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Her head lifted. And her startled gaze locked with mine.
‘Renzo!’ she yelped. ‘I mean, Mr... Mr Camaro,’ she stumbled over the words, and I could sense the vivid blush firing over her skin. The same heated reaction which had captivated me four years before.
The passion flared anew, thickening the erection in my pants and burning away the last of my caution.
‘You should call me Renzo.’ I let my gaze roam over her lush figure, brutally aware of the shudder of awareness streaking through her as she clasped the towel to her breasts. ‘After all, it is way past time you stopped pretending.’
‘Stopped pretending what?’ she asked, as if she really didn’t know.
My teeth clenched to contain the spurt of outrage. Did she still believe she could deceive me? When she stood all but naked before me?
I forced an indulgent smile to my lips, trying to be the charming playboy I had made myself become, despite the hunger and anger streaking through my body, which reminded me far too forcefully of the feral boy who had once been so desperate for the merest sign of affection.
‘You can stop pretending I was not your first lover,Principessa.’
Jessie
He knows!
‘How long have you known?’ I blurted out, shivering violently.
I tried to keep the panic out of my voice. Part of me wanted to deny the truth, but another part of me was stupidly pleased he had recognised me at last. That would be the part of me that was an idiot.
‘Long enough.’ Renzo smiled, but the gleam in his eyes was both possessive and furious, and I knew he wasn’t amused. ‘Why didn’t you tell me who you were when you arrived here?’ he demanded, temper sharpening his tone.
I wrapped the towel around my shoulders, covering myself from that searing gaze—which skated over my figure with a sense of entitlement which was both disturbing and dangerously exhilarating. As I clasped the towel over my breasts, I could do nothing to stop the vicious shiver of reaction.
I gave a jerky shrug, trying to look unconcerned about having been caught in my lie as tension coiled in my gut.
‘I didn’t think you’d remember me,’ I said—which wasn’t entirely a lie. He had certainly forgotten me soon enough after that night. And it had taken over a month for him to recognise me again.
Even so, I hated the resentment in my tone. I despised myself for caring enough to be upset.
Humiliated, I forced myself to step past him, intending to head back to my villa and pack my bags. But his hand shot out, with startling speed, and he snagged my wrist in an iron grip. He was standing unaided, I realised, his stance strong, and I could feel the adrenaline, the vitality pumping through him. This was not the man I had met at the beginning of the summer. But nor was he the entitled playboy I remembered either, the fierce fury in his gaze something I had never seen before.
‘Where are you going?’ he demanded—the pretence of humour gone.
‘To pack,’ I said, attempting to tug my arm out of his grasp. ‘I’m leaving tomorrow,’ I added, just in case he had forgotten.
‘You’re not leaving,’ he said, tightening his grip. ‘I don’t want you to go.’
Something burst in my chest, something that felt almost like joy, and I hated myself even more.
Good grief, Jess, exactly how pathetic are you?
‘I can’t stay,’ I replied, even though that stupid, needy part of me still didn’t want to leave... What was that even about? ‘Certainly not now.’
‘Why not?’ he demanded. ‘Because now I know who you are?’ His gaze skated over me again, entitled, provocative and fierce with challenge.
He tugged me towards him, until I was standing close enough to smell him—the tantalising aroma of soap and man. His jaw was stubbled, his hair unkempt, his clothes the usual combo of sweatpants and loose T-shirt he now lived in. His body was leaner than it used to be, but his skin was healthily tanned, those pure green eyes alive with vitality and purpose, and his shoulders were strong and broad again and his frame was filling out.
He looked more like the playboy now than the recluse.
‘Are you really that much of a coward,Principessa?’ he murmured.
Adrenaline kicked and throbbed in my veins at the taunt.
But suddenly I realised something that made this man different from the playboy. I couldn’t see the easy confidence he had used like a shield once upon a time. Instead, his face was grim, the charm stripped away to leave only intensity.
