Читать книгу The Wedding Party And Holiday Escapes Ultimate Collection - Кейт Хьюит, Aimee Carson - Страница 98

CHAPTER FIVE

SANDRO LEANED BACK in the chair by the fire and gazed moodily at the flames flickering in the huge hearth. Resentment warred with guilt inside him as he listened to Liana move in the bathroom, turning on taps. Taking off her clothes. Would she be able to get that slinky dress off by herself? He knew she wouldn’t ask for help.

Ever since they’d entered this room with all of its sensual expectation she’d become icier than ever. It angered him, her purposeful coldness, as if she couldn’t stand even to be near him and wanted him to know it, but he still couldn’t keep a small stab of pity from piercing his resentment. She was a virgin; even if she would never admit it, she had to be a little nervous. He needed to make allowances.

The desire he’d felt for her still coiled low in his belly but even so he didn’t relish the prospect of making love to his wife. Of course there would be no love about it, which was neither new nor a surprise. He shouldn’t even want it, not when he knew what kind of woman Liana really was.

He had no illusions about how she would handle their wedding night. Lie stiff and straight as a board on that sumptuous bed, scrunch her eyes tight, and think of her marital duty. Just the thought of it—of her like that—was enough to turn his flickering desire into ash.

Distantly Sandro realised the sounds from the bathroom had stopped, and he knew she must be stuck in that dress. He rose from the chair, dressed only in his trousers, and rapped on the bathroom door.

‘Liana? Do you need help getting out of your gown?’ Silence. He almost smiled, imagining how she was wrestling with admitting she did, and yet not wanting to accept anything from him. Certainly not wanting him to unzip her. ‘I’ll close my eyes,’ he said dryly, half joking, ‘if you want me to help you unzip it.’

‘It’s not a zipper.’ Her voice sounded muffled, subdued. ‘It’s about a hundred tiny buttons.’

And before he could stop himself, Sandro was envisioning all those little buttons following the elegant length of her spine, picturing his fingers popping them open one by one and revealing the ivory skin of her back underneath. Desire leapt to life once more.

‘Then you most certainly need help,’ he said, and after a second’s pause he heard the sound of the door unlocking and she opened it, her head bowed, a few tendrils of hair falling forward and hiding her face.

Wordlessly she turned around and presented him with her narrow, rigid back, the buttons going from her neck to her tailbone, each one a tiny pearl.

Sandro didn’t speak as he started at the top and began to unbutton the gown. The buttons were tiny, and it wasn’t easy. It wasn’t a matter of a moment either, and he didn’t close his eyes as he undid each one, the tender skin of her neck and shoulders appearing slowly underneath his fingers as the silk fell away in a sensual slide.

His fingers brushed her skin—she felt both icy and soft—and he felt her give a tiny shudder, although whether she was reacting out of desire or disgust he didn’t know. He sensed she felt both, that she was as conflicted as he was—probably more—about wanting him. The realisation sent a sudden shaft of sympathy through him and he stilled, his fingers splayed on her bared back. He felt her stiffen beneath him.

‘If you’d rather,’ he said softly, ‘we can wait.’

‘Wait?’ Her voice was no more than a breath, her back still rigid, her head bowed.

‘To consummate our marriage.’

‘Until when?’

‘Until we’re both more comfortable with each other.’

She let out a little huff of laughter, the sound as cynical as anything he’d ever heard. ‘And when will that be, do you think, Your Highness? I’d rather just get it over with.’

What a delightful turn of phrase, he thought sardonically. Her skin had warmed under his palm but when he spread his fingers a little wider he felt how cold she still was. Cold all the way through. ‘You’re right, of course,’ he answered flatly. ‘We might as well get it over with.’

She didn’t answer, and he finished unbuttoning the dress in silence. She held her hands up to her front to keep it in place, and Sandro could see the top curve of her bottom, encased enticingly in sheer tights, as she stepped back into the bathroom. She closed the door, and with a grim smile he listened to her lock it once more.

* * *

Liana lay in the bath until the water grew cold and the insistent throb of her body’s response to Sandro started to subside—except it didn’t.

She’d never been touched so intimately as when he’d unbuttoned her dress. She realised this probably made her seem pathetic to a man like him, a man who was so sensual and passionate, who had probably had a dozen—a hundred—lovers. As for her? She’d had so little physical affection in her life that even a casual brush of a hand had everything in her jolting with shocked awareness.

And now the feeling of his fingers on her back, the whisper of skin on skin, so intimate, so tender, an assault so much softer and gentler than that life-altering kiss they’d had six weeks ago and yet still so unbearably powerful, had made that awakened need inside her blaze hotter, harder, its demand one she was afraid she could not ignore.

The water was chilly now, and reluctantly she rose from the tub, and swathed herself in the robe that covered her just as Sandro had promised but which she knew he could peel away in seconds.

She took time brushing and blow-drying her hair, stared at her pale face and wide eyes, and then pinched her cheeks for colour. No more reasons to stay in here, to stall.

Taking a deep breath, she opened the bathroom door.

Sandro was facing the window, one arm braced against its frame, wearing only a pair of black silk pyjama bottoms, and the breath rushed from Liana’s lungs as she gazed at him, the firelight flickering over his powerful shoulders and trim hips, his hair as dark as ink and his skin like bronze. He looked darkly powerful and almost frightening in his latent sensuality, his blatant masculinity. Just his presence seemed to steal all the breath from her body, all the thoughts from her head.

She straightened her spine, took a deep breath. ‘I’m ready.’

‘Are you?’ His voice was a low, sardonic drawl as he turned around, swept her from head to toe in one swiftly assessing gaze. ‘You look terrified.’

‘Well, I can’t say I’m looking forward to this,’ Liana answered, keeping her voice tart even though her words were, at least in part, no more than lies. ‘But I’ll do my duty.’

‘I thought you’d say something like that.’

‘Then perhaps you’re getting to know me, after all.’

‘Unfortunately, I think I am.’

She flinched, unable to keep herself from it, and Sandro shook his head. ‘I’m sorry. That was uncalled for.’

‘But you meant it.’

‘I only meant...’ He let out a long, low breath. ‘I just wish things could be different.’

That she was different, he meant. Well, sometimes she wished she were different too. She wished being close to someone—being vulnerable, intimate, exposed—wasn’t scary. Terrifying.

Was that what Sandro wanted? That kind of...closeness? The thought caused a blaze of yearning to set her senses afire. Because part of her wanted that too, but she had no idea how to go about it. How to overcome her fear.

‘Well, then,’ she finally said, every muscle tensed and expectant. A smile twitched at his lips even though she still sensed that restless, rangy energy from him.

‘Do you actually think I’m going to pounce on you right this second? Deflower you like some debauched lord and his maiden?’

‘I hope you’ll have a bit more finesse than that.’

‘Thank you for that vote of confidence.’ He strolled towards her with graceful, loose-limbed purpose that had Liana tensing all the more.

He stood in front of her, his gaze sweeping over her so that already she felt ridiculously exposed, even though she wore the bathrobe that covered her completely.

‘You’re as tense as a bow.’ Sandro touched the back of her neck, his fingers massaging the muscles knotted there. ‘Why don’t you relax, just a little?’

Her fingers clenched convulsively on the sash of her robe. Relaxation felt like an impossibility. ‘And how am I supposed to do that when I know—’ She stopped abruptly, not wanting to admit so much, or really anything at all.

Sandro’s dark eyebrows drew together in a frown as he searched her face. ‘When you know what?’

‘That you don’t like me,’ she forced out, her voice small and suffocated, her face averted from his. ‘That you don’t even respect me or hold me in any regard at all.’

Sandro didn’t answer, just let his gaze rove over her, searching for something he didn’t seem to find because he finally sighed, shrugged his powerful shoulders. ‘And you feel the same way about me.’

‘I—’ She stopped, licked her lips. She should tell him that she’d only told him she didn’t respect him to hurt him and hide herself, because she’d hated how vulnerable she’d felt. And yet somehow the words wouldn’t come.

‘I think it’s best,’ Sandro said quietly, ‘if we put our personal feelings aside. The last time we were alone together, I kissed you.’ He spoke calmly, rationally, and yet just that simple statement of fact caused Liana’s heart to thud even harder and a treacherous, hectic flush to spread over her whole body. ‘You responded,’ he continued, and she closed her eyes, the memory of his kiss washing over her in a hot tide. ‘And I responded to you. Regardless of how different we are, and how little regard we have for each other’s personal priorities or convictions, we are physically attracted to one another, Liana.’

He rested his hands lightly on her shoulders, and she felt the warmth of his palms even through the thick terry cloth of her robe. ‘It might seem repellent to you, to be attracted to someone you don’t respect, but this is the only point of sympathy it appears we have between us.’

And with his hands still on her shoulders he bent his head and brushed his lips across hers. That first taste of him was like a cool drink of water in the middle of a burning desert. And her life had been a desert, a barren wasteland of loneliness and yearning for something she hadn’t realised she’d missed until he’d first touched her.

Her mouth opened instinctively under his, her hands coming up to clutch the warm, bare skin of his shoulders, needing the contact and the comfort, the closeness. Needing him.

His lips hovered over hers for a moment, almost as if he was surprised by the suddenness of her response, the silent yes she couldn’t keep her body from saying. Then he deepened the kiss, his tongue sweeping into the softness of her mouth, claiming and exploring her with a staggering intimacy that felt strangely, unbearably sweet.

It felt important, to be touched like this. To feel warm hands on her body, gentle, caressing, accepting her in a way she’d never felt accepted before. Not since she’d lost Chiara, since she’d let her go.

She’d never understood how much she needed this in the years since then, the touch of a human being, the reminder that she was real and alive, flesh and blood and bone, emotion and want and need. She was so much more than what she’d ever let herself be, and she felt it all now in an overwhelming, endless rush as Sandro kissed her.

And then he stopped, pulling back just a little to smile down at her with what seemed terribly like smugness. ‘Well, then,’ he said softly, and she heard satisfaction and perhaps even triumph in his voice, and with humiliation scorching through her she pulled away.

Of course he didn’t accept her. Didn’t like her, didn’t respect her. Didn’t even know her. And she didn’t want him to, not really, so with all that between them, how could she respond to him this way? How could she crave the exposing intimacy she hated and feared?

Numbness was so much easier. So much safer. She might have lived her life in a vacuum, but at least it had been safe.

She tried to pull back from Sandro’s light grasp and he frowned.

‘What’s wrong?’

‘I don’t—’

‘Want to want me?’ he filled in, his voice hardening, and Liana didn’t answer, just focused on keeping some last shred of control, of dignity, intact. Blink. Breathe. Don’t cry.

‘But you do want me, Liana,’ Sandro said softly. ‘You want me very much. And even if you try to deny it, I’ll know. I’ll feel your response in your lips that open to mine, in your hands that reach for me, in your body that responds to me.’ He brushed his hand against her breast, his thumb finding the revealingly taut peak even underneath her heavy robe. ‘You see? I’ll always know.’

‘I know that,’ she choked. ‘I’m not denying anything.’ She turned her face with all of its naked emotion away from him.

‘No,’ he agreed, his voice as hard as iron now, as hard as his gunmetal-grey eyes. ‘You’re not denying it. You’re just resisting it with every fibre of your being. Resisting me.’ She let out a shudder, and he shook his head. ‘Why, Liana? You agreed to this marriage, as I did. Why can’t we find this pleasurable at least?’

‘Because...’ Because she wasn’t strong enough. She’d open herself up to him just a little and a tidal wave of emotion would rush through her. She wouldn’t be able to hold it back and it would devastate her. She knew it instinctively, knew that giving in just a little to Sandro would crack her right open, shatter her into pieces. She’d never come together again.

How could she explain all of that?

And yet even so, she knew she had to stop fighting him, stop this futile resistance, because what purpose did it really serve? She was married to this man. She had known they would consummate this marriage. She just hadn’t expected to feel so much.

‘Liana,’ Sandro said, and he sounded so tired. Weary of this, of her.

‘I’m sorry,’ she said quietly. ‘I’ll...I’ll try better.’

‘Try better?’ He raised his eyebrows. ‘You don’t need to prove yourself to me, Liana.’

Didn’t she? Hadn’t she been proving herself to her parents, to everyone, for so long she didn’t know how to do anything else? How to just be?

She dragged in a deep breath. ‘Let’s...start over.’ She forced herself to meet his narrowed gaze, even to smile although she felt her lips tremble, and the tears she’d kept at bay for so long threatened once more to spill.

When had she become so emotionally fragile? Why did this man call up such feelings in her? She wanted to be strong again. She wanted to be safe.

She wanted to get this awful, exposing encounter over with.

‘Start over,’ Sandro repeated. ‘I’m wondering just how far we need to go back.’

‘Not that far.’ She made her smile brighter, more determined. She could do this. They’d get over this, and life would be safe again. ‘You’re right. I...I do want you.’ The words were like rocks in her mouth; she nearly choked on them. Willing her hands to be steady, she undid the sash of her robe, shrugged it off, and stood before him naked.

Sandro’s gaze widened, and Liana felt herself flush, a rosy stain covering her whole body that could not be hidden. And she longed to hide it, hide her whole self, mind and body and heart, yet she forced herself to stand there, chin tilted proudly, back straight. Proud and yet accepting.

Sandro shook his head, and her heart swooped inside her. ‘This isn’t starting over,’ he said quietly. ‘This is you just gritting your teeth a bit more and putting a game face on.’

‘No—’ she said, and with desperation driving her, a desperate need to get this all finished with so she could hide once more, she crossed to him and, pressing her naked body against his, she kissed him.

* * *

Sandro felt the softness of her breasts brush his bare chest, her lips hard and demanding on his, a supplication his libido responded to with instant acceptance. Instinctively his arms came up and he pulled her closer, fitted her against the throb of his arousal and claimed the kiss as his own.

She tasted so sweet, and her body was so soft and pliant against his. Too pliant. He inwardly cursed.

He didn’t want this. Liana might be submitting to him, but it was an awful, insulting submission. He wanted her want, needed her not just to acknowledge her desire of him, but to embrace it, him, even if just physically. Emotionally they might be poles apart, but couldn’t they at least have this?

Almost roughly, his own hands shaking, he pushed her away from him and shook his head.

‘No. Not like this.’

Her eyes widened. ‘Why not?’

He stared at her for a moment, wondering just what was going on behind that beautiful, blank face. Except she wasn’t quite so blank right now. Her eyes were filled with panic, and her breath came in uneven, frantic gasps.

This wasn’t the understandable shy reticence of a virgin, or even the haughty acceptance of the ice queen he’d thought she was. This was, he realised with a sudden jolt of shock, pure fear.

‘Liana...’ He put his hands on her shoulders and felt a shudder rack her body. ‘Did you have a bad experience?’ he asked quietly. ‘With a man? Is that why you’re afraid of me? Of physical intimacy?’

She whirled away, snatched up her robe, and pushed her arms into the billowing sleeves. ‘I’m not afraid.’

‘You’re certainly giving a good impression, then.’ He folded his arms, a cold certainty settling inside him. Something had happened to her. It all made sense: her extreme devotion to her charity work, her lack of relationships, her fear of natural desire. ‘Were you...abused? Raped?’

She whirled back round to face him, a look of shocked disbelief on her face. ‘No!’

‘Most women wouldn’t fight a natural, healthy desire for a man, Liana. A man who has admitted he wants you. Why do you?’

‘Because...’ She licked her lips. ‘Because I wasn’t expecting it,’ she finally said and he raised his eyebrows.

‘You weren’t expecting us to find the physical side of things pleasant? Why not?’

She shrugged. ‘Nothing about this marriage or our meeting suggested we would.’

‘The kiss we shared six weeks ago didn’t clue you in?’ he asked, a gentle hint of humour entering his voice, surprising even him.

She blushed. He liked it when she blushed, liked how it lit up her face and her eyes, her whole self. It gave him hope. ‘Before that, I mean,’ she muttered.

‘All right, fine. You weren’t expecting it. But now it’s here between us, and you’re still fighting it. Why?’

She hesitated, her gaze lowered, before she lifted her face and pinned him with a clear, violet stare. ‘Because I agreed to this marriage because it was convenient, and I didn’t want anything else. I didn’t want love or even affection. I didn’t want to get to know you beyond a...a friendly kind of agreement. I thought that’s how you would think of this marriage too, and so far nothing—’ her breath hitched, her face now fiery ‘—nothing has been like I expected!’

He didn’t know whether to laugh or groan. ‘But you’re still not telling me why you don’t want those things,’ Sandro finally said quietly. ‘Why you don’t want love or affection.’ And while her admission didn’t surprise him, he suspected the reason for it was different from what he’d thought. She wasn’t cold. She was hiding.

She stared at him mutinously, and then her lower lip trembled. It made him, suddenly and fiercely, want to take her in his arms and kiss that wobbling lip. Kiss the tears that shimmered in her eyes, tears he knew instinctively she wouldn’t let fall. Then the moment passed and her expression became remote once more. ‘I just don’t.’

‘Still not an answer, Liana.’

‘Well, it’s the only one I have to give you.’

‘So you don’t want to tell me.’

‘Why should I?’ she demanded. ‘We barely know each other. You don’t—’

‘Like you?’ he filled in. ‘That might have been true initially, but how can I ever get to like you, or even know you, if you hide yourself from me? Because that’s what the whole ice-princess act is, isn’t it? A way to hide yourself.’ He’d never felt more sure of anything. Her coldness was an act, a mask, and he felt more determined than ever to make it slip, to have it drop away completely.

‘Oh, this is ridiculous.’ She bit her lip and looked away. ‘I don’t know why you can’t just toss me on the bed and have your wicked way with me.’

He let out a choked laugh of disbelief. Liana, it seemed, had read a few romance novels. ‘You’d really prefer that?’

‘Yes.’ Her eyes turned the colour of a stormy sea and she shook her head. ‘I want to want that,’ she said, her voice filled with frustration, and he thought he understood.

She wanted something different now. Well, so did he. He wanted to know this contrary bride of his, understand her in a way he certainly didn’t now. But he was getting a glimpse of the woman underneath the ice, a woman with pain and secrets and a surprising humour and warmth. A woman he could live with, maybe even love.

Unless of course he was being fanciful. Unless he was fooling himself just as he had with Teresa, with his father, believing the best of everyone because he so wanted to love and be loved.

But surely he’d developed a little discernment over the years?

‘I’m not going to throw you on that bed, Liana,’ he said, ‘and have my way with you, wicked or otherwise. When we have sex—and it won’t be tonight—it will be pleasurable for both of us. It will involve a level of give and take, of vulnerability and acceptance I don’t think you’re capable of right now.’

She didn’t answer, just flashed those stormy eyes at him, so Sandro smiled and took a step closer to her. ‘But I will sleep with you in that bed. I’ll lie next to you and put my arms around you and feel your softness against me. I think that will be enough for tonight.’ He watched her eyes widen with alarm. ‘More than enough,’ he said, and he tugged on the sash of her robe so it fell open and she walked unwillingly towards him.

‘What are you doing—?’

‘You can’t sleep in that bulky thing.’ He slid it from her shoulders, smoothing the silk of her skin under his palms. ‘But if you want to wear that frothy nightgown, go ahead.’

Her chin jutting out in determination, she yanked the nightgown from the bed and put it on. It was made mostly of lace, clinging to her body, and Sandro’s palms itched to touch her again.

‘Now what?’ she demanded, crossing her arms over her breasts.

‘Now to bed,’ Sandro said, and he pulled her to the bed, lay down, and drew her into his arms. She went unresistingly, yet he felt the tension in every muscle of her body. She was lying there like a wooden board.

He stroked her hair, her shoulder, her hip, keeping his touch gentle yet sure, staying away from the places he longed to touch. The fullness of her breasts, the juncture of her thighs.

If he was trying to relax her, it wasn’t working. Liana quivered under his touch, but it was a quiver of tension rather than desire. Again, Sandro wondered just what had made his wife this way.

And he knew he wanted to find out. It would, he suspected, be a long, patient process.

He continued to slide his fingers along her skin even as his groin ached with unfulfilled desire. He wanted her, wanted her in a way he hadn’t let himself before. He’d fought against this marriage, against this woman, because he’d assumed she was the same as the other conniving women he’d known. His mother. Teresa.

But he suspected now—hell, knew—that his wife wasn’t like that. There was too much fear and vulnerability in that violet gaze, too much sorrow in her resistance. She fought against feeling because she was afraid, and he wanted to know why. He wanted to know what fears she hid, and he wanted to help her overcome them. He wanted, he realised with a certainty born not of anger or rebellion but of warmth and fledgling affection, to melt his icy wife.