CHAPTER ELEVEN
HE WAS ON THE phone when she arrived. She heard the deep rumble of his voice, the timbre instantly familiar to her, and she hesitated on the threshold of his office before knocking once and pushing the door inwards.
“Is this a bad time?” She said quietly.
His eyes clashed to hers and she had the strangest sense that she was unwelcome, despite the fact he’d more or less demanded she come to see him.
“Sit.” He nodded towards the chair opposite him, but continued to speak for several minutes, making notes and giving commands in rapid-fire Italian. She stared out of the windows behind him, not thinking, not listening. Nothing.
Just waiting.
And finally, he disconnected the call with a sigh, and focused the full force of his attention on her. She roused herself, bringing her attention back to his face. Trying to be calm.
Trying to be calm, trying to be herself, when she felt like she had no clue who that was anymore.
“Tell me about your marriage.”
Grace froze, her expression obvious. It was clearly the last thing she’d expected. “My marriage to Steven?”
“Yes, to Steven. How many husbands have you had?”
Her lips flickered dismissively at his sarcasm. Marco pushed back in his seat, steepling his fingers beneath his chin and watching her with the kind of intensity designed to wrong-foot his business adversaries.
“Just the one.” Grace crossed one leg over the other, attempting to effect a pose of relaxation. “What do you want to know?”
“You had separate bedrooms.”
Grace’s eyes widened and her lips parted. She stared at him, her cheeks pale, her hands clasped in her lap. It had been Steve’s idea to have separate rooms. I don’t ever want you to feel pressured by me. We’re friends, Gracie. Flatmates. Family.
“Why do you say that?”
“Is it true?”
Grace swallowed, her expression clearly showing concern. “I don’t see that it’s any of your business.”
“Damn it, Grace. Is it true?”
She bit down on her lip, and her eyes were beseeching when they lifted to his. “Yes. We had separate bedrooms.”
Marco nodded, giving nothing away with his body language. “Why?”
Grace stood, her legs a little unsteady as she walked to the large windows that showed a view of his gardens. “It wasn’t a normal marriage,” she said softly. “We weren’t … intimate.”
Marco sat still, staring at her back, using every piece of strength he possessed not to react to the news. “At all? Ever?”
Grace shook her head without looking in his direction. “Before Rome,” she said quietly. “We were a couple. But afterwards, after you, and when I found out I was pregnant, no. I didn’t sleep with him again.”
Marco’s eyes closed as he processed this information, trying to make sense of what it meant and how he could reconcile this announcement with his feelings on the matter. “I don’t understand,” he said finally.
“Of course you don’t.” Grace scoffed, turning around to face him with eyes that were bleak and hollow. “How could you? Sex was the last thing on my mind.”
“You married him.”
“Yeah! I know. I was there.”
“But you weren’t in love with him.”
“On the contrary, I loved him very much. Just not in that way.”
“Then why marry him? Why not be his friend…”
“Because he loved me in that way,” she said with a small shiver. “Because he had loved me when I was poor and young and naïve and he loved me so damned much. Because he paid for me to go to college and he made me what I am now. Because he said it made sense and I trusted him. Because I was scared and alone and I had no idea what to do and suddenly he gave me an option on a silver platter. Because I didn’t want to disappoint him and because he wanted it so damned much.”
Marco listened to her angry response with a sinking feeling in his gut.
“I wish you’d told me the truth back then.”
“I know that.” And tears sprung to her eyes, then overflowed down her cheeks. Grace dashed them away angrily. “I know that I was wrong. I’ve told you how sorry I am and I’ll say it again and again if that’s what it takes. I should have been stronger, braver, smarter. You were wrong last night, Marco. I wasn’t using Steve. Not really. Not as much as he was using me. I didn’t see it at the time but now I understand. He used my fear and anxiety and my past to get me to say ‘yes’. He knew I would never have married him otherwise.” She spun away, crossing her arms over her front, staring out at the citrus grove.
“I loved Steve, but he was selfish. He wanted to marry me, and what Steve wanted…”
Marco stared at her, the words she’d said spinning around them.
“Sound like someone else you know?” Grace whispered, shivering now. She pressed her head forward, against the glass of the window. It was pleasingly cold and her brow was fevered. She was fevered.
She lifted her hands to the buttons on her dress. There were at least ten down the front. She undid the first one, then the next, then the next, all the while her eyes stayed closed and her head remained pressed against the glass.
“What are you doing?” The question came from deep in his chest.
“My first marriage was to my best friend. A man I adored and trusted implicitly. But it was sexless. And now I’m marrying you. A man who hates me and I’m terrified of. And all we have is sex.”
She turned around then, pushing her dress off her body, her eyes not wavering from his face. There was challenge in her every look. She didn’t see the way his skin paled beneath his tan, nor the way his hands clenched the sides of his chair; she was far too focused on how she felt.
“Stop it.”
“Why?” She reached around and unclipped her bra. He watched as she freed her breasts and then slid her hands into the elastic of her underpants. “This is what you want me for, isn’t it?”
He groaned and stood then, moving towards her, grabbing her wrists and lifting them away from her underwear. “Stop it.”
“No.” She lifted her chin defiantly, her eyes simmering with anger and resentment. “This is what you want.” More emphatic this time. Urgent. “You’ve made it obvious. And I want it too, Marco.”
He swore in his own tongue. “This is madness.”
“Yeah.” She nodded, but pulled her hands free so she could finish undressing. “But it always has been with us.”
Truer words had never been spoken, he thought with a wry grimace.
She lifted her hands to his shirt and began to separate the buttons and Marco was ashamed that he let her, but it was like watching a high-speed collision. It was all happening too fast and he hadn’t yet come to his senses. She pushed his shirt apart and brought her mouth to his chest, kissing the warm flesh between his pecs in a way that made his gut clench with fierce desire.
But this was so wrong and he knew it; he knew he needed to wrestle control back of the situation. “I don’t want this.”
Grace shook her head. “Tough. Yesterday, you carried me over your shoulder and took me to bed. I can’t lift you up, but I have other ways of making you face this.”
“Grace,” he didn’t want to know what those other ways were. “Listen to me.”
“No.” And there was such wildness in her face that he wondered if arguing with her was actually worse for Grace than simply letting her seduce him. Letting her release her tension and confusion in this way.
“We’ve gone down this road. It doesn’t help. We need to talk now. To talk this through.”
“And say what? Say that you hate me? That you’ll never forgive me? That you wish I’d told you? That you’ll take Ben away if I don’t marry you?” She shook her head swiftly. “You’ve already said that and believe me, you don’t need to say any of it again. I remember. I remember. I understand.” Her hands dropped lower, to his pants. She found the belt buckle and pulled it out of the loops, dropping it on the floor at his feet.
The sense of panic was blinding. It tore through him. The damage he’d inflicted was something she wore around her shoulders – he could see it as clearly as if he’d taken a blade and scored her flesh. “I would never take Ben from you. You don’t need to worry about that.”
Her eyes lifted to his face, her smile haunted and dismissive. “You’ll sue for some custody though which is the same thing.”
She didn’t give him a chance to respond. Her fingers parted his belt and then pushed at his pants and he groaned as he let her slide them down his legs, stepping out of his shoes at the same time as his pants.
“And I’ve told you I’m sorry. I’ve told you I love you. We’ve both said everything we need to say. I don’t want to hear anymore. Please, Marco. Make love to me.”
“No…”
“Not make love,” she corrected, misinterpreting his denial. “You don’t do that, I know. Screw me. Here. Now. Please.”
“Grace,” he groaned, but then she lifted up on tiptoes, pressing her mouth to his, her breasts firm against his chest.
“If you want to talk, fine. But I need this now. Please.”
He nodded, catching her face in his hands and holding her still. “We will talk later. Tonight. Dinner. Si?”
“Sure.” She shrugged as if it made no difference; as if she didn’t care. He couldn’t believe that was true though. He buried himself in their kiss; tasting her and taking from her what he needed. Assurances he hadn’t thought important – promises he would have sworn he didn’t want to hear.
He kissed apologies into her mouth with gentleness, his fingers running along her cheekbones and tangling in her hair, loosening it from the bun she wore until it fell wild and gold around her face, like it had been the first time he’d seen her.
He kissed her with everything that was in his heart.
“You are sunshine,” he said seriously.
“Don’t.” She pulled away, and there was a look in her eyes that broke something in his chest. A look of wild desperation and feral savagery. Both emotions shook him, and he held her where she was, at arm’s length, and stared down at her.
“Don’t say the nice things. I don’t want to hear them.”
“Grace.” Marco had never known panic. Not once in his life had he felt anything like this. Fury, sadness, desperation when she’d left. Anger and despair at hearing of her marriage. But this? Panic was swallowing him whole. The situation had flown so far out of his control he had no idea if he could ever take it back.
She sobbed, and he felt her grief and worse, he knew himself to be the cause of it. But before he could straighten his thoughts, she shook his hands free and brought her body back to his. “If you say another word, I’m walking out that door. All I want, all I need, is to feel you. Please. Please.”
And the words rang with haunted need. He would have done anything, been anything, said anything in that moment to wipe the sadness from her face.
He nodded slowly, but it might as well have been a nod to the hangman. The axe was dropping.
*
His kiss was oxygen to her flame. She took it and returned it, burning him with her intensity. She pushed him backwards and he spun her in the same motion, pressing her into the desk, clearing it impatiently with one hand as he hoisted her up onto it, her naked form spread beneath him. With his mouth he worshipped her flesh and his eyes paid homage to her being. He ran his tongue over every inch of her, tasting the sweetness of her soul and the tang of her sweat. He sucked each of her fingers into his mouth and then he brought his mouth down to her womanhood, tasting the very essence of her being until she exploded against his mouth.
He dragged his mouth lower still, kissing the sensitive flesh at the top of her thighs, behind her knees, finding the curves of her calves and the twists of her ankles, until she was covered in goosebumps and quivering with visible need.
She lifted her legs, placing her feet on the edge of his desk, withdrawing from him at the same time she issued a silent invitation. He stood, his chest shifting roughly with each hard-drawn breath.
What he needed paled in comparison to Grace’s needs.
Finally, he understood her.
And understanding brought with it regret – because he understood how badly he’d failed her. He communicated that, or tried to, with the tenderness of his touch. He revered her, stroking her gently, guiding her legs apart as he moved inside of her, taking her as though she were spun of the most fragile gossamer in existence. But she slammed her palms against his desk.
“No.” She fixed him with an angry stare. A stare that looked to all the world like she might tip over into hysterical bawling at any moment. “Not like that. Not like this.”
He swore, biting back his frustrations.
“Take me hard. Hard. Please.”
The last word was suspiciously thick and he didn’t want to look into her eyes, because he knew he’d see tears sparkling against her lashes.
He groaned as he did just what she’d said, thrusting into her as hard and fast as he could. She shuddered against the desk, her relief so obvious. She arched her back, pushing her hands over her head and he chased her wrists, pinning them down as he took her just like she’d wanted, just as he’d thought he wanted.
It was both intimate and animalistic. A purely primal, physical coming together. In some ways, he would have thought that meant it lacked emotion, but it didn’t. He felt every turn of her heart from the inside out and he wondered why it had taken him so long to understand her properly. To understand the hurts she bore.
He watched her fall apart and her eyes clung to his, seeking something he didn’t know he possessed – searching him for answers he couldn’t find. But he stared back at her, hoping he could give her something, anything, to stave off the sadness that he now saw wrapped around her. Around all of her. Even her smiles.
She fell apart on his desk, but he didn’t.
He paused, his body moist with perspiration, all of him as hard as a rock. He looked down at her, and then, slowly, he pulled out of her. “Now, my way.”
She bit down on her lip, fear obvious in her features.
But he didn’t care. This wasn’t the time to be faint-hearted. He lifted her easily and laid her on the floor, reaching for their discarded clothes as a makeshift pillow behind her head. He kissed her as he moved back inside of her, gently, slowly, tauntingly and he kissed her as he moved, feeling her gasp into his mouth. He felt her try to pull away, and he understood.
She couldn’t make sense of this.
Hard and fast she got. Hard and fast she felt she deserved – because it was sex as punishment. There was nothing gentle or kind, nothing intimate and sweet, about the way they’d been coming together.
But this?
He wouldn’t let her run away from it. His kiss was gentle now, just like her, but there was strength in it, also like her. His kiss was all the promises she sought, he could only hope she understood. That she was listening. He knew what she liked, how to move to please her, but he drew her pleasure out, stretching it like an elastic that couldn’t ever snap. He rolled his hips, kissing her, feeling her hunger in every fiber of his being. It echoed his own needs.
He stoked her softly, cajoling her to a new climax, and all the while he was stripping her raw, exposing her deepest feelings and needs, her vulnerabilities and wants. And he held her, gently kissing her, breathing in as she breathed out. Answering every question she posed with each motion of her body.
They exploded as one; each so completely attuned to the other that their release could only have been simultaneous. He ran his hands higher, catching her hands and threading his fingers through hers, holding her tight, kissing her, moving inside of her as pleasure vibrated across them.
It was intense, but in a different way to their usual coming together. Something had shifted, and when finally he put some space between them – just enough to look at her passion-warmed face – he felt the whole world tipping off its axis. Did she feel it too?
He couldn’t tell.
His body still claimed hers and yet she was shutting off, pulling away from him, withdrawing from the intimacy that they’d shared. Her eyes ran from his as though they were of an opposing magnetic polarity and her body was stiff where seconds earlier it had been fluidic heat.
His phone rang but even if it hadn’t, Grace would have pushed him away. He could sense it coming and the whole experience was as unpalatable as it was foreign. He ignored the ringing but she didn’t.
“Get it.” The words were cold. Clipped.
“It’s not important.”
“Take the call. We’re done here.”
His laugh was a harsh sound of shock, totally lacking in humour. “Cristo, cara. We are so far from done.”
“That’s what I needed from you. It’s what you want from me.” She cleared her throat awkwardly and shifted her body weight. He was significantly larger and stronger but he’d never used his size to take anything from a woman she wasn’t willing to give. He moved naturally, allowing her to lift up and stride back to the window. Naked, beautifully naked, she stared at the view for several quiet, long minutes. He watched her, his body on tenterhooks, as though she’d primed him in some way.
He opened his mouth to speak, no idea what he wanted to say, when his phone rang again. He made a noise of exasperation but Grace angled her head, so he caught the hint of her profile. “Answer it.”
He snatched the phone up, intending simply to get rid of whomever was on the other end. There were several missed calls; he hadn’t even realized it had been ringing before.
“There you are! God, I’ve been calling and calling.”
Marco heard his sister’s tone and was, momentarily, distracted from Grace. “Is everything okay, Claudia?”
Grace was getting dressed. He watched as she lifted her dress into place, not bothering with underpants or a bra. She kept her head dipped forward as she re-did each button, closing herself up, shutting off to him.
“Yes, yes. Will and I are around the corner. We need to see you.”
He suppressed his first reaction – irritation. “Can it wait?”
“No, Marco. It’s important. Ten minutes, okay?”
He disconnected the call and thrust the phone into his pocket. Grace was waiting by the door, her look impassive.
He ached to pull her back into his arms, to rattle that look of calm determination from her features, because now he saw what was behind it. The pain.
“Claudia and Will are coming over,” he heard himself say softly. As though they hadn’t just shared something magnificent and spine-tingling in the middle of his home office. “They’ll be here in ten minutes.”
Grace stared out the window, over his shoulder. “I’ll stay in my room.”
Marco controlled his temper with difficulty. “You will do no such thing.” And he was floundering with no clue what to say, so he clung to the one thing he thought might achieve his result. “We had a deal. Around my family, we act like this is all real. Got it?”
For the smallest of seconds, she met his gaze, and then she was looking at the ground. “Yes, Marco.”
Her response angered him further, but what could he say? He’d demanded she fall in with his earlier stipulation, and so she’d agreed.
“Freshen up. I’ll take them to the terrace when they arrive.”
“Fine.”
He watched her go, something dropping heavily in his chest.
He watched her all the way to the end of the corridor, when she turned a corner and moved from sight.
And then he swore, slamming the door shut in the curse’s wake.
What the hell was he supposed to do?