His tongue thrust and retreated, establishing a primal rhythm in a dangerous dance. Blood pooled in his abdomen and stiffened the erection which had been plaguing him all day. He heard the dull thud as the plate she’d had perched on her lap hit the grass. He focused on her taste, her texture, deafened by the throbbing pulse rushing past his eardrums as the blood charged into his crotch.
When he finally came up for air, she was panting. Her eyes fluttered open. As the haze of desire cleared, she jolted back, tearing her head out of his hands.
She touched shaking fingertips to her mouth, her delicate skin abraded by the light rub of his freshly shaven cheeks. She stood and scrambled back.
“That shouldn’t have happened,” she said.
He stood too, knowing he should agree with her but finding it hard to think past the hunger clawing at his gut. Because there was nothing more he wanted to do right now than take her back to the villa and carry her to his bed.
She picked up her purse, and pressed it to her belly, her head downcast as she chewed on her bottom lip. “I’d like to return to the villa alone,” she said, her voice so full of confusion and anxiety, it sparked his temper.
She couldn’t be innocent—he knew that. She was twenty-four years old and had spent the last five years busy collecting boyfriends as well as citations.
“No way,” he said. “I’ll escort you.”
Her eyes grew wide, and fury with himself edged his voice. “Don’t worry. I can keep my hands to myself.”
Did she think he was some kind of beast? Incapable of controlling his own hunger?
He texted Marco Calzone, the young Italian whom he had tasked with heading up tonight’s security detail.
Taking Katherine’s arm, feeling the pulse punch the inside of her elbow, he escorted her back through the gardens and up the marble steps toward the entrance hall. Marco was waiting with the keys to his convertible.
They drove back to the villa in silence.
She dashed off to her room, obviously concerned that he would try to follow her. Try to force himself on her.
He ought to return to the party. Forget about her. But the throbbing ache in his crotch refused to subside.
Disgusted with himself, and her, he walked through the villa then headed down from the terrace, through the gardens toward the pool.
He stripped down to his boxers and dived in. The frigid water stung his skin, finally cooling the heat that had been building ever since Katherine had walked out onto the terrace. The heat that had made him want to press her to his will.
He powered through the water, flipped into a turn and then powered back toward the deep end—ready to carry on going until he’d tamed the beast inside him. But he had a bad feeling that, now the damn thing had been unleashed, there would be no putting it back in its cage tonight, even if he swam all the way back to freaking Sorrento.
* * *
Katie flipped the lock on her bedroom door. But she knew it wasn’t Jared Caine she was trying to keep out—it was herself. And her reaction to him.
The firestorm that had burned through her blood when he’d kissed her was everything she remembered from five years ago, and more. His lips had been coaxing, subtly demanding at first, but as soon as she’d opened her mouth she’d been plunged into a pit of red-hot lava.
If she’d been concerned about the strength of her attraction to him before, she was terrified now.
She crossed the room to fling open the balcony doors. The breeze went some way to cooling the burn on her cheeks until she heard the rhythmic splashing coming from the pool.
Walking onto the balcony, she leaned over and spotted Jared’s powerful body slicing through the water in smooth, efficient strokes. Her breath got trapped in her throat as she watched him.
She shouldn’t look.
But she couldn’t seem to detach her gaze. Eventually, his strokes slowed, he braced his hands on the edge of the pool and lifted himself out. Water sluiced down his body as he kicked off the wet boxers. He was too far away for her to make out any details but she recalled the feel of him, his hard length pressing into her belly as they danced. She devoured the sight of him, so tall, so powerful as he walked across to the pool house and lifted a towel from the pile by the door.
He toweled himself in leisurely strokes then hooked the towel around his waist. He took the terrace steps two at a time then strolled through the gardens toward the villa.
She lurched back to plaster her body against the balcony wall, scared he would see her transfixed.
She crept back into the darkened bedroom but stopped dead as she heard the soft pad of his bare feet in the living area outside. The footsteps slowed, then stopped, and she noticed the shadow cast under her door.
Her heartbeat hit her larynx in harsh, staccato thuds. The urge to cross the room and fling open the door, to tell him how much she wanted him, held her spellbound. She felt terrified and aroused at the same time. But then the shadow faded away with the sound of his retreating footsteps.