellow stone, half covered by the rampant scarlet Virginia creeper. The sun was shinning, it was a glorious June day, and yet she felt none of the joy such a beautiful day should bring. For a moment she folded her arms across the steering wheel and let her head drop. She had to smile for her mother, even though her heart felt like lead in her chest. It was hard…so very hard…Even more so now she knew the doctor’s prognosis…