CHAPTER SIX

      RAOUL looked down into her eyes. Neither the darkness of his past nor the ghosts that plagued him were enough to stop him now.

      And, even though he knew it was insane, that he was the last person to deserve her, he wanted her—wanted all of her, at least for tonight. For the promise he had made, he told himself. Only so she might believe it to be true.

      The setting sun turned the air molten around them, shimmering with a thousand wishes, a thousand hopes. The first of his wants, he knew was in his control. His lips brushed hers as he sensed the shadow of the bridge move over them while his lips tasted, explored, tested.

      Her mouth melded to his willingly as she gave herself up to his kiss, her sweet, sweet lips parting in invitation, an invitation he had no power but to accept as he felt the heat in his body build as her body curled into him, her hot mouth dragging him in.

      And it was his turn to go willingly, losing himself in her liquid depths, plundering her mouth, wanting to reach deeper, harder. Needing more.

      Their kiss started at the Bridge of Sighs, but it did not end there. It did not end anywhere close to there. For the first time in her life, she felt truly alive, every part of her tingling with hot awareness, as if a switch had been thrown and her body was humming with electricity looking for somewhere to go. Looking for release of a charge that would burn her up if she couldn’t let go.

      Until all too soon they were back at the palazzo.

      ‘We are home,’ Raoul whispered against her sensitive lips, tracing the pad of one finger down her cheek. ‘It is time to go.’

      ‘Already?’ she asked, too comfortable to move, and he chuckled softly, a satisfying, rumbling sound that said he wasn’t done with her yet either.

      ‘It does not have to be the end …’

      She blinked up at him, sensing the invitation in his words, giving her the choice when there was really no choice at all. ‘Make love with me, Raoul.’

      This time he didn’t chuckle. Instead he growled and scooped her up into his arms, not letting the sudden sway of the vessel throw him from his stride as he lifted her bodily from the gondola and through the sea door, his lips once more meshed with hers as he negotiated the route up the stairs and into the apartment.

      He found her room, lit in the soft night glow of the city, hesitating momentarily before laying her almost reverently on the wide bed. For the first time she didn’t see the endless orgy going on around her, didn’t envy them, because Raoul was here with her and soon she would be his.

      He growled again as he joined her, collecting her into his arms as he pulled her into his kiss.

      She was drowning, she decided. She had been drowning all night, finding it impossible to draw air, finding it impossible to breathe or to think or to anything but drown under a torrent of sensation.

      And drowning had never felt so good.

      His hot mouth was at her throat, his hands moulding her to him, length to delicious length, joining them at breast and thigh and making her gasp when she felt him against her belly, hard, insistent and wanting.

      What little air there had been was consumed in a raging heat that started and ended between her thighs.

      Her hands tangled in his hair, urgent and busy, sliding the tie from its length. Her fingers luxuriated in its silky weight as he dipped his head and took her breast in his mouth. Even fully clothed she felt his hot breath sear her skin, felt his teeth graze one sensitive nipple until she cried out with the pleasure of sensation and the frustration of the barrier of clothing.

      He was already ahead of her, his long fingers working at the buttons of her blouse, peeling it away, dispensing too with her skirt and sliding it down her legs, unwrapping her, opening her up to his gaze. She waited, afraid and tremulous, unable to breathe while he lifted his head, wanting him to like what he saw, needing both his approval and his desire.

      In a face built of shadows and darkness, his eyes gleamed in the soft slanting light as his hands traced their way back up her legs, resting flat-palmed on her belly, his fingertips tracing the line of her lace bra. ‘Bella,’ he said. His voice was so low and filled with gravel that it seemed she felt his words through the touch of his fingers rather than heard him speak. ‘You are so perfect.’ He dragged in air, his dark eyes looking suddenly tortured, confused. ‘But I … Bella, I do not deserve …’

      ‘I want you,’ she said, empowered by the raw admiration she had seen in his eyes, the raw power before whatever doubts had crept into his mind, about whatever sense of wrong he was committing. This was not wrong and it never could be. She raised herself onto one elbow, unclipping her bra with her free hand, coaxing the strap down her arm, letting the scrap of lace fall from her breasts. ‘I want you to make love to me, Raoul. I want to feel you deep inside me.’

      He groaned then, a sound that seemed rent from his very soul. It was so very dark and anguished that for a moment she was afraid he might leave her—but then he looked at her, his chest heaving, and his eyes told her he was going nowhere. His fingers worked at his shirt, reefing it off, and she could not resist putting her hand to his skin, drinking in the complexities of his skinscape—the sculpted flesh, the wiry brush of hair, the nuggety nub of a nipple.

      He hissed in air when she flicked that nub with the nail of her thumb, already shrugging down his trousers, kicking off his shoes, brushing off his underwear with the sweep of one hand that exposed all of him to her gaze.

      She gasped at his size, her body sizzling at the raw, masculine potency, and she saw his eyes glint at her reaction before he tumbled her back on the bed.

      ‘You’re beautiful,’ she said, awed by the power and beauty of his body under her hands as he rained kisses on her skin, her throat, her belly, her breasts, making her cry out as he rolled his tongue around one sensitive nipple, drawing it into his hot, liquid mouth.

      All the time the need inside her coiled tighter and more insistent, so that when his hand scooped down her side and brushed her last scrap of clothing she thought she might explode.

      ‘Raoul!’ she cried. He shushed her with his kiss, tangling his tongue with hers, pulling her deeper as his fingers slipped under the lace and through her neat curls, parting her with just the tip of one incendiary finger. Never had she felt like this, breathless, overwhelmed and on the cusp of something so magnificent, so momentous. Never had she felt so out of control.

      ‘I need you,’ she said—yet Raoul showed no mercy, drawing her nipple into his mouth, sliding his fingers deeper into her hot, slick darkness, his thumb circling that exquisitely sensitive nub, where it seemed all her nerve endings coalesced, one finger pushing inside her, almost sending her over the edge.

      Her hands flailed on the bed, searching for something—anything. She found him, rock-hard, hot and already beading with moisture, and it was his turn to groan as he pulsed and bucked in her hand.

      ‘Bella,’ he said, grinding the word out between his teeth as though she was hurting him.

      ‘I want you,’ she repeated, writhing under him, knowing that if he didn’t make love to her right now she would surely burn up in these desperate, all-consuming flames. ‘Please, I need you!’

      This time he showed blessed mercy, whisking off her remaining garment with an efficiency she might have congratulated in other, less urgent circumstances but right now any delay was too long, any time a waste, when all she wanted in the