She stared at him miserably. ‘It’s the end of the sight-seeing,’ she said flatly. ‘Time to…to get back to normal.’
‘Normal?’ He flung the paper to one side and leant close to her, taking one of her wrists in his hand as he stopped her instinctive jerk backwards. ‘And what is your definition of normal, Sophy? Nothing about this relationship is normal as far as I can see.’
‘Please, Andreas.’ His fingers were like steel and soon people would begin to notice. ‘You’re hurting me.’
‘Whatever it is that holds you from the past is like a lead weight round your neck,’ he grated softly, ‘and, believe me, Sophy, it is not normal. You asked me for time and I have given you time, but you are acting as though I forced myself on you last night rather than taking umpteen cold showers and walking the floor until dawn. What the hell do you want from me, anyway?’
‘Nothing,’ she shot back quickly. ‘I want nothing from you. I didn’t ask to come on this trip; it was your idea. Remember?’
He let go of her then, settling back in his seat as his eyes continued to hold hers, their grey depths shining silver. ‘Yes, I remember,’ he said softly after a few seconds had ticked away in a screaming silence that was painful.
The waitress chose that moment to bustle up with coffee and croissants, managing—whether by chance or design—to brush Andreas’s shoulder with one ripe breast as she placed their food in front of them. The fact that Andreas didn’t appear to notice the manoeuvre was scant comfort to Sophy, and the other woman’s actions seemed to confirm everything she was thinking.
‘She likes you.’ As the waitress disappeared in a flourish of black cotton and lacy white apron, Sophy’s voice was very low. Part of her couldn’t believe she’d actually said it out loud.
‘What?’ Andreas had been about to pour them coffee but now he froze, his eyes narrowing still further. ‘Who likes me?’
‘The waitress,’ Sophy said woodenly. ‘She likes you.’
‘What the hell are you talking about?’
‘She wanted you to notice her.’
‘Well, I didn’t.’ He poured two cups of coffee, settled back in his seat again and then stood up, his voice a growl as he said, ‘Damn it, I’m not sitting here like this when I want to talk to you, and I sure as hell can’t do it in here.’
He pulled her up none too gently and then, despite her protests, all but frogmarched her out of the dining room and out of the hotel into the street outside. He didn’t say a word as he whisked her along the pavement to a little dusty square at the end of the street, but after pushing her down on a gnarled wooden bench, sat down beside her. ‘I’ve got the feeling I missed something back there,’ he said grimly, ‘and I do not like that. Now, explain.’
She stared at him, at the handsome face now set in dark angry lines, at the big broad shoulders and powerful chest, and suddenly wished she was back to yesterday morning when life had been golden.
There was a radio blaring somewhere and a baby crying in the old, gently decaying houses surrounding the square, but apart from a couple of pigeons pecking somewhat lethargically at a piece of stale bread, the place was deserted. ‘I want to go back to the hotel,’ she said stiffly. ‘Right now.’
‘Tough.’ He eyed her implacably. ‘If I’d got what I wanted we would have spent the last four days in bed instead of skirting the issue.’ He was clearly determined not to let her off the hook.
‘What issue?’ She tried not to think about the bed bit.
‘You know damn well what issue,’ he growled softly. ‘The issue of us, and don’t say there isn’t an us because we wouldn’t be here now if there wasn’t.’
‘There isn’t—’
He cut off her voice by the simple expedient of taking her mouth in a kiss that had no gentleness but was all fire and thunder. His lips were urgent and burning as his fingers tangled in her hair, and he crushed her against him almost angrily, forcing her lips apart and exploring her mouth with an arrogance that spoke of possession.
He hadn’t kissed her like this before, and although she struggled for a few seconds the swift, hot and insistent flow of desire that immediately scorched her nerve endings was too strong to fight. She wanted him, wanted to be held by him like this.
She fell against him, there in the square in the bright hot sunlight as the kiss deepened still more, his mouth savaging hers, and as always when he so much as touched her the rest of the world faded away.
‘Diabolos.’ It was Andreas who pulled away. ‘You say there is no us when I could take you here, now, in the open and you would not resist me?’
Sophy lifted her chin, her heartbeat threatening to choke her as she struggled to control the alien passions his lips and body invoked. ‘It was just a kiss,’ she said numbly.
He nodded, his eyes merciless. ‘But if we had been in your room or mine and I had not stopped, what would it have been then? You want me every little bit as much as I want you, and I am done playing these games. I have been patient and still you fight me, even as your body betrays you every time I touch you. You have been married and so it is not sexual inexperience that holds you back.’ He glared at her, his mouth grim.
There was sexual experience and then there was sexual experience, Sophy thought bitterly, and she didn’t doubt for a moment she knew none of the tricks and sexual gymnastics a man like Andreas would expect of a woman.
‘So, what is it?’ he continued relentlessly. ‘Why do you continue to fight me and yourself? Are you afraid of me?’
She had to make him see that there could never be anything between them and only the truth—or a limited version of it—would do that. She nerved herself and said quietly, ‘Yes.’
His eyebrows rose at the unexpected honesty and he tensed for a moment, before visibly forcing himself to relax and gentling his voice as he said, ‘I don’t understand, Sophy. Why? What have I done to make you fear me?’