‘H-how long?’
‘Dio, woman,’ he breathed savagely. ‘What are you trying to do to me?’ His silver-green eyes gave an aggressive flash. ‘For ever, okay? I want it all: the love, the ring, the marriage—the whole damn crazy package!’
‘Then why are you so angry about it?’ she cried out.
He squared his wide shoulders. Pale and tense, ‘It would not hurt you, Rachel, to give me some small encouragement to feel happy about loving you,’ he pushed out.
Then he turned his back to her and grabbed his nape with long angry fingers. Rachel hovered, wanting to go to him but still too scared to move.
Then, why areyou scared? she asked herself. He had just said he loved her and she was standing here giving him every impression that she—
She closed the gap between them, running her arms around his waist and pressing herself in close to his rigid back. ‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered. ‘But I’ve loved you so much and for so long when Iknew I didn’t have the right to feel like this!’
A sound ripped from his throat and he spun in her arms. His eyes were like twin black diamonds, still angry, possessive—real.
‘No—w-wait, I need to say this—’ she shivered out when she saw what was coming. ‘I knew that I had no right to fall in love with you after the way I had hit on you without giving a thought to the trouble I was going to cause! Then w-we thought we had made a baby so I used it as an excuse to stay and—’
‘We used it.’
‘But it just wasn’t fair of me to load you down with my foolish feelings when—No!’ she protested. ‘I’ve not—’
Finished…
What a waste of breath, Rachel thought as she fell into the kind of kiss that made words redundant.
By the time he lifted his head again, streaks of desire were burning into his cheekbones. ‘Any reason why we cannot continue this…discussion in bed?’ he said huskily.
What discussion? Rachel thought dryly as she wound her arms around his neck. ‘You want to…talk?’ she asked innocently.
His mouth twitched. ‘No.’
‘You perhaps want to say something about the way you unleashed your charms on another woman tonight?’
He tensed. ‘You want me to apologise—’
‘I want you topay ,’ Rachel told him. ‘At least you were saved from watching me act like that with Alonso.’
‘But I did see.’ He grimaced. ‘I watched the handsome bastard leap out of his car and take you in his arms. I watched him kiss you as if he had every right to do it, and I saw the adoring expression on your face as you looked up at him!’
‘It wasn’t adoring, it was shock!’ Rachel protested.
‘Youlet him kiss you.’
‘Italians are always kissing each other.’ She dismissed that accusation.
‘You let him drive you away in his flashy red car.’
‘It was either that or get caught in the street by a snooping reporter.’ Then she frowned. ‘Where were you when this was happening?’
His sigh was rueful. ‘Making a fool of myself over lunch with five important business associates, by just getting up and walking away,’ he confessed. ‘Then I got the call from Francesca and my day just continued downhill from there.’ He ran his fingers through her hair, his eyes hooded. ‘When you walked out of the restaurant I thought you were going to go to him.’
Rachel stared at him in blank disbelief. ‘Since when have you been so short on ego tothink such a thing?’
‘Since I met you,’ he said. ‘You have a unique way of eating away at my ego.’
‘That’s such a lie,’ she denounced. ‘You’ve done nothing but bully me and want sex from me since we met!’