The Italian's Baby Bargain: The Italian's Wedding Ultimatum / The Italian's Forced Bride / The Mancini Marriage Bargain. Kate Walker
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he said some pretty crazy things too.
‘Now, just let go…!’
She did.
As her heart-rate returned to something approaching normal she gave a languid sigh. Alessandro’s leg remained thrown across her, pinning her to the bed—not that she felt any urge to move from where she was. Her body was still rocked with tiny golden aftershocks.
She stroked his dark head where it lay on the pillow and smiled a sleepy, smugly contented smile. Her back arched a little as he stroked a brown finger down the valley between her pink-tipped breasts.
His dark lashes lifted from the sharp angle of his cheekbones. ‘Why didn’t you tell me…?’
Sam, who knew exactly what he was saying, closed her eyes and feigned innocence. ‘Tell you what?’
‘You have never been with a man, cara.’
‘I was hoping you wouldn’t notice.’ She opened her eyes and saw no answering smile on his face. ‘Sorry if I was totally clueless, but…’ She reached up and stroked his lean cheek, feeling the first stirrings of reawakened sexual interest as she recalled the abrasive sensation of his stubble on her burning skin as he worked his way down her body. ‘If you’re willing to bear with me, I think I could be a very fast learner.’ Then, realising that she was making a lot of assumptions she had no right to make she added quickly, ‘Always supposing we ever…you…we decide…’ Maybe he was already regretting it? Maybe he was wondering how to tell her she’d have to find someone else for lesson two?
‘Perhaps we should get out our diaries and see if we have a spare afternoon?’ he inserted, sounding unaccountably angry.
‘I don’t have a diary.’ She held her breath, thinking, That’s his cue to say, And I don’t have a spare afternoon.
He didn’t.
‘You should have told me…’
‘Are you angry?’ She looked at his face, memorising each plane and angle. ‘About the virgin stuff?’
The awkward addition made his lips quiver. ‘I’m not angry. I’m…I would have been gentler…’
‘That would have been a pity.’ She laid her head on his chest and felt the vibration of his surprised laugh.
‘Today was a first for us both.’
She lifted her head. ‘It was?’
‘I’ve never slept with a virgin before. The women I—’
‘I know,’ she said quickly. ‘They’re like you. That’s the way I want to be,’ she told him, thinking, I can do this! ‘If you want me, that is…’ She swallowed, trying and failing to read his expression.
‘If I want you…?’ he echoed, sounding really strange. He rolled onto his back. She watched as he lifted a hand and then just lay there.
Sam stared at his chest, rising and falling. His hand fell away, and as he turned his head towards her she held her breath.
‘Oh, I want you,’ he said thickly, and as he reached for her with a sigh of relief she went to him.
Much later, when the room had grown dark, Alessandro got up from the bed to throw a log on the dying embers of the fire. His tall, lean body was silhouetted against the dancing flames as he walked back to the bed.
My God, he’s so beautiful!
‘A fire in the bedroom is very…decadent,’ she murmured as she snuggled up to him.
Alessandro ran a finger down the supple curve of her spine, and in the dark she smiled.
Her smile guttered when he asked quietly, ‘Should we be worried?’
Sam knew immediately what he was talking about. The second time they had made love she had not known what he was apologising for until he had explained that the condom had broken. Still floating on a blissful cloud after their slow, sensuous, mind-blowing lovemaking, the implications of his explanation had not hit her. Now they did.
She did some speedy mental calculations and shook her head. ‘No, it’ll be fine,’ she said, with more confidence than she actually felt.
‘Well, you would tell me if…?’
Sam frowned. ‘I told you—it’ll be fine. I’m so glad I settled…’
His finger stopped stroking, but stayed where it was.
‘Settled…?’
‘Uh-huh,’ she confirmed sleepily. Passion expended an awful lot of energy. ‘My mum is always saying there’s no point waiting for Mr Perfect because he doesn’t exist…you should settle…’
‘But he does exist, doesn’t he?’
Bewildered by the edgy note that had entered his deep voice, Sam turned her head on the pillow, and in the shadows found his taut expression inexplicably hostile. ‘What do you mean?’
‘I mean Jonny was your Mr Perfect, and as he was unavailable you settled for me. It is not flattering for a man to realise the woman in his arms was thinking of another man while he made love to her. Madre di Dio, do you think I will tolerate being someone you settle for?’
‘Thinking about someone else…?’ she parroted, as though the words had no meaning. Which, of course, they didn’t. With her body and mind drenched down to cellular level with awareness of Alessandro, Sam was having understandable trouble getting her head around this idea.
She met his suspicious, angry eyes and experienced a blinding flash of comprehension and anger.
‘For goodness’ sake, I couldn’t even remember my own name—couldn’t figure out where you ended and I started. Think about someone else?’ she ejaculated with a bitter laugh. ‘You’re the last man in the world I’d have thought needed his ego massaging. Surely someone has mentioned before now the fact that you’re really very, very good at this?’
‘Dio!’ he breathed as, overcome by embarrassment, she buried her face in his chest. ‘I really never know what you’re going to say next.’
She slid her hands over the soft whirls of dark hair on his chest and ran a finger across his masculine nipple. ‘Neither do I.’
The husky admission drew a short laugh from Alessandro, who placed a hand underneath her bottom and scooped her towards him.
‘When my mum was saying all that stuff about Mr Perfect I was still thinking in terms of a life partner. Now I realise I’m not actually suited to marriage.’
‘You’re not…?’
She shook her head emphatically. The last thing Alessandro wanted was a clingy, needy woman. ‘No—definitely not. I’m too selfish. I like my life the way it is…’ Her eyelashes swept downwards as she added huskily, ‘With certain additions.’
He rolled over until he was looking down into her face and her body was pinioned by his long, lean length. ‘A lover being one of those certain additions…?’
Not just any lover. Her perfect lover.
She nodded. ‘Nobody needs to know—I mean, it’s not as if we would be dating, or a couple or anything. We’d just be…’ She felt the heat run up under her skin as, trying to sound nonchalant, she finished, ‘This.’
‘You want this to be a secret affair?’
He looked shocked—or was that relieved? ‘Not secret, exactly, but…’
‘You don’t want to broadcast it?’
‘It’ll be a lot simpler that way,’ she observed, saying what she thought he wanted to hear. If giving him space was the only way to keep him, she could