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He’d believe her when she told him she’d changed her mind and wanted nothing more to do with him.
He had to.
Chapter Four
Sam tiptoed through the silent house down to the kitchen. Silently she took the pasta and bread from the refrigerator. She pressed the minimum number of buttons on the microwave to reheat them, holding her breath after each beep and opened the door before the buzzer could sound.
She loaded a tray with a dinner plate, cutlery, serving bowl, bread and water glass. Her gaze stole to the floral arrangement in the middle of the kitchen table. A few gaillardia blooms would not be missed from the centerpiece and would make the simple pasta dinner more appealing.
Damn it, no. She was not going out of her way to please Giacomo. She’d take over their leftover dinner because she’d promised him, but that was all he was getting.
Back straight and head high, she carried the tray through the darkened yard, the crushed shell path to the garage gleaming white in the moonlight. Flickering blue light painted the curtains of the workshop, beckoning her onward like a flame calling a moth.
As she climbed the stairs, she heard the low voice of a television announcer dispassionately reporting the latest financial news. She expected to find Master Giacomo sprawled in the lounger, feet up, as he watched the television. Instead, when she pushed open the workshop door and stepped inside, she saw him hunched over in the recliner, elbows on his knees as he leaned toward the screen.
His head snapped around at the sound of the door closing behind her. If she’d thought her eyes were too wide before, they were nothing compared to his. White showed all around the iris and his olive skin had turned sallow and pale.
Instinct overrode all her good intentions. She placed the tray on the nearest flat surface and ran to him, kneeling on the carpet so she could take his cold hands in hers.
“What is it? What’s wrong?”
She glanced at the image on the television but news of a bank merger in Hong Kong could not be causing this distress.
His fingers tightened around hers, the pressure stopping just short of pain.
“So much has changed. My world, it is gone.” His voice broke and he swallowed convulsively. “There is nothing to return to. I am in hell after all.”
He closed his eyes and bent his head but she doubted he was praying. His throat worked as he swallowed rapidly and she guessed he was fighting back tears.
Silently she rose to her feet. Still holding his hands, she circled around to the front of the recliner. He opened his eyes, gazing at her with dark brown orbs sheened with moisture. At least they were no longer ringed with white.
“What are you doing?” he demanded.
This was a bad idea. She was supposed to tell him that she wanted nothing more to do with him. But he was in pain and she could ease his distress. She was as helpless to resist as if she were caught in one of the deadly riptides off the coast. She knew how to survive a riptide—go with the current and wait for it ebb before fighting toward the shore. The same advice applied here. Rather than struggle not to help him, in fact to actively hurt him, she would go with the flow of her emotions and help him recover from his pain. Then she’d tell him she’d changed her mind, once the emotional current had subsided.
She climbed onto the recliner, kneeling astride his lap. Her pussy tingled with anticipation as she spread her legs, but no leather-clad bulge rose up to meet her. Sex was the farthest thing from his mind at the moment. Sam was a little disappointed but mostly relieved. He would be able to accept her comfort without confusing it with other things, and make it easier for her to break away later.
She slipped her fingers from his grasp. Reaching up, she glided them between the thick strands of his hair.
“What does it look like I’m doing?”
Before he could answer, she bent her head and sealed his mouth with a kiss. He hesitated for a terrifying moment, an eternity when she feared her gesture would not be accepted, that her efforts to comfort would be met with scorn and derision.
Then his mouth opened, taking control of the kiss. He sucked gently on her lower lip, his tongue caressing the sensitive skin. A moment later, she felt a cool draft against her back, as he lifted her pajama top. Then his warm hands were sliding up her spine, beneath the thin cotton, and she sighed into his mouth.
Gently he pressed her body closer until the swell of her breasts bumped his chin. He lifted his mouth from her lips, muttered something dark and urgent in Italian, and bent his head to take one cotton-covered nipple into his mouth.
Sam moaned, her eyes closing and head tipping back as she lifted her breasts to him, offering him more. Her fingers flexed, gripping his thick hair. Her brain urged her to push him away, to stop this before it went any further and tell him of her resolution. Her body begged her to pull him closer, to fuse his hot mouth to her breast and drown in the waves of sensation emanating from his skilled lips and tongue.
In the end, she did neither.
He lifted his head but only to transfer his attention to her other breast. The air upon the damp cotton of her shirt chilled the nipple he’d abandoned, beading it to a hard point. When he lifted his head from her second breast and blew lightly across the wet tip, Sam felt the pleasure down to her core.
His fingers trailed up her sides, pressing just hard enough not to tickle, eliciting shivers of delight instead. Beneath her shirt, his thumbs caressed her wet nipples, stroking back and forth in a seemingly random pattern of fast and slow touches that quickly drove her mad. She stopped trying to anticipate his touches and sank into the feeling.
Her sleep shorts grew damp, hot and humid like a summer night and she rolled her hips, seeking relief. She bumped up against the solid iron of his cock stretching the front of his leather pants in a hard ridge.
Sam moaned, rubbing against him. His answering groan seemed torn from the depths of his soul.
