He wasn’t even angry with her for her persistence because now it felt like some rank poison was throbbing beneath his skin and he needed to cut through the surface to let that poison out.
‘One night there was some big row. I don’t know what it was about—all I do know is that my father was completely loaded and my mother was shouting at him. I heard him yell back that he was going out and then I heard her going after him. I knew he was in no state to drive and I tried to stop her. I...’
He’d done more than try. He’d begged her not to go. He’d run over and clung to her with all the strength his eight-year-old body could muster, but she hadn’t listened. She’d got in the car anyway and the next time he’d seen his mother was when she’d been laid out in her coffin, with white lilies in her hands and that waxy look on her cold, cold cheeks.
‘She wouldn’t listen to me,’ he bit out. ‘He crashed the car and killed them both. And I didn’t manage to stop her. Even though deep down I knew what a state my father was in, I let her go.’
He stared out at the grounds of the house he’d moved into soon afterwards when his grandfather had brought them all here. A place where he’d been unable to shake off his sorrow and his guilt. He’d run wild until his grandfather had sent him and Dario away to school. And he’d just kept on running, hadn’t he? He wondered now if the failure of his attempt to stop his mother had been the beginning of his fierce need to control. The reason why he always felt compelled to step in and influence what was happening around him. Was that why he’d done what he’d done to his twin brother?
‘But maybe you couldn’t stop her.’
Willow’s voice—suddenly so strong and sure—broke into his thoughts.
‘What are you talking about?’ he demanded.
‘Children can’t always make adults behave the way they want them to, Dante,’ she said, her words washing over him like balm. ‘No matter how hard they try.’
Dante turned round, still unable to believe how much she’d got out of him. She looked like some kind of angel sitting there, with her pale English skin and that waterfall of silky hair. In her simple cotton dress she looked so pure—hell, she was pure. But it was more than just about sex. She looked as if she could take all the darkness away from him and wash away the stain of guilt from his heart. And her grey eyes were fixed on him, quite calmly—as if she knew exactly what was going on inside his head and was silently urging him to go right ahead and do it.
He wasn’t thinking as he walked across the room to where she sat at an antique writing desk with the oil painting of Sicily which hung on the wall behind it. The hot, scorched brushstrokes and cerulean blue of the sky contrasted vividly with her coolness. Her lips looked soft and inviting. Some warning bell was sounding inside his head, telling him that this was wrong. But some of the poison had left him now. Left him feeling empty and aching and wanting her. Wanting to lose himself in her.
She didn’t object when he pulled her out of the chair and onto her feet. In fact, the sudden yearning in her eyes suggested that she’d wanted him to touch her just as badly as he needed to.
His hands were in her hair and his mouth was hovering over hers, their lips not quite touching, as if he’d had a last-minute moment of sanity and this was his chance to pull back from her. Was that why she stood up on tiptoe and anchored her hands to his shoulders? Why she flickered the tip of her tongue inside his mouth?
‘Willow,’ he whispered as his heart began to pound.
‘Yes,’ she whispered back. ‘I’m right here.’
He groaned as he tasted her—his senses tantalised by the faint drift of her scent. Dropping his hands from her hair, he gripped her waist and he thought how incredibly light she felt. As light as those drifts of swansdown you sometimes saw floating across hazy summer lawns. He deepened the kiss, and as she sucked in a breath, it felt like she was sucking him right inside her. For a moment he thought about the very obvious place where he would like to be sucked and his hand reached down to cup her breast. He heard the urgent little sigh of delight she made. He felt the restless circle of her narrow hips, and he could feel control leaving him as she kissed him back. He tried to remember where he’d put his condoms and just how long they had before they were expected up at the main house. And all the time he could feel himself going under—as if he was being consumed by a tide of rich, dark honey.
But along with the sweet, sharp kick of desire came the reminder of all the things he’d told himself he wasn’t going to do. He’d messed up enough in his life. He’d failed to save his mother. He’d ruptured his relationship with his twin brother. In business he’d achieved outstanding success, but his personal relationships were not the same. Everything he touched turned to dust. He was incapable of experiencing the emotions which other men seemed to feel. And even though Willow Hamilton had allowed her stupid fantasies to manipulate events... Even though she had dragged him into her fantasy and made it impossible for him to walk away from her—that gave him no right to hurt her.
It would be too easy to take her innocence. To be the first man to claim her body for his own. To introduce her to the powerful but ultimately fleeting pleasures of sex. He closed his eyes because imagining her sweet tightness encasing him was almost too much to bear. He thought about easing into her molten heat, with his mouth clamped to one of her tiny nipples. He thought about how good it would feel to be able to come inside her. To pump his seed into her until he was empty and replete. To kiss her and kiss her until she fell asleep in his arms.
But a woman’s virginity was a big deal, and someone who had suffered as Willow had suffered deserved more than he could ever give her. Because he was programmed not to trust and never to stay. He would take pleasure and give pleasure and then close the door and leave without a backwards glance.
Dragging his mouth away from hers and dropping his hand from her breast as if it was on fire, he stepped away, trying to quieten down the fierce sexual hunger which was burning inside him. But when he saw the confusion clouding her beautiful eyes, he felt a moment of unfamiliar doubt which he couldn’t seem to block out.
His mouth twisted.
‘I meant what I said back in England,’ he gritted. ‘You aren’t somebody I intend to get intimate with, Willow. Did you think that because I’ve just told you something about my deeply troubled past...’ His voice took on a harsh and mocking tone. ‘That I would want you? Did you think any of this was for real? Because if you do, you’re making a big mistake. For the sake of my grandfather and his romantic ideals, we will play the part of the happily engaged couple whenever we find ourselves in his company. But when we’re alone, the reality will be very different. Just so you know, I’ll be sleeping on the couch.’ He gave a tight smile. ‘And I’ll do my best not to disturb you.’
CHAPTER NINE
THE DARK SHAPE was moving almost silently around the room but it was enough to disturb Willow from her troubled sleep. Pushing the hair back from her face, she sat up in bed and snapped on the light to see Dante standing fully dressed, his face shadowed and unfriendly.
‘What are you doing?’ she whispered.
‘Going out for a drive.’
‘But it’s only...’ She picked up her watch and blinked at it. ‘Just after five in the morning!’
‘I know what the time is,’ he growled back as he grabbed a clutch of car keys.
‘So...why?’ Her voice was full of bewilderment as she looked at him. ‘Why in heaven’s name are you going out before the sun is even up?’
‘Why do you think?’ He turned to look at her properly and all his dark and restless energy seemed to wash over her. ‘Because I can’t sleep.’