The Tuscan's Revenge Wedding (Italian Billionaires #1)(35)
Leaning back in his chair at a slight angle, Nico stretched out his long legs, crossed his ankles and took up his wine glass. His gaze rested on her, accessing, intent, as he sipped the rich red vintage.
Something oddly predatory in his gaze set tension to coiling in her stomach. Imagination, she told herself, yet she could not be entirely natural under that steady regard.
“What?” she asked after a moment, threading her fingers through her hair to bring some order to the wind-tangled strands.
“Nothing.” He pushed the bread and olives toward her, nudged her glass a little closer. “Eat. Drink your wine. Relax.”
“I don’t do relaxation very well.” She reached for an olive and took a small bite. The flavor was so fresh and rich that she gave it closer attention.
“I’ve noticed.” He nudged her glass again. “You do know that a few sips won’t make you drunk?”
“Yes, of course.”
“And that it did not, almost surely, contribute to your mother’s death?”
She made no answer as she discarded the olive pit. The cause of death had actually been stronger spirits mixed unwisely with prescription drugs, but it would only weaken her position, and possibly her resolve, to admit it.
“She was, in that too apt phrase, drowning her sorrows, yes?”
Amanda looked away toward a low stone wall that ran along one side of the trattoria. A large orange tabby cat lay sunning on its concrete cap. “I suppose.”
“You have too much common sense to do the same,” he said with the lift of a shoulder. “That being so, you may as well enjoy one of life’s greatest pleasures.”
Too much common sense. Amanda was not sure she liked that description. It made her feel rather older than she was, and minus any trace of daring.
The wine was a serious temptation, in all truth. Everyone seemed to relish it so here in Italy, drinking it as naturally as breathing. It had no special significance to them, carried no puritanical taboos, but was simply part of life.
And what a life it was, she thought as the breeze fanned her face and lifted her hair. With its emphasis on family and caring, food and warm, ever-ready emotion, it made her more aware than she wanted to be of the barrenness of her days.
It was so beautiful here, just now, so quiet and peaceful. The only sounds were the distant wash of the sea, the clatter of pots and dishes from the kitchen, the drone of bees and lazy slap of the canvas strips overhead as the sea breeze lifted them and let them fall again.
She eyed the glass in front of her. Sighing a little, she looked away, took another olive.
“Of course you must do as you prefer,” Nico said with a gleam of challenge rising in his eyes. “You will know best if it’s likely to make you do things that are wild and unlike yourself.”
“Not happening.”
“How can you know if you’ve never tried? You might lose all control. You could tear off your clothes and run naked down to the sea.”
She snapped her head around to stare at him while heat flared upward across her cheekbones. “Don’t be ridiculous!”
“If that isn’t what you fear, what is?” He swirled the wine in his glass, breathing the bouquet that rose from its rich red vortex before taking a deep, appreciative sip.
It was pure provocation and she knew it. That did not prevent the rise of a strong need to show him she feared nothing, least of all him and his uninformed judgment of her. She gave him a dark look. “It would serve you right if I did drink too much, if I climbed into your lap and begged you to make love to me right here.”
“I believe I could handle it,” he said, his voice layered with dry humor and something more that deepened its tone.
She met his eyes for a long moment, absorbing the speculation and dark promise they held. She’d thought to startle him, even discompose him. It hadn’t worked, yet he didn’t mean what he’d said, surely he didn’t.
The thought that he might turned her mouth dry. The day was suddenly far too warm and the only thing on the table to drink was the wine. Watching him inhale its bouquet, taste and swallow with such evident enjoyment made her mouth water with the sudden need to see what was so pleasurable about it.
“You know very well you would be outraged if any woman with you did such a thing,” she said in strained derision.
“Are you quite sure?”
“And if one of your sisters dared crawl into a man’s lap in a public place, you would lock her up for a year!”
“True,” he said as he surveyed her in languid appreciation, his gaze drifting slowly from her mouth to her breasts under her crisp white blouse and back again, “but you are not my sister.”
Her nipples tightened under his gaze and her stomach muscles clenched. Beneath the peace of the setting lay a sudden and most definite sizzle of tension. She desperately needed something to drink and it mattered little at that moment whether it was alcoholic or not.
“Oh, all right! But if I’m to have wine, I’d like mineral water to go with it.”
His smile was triumphant but approving. It was almost worth the surrender to see the way it changed his face, lighting it with devastating attraction. Also to feel the warmth of his favor before he signaled for the waiter and ordered mineral water for them both.
Their meal arrived in due time. Whether it was the wine, the cook, the place, the beauty of the day or the company, it seemed to Amanda that she had never tasted such wonderful food. Before she knew it, she had finished every drop of the lovely elixir in her glass.