‘You’re saying that I’m too thin now?’
‘A little.’ He smiled. ‘It will give me enormous pleasure to feed you up, cara.’ One of many pleasures he anticipated during the days to come.
He settled her into the car, and placed her bags in the back, but thought that she seemed te
nse as he drove out of the airport towards the hotel.
‘Are you OK?’ he asked softly.
‘Mmm! Just fine,’ she answered brightly.
He didn’t want her brittle; he wanted her fiery in his arms again. ‘Ever been to Barcelona before?’ he enquired conversationally as he raced the car towards the city.
She shook her head. ‘No, never.’ She peered out of the window. ‘Do you know it well?’
‘Well enough to find my way around without a map.’
Her nerves were making breathing difficult. ‘And you’re here on business?’
‘That’s right. A big deal has been concluded.’ He shot her a glance, reading nothing in her shadowed profile. ‘I have to have dinner with some people tomorrow night. I’ve known them for years and years.’ He indicated right. ‘I thought you might like to come along, too?’
‘Well, unless you’re planning to leave me alone in the hotel for the evening!’ she joked, but she felt a surge of satisfaction before reprimanding herself. Just because he wanted to take her out to meet some people he was doing business with didn’t mean that they were conducting a normal relationship.
No, her role had been defined from the very beginning: she was his mistress—she gave him pleasure.
And you? mocked an inner voice. Does he give you pleasure, too?
She stole a glance at the hard, dark profile. Of course he did, though she suspected that it had been without any effort on his part. She was almost completely smitten now—so imagine what it would be like if he was trying to impress her…if he were courting her in a traditional way! But why bother wishing for what she couldn’t have? That way led only to disillusionment and heartache.
So snap out of it, she told herself. There was no point in agreeing to come here if she was just going to mope around and wish for the impossible.
She glanced out of the window again. ‘So come on, Giovanni,’ she murmured, ‘let’s have the guided tour.’
‘My pleasure,’ he murmured back, unwittingly echoing her thoughts as he began to tell her about each majestic building they passed.
The hotel was in the Ramblas, close to the enchanting Gothic Quarter of the city, and suitably impressive. He checked her in and then they rode up in the lift towards his suite, but the presence of other guests meant that they stood on opposite sides of the confined space, as awkwardly as strangers.
But the moment he had shut the door behind them, he took her into his arms and began to kiss her, and—whilst part of her wished that he might have waited—she gave herself up to the glory of that kiss. Three months without him became a distant memory as his hard mouth danced sensation all over her skin, and she was shaking and dazed when he finally lifted his head to stare down at her.
‘So did you miss me?’ he questioned silkily.
As a mistress, surely she could be as truthful as she liked. ‘I missed that,’ she admitted.
His mouth hardened. ‘And nothing else?’
‘My coffee bill has been halved,’ she joked and saw the narrowing of his eyes. ‘What do you want me to say, Giovanni?’ she provoked, half in exasperation. ‘That I sat around weeping into my little handkerchief, dreaming of you night after night?’
In her way, her lack of sentiment made it easier to do what he had been almost beside himself with the thought of doing since he had driven away from her flat that morning. His planned offer of a drink forgotten, he ran his hands possessively down the sides of her body, feeling her responding shiver.
‘This is how I dreamt of you,’ he purred, and shrugged the silk jacket from her shoulders, before tossing it over the back of a chair. ‘Like this.’ With one fluid movement he slid the zip of her skirt down, and as it fell to the floor with a whisper he let out a small, impatient groan when he saw what she was wearing beneath.
A scarlet thong and a matching scarlet garter belt, holding up stockings of creamy white which clung silkenly to the tantalisingly long legs.
‘Matri di Diu!’ he muttered hoarsely.
‘You like it?’
‘Is it new?’ he breathed.