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Take a guess, signorina.'
'You've come to clean the pool?'
He had never been mistaken for a worker before! Cesare's mouth curved into a smile.
He guessed who she must be. Her hair was too wet to see its real colour, but her eyes were green with flecks of gold—a bigger, wider version of her brother's. He knew deep down that there was a long-established rule that you treated your friends' sisters as if they were ice-queens, but it was a rule he found himself suddenly wanting to break.
'Do you want me to?' he drawled. 'Looks pretty clean to me. Anyway, I don't want to interrupt your swim.'
Sorcha shook her wet hair, but something about his hard, lean body was making her
pulse race. 'No, that's fine. Don't worry—I've finished now.'
There was a long pause while they stared at one another, and the teasing became something else, while something unknown shimmered on the air.
'So, why don't you get out?'
Did he guess that she was scared to? Because she could feel the tight tingle of desire which was rucking her swimsuit across her breasts and making the tips feel so hard that they hurt?
'I will in a minute.'
'Do you mind if I get in and join you?' He put his hand to the first button on his jeans and shot her a questioning look, but the sight of her dark-eyed confusion made him relent just as Rupert came round the corner.
"Cesare! There you are! Oh, I see you've met Sorcha. Hello, little sister—how are you? '
Very well’ she said, biting her lip and dipping down into the water in the hope that its coolness might get rid of her embarrassed flush. 'Considering that no one came to meet me at the station.' But she was angry with herself, and with the black-eyed Italian for having made her feel...what?
Desire? Longing?
She frosted him a look—which wasn't easy on a boiling hot day when your hair was plastered to your head and your heart was racing so much that it felt as if it was going to leap out of your chest. 'Cesare?' she questioned acidly, wondering why the name sounded familiar.
'Cesare di Arcangelo,' he said. 'Rupert and I were at school together.'
'Remember I told you about the Italian who bowled women down like ninepins? ' laughed Rupert. 'Owns banks and department stores all over Italy?'
'No’ answered Sorcha in a voice of icy repression. 'I don't believe I do. Rupert, would you mind handing me my towel?'
'Please, allow me.' Cesare had picked up the rather worn beach towel and was handing it towards her, holding her gaze with his black eyes. Her coolness intrigued him, for he had never experienced it from a woman before, and her lack of eagerness hinted at a pride and self-possession which was all too rare.
'Forgive me,' he murmured as he held the towel out. 'But I couldn't resist teasing you.' Yet his mockery had been deliberately sensual, and it had been wrong. He had noted her reluctant, embarrassed response—and now he could have kicked himself for subjecting a beautiful young woman to such an onslaught.
He sighed. Her mouth looked as if it were composed of two folded fragrant rose petals
which he would have traveled the world to kiss. And he had behaved like some impacciato idiot.
And she is the sister of your friend—she is out of hounds, 'Will you forgive me? ' he persisted.
He sounded as if it mattered, and Sorcha found she couldn't hold out against what seemed to be genuine contrition in his eyes.
'I might’ she said tartly. 'But you'll have to make it up to me.'
He gave a low laugh. 'And how will I go about doing that? Any ideas?' he questioned innocently, and something passed between them at that moment which he had never felt before. The rocket. The thunderbolt. Colpo di fulmine. Some random and overwhelming outside force—a kind of unspoken understanding—which took the universe into the palm of a gigantic hand and began to spin it out of control.
"I’ll I’ll think of something/ said Sorcha breathlessly.
'Anything/ he murmured, and at that moment he meant it. 'And it's yours.'
There was an odd kind of silence and then Sorcha hauled herself out of the pool in one fluid movement, water streaming down her long legs. Never had she been so conscious of her body as in the presence of this Italian.
