some underwear as well as the nightshirt.
'Yes,' she said briefly.
'How many?'
She exhaled. 'Does it matter? It isn’t as if You’re
going to be left having to look after me if I end up
in a wheelchair or anything, is it?'
'Is that a possibility?' He was still massaging her
leg, but now his fingers were slowly stroking over the
tight scar tissue itself. For some odd reason Jodie discovered
that she badly wanted to cry. No one had ever
touched her scars with anything other than clinical
detachment. The long months in hospital had inured
her to physical examinations, to doctors discussing
her as though she were a piece of broken equipment
they were trying to piece together again and put in
working order. Which, of course, to them, was exactly
what she had been. She was grateful to them for everything
they had done for her — how could she not
be? — but at the same time…
At the same time what? Secretly, she had craved a
more personal touch, a comforting, knowing touch
that neither flinched from her scars nor made a dramatic
fuss about them.
But not a touch that made her feel the way
Lorenzo’s touch was making her feel!
'No. My leg is always going to be weak, but it has
healed properly now,' she blurted out, then bit her lip,
not wanting to remember those horrifying days when
the doctors had feared they might have to amputate.
'Thank you. You can stop now. The cramp has gone,'
she told him as she forced herself to concentrate on
something — anything — other than on the smooth gliding
stroke of his fingers against her skin. No lover
could have… No lover? Now what was she thinking?
She rolled over so that she could face him, all too
conscious of the warm weight of his hand where it
still lay across her bare thigh, her eyes widening as
she took in what she hadn’t realised before: namely
that all he was wearing was a towel, wrapped low on
his hips, and that the body it revealed was enough to
make any right-thinking woman go weak with female
appreciation. But from now on she was not going to
allow herself to want any man, she reminded herself
fiercely, and certainly not a man like this one. Every
instinct she possessed told her he was far too dangerous.
He was an autocratic alpha male who was
determined to get what he wanted, no matter who he
had to use in order to do so, and it was that she ought
to be concentrating her attention on — not the taut
muscles of his flat belly, or the distracting maleness
of the body hair that arrowed downwards to where
his towel had slipped slightly to reveal where it began
thickening out. Jodie touched her tongue-tip to her
lips and sucked in a shaky gulp of air.
Lorenzo removed his hand from her thigh and
straightened, pausing in the act of resecuring his towel
to watch as Jodie focused on the movement of his
hands, her breathing accelerating.
'If you keep on looking at me like that,' he began
in a warning tone, 'I’m going to think—'
'What do you mean?' Jodie protested, her face
burning.
'You were looking at me like a girl looking at her
first man,' Lorenzo said mockingly. 'Which leads me
to wonder what kind of woman you are that you look
at me like that — and what kind of man this ex-fiance.
of yours was to give you that need.'
'I wasn’t looking at you like anything,' Jodie argued
frantically. 'You’re imagining it. No modern
woman needs to wonder what a man's body looks
like.'
'So it wouldn’t bother you, then, if I weren’t wearing
this?' Lorenzo suggested, his fingers resting
against the top of his towel.
Jodie made a valiant attempt at a small nonchalant
shrug. 'No — why should it? One naked male body is
much like any other.'
'Was your ex-fiance. circumcised?'
Jodie opened her mouth and then closed it again,
her face slowly turning a deep shade of pink whilst
her heart skidded and bounced around inside her chest
cavity as though seeking the same invisible escape
route as her thoughts. Was he asking her that because
he had guessed that she simply didn’t know? Because
he wanted to humiliate her by making her admit how
limited her sexual experience really was?
'Er…why do you ask?'
'Why Don’t you answer?'
'I’m not questioning you about your past sex life.
And if we're going to get married—'
'If? There is no if about it. I’ve already contacted
my lawyer. He'll be here in the morning.'
'It will take quite a long time to go through all the
legal formalities, I expect.'
'Not for us. Once we have seen Alfredo we shall
be leaving for Florence.'
'Florence?'
'I have some business to attend to there, and you
will want to buy a wedding outfit.'
