Marrying the Italian: The Marcolini Blackmail Marriage / The Valtieri Marriage Deal / The Italian Doctor's Bride. Caroline Anderson
Читать онлайн книгу.
back to Italy with you.’
He measured her with a cool, appraising look. ‘You might not have a choice if you have conceived my child,’ he said. ‘I am not prepared to be separated by thousands of kilometres from my own flesh and blood.’
Claire felt her heart lurch, panic fluttering like startled wings inside her chest. ‘If I have fallen pregnant there is no guarantee it will end in a live birth,’ she said, trying to ignore the blade of pain that sliced through her at admitting it out loud. ‘If you want to become a father you would be well advised to pick someone who is capable of doing the job properly.’
His eyes held hers for a tense moment before he dropped his hands from the wall. ‘I am aware of the statistics, Claire,’ he said. ‘But with careful monitoring it may not happen again.’
‘I am not prepared to risk it,’ Claire said. ‘If we are going to continue this farcical arrangement I want you to use protection. I will see my doctor tomorrow about arranging my own.’
Antonio watched as she pushed herself away from the wall, her arms around her middle like a shield, her eyes flashing resentment and pent-up anger against him.
He could still feel the tight clutch of her body around him, the way she had convulsed to receive every drop of his seed. He wanted her so badly it was a bone-deep ache inside him; it had never gone away, no matter how hard he had tried to ignore it. And she wanted him, even though she resented it and did her best to hide it. Her body betrayed her just as his had. And it would betray her again. Of that he was sure.
CHAPTER NINE
CLAIRE slipped past Antonio to the plush bathroom and closed the door firmly behind her. She considered locking it, but upon inspecting the device recognised it was one of those two-way models which could be unlocked from either side of the door—no doubt installed as a safety feature, in case a guest in the hotel slipped and fell in the bathroom. She realised the only lock she really needed was a lock on her heart, but as far as she knew no such item existed. She was as vulnerable to Antonio as she had ever been—maybe even more so now she had experienced such rapture again in his arms.
She stepped into the shower stall, hoping to wash away the tingling sensations Antonio’s touch had activated, but if anything the fine needle spray of the shower only made it worse. Her whole body felt as if every nerve beneath her skin had risen to the surface. Every pore was swollen and excited at the anticipation of the stroke and glide of his hands, the commandeering of his mouth. She touched her breasts. They felt full and heavier than normal, and her nipples were still tightly budded, the brownish discs of her areolae aching all over again for the sweep and suck of his mouth.
Her hands went lower, over the flat plane of her belly and down to the cleft of her body where he had so recently been. She felt tender and swollen, still acutely sensitive, the intricate network of nerves still humming with the sensations Antonio had evoked.
She turned the water off and reached for a fluffy white towel. But even after she was dried off and smothered all over with the delicately fragrant body lotion provided, she felt the tumultuous need for fulfilment racing through her body.
The hotel suite was large, but it only contained one bed—and Claire knew she would be expected to share it with Antonio. Because of their history, she also knew there would be no demarcation line drawn down the middle of the mattress.
Antonio was a sprawler. She knew there would be no hope of avoiding a brush with a hair-roughened limb or two. It would be a form of torture, trying to ignore his presence. If it was anything like in the past he would reach for her, drawing her close to him, like two spoons in a drawer, his erection swelling against her until she opened her thighs to receive him as she had done so many times before.
Her mind began to race with erotic images of how he had taken her that way: the breathing of him against her ear as he plunged into her wetness, the pace of their love-making sped up by its primal nature, the explosion of feeling that would make her cry out and make him grunt and groan as each wave of ecstasy washed over them, leaving them spent, tossed up like flotsam on the shore.
Claire exchanged the towel for the bathrobe and, tying the belt securely around her waist, took a steadying breath and opened the door back into the suite.
Antonio was sitting with his ankles crossed, a glass of something amber-coloured in his hand. ‘Can I get you a drink, Claire? You look as if you need something to help you relax.’
She gave him a brittle glance. ‘The last thing I need is something that will skew my judgement,’ she said. ‘What I need is a good night’s sleep—preferably alone.’
His mouth tilted at a dangerously sexy angle. ‘There is only one bed, tesoro mio. We can fight over it, if you like, but I already know who will win.’
Claire knew too. That was why she wasn’t even going to enter into the debate. She eyed the sofa. It looked long enough to accommodate her, and certainly comfortable enough. She would make do. She would have to make do—even if it meant twice-weekly trips to a physiotherapist to realign her neck and back as a result.
Antonio got to his feet in a single fluid movement. ‘Do not even think about it, Claire,’ he said, placing his drink down with a clink of glass against the marbled surface. ‘Our reconciliation will not be taken seriously if the hotel cleaning staff come in each day and see we have not been sleeping in the same bed.’
Claire fisted her hands by her sides and glared at him. ‘I don’t want to sleep with you.’
He gave her an indolent smile. ‘Sleeping is not the problem, though—is it, cara?’ he asked. ‘We could sleep in the same bed for weeks on end if we were anyone other than who we are. Our bodies recognise each other. That is the issue we have to address in sharing a bed: whether we are going to act on that recognition or try to ignore it. My guess is it will continue to prove impossible to ignore.’
I can ignore it. Claire decided—although with perhaps not quite the conviction she would have liked, given what had occurred less than an hour ago.
Antonio pulled back the covers on the bed. ‘I will leave you to get settled,’ he said. ‘I am going to have a shower.’
She clutched the edges of the bathrobe tightly against her chest. ‘Do you expect me to stay awake for you—to be ready to entertain you when you get back?’ she snipped at him.
He smoothed the turned-back edges of the sheet before he faced her. ‘I expect no such thing, cara,’ he said. ‘You are tired and quite clearly overwrought. Perhaps you are right. I should not have taken advantage of your generous response to my attentions. I thought we both wanted the same thing, but in hindsight perhaps I misjudged the situation. If so, I am sorry.’
Claire captured her bottom lip, chewing at it in agitation. He made it sound as if he had ravished her without her consent, when nothing had been further from the truth. She had practically ripped the clothes off his body in her haste to have him make love to her. She had been as out of control as he had, her need for him like an unstoppable force—a force she could still feel straining at the leash of common sense inside her, waiting for its moment to break free and wreak havoc all over again.
‘It’s not your fault…’ The words slipped out in a breathless rush. ‘I shouldn’t have allowed things to go so far. I don’t know why I did. I don’t think it was the wine or the dancing…it was just…curiosity…I think…’
His brows arched upwards again. ‘Curiosity?’
Her tongue darted over the surface of her lips, her gaze momentarily skittering away from his. ‘I guess, like you, I wanted to know if it would be the same…you know…as it had been before…before things went wrong…’
He came closer and, using his finger, brought up her chin so her eyes met his once more. ‘We cannot change what happened,’ he said. ‘Our past is always going to be there, whether we continue our association or not. We will both carry it with us wherever we go in the future, and whoever shares