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As she dashed back to her room through the palazzo’s corridors she conceded two things: even if Don Vincenzo managed to teach Nick some much needed manners, he would never be remotely civilised—and she needed a new plan. Fast.
When she reached the bedroom, she flipped the lock, then eyed the connecting door that led to their shared bathroom—which she already knew didn’t have a lock.
Dragging an inlaid-gold armchair that stood next to an antique writing desk across the thick silk carpeting, she propped it under the gilt handle, tried the door, then stood back to admire her work. Okay, it was a little desperate and extremely lowering to realise she didn’t trust herself to resist that hungry look in Nick’s eye should he pay her a surprise visit.
But at least she had a new and brilliantly simple strategy to keep him—and herself—under control. For tonight at any rate.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Rafe’s mane of midnight black hair caught the wind, the tempest of emotion on his face as wild and unyielding as the thunderous roar of the sea pounding the ship’s deck. ‘Ye shall not deny me another night, Shanna,’ he yelled. ‘I own ye now.’
‘Take me then,’ Shanna hurled the words through the lashing rain. ‘But you shall never own me,’ she cried, the fire in her belly igniting as his manhood plunged deep.
EVA groaned and closed her favourite book. It was no good. However hard she tried, instead of seeing Rafe the Pirate Captain and Shanna the fiery beauty who had brought him to his knees, she kept seeing Nick and herself. But Nick wasn’t the one being brought to his knees.
Her head shot up at the muffled thump on the balcony. An all-too-familiar silhouette appeared in the open terrace doors. She shrieked and jerked upright in bed—and The Pirate’s Captive flew out of her hands and landed on the carpet with a thud.
‘Nick!’ The figure strolled into the room. ‘What are you doing?’ she squeaked.
‘Paying you a visit,’ he said, his breathtakingly handsome face illuminated by the dim light from the bedside lamp. ‘What does it look like?’
She leapt out of bed, determined not to be caught lying down, and cursed her own stupidity. Her brilliantly simple plan had a major flaw. The palazzo had no air conditioning, so she’d left the balcony doors open to let the lavender scented breeze from the gardens cool the still air. She’d noticed the neighboring balconies on the bathroom and Nick’s room, but hadn’t given them a second thought, because they were a good three feet apart. How on earth had he got across? Without breaking his neck?
‘You can’t come in here.’ She headed towards him, deciding to lead with her temper and ignore the pump of adrenaline making her limbs tremble. ‘You have to leave.’ She thrust her forefinger towards the balcony doors to point him in the right direction. ‘Now.’
Instead of following her perfectly succinct order, he walked right past her. ‘That’s gratitude for you,’ he said lazily. ‘When I’ve just risked life and limb to safeguard your reputation.’
She slapped her palms on her hips. ‘My reputation?’ she snapped. ‘You’re in my room in the middle of the night!’ she whispered furiously.
Just because her breasts were tingling beneath the skimpy silk of her nightgown, and she’d been imagining him ravishing her on the deck of a pirate ship she definitely did not want him here. ‘How is that going to safeguard my reputation?’
‘No need to get your knickers in a twist,’ he countered, the statement making her uncomfortably aware that she had no knickers on to get in a twist. ‘No one knows I’m here.’
Before she could tell him that was hardly the point, he gestured to the chair propped against the bathroom door and swore softly. ‘I knew it,’ he muttered, exasperated. ‘You barred the door.’ His eyes drifted down her frame. ‘Now how childish is that?’ he drawled, a slow smile appearing.
Her nipples puckered into hard points, so she crossed her arms over her chest.
‘It’s not childish,’ she muttered, the swelling in her breasts and the pounding between her thighs making it impossible to maintain an adequate level of scorn in her voice. ‘Certainly not as childish as climbing about on balconies in the middle of the night,’ she added.
He shrugged, picking up the summer dress she’d left flung over a chair. ‘I wanted to see you.’ He raised the dress to his face and took
a deep breath.
She forced down the blip in her heartbeat at the possessive tone, the sensual gesture. ‘Well I don’t want to see you,’ she countered, and tried to make herself believe it.
‘What have we here?’ he murmured, spotting something on the floor as he flung her dress on the bed. Bending down, he rose holding her discarded paperback. ‘Well, well, I never would have guessed it.’ He gave a gruff laugh, examining the battered cover—which bore a colourful illustration of a bare-chested Rafe and an all but bare-breasted Shanna in an extravagant clinch. ‘You read porn.’
She gasped. ‘It’s not porn.’ She tried to grab the book, but he held it easily out of reach. ‘It’s romantic fiction.’
He chuckled. ‘Girly porn, then.’
‘It’s not porn of any kind.’
‘Let’s read it and see.’ He held the book down, began to rifle through the pages.
She snatched the paperback out of his hands. ‘It’s not porn,’ she said, whipping the book behind her back. ‘You’ll have to take my word for it.’
No way was she letting him read the book, especially the passages she’d dog-eared. It would only inflame the situation—and her. And her body was already on fire. His big body brushing hers as he backed her into a corner.
