Читать книгу Ruthless Revenge: Sweet Surrender - Эль Кеннеди, Annie West - Страница 16
ОглавлениеTHEY SAT AT a glass-topped table on the shady pool terrace. Ella didn’t know whether it was the luxury of her deeply upholstered chair, the glass of chilled Semillon Donato had poured or his air of ease but, remarkably, she began to relax.
Almost as if that hectic interlude in the foyer had never happened.
No, not that. She was hyper-aware of him—every move, every look. The shimmering excitement in her belly had eased a little, but not vanished.
Yet something had shifted. The challenge was no longer overt but overlaid with what felt curiously like understanding. Or a truce.
There’d been no provocative comments since she emerged from the bathroom. No double entendres. No confrontation and definitely no smirking from Donato.
He’d ushered her out here, chatting easily as if they hadn’t just imploded in each other’s arms. Maybe that should have insulted her, but Ella was relieved, feeling some of her jittery tension drain away.
She’d settled at the table, relieved to be off her unsteady legs, and watched him uncover a feast. The sort that took hours, and professional chefs, to prepare.
She should be critically analysing every nuance of the situation, working out how to counter the threat Donato posed.
It was a measure of the strangeness of the day, and of his easy charm, that Ella simply gave in to hunger and ate.
The food was delicious. There were tiny melt-in-the-mouth lobster patties, crispbread bites with prawns and aioli, a colourful salad decorated with fresh mango, and an array of other delicacies.
Had Donato snapped his fingers and ordered a banquet? Did he offer such feasts to all the women he seduced?
Her breath shortened. He hadn’t needed to seduce anyone today, had he? She’d been primed and ready for him.
He refilled their glasses and Ella’s gaze fixed on his well-shaped hands and sinewy forearms, strong and dusted with dark hair. He was so blatantly enticing. Something dropped hard in her belly.
Fantastic sex as an antidote to life’s problems? If only it were that simple.
‘Are we going to talk about it?’ She pushed her plate away. ‘Or are we going to ignore the elephant in the room?’
A long dimple carved Donato’s cheek and a chord in her chest tweaked hard. So much for burning off the passion he’d aroused. Instead her susceptibility had increased.
Ella blinked, stunned but somehow not surprised. She’d never been into casual sex. And for her there’d been nothing casual about today, though she wouldn’t examine just what that meant.
‘You think of sex as an elephant?’ he murmured.
Her lips twitched despite her resolve.
‘Don’t be obtuse.’ She reached for her glass and took a sip. The crisp wine was delicious against her suddenly dry throat. ‘We’ve resolved nothing. I—’
‘Of course we have.’ His smile grew and he gave her that look. The one that made her feel as if she didn’t know her own body any more. ‘We’ve confirmed that you and I are every bit as good together as we’d assumed.’
His eyes didn’t leave her face but heat licked her in all sorts of hidden places. He lifted his glass in silent salute and drank. Ella was left wondering how the sight of that tanned throat working as he swallowed could create a squall of such hectic need in her.
She shook her head.
‘Don’t play coy, Ella. You wondered right from the start how we’d be together.’
Ella firmed her lips. ‘Don’t try to distract me, Donato. It won’t work.’
The glint in his dark eyes and the quizzically raised eyebrow told her he disagreed. She put her glass down with a click and sat straighter.
‘You said this morning you still want this marriage.’ She couldn’t bring herself to say marry me. It was just too far-fetched. ‘Why? There’s nothing you’d gain by it.’
His raised eyebrow shot even higher.
Ella put up her hand. ‘We’ve already demonstrated you don’t need marriage for sex.’
Would he make a quip about that? She’d laid herself open to it. But no, he merely sipped his wine.
‘How about an introduction to Sydney society?’ He tilted his head to one side as if sharing a confidence. She didn’t believe it.
‘You hardly need that.’
‘Don’t I?’ He leaned back further, lounging casually as if they discussed nothing more important than the ship passing far out to sea, or the rainbow lorikeets clustering in the ancient Port Jackson fig tree at the bottom of the garden.
Ella wanted to grab him by the collar and shake him till he lost that complacent look. Or kiss him. She shoved the thought aside. She was already in enough strife.
‘Of course not. You’ve got the money and influence to open any door.’ Just look at this house. Whether he owned or rented it, it cost a bomb.
‘But you know I also have a criminal record. I served time in juvenile detention, then prison.’ Did she imagine his mouth thinned on the words? Though his expression remained unreadable, his face looked somehow more severe.
‘So?’
‘It hasn’t occurred to you that someone with my background might find doors still closed to him? That some people are uncomfortable mixing with an ex-con? A dangerous ex-con.’
Dangerous. There was that word again.
Yet would a truly dangerous man have treated her as he had?
She’d disintegrated at his touch, thrown herself at him, behaved with a reckless carnality that even now took her breath away. Yet not once had he tried to force her, though it was obvious he wielded power as easily as she did a thermometer. Though he’d challenged her from the moment they’d met, she’d never relinquished the right to choose. If anything, he’d emphasised that, leaving it to her to bridge the gap between them.
Nor had he made her feel cheap. He’d reminded her it had been a mutual seduction.
Ella thought of Donato’s hand at her back as she’d walked out here on legs that threatened to give way, how he’d given her time to come back to herself after their tumultuous lovemaking.
Donato Salazar, ruthless tycoon, the man who held her father in the palm of his hand, had been kind.
And not because he wanted something. She’d already given him what he wanted back in the foyer, with her legs around his waist and her hands clutching him close.
He was far more than the dangerous predator she’d first imagined.
Ella remembered something she’d read on the Net last night. About how there’d been virtually no turnover in his personal staff, about the loyalty he inspired. She’d assumed he paid well. Now she wondered if it was more complex, more to do with the man himself.
Ella stared, mesmerised by the hint of tension in Donato’s shoulders.
Was it true? Were there really doors still barred to him?
She couldn’t believe he let the opinions of others matter. There was something so sure about him, so adamantine.
‘You’re saying you want to marry into my family to gain respectability?’ She frowned. Her father had been part of elite Sydney society for years but his position had slipped. There were some who disapproved of him and his flashy ways.
‘Is that so unbelievable?’
‘Frankly? Yes.’
He said nothing. Impatience rose.
‘So you’re not going to tell me what’s going on?’
Eyes the colour of twilight held hers. Their colour seemed to darken as she watched. It must be a trick of the light. But there was no mistaking the subtle change in his expression. It grew shuttered.
Moments ago she’d flirted with the idea Donato wasn’t nearly as scary as imagination had painted him. That illusion vanished now. He looked as unsentimental as the worst corporate raider.
Except there was more. Ella felt again the heat of his possession. That current of electricity. That connection. She couldn’t believe, after a lifetime dealing with her self-serving, merciless father, that she’d respond this way to a man who was just the same. Her sixth sense told her there was a lot more to Donato.
Briskly she rubbed her hands over her arms, trying to smooth her prickling flesh.
‘Why don’t you tell me the truth? Why insist on this farce of a marriage?’ Her voice rose as disappointment vied with frustration. Had she really hoped things had changed because they’d been intimate?
Heat streaked Ella’s cheeks and she turned, staring across the lush garden to the sea beyond. She wasn’t used to these games. She wasn’t used to casual sex and its aftermath. Donato had provoked her and she’d let anger and desire lead her out of her depth.
She should be home now, washing clothes for work next week. Or scouting the sales and second-hand furniture stores for another lost treasure to restore.
Donato leaned forward and involuntarily her gaze slewed to his. Something kicked in her chest as the air thickened.
It’s too late. The damage is done. You can’t turn back the clock. He fascinates you and you still want him.
Ella reached for her wine glass then let her hand drop. It wasn’t alcohol she needed. Her head was fuzzy enough without it.
‘The truth is rarely simple, cariño. And not always desirable.’
Was it the unexpected lilting endearment that caught at Ella’s throat? Or the expression on Donato’s face? That fleeting hint of emotion stilled Ella’s heart. She stared, wondering if she’d imagined it. But there’d been no mistaking the stark pain she’d glimpsed. It stunned her.
‘You want the truth?’ He shook his head, muttering something that might be Spanish. It had those fluid cadences. Then he sat forward, his elbows on his knees as he filled her personal space. ‘The truth is—I want this wedding your father is planning.’
She should have been insulted. Despite their sexual attraction, he didn’t want marriage for the sake of marrying her. He’d been just as willing to marry Fuzz. Instead Ella was intrigued. There was something there. Something she couldn’t put her finger on, that would explain everything if only she understood.
He wanted the wedding.
Not her, but the wedding.
Ella frowned, testing the notion that Donato would marry a stranger, a total stranger, just to secure a place in society. It didn’t make sense.
‘Stop scowling, Ella. You’ll give yourself a headache.’
‘You don’t think the idea of being forced into marriage is enough to make my head hurt?’ She couldn’t believe he’d do it. It was too preposterous.
To Ella’s surprise, Donato reached out and took her hand, clasping it loosely. ‘It will be all right.’ His voice was low and reassuring, like a wave of soft warmth. ‘All you need to know is that while the wedding plans go ahead so does my support for your father.’
For a heady moment she wanted to sink against him, trust that it really would be all right. But how could that be?
‘Except you’re threatening him.’ And, as a result, the rest of her family.
‘You care so much about his money? You’re dependent on it?’
Her eyebrows arched. She hadn’t been dependent on Reg Sanderson’s money since the day she turned seventeen and walked out of the door to pursue her own life. It didn’t matter that her dreams were mundane by her father’s standards. Becoming a nurse, doing something concrete and practical to help people. Being financially independent. Choosing her own friends. All those things had been important milestones.
‘I care that you think you can blackmail me into marriage. It’s not ethical.’ She speared him with a look and tugged to free her hand from his grip. It didn’t work and she shot to her feet.
Donato rose at the same time, looming close. ‘You want ethics from me? From an ex-crim?’ His jaw set.
‘Why not?’ Ella should be intimidated by the glint in his eyes and by the way he crowded her, his wide shoulders hemming her in. Instead she felt a delicious thrill as she arched her neck to hold his gaze. With Donato she’d never felt more starkly the divide between male and female. She revelled in his size, his brooding presence and the unfamiliar sensation of being almost petite.
Was she insane?
‘You’re not a thug, Donato.’ There was too much intense thought behind his alert gaze for that to be true. And too much control—it was stamped on his features. Then there was the way he’d made love to her...
For the first time it seemed words eluded him. He stared as if he’d never seen her like before.
What? Had he really thought she’d have given herself to a man she feared?
‘You don’t say,’ he said at last. ‘And you’re an expert on thugs? Growing up in a north-shore mansion and attending a posh private school?’ His words were a silky taunt and she wondered at the anger she’d inadvertently stirred. Because she refused to think the worst of him? Had she questioned too closely?
‘You did check on me.’ Ella blinked, amazed at how betrayed she felt. She tasted disappointment, a bitter tang on her tongue.
Donato frowned. ‘I said I hadn’t. It doesn’t take an investigator to know your father wouldn’t send his darling daughter anywhere she’d mix with the wrong sort.’
Ella’s stomach swooped in relief. She hadn’t wanted to believe Donato had lied.
She huffed a mirthless laugh. She’d never been Reg’s ‘darling daughter’. If only Donato knew, her school had had its share of bullies. Maybe if she’d been pretty or pert or less studious they wouldn’t have targeted her.
‘I’ve met some thugs in my time.’ Her father being one. ‘They bully those who seem weaker. But really they’re cowards, scared of anyone stronger.’
‘Yet you don’t think of me as a bully?’
Ella drew a deep breath, then wished she hadn’t as she dragged in his spicy warm scent. It made her want to kiss that hard beautiful mouth. She dragged her hand free and stepped back, her chair grating across the flagstones.
‘No, I don’t.’ Donato was demanding, arrogant, clever and ruthless. But he’d been considerate, reassuring and almost...tender. He’d kept his word, refusing to have her investigated because he knew the idea revolted her. He’d been honest, up to a point.
‘Tell me about the man you attacked.’
Donato’s head reared back. ‘What makes you think I want to talk about that?’
She shrugged. ‘Why wouldn’t you? Don’t tell me you’re scared I’ll judge you?’
Instead of bridling at the taunt, Donato surveyed her with a thoroughness that brought all that reckless awareness straight to the surface in a blaze like wildfire.
Ignoring the flare of arousal, she stared straight back. She needed to understand him.
‘Why did you fight with him?’
He shrugged, his expression closed. ‘He deserved it. He hurt someone.’
Ella frowned. She hadn’t read about anyone else in the fight, just the teenage Donato and a forty-year-old man. Yet it had been the older man carted off to hospital after the police intervened.
‘So you were protecting someone?’ Her chest contracted at the idea of a teenager taking on a grown man to save someone else.
She’d never had a protector in her life, had always fought her own battles, but the idea held huge appeal. Perhaps because no one had ever stood up for her. It made his actions more understandable, more forgivable.
Ella counted one breath, two, three, before finally he shook his head.
‘It wasn’t that simple. Don’t imagine I’m some hero.’ His mouth twisted harshly. ‘I’m not.’
Her thoughts stalled at his tone, and at that flash of dark emotion. He looked...tortured. And she’d swear she heard desolation in his stark words. Then, even as the impression formed, his expression was wiped clear.
But that split second had been enough to set Ella’s thoughts whirling.
Did he blame himself for not protecting this other person? Clearly something still ate at him, despite the passage of time. Donato was in his mid-thirties, yet long-ago hurt was buried beneath all that surface sangfroid.
Whatever he felt in that carefully guarded soul, it ran deep and strong.
Instead of frightening her, the knowledge drew her. She wanted to smooth her hands over his set shoulders, press herself against him and learn all there was to know about Donato Salazar.
Fear jolted through her. Fear of how much she wanted to break down that wall of superior calm and find the man behind it.
You haven’t known him a day and already you want so much!
Alarm made her voice abrupt. ‘Is that the only time you’ve been violent?’
‘What is this, an interview?’
Ella notched her chin high. ‘You’re the one talking about marriage.’
‘I’ve never been violent towards a woman. It’s not something you have to worry about.’
‘Because you say so?’ She crossed her arms over her chest.
‘It’s not something I’d ever do.’ Indignation flashed in his eyes, but it was the proud set of his chin, the distaste in his flared nostrils and flat mouth that told her she’d struck a nerve. ‘I was brought up to respect women. You have nothing to fear from me.’
Scary how easy it was for her to believe him.
‘What about men?’
‘If you were a man we wouldn’t be having this conversation.’ His voice dropped to the deep, resonant pitch that made her want to do something crazy, like drag his head down to hers and kiss him till he told her all his secrets.
She made herself take a single step back from him. His jaw tightened.
‘You haven’t answered my question.’
‘Am I physically dangerous?’ He sighed and shook his head. ‘It was all a long time ago. I told you on the phone. I learned to think before I act. Prison is a great teacher.’
He lifted one finger to follow the line of that narrow scar bisecting his cheek. ‘I thought I was tough as a kid but I had a lot to learn.’
Ella’s heart lurched. Imagine going behind bars as a teenager and emerging a man. Imagine who he’d mixed with there. No wonder Donato had a hard, impenetrable edge.
That scar, though silvered now, scored perilously close to the corner of his eye. It was faint enough to give him a rakish hint of the buccaneer, but she’d dealt with knife wounds when she’d worked in Emergency. She knew what sliced flesh looked like.
‘Ella?’ His breath feathered her face, warm and coffee-scented. ‘You’re feeling sorry for me?’ His brows knitted as he leaned over her, astonishment clear in those brilliant eyes.
‘No, I...’
Her words dissolved as his lips brushed hers, soft and almost tentative.
That was all it took. One kiss. Not even a kiss but the merest whisper of a caress, and she ignited, falling against him as he tugged her in. He wrapped his arms around her, not hard, but to her disordered mind it seemed protectively, tenderly. That just fuelled her response, like petrol poured on open flames.
He pulled his head back to stare down at her, his gaze darkening to midnight.
‘I don’t need your pity.’ She felt the rumble of his voice through their bodies, where she pressed against him. ‘I was found guilty, remember?’
‘Who said anything about pity?’ Yet there was a knot in her throat at the idea of him as a kid, coming of age in prison because he’d tried to defend someone.
His look sharpened. ‘Women want me because I’m rich. Because I’m powerful. Or for a thrill because I’m big and bad and dangerous.’ That unblinking gaze pinioned her. ‘Never because they feel sorry for me.’
It was a warning, as clear as a flashing red light. Yet he hadn’t mentioned the most obvious reason any woman would want him. Because he was the single most fascinating, sexy, infuriatingly charismatic man on the planet.
Ella had finally found a weak spot in his aura of omniscient authority. When she had more time, when she wasn’t pressed up against him from thigh to breast, she’d think about that.
Now, though, her thoughts frayed. Logical Ella was unravelling. That new bold Ella stirred again, the woman who dared to act on impulse, regardless of consequences. She shuddered as desire rose like a blast of hot summer air.
‘Good, then you won’t expect sentiment from me.’ She rose on her toes and anchored her hands in his thick soft hair, pulling him down to her level.
She was confused by this man, alternately irritated and fascinated. But she needed him. More now than before, as if what they’d shared earlier had given her a taste of something deliciously addictive.
‘Kiss me, Donato.’ It was new Ella speaking, her voice an unfamiliar throaty purr. ‘And make it good.’
Ella had never said anything like that to a man. But the fingers threading his hair were hers, as were the breasts straining against his hard torso, and the hips circling needily as he clamped her against him. The mouth was definitely hers, fusing with his demanding lips, sighing her pleasure as he forgot about conversation and gave her what she needed.
By the time they made it to a large canopied day bed near the pool, she was in her underwear and he’d lost his shirt and shoes.
Ella lay back, enjoying the view of his bronzed torso, powerful and dusted with dark hair across the chest. Even the couple of scars, pale on his ribs, didn’t mar his perfection. Muscles bunched and twisted as he reached for a condom then shoved down his pants.
A gasp escaped and he looked up.
It would be too naïve of her to blurt out that he was the most imposing man she’d ever seen. Just the sight of him made her heart hammer.
‘You’re well prepared.’ Was that her voice, that husky drawl of invitation? ‘Do you usually carry so many condoms?’
His mouth curved in a tight smile at odds with the blaze in his eyes. ‘I was expecting you.’
He reached out, dispensing with her underwear with casual efficiency. His eyes like lasers, so hot she felt her skin shiver. Then his mouth was on her breast, his hand between her legs, and there was nothing but Donato and pleasure so intense it saturated her, from her bones to her brain and everywhere in between.
He licked her nipple and her breath caught. He sucked it inside his hot mouth and her hands on the back of his head turned to claws, dragging him closer.
His hand moved and she bucked against him. Impossibly she felt a trembling begin deep inside. A trembling that grew and spread.
‘Now! I need you now.’ Desperately she groped down between them. He was thick and solid against her palm, twitching at her touch.
Heat suffused her, intensified at the slide of his hard body against hers. The tickle of chest hair against her breasts, the haze of his breath on her neck. His fingers covered hers, guiding, till he was right where she needed him.
Their eyes locked as Donato dragged her hands above her head, holding them high against the cushions as he thrust home with one hungry glide that brought them colliding together.
Ella arched up, stunned by the sheer intimacy of him there, at the heart of her, his eyes holding hers as surely as he claimed her body. The air locked in her lungs as sensation rocked her. Not physical sensation but something she couldn’t name, a sense of rightness, of belonging.
Donato’s eyes widened. Did he feel it too?
Ella remembered how it had felt coming apart in his arms, drowning in his gaze. She felt it again, fierce pleasure and more too, the powerful connection, the sense she gave up part of her soul, not just her body. It had scared the life out of her.
She squeezed her eyes shut, focusing on the crescendo of physical rapture. The climax that was upon her before she knew it, throwing her high to the stars. She bit her tongue, desperate not to cry his name as ecstasy took over, needing not to give in completely.
Donato jerked hard, spilling himself, his voice a guttural, seductive slur of Spanish, and her eyes opened of their own volition.
Instantly she was lost in indigo heat, in the heady, terrifying tumble into unfamiliar territory that wasn’t merely about eager bodies and erotic caresses. Into a place where she was no longer Ella but part of him, part of Donato, and he was part of her.
He held her gaze for what seemed minutes, their breathing ragged, chests heaving, bodies twitching in the aftershock of that momentous eruption of delight.
Ella told herself it was okay. She’d be fine. She was just unused to sex. To giving herself to any man. This was purely physical.
Then he bent his head and touched his lips to hers in a delicate feather of a kiss and something huge and inexplicable welled up inside. Ella choked back a lump in her throat, blinking furiously as heat glazed her eyes and a tear spilled down her cheek.
