An Inheritance of Shame(24)

He tucked a stray tendril of hair behind her ear, trailed his fingers down her cheek. She closed her eyes, drew in a shuddering breath and then opened them to stare straight into his own.

‘Make love to me, Angelo. Make love to me, please.’

Her broken plea felled him. How could he deny her? How could he resist her? Angelo curled his hands around her shoulders and kissed her softly. At least, it was meant to be a soft kiss, a tender thing, but memory and need crashed over him, reminding him of how accepted he’d felt in her arms, as if her embrace were the only home—the only hope—he’d ever had.

He deepened the kiss, turned it into both a demand and entreaty. His tongue swept into her mouth and he slid his hands under her T-shirt, cupping the lush fullness of her breasts as a sob of longing broke from her throat and she hooked one leg around his, drawing him even closer to her own intoxicating softness.

He’d meant to lead her upstairs, to pull back the satin sheets and lay her down gently, like a treasure. He’d meant to take his time, to make love to her properly, for he knew the last time they’d been together it had been desperate, frantic—and incredible.

And it was just as frantic now—and just as incredible.

Her fingers fumbled with the zip on his jeans and then curled around his erection. He let out a ragged moan as he slid his own hand up the silky length of her thigh and then beneath her underwear straight to the centre of her, his fingers sliding inside her slick warmth even as his brain told him to stop rushing, they had all the time in the world—

Except they didn’t. Lucia pulled him closer, arched against him. ‘Now, now,’ she pleaded, her voice almost a sob as she pushed down his jeans and boxers with clumsy, hurried movements. He hoisted her onto the back of the leather sofa, her legs spread wide and open to him. She reached for him, guiding him towards her.

‘Lucia…’ he muttered, a token protest, for already she was wrapping her legs around his waist, arching against him, and then he was inside her and he let out a ragged gasp of desire because she felt so good.

They moved in silent, sweet complicity, and pleasure and something far deeper surged through him, overwhelmed every sense he possessed. He’d thought last time the rightness he’d felt with Lucia had been a product of his own confused grief over his father’s death, but he had no such reason this time. No such excuse. The rightness he felt, the completeness, was just as strong, just as powerful—even more so.

This was where he belonged. He, a bastard child rejected by his father and abandoned by his mother, barely tolerated by the grandparents who had raised him and reviled by the villagers who could have been his community, his strength. This—Lucia—was the only place where he felt at home. Where he belonged.

He felt her arch against him and she sobbed out his name, her face buried in his shoulder, as he reached his own climax and drew her even closer to him, never wanting to let her go.

Lucia sagged against Angelo, replete. Tears streaked down her face but they had been good tears, healing tears in their own way. She didn’t regret anything. She wouldn’t let herself.

He moved, slipping out of her, and she felt an immediate and innate sense of loss. Incredibly, she still wanted him. Gently he tucked her hair behind her ears, wiped the traces of tears from her face. He smiled, his features softened into something almost like tenderness.

‘Dio, I didn’t mean it to be as fast as that.’

She laughed shakily; already this was so different from before. From what she knew. Seven years ago there had been no pillow talk, no exchange at all. Afterwards he’d drawn her to him and she’d curled around his body, silent, singing with an ill-found happiness, and they’d both fallen asleep.

When she’d woken up with the dawn he had already left. She hadn’t even been surprised, not really.

‘There’s nothing wrong with fast.’

‘Next time it will be slow.’

Next time? The words, spoken with so much certainty, shocked her. Surely there would be no next time with Angelo.

He tugged on her fingers. ‘Come upstairs.’

‘Where?’

But he didn’t answer, just led her up the winding staircase and then into what was clearly the master bedroom, and then into the huge marble en suite bathroom.

‘You’re covered in sand. And tears. Let me wash you.’

Wash her? It seemed like an incredibly intimate, tender thing to do, so different from the frantic urgency of what had happened before. This was new, uncertain territory, thrilling and scary. She didn’t know this Angelo.…And yet as he led her to the huge glassed-in shower with a wry, tender smile she felt like she’d always know him.