Take Me

Travis had never had to work so hard with a woman. He beckoned, they came. He wanted, they gave.

He left, well… he didn’t know exactly what they did when he left. But the one thing he did know was that there was no way that Lily was going to mess up his sexual self-esteem.

Travis turned and walked out of the bathroom, colliding with Lily as she headed for the main door of their suite.

He grabbed her arm roughly, hoping it looked like he was trying to steady her, when really all he wanted was to finally touch her. He repressed a groan of desire as his fingers wrapped around her upper arm, lightly brushing against her incredible br**sts.

“What are you doing in that dress?” he said, regretting his sneer and tone the minute the words flew from his lips. Dealing with Lily was difficult enough right then—he was so horny he wanted to drag her by her hair into the bedroom and take her again and again and again—but seeing her in that dress, the incredible sheath from the fashion show, was enough to send all of the remaining blood away from his brain.

Lily wrenched her arm from his grasp and took a step away from him. Licking her delicious red lips, she narrowed her eyes. When did her eyelashes grow so long? Travis wondered inanely as he watched her pupils dilate.

“Not that it’s any of your business, Travis,” she said, his name sounding like a curse, “but I’m going out to eat dinner.”

Travis took another step closer to her. “Everything you do in this country is my business,” he said, unable to stop the rush of words even though he knew he sounded like an idiot. “I brought you here, and whatever you do you’re going to be doing with me.” If only that were true, he thought.

Lily’s eyes widened. “Oh.” Her mouth formed a pretty little circle. Sweet as sugar, she said, “I didn’t know you were so proprietary with your colleagues. I wonder why you even brought me along if you were planning to make all of the decisions anyway?”

Travis didn’t trust himself at all standing so close to Lily, particularly when she was wearing that dress. If she were any other woman, he would have kissed the smirk off her face; but for the first time, he wasn’t sure if a woman wanted him to kiss her. Yet again, Travis regretted his impulsive decision to bring Lily to Italy. He had been blinded by the need to bury himself between her br**sts, to sink into her wet heat.

Angry at her, but even angrier at himself, Travis ground out, “Wait here for me. I’m coming with you.”

Lily sighed dramatically but had the good sense to head back into the living room to sit down. If she had tried to bolt, he would have had to spank her until she knew who was boss.

His c**k surged beneath the towel at the thought of bringing his hands down onto her round butt cheeks.

He grabbed his suitcase off the living room couch and walked into the bedroom. God forbid Lily knew that he couldn’t keep from getting a hard-on around her, even after he’d beat off like a schoolboy in the tub minutes before. Then she’d think that she actually had some sort of control over him.

No matter how cool he had to play it from that point forward, he was going to make sure that she never found out how badly she affected him. Lose the hard-on and get dressed, moron, he instructed himself with cold practicality.

Five minutes later he emerged in faded jeans and a Red Sox T-shirt. Lily, who was lounging on one of the plush sofas, had the nerve to raise an eyebrow when she saw him, and say, “Nice T-shirt.”

Travis had hoped to shame her into changing her outfit by dressing like a slob—her dress messed with his brain waves in a big way—but the opposite had happened: He felt like a schmuck for underdressing.

The only thing left to do was to get out of this godforsaken hotel room—the bathtub would never look quite the same again—and into the crisp, clear Tuscan air. After a quick dinner he’d drop Lily back off at the hotel and prowl the bars in town.

If a festival of weddings was going on, there were bound to be plenty of single, desperate women dying for an American businessman to show them a good time.

Travis held open the door. “Let’s go.”

Lily ignored his brusque manner and as he followed her down the stairs, he felt like a double-sized schmuck. At the bottom of the stairs, the man behind the counter inquired, “Is the room okay, Signora Lily?”

Lily graced him with a wide smile. “Oh, Giuseppe, it’s absolutely perfect.”

Jealousy bubbled up inside Travis at their easy informality. “Giuseppe?”

Lily shrugged one pretty shoulder. “I called him to ask about restaurants while you were getting dressed.”

“I told the bella signora”—Lily blushed and Travis wanted to punch Giuseppe in the mouth—“that she would find much, how do you say, romance, at Diletto.”

At the mention of romance, Travis grunted and stalked out onto the sidewalk, making a mental note to give Lily a much overdo lecture on the dangers of flirting with strange men, especially strange men named Giuseppe.

Lily’s tinkling laugh spilled onto the narrow street. Holding her arms out wide, she spun in a circle. “I’m in love… whee!”

Her hair flowed around her shoulders, and her delight was more potent than the twilight. Travis hated how he was holding his breath, waiting to find out who she was in love with. If she said Giuseppe, he was going to lock her in the hotel room for the next five days. Or better yet, he’d put her back on the airplane and send her home. Now why hadn’t he thought of that before?

“Who are you in love with?” he grumbled, when she didn’t finish her sentence.

Giving him an impish grin, she moved down the lane. “With Saturnia, of course,” she called out.

Travis admired the sway of her hips, thinking how impossibly right she looked in Italy. But it wasn’t a case of the country making the woman.

Tonight, Lily’s presence made Italy come to life.

He tugged at the front of his jeans, which were suddenly tight and uncomfortable, and ran his fingers through his hair. What was happening to him? If he didn’t know better he’d think Janica had cursed the dress with some sort of lust potion that was messing up the normal lines of communication between his brain and his dick.

He followed after Lily, down the curving streets, down into the valley below. A wide smile lit her face as she turned and pointed to the restaurant. “This is it! Diletto. Giuseppe said it means ‘delight’ in English.