‘Better, thanks.’
‘Well, we’ll have a rest before we head back to shore,’ he said, and lay down full-length on the fine sand, his long body lazily relaxed. ‘Mmm...that sun is wonderful. I don’t know about you, but I’m chilled to the marrow after being in the sea that long.’
‘I’m very cold,’ she agreed, watching him. He had his eyes shut, which made her feel safe enough to risk staring. He was almost naked, the tiny black briefs he wore clinging wetly to his body, revealing more than they concealed. She hurriedly looked up at his face, afraid he might catch her staring, but his eyes were still closed. Breathing more easily, she let her gaze wander back to his wide, tanned shoulders, that strong chest with the dark, wet tangles of hair which ran down his flat stomach and on until they disappeared under the waistband of the close-fitting briefs. No denying it, Antonia thought, dry-mouthed. He has a sexy body. Staring at his powerful thighs and those long, long legs, she felt heat begin to burn inside her.
The slow rhythm of his breathing altered at that second—quickened, was far more audible.
Antonia shot a tense, startled look at his face and was horrified to find Patrick’s eyes wide open. He had been watching her while she looked at him, she realised in shock, and a second later he reached out and caught her waist, jerked her downwards so that she fell on top of him. The impact of their bodies hitting each other sent her lungs into hyper-drive; she couldn’t get a word out for a minute.
‘Kiss me, Antonia,’ he whispered, his eyes very blue in the Venetian sunlight.
She shook her head wordlessly, deeply conscious of his body touching hers so intimately.
He murmured, ‘You won’t lay your ghosts until you’ve admitted you have a body and it has very physical instincts, Antonia.’ His fingers twined themselves into her wet hair. ‘Don’t be scared; just let those instincts take over. Kiss me.’
‘I can’t,’ she groaned, but she couldn’t stop staring at his mouth.
It smiled at her, a warm and passionate curve. ‘Yes, you can
, if you stop telling yourself there’s something wrong with wanting to.’
‘Who says I want to?’ She pretended indignation, very aware of his blue eyes staring up at her intently, as if he was trying to see inside her head. She was afraid he could, too; she was afraid Patrick was telepathic, could read her every thought, every feeling.
Why was she so vulnerable to him? How did he make her feel this way? Why this man, rather than any other? Right from the moment she first saw him she had felt like this about him.
He kept staring into her eyes and his deep, low voice tormented her. ‘Kiss me, Antonia.’
‘I don’t want to,’ she lied.
‘Yes, you do,’ Patrick said, and he was right; she did. She was dying to kiss him, and at the same time scared to death. But how did he know that?
‘Antonia, how can you talk about getting married when you freeze every time a man comes within a foot of you?’ he asked.
‘If you know I’m so scared, why are you always trying to make me kiss you?’
‘You aren’t scared of me, Antonia. That isn’t fear you’re feeling, is it? Do I really have to tell you what it is?’
She gave him a distraught, flickering look. ‘Stop talking like that!’
‘If you don’t want me to talk about it, stop me talking,’ he whispered. ‘Kiss me.’
‘Well, if it’s the only way to shut you up!’ she said crossly, took a deep breath, and swooped down at him, brushed her mouth over his, a light, butterfly kiss gone almost as soon as it touched him.
‘Now can we swim back to the beach?’ she said, unsteadily.
Patrick didn’t answer; he had closed his eyes; his tongue-tip moved along his mouth. Antonia watched, dry-mouthed, unbearably excited.
‘You taste of the sea,’ he said softly. ‘Let me taste you again.’
She bit her lip, staring at the parted curve of that sexy mouth, her heart beating heavily, wanting to kiss him so much that it was an agony. She couldn’t bear it—she had to feel his mouth again; she slowly lowered her head. As her mouth touched him she felt his tongue move softly between his lips to meet her, and an involuntary groan broke out of her.
‘Patrick,’ she moaned, deaf to her own voice, her eyes shut tight, letting herself sink into the dark bliss of sensuality for the first time in her life.
After that night in Bordighera she had felt for a while as if she were in a dodgem car, crashing around helplessly, being knocked from here to there by life without having any power to dictate her own direction. She had been terrified by the instability, the uncertainty that that night on the beach had revealed to her. That was why she had accepted Cy’s proposal. He had offered her a calm, secure life with a man she liked, who would never hurt her or frighten her.
She had felt threatened again ever since Patrick came back into her life. She had never forgotten him, even though she had only seen him so briefly at that party in her uncle’s house two years ago. The attraction had been immediate, devastating; and, ever since they’d met again, that feeling had intensified hour by hour, day by day: the deep beat of a dangerous drum, a growing excitement, which might explode at any second and blow her life apart.
She felt that drumbeat now, her whole body shaking as Patrick deliberately moved against her, the damp-furred masculinity of his inner thigh brushing against her, making her shudder with erotic sensuality. His hands moved too, tormenting and caressing, making her whimper with aroused desire, with frustrated need.