The city was a hectic blur of russet-topped stone buildings and narrow, medieval streets; the Tuscan hills rising serene and green in the distance, the gleaming waters of the wide River Arno welcoming and yet mysterious as it cut through the city. Yet the city seemed strangely distant for all that it was right there on the other side of the car window. It was the man beside her, she realized as she came fully awake. He was like some kind of electrical source, emanating heat and power with such force that even the jewel of the Italian Renaissance seemed to fade when he was near.
You must still be dreaming, she told herself sharply now, as the car purred around a tight corner, low and muscular. Wake up!
“How long was I asleep?” she asked, her voice sounding much too loud in the close confines of the car. Had she really fallen asleep in this man’s presence? She could only blame her sleepless night—surely, only exhaustion could possibly have allowed her to lower her walls so completely. Her hands moved to her hair involuntarily, as if smoothing it back into place might ease her sudden acute embarrassment that he had seen her in so defenseless a state.
“I stopped counting your snores some time ago,” Nikos responded dryly. “Musical as they were.”
She shot him a look, and saw that half smile of his playing over his mouth. She could not imagine what it might mean—or why she interpreted it as softer, somehow. She knew better. She knew any softness from this man was momentary at best, like a trick of the light.
“I do not snore,” she said, her voice sharper than she meant it to be. She cleared her throat, and forced herself to relax, at least outwardly. “How rude!”
“If you say so,” he replied. His dark gaze swept over her for a brief, electric moment, then returned to the road in front of him. “But I think it is far ruder to fall asleep in someone else’s presence. I am wounded that you find me so profoundly boring, Tristanne.”
Intuition—and the suicidal urge to poke at him—made her smile like a cat with a bowl of cream. Perhaps she thought she was dreaming, and that he could not harm her. Awake, she should have known better.
“Poor Nikos,” she said with bright, false sincerity. “This must have been a new experience for you. I am sure the women of your acquaintance normally go to great lengths to pretend that you are so captivating, so interesting, that they can scarcely breathe without your express permission. Much less sleep.” She made a show of yawning, and stretched her feet out in front of her, as if she was not in the least bit captivated, interested, or even aware of his brooding presence beside her.
She was dimly aware that the car stopped moving, but she could hardly concentrate on something so minor when he was turning toward her, his big body dwarfing the sleek confines of the car’s leather interior, his dark eyes glittering with something edgy and wild that she could not identify.
Though her body knew exactly what it was, and hummed in sensual response, her breasts growing heavy and her nipples hardening beneath the simple green knit sheath she wore.
“Once again,” he said, his voice smooth and dangerous, “I am astonished at how little you seem to know about being a man’s mistress, Tristanne. Do you truly believe that my former mistresses taunted me? Mocked me?”
Some demon took her over, perhaps, or it was that restlessness inside of her that made her ache and burn and need. But she did not—could not—cower or apologize or back down at all, despite the clear sensual menace in his voice, his gaze, the way his arm slid along the back of her seat and hemmed her in, caged her, reminded her of the role she was supposed to be playing.
Whatever it was, she met his gaze. Boldly. Unapologetically. As if this was all part of her plan. She raised her brows, challenging him.
“And how quickly did you tire of them, I wonder?” she asked softly, directly. “So accommodating, so spineless. Do you even remember their names?”
Something too primal to be a smile flashed across his face then. His eyes turned to liquid gold, like a sunset across water, and Tristanne forgot how to breathe.
“I will remember yours,” he promised her. “God help you.” He let out a sound too harsh to be laughter, and nodded toward her window, and through it toward the covered archway that led to the imposingly large door of the ancient-looking building before them. “But there is no time for this now. We have arrived.”
She could not say if she was relieved or disappointed when he left her scant moments after he ushered her into the sumptuous foyer of the sprawling flat. It commanded the whole of the top floor of an old building tucked away on an ancient side street in the city center. Tristanne did not realize how central it was, in fact, until the door closed behind Nikos and she turned to gaze out the floor-to-ceiling windows that comprised the far wall. She was staring directly at the famous red and marble dome of the cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore itself. Brunelleschi’s world-renowned Duomo was the whole of the view—filling the wall of windows and so close she felt as if she could very nearly reach out and touch it.