“You are mistaken.”
“I’m not,” he replied, his lips a fraction above hers, “and it doesn’t matter anyway. You are mine.”
This time when he slanted his mouth over hers, she held herself firm and refused to break. He ran his tongue along the seam of her lips, slid his hands down to grasp her buttocks. Then he pulled her into the cradle of his hips.
And, oh my, he was blessedly, hugely, gloriously hard. For her.
But she would not break. Her sanity depended on it. Depended on holding a part of herself separate from him. She knew more about him now than she ever had before, and that knowledge threatened to enslave her heart in spite of everything he’d done.
But why? Why did she feel this pull, this intense storm of emotion over this man? Why not David, her long-suffering and incredibly patient boyfriend who’d finally left her over a year ago because she couldn’t ever love him the way he’d wanted her to?
It wasn’t fair.
“Dios,” Alejandro said against her tightly closed mouth. “You are determined to fight me.” His lips moved along her jaw line, down her throat. Before she realized what he was doing, he slid his fingers beneath the shoulders of her dress and jerked it forward, down her arms, trapping her with her naked breasts exposed to his gaze.
“Alejandro, let me go! Someone could see.”
“I thought you could not be wearing a bra beneath this,” he said almost to himself, his eyes hot as they moved over her naked skin. “I have wondered about it for hours.”
The way he looked at her made her breath shorten. Like he wanted to worship her. She could almost forget she was standing in his foyer, bare to the waist, her nipples tightening into hard peaks beneath his scorching gaze.
“What else aren’t you wearing, Rebecca?” he asked, his voice a sensual purr.
She couldn’t speak as his hand slipped into the back of her dress.
Soon enough, he would know. His groan told her even before his hand settled on her bare bottom that he’d realized she wasn’t wearing any panties.
“The material is too clingy,” she babbled. “There would’ve been a line…”
“This comes off. Now.”
“No, Alejandro, wait—what if someone sees me?” she exclaimed as he started to tug the material down.
“They won’t.” He skimmed the expensive jersey from her body until she stood in nothing but high heels and a puddle of fabric. Then he took a step back, perusing her thoroughly. “You are exquisite, Rebecca. I have waited too long for this.”
Her brain kicked into gear as her skin prickled from the cool air of the foyer. Alejandro had servants and he’d undressed her in a public area of his house. And she just stood there like a museum exhibit while he ogled her. Anyone could come along at any minute. She would be humiliated.
Rebecca started to reach for her dress, but Alejandro was there first, scooping her into his arms.
“No,” he growled. “I want you in my bed. You will not need any clothing for many hours yet, bella.”
18
A different kind of panic gripped her by the throat as Alejandro carried her into his bedroom and kicked the door shut. She was naked in his arms. Though he’d brought her to his room, she still believed he somehow meant to shame her beyond her wildest imagination.
It was a ruse, she was certain of it, and she began to kick her legs, trying to force him to put her down.
“Be still,” he commanded. A moment later she was on the bed and he hovered over her, his fully clothed body pressing down on her naked one. The finely spun wool of his tuxedo scraped sensuously along her skin with every movement, heightening her senses. Heightening her traitorous need for him.
“Tell me,” he said, his lips on her jaw, her throat, her collarbone. “Tell me you do not want this, Rebecca, that your body does not ache for mine.”
His mouth fastened over one aching nipple and she arched her back, cried out at the unimaginable pleasure. He gave her absolutely no time to adjust to the feelings assailing her body as his fingers slid between her thighs and found the sensitive heart of her.
“Alejandro,” she gasped as he stroked her clit.
“Tell me you don’t want me,” he repeated, his breath hot against her body as he moved to her other nipple and sucked it between his lips.
Rebecca shuddered, her body alive with more sensation than she’d felt in a very long time. The other night in the pool she hadn’t quivered like this, hadn’t thought she would die with every slick pulse of his fingers against her, inside her.
She was on the edge so quickly it shocked her, ready to tumble into an orgasm just from the feel of his tongue on her nipples and his fingers inside her. But he stopped, said heated words in Spanish while he sat up and ripped at the studs on his shirt. She looked at him, her heart tumbling over in her chest, breaking for the millionth time because of him.
Because of the things he made her feel. Her heart was a bruise in her chest, her eyes ached with unshed tears, and yet she couldn’t stop herself from reaching for him. She lifted herself up until she could touch his jaw, press her hand to his skin, her fingertips sliding down to his lips, over them. Feeling them for the first time in years.
Those beautiful lips that had given her more pleasure than she could have ever imagined. He’d been the first man to make love to her with his mouth. She’d never told him that.
He’d gone completely still as she touched him, his gaze hot and intense as he watched her. She slipped a finger into his mouth, over the front of his teeth, across the tip of
