CHAPTER THREE
ALESSIAHADBEENkissed only once. It had been at the leaving ball at her English boarding school at which sixth formers from the twinned boy’s school nearby had been invited. Drinks had been spiked and inhibitions, which a born princess like Alessia had in spades, were dismantled. What she remembered most about that kiss was its slobberiness. In the five years that had passed, she’d looked back on that night with a certain wistfulness. If she’d known it would be her only kiss she would have made the most of it, slobberiness or not. It wasn’t that Alessia prized her virginity, more that she was acutely aware of her position and that the eyes of the world followed her whenever she left the castle grounds. Many of the eligible men she came across were either sycophants or leeches or brimming with pomposity. Often all three. If she was to be linked to a man, the press would make a huge deal about it, and if she was to put herself under what would be an even greater microscope than the one dealt with on a daily basis then that man needed to be worth it. She wanted to respect the man she gave her heart to, and be confident that he wouldn’t sell stories about her or her family. No such man had come into her life.
When Gabriel’s firm mouth found hers, the feelings that engulfed her were so incredible that it made her five-year kissing abstinence worthwhile.
Nowthiswas a kiss...
Alessia closed her eyes and sank into the headiness of a mouth that sent sensation thrumming through her lips and over her skin and then seeped beneath the flesh to awaken every cell in her body.
Wrapping her arms tightly around his neck, her hunger unleashed and she returned the kiss with all the passion that had hidden dormant for so long inside her. At the first stroke of his tongue against hers, the heat that filled her insides was strong enough to melt bone, and when his hands roamed the planes of her back there was only a dim shock that she had, at some point since their mouths found each other, shifted her body so that she was straddling his lap.
She didn’t want to think, she thought dreamily as his mouth broke from hers and dipped down to the sensitive skin of her neck and his hands lifted her silk pyjama vest top up and over her head. If a touch and a kiss could evoke such wonderful pleasure then she wanted to fall into it.
For the first time in her life, she wanted to forget who she was and all the expectations she put on herself for being Princess Alessia, and let all the demons be thrown aside and justfeel, because she’d had no idea that feeling could be so incredible.
A voice in her head whispered that she should tell Gabriel she was a virgin...
She pushed the voice away.
The moment the pyjama top was discarded, Gabriel cupped her cheeks tightly and kissed her with an ardency that sent more incredible tingles racing through her. Alessia dove her fingers through the thick black hair and moaned when his mouth assaulted her neck again, gladly letting his hands manipulate her into arching her back so he could take one of her breasts into his mouth. At the first flicker of his tongue against her erect nipple, she gasped at the thrill of pleasure, and dug her fingers even harder against his skull, and when she shifted slightly and felt the hard wedge pressing against the apex of her thighs, instinct had her press down and gasp even louder at the pulsing sensations that enflamed her.
Gabriel’s arousal was such that when Alessia ground down on him, the barrier of thin clothing separating them was barrier enough to make a grown man weep for release. No woman’s skin had ever tasted this good or felt this soft, Gabriel thought as he devoured Alessia’s other breast. And what beautiful breasts they were, tiny and high and with dark tips as moreish as her rosebud lips.
He didn’t know who was more desperate for him to take possession of her. Alessia ground down on him, cradling his head tightly against her breasts, and when she gave another of the throaty moans that added fuel to his arousal, all he could focus on was his need to be inside her. In an instant, he flipped her round so she was on her back. In an instant, her legs wrapped around his waist and she was grabbing at his buttocks, rosebud mouth finding his and kissing him with the hot sweetness that was as intoxicating as everything else about her. Mouths fused, hands grabbed down low, brushing against each other as they scrambled to undo his trousers and rid Alessia of her pyjama shorts. Without breaking the connection of their mouths, they managed to rid themselves of her shorts and then Gabriel was free from his own confines and Alessia was using her toes to yank them down to his knees. Any idea of kicking his trousers off were forgotten when she arched up with her pelvis and he felt her slickness.
Damn but she was as hot and ready for him as he was for her.
Her hands grabbed his buttocks again, and that was it for him. Spreading her thighs and pushing them up, he thrust deep into the tight, tight heat.
The discomfort was so momentary that Alessia ignored it. How could she do anything else when she was being filled so gloriously and completely?
She’d watched enough sex scenes to know what to expect but this was so much more than she could ever have known and she cried out with every hard drive inside her, Gabriel’s each and every thrust filling her so greatly that her mind detached itself from her body and she became nothing but a vessel of sensual ecstasy.
Breathless groans and cries of pleasure mingled between their enjoined mouths, fingers bit into flesh and scraped through hair, the moans between them intensifying as something deep inside her wound tightly, coiling and coiling,burning.
Gabriel, lost in a hedonistic cloud, resisted the demand for release building inside him. Never, in all his thirty-five years on this earth, had he experienced anything like this, such complete sensory capitulation. It wasn’t just the feel of being inside Alessia’s tightness—and Lord, such unbelievable tightness—it was the feel of her flesh compressed so tightly to his, the seductively sweet taste of her mouth, the scent of their coupling... It was mind-blowing, and he didn’t want it to end. He spread her thighs even further to reach even deeper penetration—Lord, this was something else—and lifted his face from hers so he could stare at the face of the woman as beautiful as the body he was pounding into, and when he plunged his tongue into her mouth again and heard the throaty groan as she thickened around him, he could hold on no more and, with a roar of ecstasy, Gabriel let go.
Gabriel quietly donned his clothes using the small stream of dusky light through the gap in his curtains to see by. The sun was rising. Soon it would be day. Soon the castle would come to life. He wanted to be gone before that happened.
Before he left, he gazed at the dark hair poking out above the bedsheets, the figure the hair belonged to huddled beneath. His heart clenched into a fist.
He’d never experienced a night like that before.
He’d never lost himself like that before. He’d been cast under a spell, that was the only explanation for it. He usually came right back to himself after sex but with Alessia the spell had remained intact. He’d carried her delectable body to his bedroom and made love to her again. The second time, they’d taken it much slower, the combustible lust that had exploded between them reduced to a simmer that had seen them exploring each other’s bodies until every inch had been discovered and worshipped. His climax had been every bit as powerful as the first time. They’d finally fallen into slumber hours after the rest of Ceres had gone to sleep. And then he’d woken up and the spell had been lifted.
All he wanted now was to leave before Alessia stirred. Self-recriminations about bedding a client’s family member—a princess, no less—could wait until he was in the privacy of his own home.
She stirred beneath the sheets. He held his breath as a throb of desire stirred in his loins and closed his eyes tightly. He would not return to that bed, however deep his craving.
Only when satisfied that she was still safely asleep did he slip out of the room.
Not wishing to see any member of the Berruti family, uncertain he’d be able to look any of them in the eye, he called the driver he’d been appointed, left a note for Queen Isabella, King Julius and Prince Amadeo thanking them for their hospitality and, ten minutes later, left the castle grounds.
For the first time in Alessia’s life, she didn’t fight waking up. Even before her eyes opened, she thrilled to be awake, the magic of the previous night flashing through her.
For the first time in her life, Alessia had thrown propriety, duty and decorum to the wind and allowed the woman beneath the princess skin to take control. It had been sublime. If she closed her eyes she could still feel the echo of the fulfilment throbbing deep between her legs.
Joy filled her and she laughed softly as she opened her eyes, fully expecting to find Gabriel’s gorgeous face on the pillow beside hers.