Vanni shook his head, the lake breeze ruffling his thick hair. “Not at all. My mother was warm and full of life. I realize Vera isn’t the most . . . approachable of women. She is an excellent house manager, and she and Janice, my administrative assistant, work well together to make sure I have what I need both at work and home. My mother and Vera look a little alike,” Vanni mused after a pause, his gaze cast out at the lake. “Once in a great while.” Emma’s heart squeezed a little at something in his voice. She wondered if he kept Vera around because of that, looking for similarities in his aunt, hungry for reminders of his mother. “They were definitely alike in one thing,” he added.
“What?” Emma asked, leaning her hip against the wall and watching his striking profile instead of the sun-gilded water.
“They were both crazy about my father,” he said dryly.
“Really?” Emma asked, making a face. “Wasn’t that a bit awkward for your mother?”
Vanni shrugged, the action bringing her gaze downward to his muscular chest covered in the crisp dress shirt. “My mother never knew about Vera’s crush. Or I don’t think she did. Who knows, really, what a wife suspects?” he said, the reflection off the lake making his eyes look more blue than green at the moment. “My mother likely suspected a lot of things she wouldn’t have told me about, as young as I was.” He glanced aside and noticed her puzzled expression. “My father was an inveterate womanizer. There’s no way my mother didn’t know about his infidelities,” he stated grimly.
“Do you mean that Vera and your dad actually—”
“No,” he interrupted, catching her drift. “At least I don’t think so. Aunt Vera’s infatuation was unrequited. I always felt a little sorry for her, existing in the shadow of her sister . . . and so many others.”
Emma didn’t reply, a feeling of sadness going thro
ugh her at his matter-of-fact assessment of such a crucial aspect of his family life.
He turned to her suddenly, leaning his hip against the wall, and touched the angel on her throat.
Chapter Thirteen
She looked up. The wariness in her large, dark eyes eating at him. Her wavy, golden hair fluttered around her delicate features. He gave in to a need he often had upon seeing her, palming the back of her skull and sinking his fingers into the soft tendrils of her hair. He’d never known a woman to have such a pretty, sexy head. Every time he saw her he wanted to cup it in his palm, delve his finger into threads of coiling, golden-blond silk.
The truth was, if a similarly impossible scenario as the one that had presented itself with Emma came up with another woman, Vanni wouldn’t have bothered to explain. He would have just chalked it up to bad luck and moved on. He didn’t invest in relationships. There were other women. Why should he have to make an effort to rationalize his actions or his nature?
But here he was with Emma, determined to try. What made it even more incredible, at least from where he was standing, was that he was embarrassed about what she’d seen. It wasn’t because he’d dominated Astrid sexually on that night that shamed him; that was background noise to him, even though he understood it wasn’t to Emma. No, it was his bored, lackluster performance, the evidence of how his black mood permeated even his sexual life of late. That was what shamed him more than anything.
His gaze lowered to her pink mouth. That’s how he knew just how strongly he wanted Emma. He was willing to sacrifice a fair portion of his pride in order to have her. What’s more, he wasn’t exactly sure how to proceed. The circumstances were unprecedented. He didn’t have a lot of experience explaining himself to women. Either they got him, or they didn’t. Fitting himself into some preconceived idea of what a woman expected of him wasn’t something he was remotely interested in doing.
He saw the anxiety flicker across her face and sighed, dropping his hand from her skull, cupping her shoulder instead. She’d really curled up in that armoire and listened while he selfishly took his pleasure with another woman. She really was undone by this whole thing.
Yet here she was, willingly choosing to be with him. He admired her courage.
Another feeling rose up in him, a surprising, slicing one: Jealousy.
He couldn’t recall being as anxious as Emma looked in that moment. Not even for a majority of his childhood. His hide was too tough. He was the strong one, or so everyone said. He was the survivor. He was too bitter, too jaded to ever wear that expression again, to ever feel that vulnerable. There had to have been a time when he was that open, that unguarded to the world, though.
Hadn’t there been?
He shut his eyes briefly, shielding himself from her luminous face. It would be so much easier just to forget about it all. He’d have to examine himself far too closely for comfort in order to have Emma. It would be messy and just . . . too much of an effort.
Way too much. He should take her home this instant.
“I’m just a man, Emma. I’m not so twisted that you can’t see that, am I?” he asked quietly instead, opening his eyes.
“I see you,” she whispered.
The hair on his nape stood on end as she studied him. He suddenly felt anxious.
“And you’re not twisted,” she said. “Not yet, anyway.”
He exhaled, realizing he’d been waiting for her assessment like an irreversible, binding judgment, stupid and illogical as that was.
He looked into shining, velvety-soft eyes. Innocent. Enigmatic. Her lush, unadorned lips trembled slightly. He experienced an overwhelming urge to plunge his tongue into her mouth, to pierce her everywhere he could . . . anything to feel her as deeply as was humanly possible, to be so tight and high inside her that for a brief, mindless moment of bliss, he possessed her.
Christ. He was kidding himself if he thought he was the master of this situation. Did he really think he could ever defile her? Not even in his wildest depravity could he begin to span the depths of this wisp of a girl’s eyes.
He inhaled sharply, gathering himself. He put his hands on her waist and lifted. She gave a little of cry of surprise when he set her on top of the brick wall in front of him. Her face was almost level with his now. He stepped between her parted thighs, keeping his hands on her narrow waist.