Chapter Eight
Poppy unthreaded her fingers, and pulled her hand free from the palm of his.
‘I think they’re gone,’ she said into the silence, and moved in front of him.
He wore all black. Tiny silver accents were everywhere. On the cuffs of his shirt. They created the buttonholes, lined every seam of his costume…
He looked like an angel kissed by stardust.
‘And why did you want them gone?’ he asked. ‘Why are we not with them?’
‘You didn’t want to be with them.’ She searched the dark depths of his eyes behind his mask.
It was a simple design. Black silk with silver swirls sewn in delicate detail around his eyes. It covered his sculpted cheekbones, his noble nose, but it didn’t hide his eyes, his mouth.
His lips thinned. ‘What made you believe that?’
‘Because neither did I.’
She turned on her heel and walked back into the hall of mirrors. The lights had been turned off, but the hue from the palace gardens lit the space. It reflected from the wall of glass to her left.
‘And so because you wanted to stay behind,’ he said, his following footfall silent behind her, ‘you thought I did too?’
She stopped beneath the first tall columns. The window between them was an array of squares, each locking in a different flush of green from the palace gardens. ‘Yes.’
He stood beside her. ‘But how did you know?’
She tilted her head—looked up at him. ‘Was I wrong?’
‘How did you know?’ he pressed, his question an urgent husk.
‘Little things.’
He frowned. ‘Little things?’
‘The tension in your shoulders,’ she said, her eyes following the rigid length of his broadness. ‘The flick of the pulse in your throat.’
And it pulsed now under her gaze. Hard.
‘I’m not tense,’ he denied.
‘I knew, because we’re married,’ she said. ‘Because I noticed you didn’t hurry to leave—that we stayed back.’
‘No.’ His black eyes flashed with a thousand shards of silver ice. ‘You’re a creature of too many contradictions, Poppy. You called me a stranger. You can’t bend your convictions to suit you, because you want the night to end before it’s over. We’ll go outside. Now.’
He turned to leave, but gently she placed her fingers to his arm. Halted him.
All night she’d played the dutiful wife. Ignored the barbs of curiosity asking questions laced in venom, to acquire knowledge of her life—her marriage—for their titillation. And she’d done it for him. But this she would do for herself.
‘We’ve done enough for tonight,’ she said, because they had.
But had she done enough?
Her heart shrank. It had been easy to see his lack of desire to join the others. Little things anyone who knew him even a little could have seen, if only they’d looked.
She hadn’t been looking before.
She hadn’t noticed.
Guilt bloomed, thick and heavy, in her throat.
Silent boom, after silent boom, the fireworks illuminated the space. Highlighted each one of his dark, slashing features.
He dipped his head. ‘Did you want to stay behind for this?’ His heated breath feathered her lips.
‘For what?’
‘This.’ He claimed her mouth. Konstantinos possessed it. Commanded it with the skilful pressure of his to open. To let him in. His hands went to her waist She stepped with him as he pulled them from the view of the window to the columned wall beside it.
Her hands rose to his arms. They bulged in her grasp. Strength. Power. It was laced in every muscle throbbing beneath her touch. And she knew she should yank his arms away. That she should not open for him. She shouldn’t let his tongue sweep between her lips and thrust inside.
But she did.
She kissed him just as fervently.
He dragged his mouth from hers. And both breathless, both panting, they stared at each other.
‘More,’ she husked.
He fell to his knees. Hid his gaze in the folds of her dress. His hands gripped her hips. He placed hard, fervent kisses to her stomach.
He reached for the gold hem of her dress at her feet.
She steadied herself on the arc of his shoulders.
‘Tell me this is the more you want,’ he commanded. But his fingers stilled. The dress barely exposing the naked flesh of her ankles held in his waiting fingers.
She closed her eyes. Tried to stem the melting urgency of her body.
She wanted him to lift her skirts higher.
Their desire… Still, it rampaged through her. Stronger than it ever had been. And she knew why. It was because on the balcony she’d glimpsed something.
Something vulnerable beneath his suit.
He’d never reacted to the death of their son with anything resembling the pain she hadn’t been able to contain. But in those articles… Those images… On the balcony tonight…
It was armour, wasn’t it? His image. His public reputation.
On the balcony, it had cracked. She wanted to know who lived inside. To see him break loose from his rigid demeanour of self-control. From the rules that had guided them in their marriage to always put his image first. To keep the fire between them to the bedroom. Behind closed doors.
She wanted to see him as desperate as she was.
She wanted him to surrender to these emotions driving through them here. Now.
And if he can? What does that prove?
He was human.
He…felt.
And if he felt, he could grieve and maybe, just maybe, he felt something for their son.
‘It is,’ she said, and braced herself. Her skirts rose. His mouth pressed hard little kisses to her calf, her knee, her inner thigh.
Then he was there.
At the heart of her.
‘Poppy,’ he breathed against her skin.
She tingled. Everywhere. Anticipation dimming out everything but the need to have his mouth closer.
Konstantinos gripped her hips—pulled his mouth harder against her.
Her fingers cradled his scalp. ‘Yes,’ she moaned.
His tongue lathed up and down her panties on top of her intimate folds.
Poppy let out a helpless whimper.
The sky outside exploded in Technicolor. Every mirrored surface in front of her flared into a rainbow of light. And then she saw them contained within the mirrored display. Bursts of light bringing their shadowed bodies out of the darkness.
It was erotic. It was—
His mouth clamped around her throbbing nub. He sucked. Kissed her. Deeply.
‘Konstantinos!’
The fireworks outside were inside her now. Continuously. Breathlessly. They exploded.
Konstantinos stood, and drew her in against him. Held her as her body pulsed. She leaned into him. Placed her head on his chest and breathed.
Clarity formed in the fog of pleasure, softening her body against his.
He’d always taken charge of the conversation in and out of bed. What if she did? What if she took charge in a way he’d never allowed?
She’d tried. Once. But he’d stopped her…
Poppy fell to her knees.
Konstantinos watched her fall.
His solar plexus shifted into a roll of tremors.
The wall at her back, they couldn’t be seen.
Poppy on her knees before him.
It should feel like a gift. A victory. But he couldn’t breathe deeply enough.
Her eyes locked onto her intended task. Her small hands reached for him. His hips. Her fingers feathered over the arch of them. Feathered inwards over the leather of his belt and stilled at the silver buckle.
Her eyelashes fell.
Her head dipped.
The roll of his flesh intensified.
She kissed him on his stomach. Beneath his belly button.
Her fingers reached for the buckle of his belt.
She undid it with trembling fingers until it was released.
She reached for the button. Undid that too.
Pulled down his zip. And her kiss, it travelled down.
Over the black fabric covering the swell of him. The hardness.
He pulsed beneath her lips. He ached for the barrier between them to disappear. But she didn’t rush to pull his trousers down, or his boxers. She pressed small, experimental kisses to his straining erection.
He closed his eyes—curled his fingers into tight fists at his sides.
He refused to do what his body demanded. He wouldn’t free himself. Arch forward. Claim the heat of her promised kiss.
He didn’t open his eyes as her head lifted, removing the pressure. But the ache inside him didn’t ease. It intensified as he felt her fingers fumble with the tiny black buttons on the front of his boxers. As her fingers teased inside. And she found him. Touched him.
He shuddered.
This was winning, wasn’t it?
This was taking back his control.
This was one step closer to his end goal.
She wanted him, despite her contract. She was playing inside her own rules because he had made her want to. He’d made her believe she was safe inside the boundaries of them.
So why did it feel like he wasn’t in control? But she was? Why did his knees feel weak? Why did his feet not feel planted? Why did it feel as though he wasn’t exorcising her from beneath his skin, but as if he was allowing her deeper? Into his bones?
This was not what he wanted.
He was almost blind with need.
He was hanging on to control with his fingernails.
His bones locked.
He turned rigid.
He hauled her up by her arms. Yanked her into his heaving chest.
‘What is it?’ she asked breathlessly. Her fingers reached for the granite firmness of his gritted jaw.
He speared his fingers into her hair—watched the tendrils come loose from the knot at her nape, and fall to her shoulders. Her gaze clung to his. Her eyes so blue—so wide—so tempting. The urge was bone-deep to dip his head. Taste her.
He would control himself.
He would stop this. Now.
She brushed her lips over his.
‘Poppy,’ he warned.
‘Konstantinos,’ she replied, her hands reaching between them.
She freed him. Stroked him. Intimately. Until she held him—enclosed him.
He pulsed in her palm.
His control shattered.
He backed her into the wall. Her soft kiss changed. She pressed her mouth harder against his. Her tongue a darting arrow, it drove inside him. Demanded he feel only that. Only her tongue. Only her.
‘Ahh,’ he groaned.
It was too much pleasure. Too painful. Too…everything.
Everything he’d missed. Her.
Her legs parted, accommodating the pressure of his hips. ‘I need you inside me, Konstantinos. Now.’
Her need. It made him swell.
This was what he wanted. Her complete surrender. But it didn’t feel like a win. It only felt…right. Right to be here. Between her legs. His body only millimetres from being sheathed where he’d yearned to be for so long. Inside her.
His fingers pinched the fabric at her hips, scrunched it tightly into his fists as it rose up her legs.
‘Theos mou…’
She shifted, placing her high-heeled foot against his lower back. His arms went beneath her firm bottom. Supported her. Lifted her. The heat of him pressed against her core.
‘Please,’ she mewed into his mouth.
He arched his hips. Pressed himself into her heat. The barrier of her panties gave way, but it didn’t give him what he wanted. To thrust up inside her and find oblivion.
He dragged his mouth from hers, buried his face in the crook of her throat. He moved his hips. The heat of him leapt between them. He trapped it against her stomach.
‘Konstantinos?’
‘I don’t have any protection.’
‘I’m on the pill.’
It was a bitter-sweet temptation.
The swell of him pulsed on the flat of her stomach.
‘It’s not enough. The pill failed us before.’
‘A rarity,’ she assured him, but he wasn’t assured.
He knew what could happen.
He remembered what they’d lost because it had failed them.
‘It’s too much of a risk,’ he roared against her flesh in a muffled cry of defeat.
He hadn’t been careful enough with her in the past.
So safe had he thought they were, in their marriage, in the world they’d built together.
He’d thought nothing could burst the bubble around them. But he had got her pregnant.
It was his fault. All of it.
He’d turned their world upside down.
He hadn’t protected her from…the accident.
It tore through him.
Something sharp.
Something foreign.
‘No,’ he growled.
He’d almost failed her again.
Failed himself.
‘We must stop. Now.’
‘Please,’ she said. ‘It’s extremely unlikely the contraceptive would fail us twice.’
‘No.’ He lowered her leg to the floor. Pulled himself free of her embrace. Turned his back on her and walked towards the exit whilst he did up his zip. His belt. He stopped walking. Waited for her.
Her heels clicked over the floor as she moved to join him. She stood beside him. Her spine was straight. Her shoulders squared. Her feet planted.
It was a fighting stance that mirrored his own.
Konstantinos understood that tonight he’d lost the battle between them.
He was weak.
All the control had firmly been in her hands right until he’d ended it. The risk was too great for them both. But if he’d had a condom. If he’d been able to double their protection. Reduce the risk…
He needed time to reinforce his self-control.
‘You’ll go home,’ he said. ‘To Greece.’
Her brow lifted. ‘Only me?’
‘You must…’
His jaw gritted.
He needed—
‘I need some time,’ he admitted truthfully, his voice hoarse. ‘Away from you.’