His pulse quickened. What had happened next had been completely natural too.
Natural and sublime.
He swallowed, his groin hardening at the memory of how Imma had m
oved against him. Illuminated in the moonlight, her body had looked like liquid silver—felt like it too.
It had been different from that first time—slower, less frantic, more like riding a wave...an endless, curling wave of pleasure.
But then last time there had been other things in play. Obviously he’d needed to seduce her, but the intensity of his attraction had caught him off guard, made him question his motives so that it had all got tangled up in his head.
Imma had had her own agenda then too. Sleeping with him, losing her virginity, had been her first small act of independence.
Last night, though, it had been far less complicated for both of them.
It had been lust. Pure and simple and irresistible.
There had been no agenda.
He had wanted her and she had wanted him.
Of course they had been fighting it for days—fighting each other for days. But it had been too strong for both of them.
His chest tightened. They had come together as equals and Imma had made him feel things no other woman had—driven him to a pitch of excitement that had subsumed everything that had happened between them.
Including getting even with her father.
She stirred in his arms and he stared down at her, replaying that thought, turning it back and forth inside his head. Yesterday, when she had been so upset, he’d felt something shift inside him, but he hadn’t articulated it quite so bluntly before. Putting it into words seemed to make his thoughts move up a gear, give shape to his feelings.
He felt a rush of relief. Getting even with Cesare didn’t matter any more. His father’s business was as good as his already, and that meant he was free to enjoy this year with Imma.
Watching her eyelids flutter open, he felt his body grow even harder.
And he didn’t want to waste a second of it.
‘Hey,’ he said softly.
She stretched her arms, the movement causing the sheet to fall away from her naked body, sending a jolt of heat across his already overheated skin. For a moment she stared up at him, her green eyes widening with confusion, and then she met his gaze.
* * *
‘Hey...’
Imma stared up at Vicè, her heart pounding. She had absolutely no idea what to do. Last time she’d been in the same situation Claudia had called, so she had never got to this moment of acknowledgement. It had got lost, swept aside by her sister’s revelation. But now there was nowhere to hide from the truth of what they had done—what she had done.
Remembering her hoarse, inarticulate cries of pleasure, the way she had pulled his body and then his mouth closer as he’d addressed that relentless ache between her thighs, her cheeks felt suddenly as if they were on fire.
His touch had been electric, every caress sending her closer to the edge, straining for that elusive something that would douse the swirling heat at the centre of her body, until finally it had been in her grasp and she had shuddered to stillness in his arms.
She had never felt like that before—not even that first time. It had been beyond anything she’d ever experienced.
As the moonlight had spilled through the windows she had demanded and given pleasure in equal measure, surrendering to the passion he had unleashed. Now, though, in daylight, she felt a little embarrassed.
Understandably.
She had cried all over him, told him things about herself and her life that she had never shared with anyone, and then she’d had sex with him.
Her heart skipped. She’d expected the sex to be incredible—Vicè was a generous, gifted lover. But apparently he was also a good listener. Talking to him had been easy—even about things she had held so close and kept secret from others.