CHAPTER TEN
ALL THE ANGRY emotion raging through Pepe’s blood constricted when he saw Cara standing there sobbing, still clutching her bra, only her knickers on to protect her nakedness.
Something hot and sharp pierced through his chest.
Instinct and something deeper, something unquantifiable, made him close the gap between them and wrap his arms around her.
‘Shh,’ he whispered, resting his chin on her cloud of hair and raising his eyes to the ceiling. ‘Please don’t cry, cucciola mia.’
She didn’t even attempt to fight, just clung to him and cried into his chest, sobs racking her frame. Her generous breasts compressed against him but for once he couldn’t react to it. Cara’s sobs hurt his heart too much for him to care about anything but soothing them away.
He’d spent the past five days doing his best to forget she was pregnant. He’d been so set on blocking it out that he’d completely failed to take her feelings into account. Cara was such a feisty woman it was easy to forget her vulnerabilities. But she was vulnerable. Pregnancy made her more so.
He remembered the first time he’d met her. It seemed so long ago that it could have been a different lifetime but in truth it had only been a few years. It was a few weeks before his brother had married Grace. Cara had gone to stay with them in the build-up to the wedding and Luca had talked him into going on a double date, pointing out Cara would feel like a gooseberry otherwise. As she was such an important part of his bride-to-be’s life, Luca was determined Cara would find Mastrangelo hospitality second to none.
Pepe hadn’t been impressed. He’d been used to strong, confident women; the only bit of vivacity he’d found on Cara had been the colour of her hair. Other than that, she’d been like a wallflower, practically gluing herself to Grace’s side, talking to him and Luca only when spoken to and even then in monosyllables. He’d thought her surly and rude.
As the wedding had approached, slowly he’d seen a different side to her unfurl, until, by the day of the nuptials, when he had been best man and she the chief bridesmaid, she was happy to chat with him as easily as she could with Grace.
But no one else.
He’d come to realise she wasn’t surly, just painfully shy. It took her a while to overcome her nerves with someone, but when she did, she was excellent company with a dry wit that delighted him. But...she’d been Grace’s best friend. She would likely always be a part of his life. There was a vulnerability to her that none of his lovers had. Any attraction to her was quashed.
He would not involve himself with vulnerable women, no matter how sexy they were. All the same, he’d enjoyed her company, would happily return home to Sicily when she stayed there and go out on double dates. They always had the best of times together.
He’d known early on from Grace’s disappearance that Cara would hold the key to finding her. But he’d put it off. And put it off some more, always hoping Grace would turn up of her own accord or that Luca would find another clue to finding her. But as the months had passed with no word, he could not in all conscience stand idly by while his brother turned into an emotional wreck. So he’d swallowed that same conscience and sought Cara out. The one woman he’d sworn he would never seduce...
He’d spent the best weekend of his life with her.
He’d been haunted by memories of it ever since.
And now she was here, back in his arms. Her naked breasts crushed against him. Breasts that tasted like nectar...
His blood thrummed, deep and heavy, his senses reacting to the scent and feel of her, a primitive desire that came alive only for her.
He did not want to admit those brief moments of fear when he’d realised she’d gone from the party. Vanished into the night.
He did not want to think of the cold tightness that had clutched at his chest as he’d forced his driver to put his foot down through the dark Montmartre streets.
He did not want to think of his rage when he’d seen that oaf of a taxi driver manhandling her in such a callous manner.
Pepe despised violence. He’d grown up surrounded by it, not in his family, but in the associations his father had had until he had allowed his own conscience to lead him away from it.
Growing up, Pepe had vowed he would never allow his fists do the talking for him. Even when he’d felt the hot blade of the knife slice down his cheek he hadn’t retaliated. He’d been so numb from the preceding events that it had almost been a relief to feel something.
Yet for all that, it had taken every ounce of restraint not to throw himself onto the taxi driver and pulverise him.
If that driver had hurt her in any way, he doubted he’d have been able to hold on to that restraint.
Cara had stilled. He could feel her breath, hot through the crisp linen of his shirt, tickling his skin.
‘I...I need to put some clothes on,’ Cara said, trying to break away. It was happening again, that almost liquid feeling in her bones, the slavish desire creeping through her every pore. She tried to pull away but Pepe was too strong.
‘You’re not going anywhere.’
She hated the thrill that surged through her at his unequivocal declaration.
All she could see were his women. Her head was crowded with them, all lined up and merrily waving at her, happy—proud even—to be used by him and, she had to admit, use him in return. There was no romance. Romance had nothing to do with Pepe’s liaisons.
Eejit that she was, she’d once been proud of her immunity to him.
It had been one big fat lie cooked up by her pride because he had never shown the slightest bit of interest in her other than as a friend. He’d flirted with her the same way he’d flirted with every other woman on his radar, but not once had he tried it on. Not until he’d needed something from her.
She’d been happy believing his sexual ambivalence towards her was mutual. She’d felt safe. Look at the trouble she’d got herself into when she’d allowed herself to believe otherwise.
She didn’t feel safe now. Not pressed against his broad frame with his arms wrapped around her so protectively, his hand snaking down her naked spine, marking her, his musky scent filling her senses...
Her tears had left her feeling raw. Exposed and hollow. Except the void inside her was filling with something else that she tried desperately to stop. Heat. Sweet, sweet heat that pushed the tormenting images away, until the only thing that filled her head and the hollow ache inside her was him.
‘Those women meant nothing to me.’ His gravelly tones whispered into her ear, his breath warm, sending tiny darts of pleasure skittling across her skin.
Her breath hitched. ‘And I do?’
He clasped her cheeks with his big hands, tilting her head back so she was forced to look at him. His eyes were deep pools of lava.
‘I don’t know what you mean to me,’ he said, his honesty stark. Brutal. ‘You’ve been in my head for four months and I can’t shift you from there. If I’d had the choice, I would have wanted more than one night with you. And you would have wanted more than one night with me.’
Before she had the chance to form a lie of denial, his head tilted and his lips moulded on hers.
Her response was stark and utterly shocking. All the sweet heat swirling inside her immediately converged into a pool of need so deep the intensity frightened her. It took all her strength not to react, not to move her lips in time with his.
She wanted to punch at him, but when she moved her hands to his shoulders to push him away, her fingers gripped onto him.
Pepe’s lips cajoled and teased and still she resisted, fighting with the last of her will power until his tongue broke through the tight line of her lips and darted into the heat of her mouth.
Something inside her snapped.
Her grip on his shoulders tightened as she responded in kind, exploring his mouth and sensuous lips as if his kisses were the life raft to cling to, to stop her drowning.
His hands caressed away from her cheeks, one snaking round to gather her hair together and spear her scalp—she had no idea when it had escaped the confines of the tight chignon—the other making broad strokes down her back until it reached her bottom. He clasped it and pulled her tight to him so his arousal was stark against her belly.
Pure, undiluted heat rushed through to her core and an unwitting moan escaped from her throat.
‘Cucciola mia,’ Pepe groaned, breaking away to nip at her delicate earlobe. Unbelievably, he was already fired up enough to explode.
Thank God he was still dressed. If he’d been naked, he would have plunged into her the second that earthy moan had echoed into his senses.
Drums played loudly in his head, his heart thundering to the same rhythm.
The bed was only a few feet away but the distance could be as far as the moon.
Unwilling to break away from her delectable body for more than the fraction of a moment, he shuffled her to the bed then gently pushed her onto it so she was sitting on the edge.
‘Don’t move,’ he ordered, drinking her in, her colour-heightened cheeks, her bottom lip plump and begging to be kissed, her green eyes bright and dilated, her breasts heavy and swollen, the pale nipples ruched.
‘Sei bella,’ he said thickly. And she was. Beautiful.
Jeez, his hands were trembling, his fingers and thumbs disconnected from his brain, unable to work the buttons on his shirt.
Abandoning his quest to undress himself, he sank to his knees before her and gripped her hips, pulling her to him so she looked down at him.
There she sat, gazing at him with a heavy desire he recognised and which filled him with something that fizzed in his heated blood. Her fiery hair hung down and he reached for a lock of it, greedily inhaling the sweetness of its scent.
He straightened a little to kiss her again, gratified beyond measure when she responded in kind, kissing him back, her tongue playing with his, mimicking his actions while her small hands gripped his scalp.
He covered one of her breasts with the palm of his hand, thrilling to feel the soft weightiness of it, and rubbed his thumb over the nipple. Cara arched her back in response and dug her nails into his skull, deepening their kiss.
These kisses, no matter how delicious and rousing they were, were not nearly enough.
He wanted to see if she responded with the same wild abandon that had caused him to lose his head four months ago.
But first he wanted to taste all of her.
Trailing kisses down her neck, he reached her breasts and hungrily took one puckered nipple into his mouth.
She moaned and cradled his scalp some more, pushing him against her. Lavishing attention on her other breast, he then bent down lower, raining kisses over the softness of her rounded stomach and down to the black lace covering the heart of her.
Hooking the side of her knickers with his fingers, he tugged at them, looking back up at her as he pulled them down to her ankles. He could smell her arousal, a scent that hit him like an aphrodisiac cloud.
‘Spread your legs.’ Did that thick guttural voice really belong to him?
Colour heightened her cheeks and, for one heart-stopping moment, he thought she would refuse.
‘Please,’ she said through heavy breaths, ‘turn out the light.’
He kissed her. ‘It will be good. I promise.’
Understanding her shyness, he did as she requested, turning out the main light so the only illumination came from the landing, then returned to kneel before her.
He placed a hand on a trembling thigh. ‘Lie back,’ he said thickly.
She swallowed, before leaning back, her eyes not leaving his face until he gently pushed her thigh to one side.
Cara’s eyes closed and her head rolled back, her chest rising and falling rapidly.
Moving the other thigh to expose her to his covetous eyes, he held her open to him. Even in the dim light he could see the moisture glistening from her, her arousal there for him to see, and as he pressed his mouth to the heart of her he was suddenly grateful to still be clothed. Unable to relieve his own tension meant there was no danger of embarrassing himself by coming too soon.
Dimly he remembered being on their hotel bed in Dublin and her refusal to let him go properly down on her. He’d placed a simple kiss between her spread legs before she’d pushed him away and clamped her thighs back together.
He hadn’t pressed her on it, had simply thought she was as eager as he for him to be inside her. He’d never considered that she could be a virgin who had never been naked in front of a man.
Now he realised he’d got off lightly. If he’d been given a real taste of her arousal then, he doubted he would have slept in four months.
Cara’s scent and taste should be bottled as an aphrodisiac.
Her tiny moans deepened and when his tongue found her *oris she jerked and gasped, tried to move him off her.
‘Relax,’ he murmured, pressing a hand to her belly while slowly inserting a finger inside her. If he didn’t already know how aroused she was, this would have proved it beyond doubt.
Relax? Oh, how desperately she wanted to. How Cara yearned to let herself go and lose herself in the wonders of what Pepe was doing to her, because it felt so good.
But she couldn’t.
No matter how hard she concentrated on the magic of his tongue and fingers, no matter how much her body ached for release, the switch in her brain refused to turn off and just let go.
‘Please, Pepe,’ she murmured when she could not take any more. ‘Make love to me.’
He looked up at her with hooded eyes, a wolfish grin spreading over his face. ‘Say it again.’
‘I want...’
He got to his feet. For one fearful moment she thought he was going to leave her there, exposed on so many levels.
Instead he unbuttoned his shirt, his movements deft. He cocked an eyebrow. ‘You want...?’
She swallowed moisture away, staring dazedly at the magnificence of his body as he shrugged the shirt off and casually discarded it.
His trousers and underwear quickly followed, and all she could do was gaze at him with a catch in her throat.
Pepe’s arousal was all too apparent, his erection jutting out in front of him, large and proud.
‘You want?’ he repeated, stepping between her still-parted legs. ‘I want to hear you say it. I want to hear from your own lips that you want this.’
She understood why he was demanding this from her and in a way she couldn’t blame him. Even if she did blame him it would make no difference. If he were to walk away right now the big deep pool she was swimming in would dissolve into a tiny puddle. ‘I want this. I want you.’
His eyes glittered. ‘Then you shall have me.’
He leaned down over her, barely touching her, the dark silky hair on his chest brushing against her sensitised breasts, tickling her. Slanting his lips on hers, he kissed her with a possessiveness that took her breath away, his hands kneading her thighs until he had her exactly where he wanted her.
And then he was inside, joyously, massively, deeply inside her, filling her completely.
‘Ahh,’ she moaned, pulling him down so his full weight was on her, adjusting herself slightly to accommodate him further, to allow him even deeper penetration.
Her body remembered the heights he’d taken her to before and, like a greedy child, was desperate to feel those same sensations again, to experience the same rippling pleasure that had blown her mind.
In and out he thrust, kissing her, squeezing her breasts, clutching her hips, penetrating to her very core until she felt everything inside her tighten.
As if he could sense that she was on the edge, Pepe increased the tempo and ground even deeper into her. It was enough.
Her orgasm rippled through her in waves so powerful and beautiful that any form of coherence abandoned her and all she could do was ride it, catching every last swell.
* * *
Cara awoke with a jolt.
An arm was curved around her belly. Deep, heavy breathing sounded from the pillow beside her.
Swallowing, she opened her eyes.
Pepe was there beside her, fast asleep. Through the dusky light she gazed at the thick black lashes, the dark stubble across his jawline, the mussed hair, the trimmed goatee.
Her heart constricted then began to hammer. She swallowed again.
After they had made love for a second time, Pepe had gathered her into his arms and fallen asleep with her head resting on his chest. Sleep had come easily for him.
She, on the other hand, had lain awake for an age. She’d disentangled herself from his arms knowing she should wake him and insist he return to his own room. Instead she’d found herself gazing at him, much as she was staring at him now. He was just so beautiful, even in repose with his mouth slightly parted, that firm yet sensuous mouth that had brought her such pleasure.
In this ethereal morning light she couldn’t find the energy to rebuke herself for being so stupid as to fall back into his bed.
Recriminations could wait.
All she could focus on at that moment was that sensual mouth.
Slowly she brought her face to his, close enough to feel his breath against her skin. Closing her eyes, she brought her lips to his, breathing him in. She raised a hand to his face and gently traced her fingers down his cheek and down the strength of his neck and over his broad shoulders. It amazed her that a body so hard could be covered with skin so smooth.
Slowly she explored him, dragging her fingers through the silky hair on his chest, circling the dark brown nipples, then tracing down the flat hardness of his belly. Her pale hand contrasted against the darkness of his olive skin. They were a couple full of contrasts, her yin to his yang.
Not that they were a couple, she reminded herself hastily. They were simply two individuals thrown together by circumstances with a chemistry that refused to be denied. If not for the life growing inside her, Cara would not be here. Pepe would likely not be here either, or if he was it would be in the arms of another.
Her stomach curdled at the thought and she squeezed her eyes shut to banish it.
Was that what her mother had done? How many times had she squeezed her eyes shut to banish the pictures of her husband with his other women?
Before the images could swamp her, Pepe’s eyes opened and fixed on her, bringing her back to the here and now.
‘You stopped,’ he murmured, his voice thick with sleep. She hadn’t realised her hand had stopped its exploration until he enfolded it with his own.
All memories dissolved as he pulled her down for a kiss, breathing in heavily.
Returning it, she closed her eyes and allowed him to guide her hand down to the thick mass of hair on his groin and the erection that had sprung from it.
Tentatively she encircled it, heat surging through her as she felt its silky weight and length, felt it throb beneath her touch. When she rubbed her thumb over the tip she discovered the bead of moisture already there and felt a thrill like no other that this was for her. Even if it was only for now.