“You mean . . . he intentionally released you?”
Vanni nodded, a strange, awed expression creeping over his face.
“It was like he was telling me to . . .”
“Live,” Emma finished for him.
His glance at Emma was a mixture of doubt and longing and hope. “Maybe I’m wrong. But that’s what it felt like, when I remembered it out there that morning.”
“You weren’t wrong. Adrian released you all over again, and this time you felt it. Vanni, that’s amazing,” she whispered.
His gaze sharpened on her. He cupped her jaw. “No. You’re amazing.”
“Me? What have I got to do with it?” Emma asked, stunned.
“Everything.”
Her lips parted, and suddenly his mouth was covering them, his tongue sliding between them, and he was rolling her on her back and coming down over her, his heat and arousal stunning her. She hadn’t realized as he’d spoken that desire had coiled just below the surface. He was heavy and hard when he lowered his trunks a moment later. He entered her, filled her completely, his fierce gaze on her the entire time. She gasped as he ground their pelvises together, circling slightly with his hips, applying a delicious pressure on her clit.
“If it wasn’t for you—for your grace, and your kindness, and your example—I would have never gotten here, Emma,” he stated gruffly, keeping his hips still. He leaned down and kissed her parted lips gently while his cock pulsed high and hard inside her.
“I would have never even considered forgiving Cristina,” he said next to her trembling mouth. “I certainly never would have forgiven myself. I would have kept on, a dead man walking in the world of the living. It’s all down to you, mon petit ange. You’ve pulled me into the world of the living, and now that I’m here, I’ll never let you go,” he assured her heatedly.
He braced himself with his hands on the cushion and began to move.
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Available December 2014 from Berkley
Two and a half years ago
His final project for the benefit ball cast admiring looks at her many reflections as she sashayed out of the room. Not without good reason, Seth acknowledged with wry amusement as he glanced at the Alien Ice Queen’s ass gloved in a clinging blue gown. The starlet paused in the act of appraising herself from all angles.
She had ample opportunity to adore herself in the luxurious, but garish, dressing room where they stood. No less than a dozen gilded mirrors adorned the suite, including a large one on the ceiling. Daphne DeGarro, the heiress-turned-reality-show-star and hostess for the Cancer Research Benefit Ball, had opened several rooms in her Hollywood Hills mansion that night for the transformation of her guests. She’d reserved her risqué, decadently decorated dressing room for Seth, however. Earlier that evening, Daphne had led him to it with a sly grin. Seth had made her his first project, turning her into a magnificent, sexually flagrant Marie Antoinette, his creative instincts sparked by the woman’s opulent bad taste and brassy beauty. The benefit ball for cancer research was now in full swing in an almost equally gaudy ballroom and downstairs terrace.
Seth was the last special effects makeup artist to finish. He was weary. He’d done his part for tonight. Between him and fourteen of his regular staff and two eager interns from Hightower Special Effects Studio, they’d completed nearly two hundred characters in costume and makeup. The price of their labor, in addition to the use of Hightower’s extensive costume-and-makeup collection, was a hefty donation to the Cancer Research Fund by each client. Daphne DeGarro might have been in love with herself, but she was shrewd. Hollywood players would pay a hefty chunk of cash to be turned into a fearsome fairy-tale creature or glamorous fantasy character for one magical night.
Perhaps the young actress noticed his gaze lingering on her backside in one of the many mirrored reflections, because she turned to him.
“Aren’t you attending the ball, Seth?” she asked.
“No, I’m done for the night,” Seth replied, briskly zipping up an airbrush case and returning it to his kit. Realizing he still had on the tinted glasses he wore when he did an application, he shoved them impatiently back on his head.
“That’s all it was then? Work?” The Ice Queen asked. He paused warily, hearing the hint of seduction in her tone. She’d drunk too much champagne while he was doing her application. He glanced up. She was arching her back slightly, highlighting her ample, airbrush-frosted breasts beneath the low-cut gown. Earlier, he had offered to glue the edges of the gown—her nipples were bound to pop over the edge at any moment—but his offer had been flatly refused. Apparently the possibility was something she hoped for rather than dreaded.
She was a temptation, all right, but one he’d grown well accustomed to denying himself. Seth liked women a lot.
Just not the actress variety.
He resumed packing his kit methodically. He knew firsthand the level of infatuation a woman could get for a man who could turn her into a breathtaking vision. He tried to recall her name, but quickly gave up. What difference did it make? Seth avoided women possessed of fame fever. This particular ingenue was burning with it, which had perhaps been his inspiration for the Ice Queen makeup.
She could use a little something to cool her down.
“No. Not just work. It’s my art as well,” he replied levelly, sliding some paints into his kit.
“I hope you’re pleased with your creation then. I know I am. I feel so honored to have been touched by the best,” the Ice Queen said tremulously. When he didn’t look up, because he had a damn strong suspicion she was feathering her fingertips across the top of her breasts and peekaboo nipples, he heard a resigned sigh.