Constantine's Revenge

Unexpectedly those black eyes avoided her questioning grey ones. It was such a shock to see the confident, self-assured Constantine Kiriazis so uncharacteristically at a loss for words that it gave her the determination to go on, push him a little harder.

‘Constantine? What do you feel?’

For the space of another heartbeat he still hesitated. But then, just when she was sure he was going to ignore her completely, or change the subject, a dismissive lift of the broad shoulders under the elegant coat shrugged off whatever restraint he was imposing on himself.

‘I feel totally uncivilised,’ he muttered, his voice thickened and rough. ‘If you want the truth, I feel wild, pagan—primitive.’

Well, she’d asked!

‘And why…?’

‘You know why!’

Constantine flung the words at her as if he hated having to speak them. Yellow flames of emotion flared in his eyes, burning away the control he had been imposing so ruthlessly up until this moment, and his proud head went back in a gesture of defiance.

‘I feel this way because of you. I want you! I’ve wanted you all night! I’ve always wanted you—and I doubt if I’ll ever be cured of this need. The two years we’ve been apart have been hell. Not having you has been like an ache in my gut, always there, always reminding me of how it used to be.’

‘Me?’

She couldn’t believe what she had heard. It wasn’t a declaration of love, but right now it was enough. He wanted her. He had missed her. He had hurt being without her.

‘Grace.’

Her name was a raw, rough-voiced sound.

‘Grace, come here!’

Common sense screamed at her to be careful, to hesitate, to allow time for second thoughts. But her heart brushed aside such foolish considerations impatiently.

She wasn’t even aware of having moved before she was across the room and in his arms, feeling them close around her, holding her tight.

His mouth claimed hers in the same second, shocking in its wild, hungry demand. And Grace responded in kind, all the pent-up longing, the loneliness, the agony of the past two years exploding into a white-hot, raging conflagration of need. She kissed him back with all the force of her emotions laid bare for him to see.

‘Grace, pethi mou…beautiful Grace…’ Constantine muttered against her mouth. ‘You are mine. You always have been mine. I will let no one else…’

‘There is no one else,’ Grace managed breathlessly, dragging in air in a brief respite from the calculated assault upon her senses. ‘No one now, no one—’

Some sixth sense had her snatching back the final word before she spoke it. She wanted Constantine to know that there was no other man in her life right now. Whether she also wanted to admit that there had been no one else since he had walked out on her was quite another matter entirely.

Oh, there had been plenty of interest. She had even been out on a few dates. But they had been short and not particularly sweet. No matter how hard she’d tried, she’d found it impossible to put on even a show of an interest she was very far from feeling.

And now she knew why. For the past two years she had been slowly starving inside, wasting away emotionally without a sight or sound of Constantine to nourish her. She had been in suspended animation, like Sleeping Beauty, waiting only for his kiss to bring her alive again.

And she never wanted to go back to those empty days. Never wanted even to think of them. Particularly not now, with Constantine’s arms enclosing her, his hands caressing her body, his mouth following a heated trail from her lips, across the soft skin of her cheek and down her throat to where her heightened pulse beat frantically in the scooped neckline of her tee shirt.

‘I lied, you know…’ he muttered against her hot skin.

‘What?’

Adrift on a warm sea of pleasure, Grace only registered that he had spoken. But then the true import of that lied hit home, slashing into her delirium.

‘You what?’ Fear clutched at her heart. ‘Constantine?’

His laughter feathered over her tightly stretched nerves, softly reassuring.

‘I lied. When I said I didn’t like what you were wearing.’

“‘Distressingly unflattering” were the words you used, I believe,’ Grace managed, the words sounding strangled and uneven as long-fingered bronzed hands smoothed over the offending outfit, making her writhe in responsive delight.

‘Distressingly provocative is more like it!’ Constantine growled. ‘Do you know what it does to me to see the way those jeans hug your pert little backside, the sway of your breasts underneath your tee shirt?’

‘I never wore a bra when I was fourteen.’

Her reply broke in the middle, cracking noticeably as those wickedly knowing fingers found the small gap between the bottom of her shrunken tee shirt and the tight-fitting waistband of the denim jeans. Shuddering in response to the tiny electric shocks of pleasure his touch sparked off along her sensitised nerves, she caught her lower lip between her teeth in order to hold back the cry of delight that almost escaped her.

‘And every time you moved, this tiny patch of skin could just be seen…tormenting me, tantalising, just begging to be touched.’

He was touching it now—with a vengeance! Making her shiver and writhe against him in a way that made the heated force of his desire only too obvious through the fine fabric of his well-cut trousers. Her blood raced through her veins, making her heart pound, her thoughts swim.