Spreading her willing body under him, Luciano mounted her and plunged his aching shaft into her delicate sheath with forceful expertise. Jackknifing up to him in welcome, she cried out. His raw dominance just increased the splintering, explosive excitement roaring through her. His every movement gave her indescribable pleasure. She was on a wild roller-coaster of sensation that pushed her closer and closer to the height that her every skin cell yearned to reach. And then she was flying up into the sun, screaming and sobbing and coming apart beneath him in a sweet agony of fierce fulfilment.
Rolling over to release her from his weight, he held her close. He pushed her tumbled hair off her brow with a hand that wasn’t quite steady. Slumberous dark golden eyes sought out hers. ‘I have a confession to make…the first time I made love to you at Ballybawn I forgot to use protection—’
‘Forgot?’ Kerry gasped in astonishment.
Faint colour accentuated Luciano’s blunt cheekbones. ‘It had been over five years for me. I got carried away and I only realised afterwards—’
‘But you didn’t tell me—’
Luciano gave her a wicked grin. ‘You shouldn’t have needed to be told,’ he teased. ‘I knew you hadn’t noticed and I didn’t mention it because I didn’t want to worry you. After all, if you got caught, you got caught—’
‘Caught?’
‘Pregnant,’ he rephrased. ‘But obviously we got away with it, cara mia.’
‘Obviously,’ Kerry repeated absently while she wondered when she had last had her period. The date seemed lost in the mists of time and the calendar on which she had kept a discreet note was back in the kitchen in Ballybawn. Strain as she did to remember how many weeks it had been since that particular event, she could not. Even so, she thought it very unlikely that she might have conceived; foreign travel, a different diet and too much excitement must have put her system out of sync.
‘Obviously getting you pregnant is a project which will require lots and lots and lots of effort from me and loads of dedicated practice,’ Luciano purred, flipping her over and hauling her back against him to acquaint her with the reality of his renewed arousal.
‘You’re also very into this project, aren’t you?’ Her smile could have lit up the room and she turned back to face him and closed her arms round his neck. As she met those dark golden eyes of his, her heart lurched inside her.
‘Very into you,’ he traded, lifting her over him and anchoring her knees to either side of him.
Kerry was shocked. ‘We can’t do it like this—’
‘Dio mio…watch me…’ With deft hands and shameless expertise, Luciano angled her up and brought her down on him, penetrating her with the slow, erotic precision of a male who knew how to generate the maximum excitement.
It was a wedding night to remember. She did not dare challenge him with that word ‘can’t’ again but was tempted more than once. He even made love to her in the shower, and in the aftermath of an orgasm which wiped her out she mumbled, ‘I love you…I love you so much…’
It was his ultimate fantasy, which he had pictured so often when he lay fighting sexual frustration in his narrow prison bed: Kerry telling him how much she loved him again. He knew that exhaustion had blown away her defences and that she barely even realised what she had confessed. He lifted her off the bathroom carpet, carried her back to bed and covered her with the sheet. He stood looking down at her while she slept. Her hair was a riot of curls half wet, half dry and she was pale, faint bluish shadows showing below her lashes.
Luciano went for another shower. That fantasy had lurked at the back of his mind from the minute he walked free from that court: the instant of cruellest revenge as he ditched her when she least expected it. He had lived that vengeful moment in his imagination many times over. Dressed in designer separates and shades as only a suave Italian anti-hero could be, he would stride off into the sunset without even leaving her a note.
Only if he didn’t even leave a note, she might call out the rescue services thinking that he had gone swimming while she slept and drowned, mightn’t she? His handsome mouth quirked. Furthermore, a mega-smooth disappearing act would be something of a challenge to pull off on a tiny island. Was he planning to swim back to the mainland? Call for a helicopter? The landing would awaken her and the cool exit would get extremely messy and human.
From a built-in unit in the dressing room, he selected beige chinos and a black shirt. As he zipped up the chinos he watched her sleep. He knew he wasn’t going anywhere and he knew why. Somewhere along the way he had lost the desire to even picture her being scared, distressed or humiliated. She was his wife and he would look after her and he would not betray her trust. He had meant every word of those vows he had spoken before the priest. He had been honest when he told her that he wanted to have a child with her. There was a whole long list of good reasons why he was staying put but only one reason that really counted and that was the one he was least comfortable thinking about.
Kerry woke up and focused on Luciano. Lounging in the chair by the bed in an elegant sprawl, he was barefoot. His shirt hung unbuttoned and loose, revealing a muscular, bronzed wedge of chest. Blue-black stubble roughened his stubborn jawline and slumberous gold eyes enhanced by the dense black frame of his lashes rested on her. Her heart skipped a beat in response. He looked so vibrantly sexy he took her breath away.
‘How do you feel?’ he enquired lazily.
She ached all over. Face flaming, she dropped her eyes.
‘Why are you blushing?’
‘It doesn’t matter—’
‘Maybe I was a little too enthusiastic…?’
Her lashes swept up because he sounded so pleased with himself.
Luciano grinned with megawatt charisma and shrugged. ‘It would be much worse if I’d underperformed. I’ll run you a bath, bella mia.’
Twenty minutes later, after a great deal of mysterious toing and froing, he ushered her into a bathroom lit solely by two dozen glowing candles. She was so taken aback she let her towel fall and stepped into the scented warm water like a woman under a spell.
Luciano surveyed her with immense satisfaction. ‘I knew you’d go for this sort of thing—’
‘How did you know?’