Chapter One #2
The intense cerulean blue of his irises glittered as he dipped his head to do a roll-call of my entire body.
‘Ciao, Mia,’ he murmured. That he knew my name didn’t really surprise me. After all, the guard had addressed me personally downstairs. But on his lips, it sounded impossibly intimate.
‘Hello, Mr Rocco,’ I replied, deciding I probably shouldn’t address him as Vittorio if I didn’t want to start hyperventilating.
Maybe this was too much excitement for a teaching assistant from West London, because I was becoming light-headed.
He tilted his head to one side. ‘How do you know my name?’ he asked, confusing me even more.
‘S-some of the other guests mentioned it,’ I murmured. I knew his name hadn’t been on the invitation, because even Becca hadn’t known who was throwing the party until we’d arrived. But was his identity supposed to be a secret?
‘And how did you get an invitation to this event?’ he asked, his gruff tone cutting through the hum of sound from the DJ set below us…and my chaotic heartbeat.
The question threw me again. Probably because I was still struggling to draw air into my lungs. But then the significance of it hit me…and what that ‘look’ had really been about. My chaotic heartbeat sank into my killer heels, humiliation washing over me.
He had spotted me in the crowd and realised I didn’t belong.
‘B-becca. I—I mean Rebecca…’ I hesitated, racking my brains to recall Becca’s surname, even though I’d known her and Jessie since Evie was in primary school.
‘Garner.’ Thank god. ‘My friend Rebecca Garner got an invite. She’s here representing her brand marketing firm in London.
’ Whose company name I could not have remembered right now if he paid me a billion quid.
One eyebrow arched. Then he leaned forward and placed his forearms on his knees, making his biceps and triceps bulge distractingly under his T-shirt. ‘And who are you here representing, Mia?’
The heat in my thong surged into my cheeks. And the humiliation which had been incinerated with everything else at the sight of those inked forearms came surging back.
‘My-myself,’ I said, because there was no point in pretending I knew anything about brand marketing. Or that I really had any right to be at his very exclusive party.
His lips quirked. ‘I see,’ he said, but I couldn’t tell whether he was amused or astonished by my gall.
I forced myself to maintain eye contact even though I was dying inside.
Was he about to kick me off the yacht?
I was crestfallen but also determined not to show it as my silly hopes and dreams for the night crashed and burned into a bonfire of embarrassment under that inscrutable gaze.
‘And what of the other women with you?’ he asked.
‘One of them is my sister Evie, the other a friend of ours,’ I murmured.
God, he was going to kick us all out. While I was resigned to leaving myself, I felt sick for Evie and Jessie, who were having so much fun…and Becca. What if she lost her job? For bringing us along on her invite? From what she’d told us, this man was extremely powerful.
‘It’s okay, Mr Rocco. We’ll leave,’ I said, suddenly desperate to get us all out of here before this got any worse.
I turned, keen to get off the yacht. But before I could take a single step, a strong hand captured my wrist.
I swung back round, and my nose connected with a slab of muscle covered in black cotton. Rocco was no longer sitting on the couch but standing close enough to make the air back up in my lungs.
The panther has pounced.
He touched a knuckle under my chin to lift my gaze to his, then leaned in. I sucked in a lungful of his intoxicating scent—woodsy cologne, clean laundry detergent and a hint of orange from the negroni he must have been drinking.
‘And how will you leave, Mia?’ he whispered, so close to my ear lobe that sensation streaked down my spine and turned my thong into a vibrator. ‘Will you swim back to Naples?’
I drew my head back and saw his amusement at my expense. Had he been baiting me all along? That he had humiliated me intentionally had irritation replacing my embarrassment.
‘If I have to, yes!’ I announced, tugging my wrist free of his grasp. ‘I won’t stay where I’m not wanted. And I’m not here to be the butt of your jokes.’
Something flashed in his eyes which looked like admiration. ‘Who said you are not wanted here, Mia?’ he murmured.
My indignation increased at the mocking tone, even as the throbbing in my panties became catastrophic from the sparkle of approval in his gaze. ‘You did…or you implied it.’
He chuckled, the sound full of masculine arrogance. ‘You have spirit. I like this in a woman.’
Heat swelled in my abdomen. Embarrassing me. How could I be turned on—when he was making fun of me?
He murmured, ‘You are also molto bella, Mia.’ The compliment came so far out of left field, it stunned me into silence. ‘I like this, too, in a woman.’
‘If you like me so much, why did you ask me to leave?’ I managed, even as I could feel my resistance losing ground fast.
His scarred eyebrow quirked, but the sensual smile oozed confidence. ‘This I did not do, Mia, when I want to touch you very much.’
My indignation dissolved in a heartbeat as I stood under that startlingly intense gaze, mesmerised by his compliment.
And the glitter of approval in his eyes.
The surge of validation—that feeling of being seen and wanted by this man, the way I’d never really been wanted by Dave—was so intoxicating, I felt as if I had just chugged five tequila slammers in a row.
‘Do you want to be touched, Mia?’ The question was delivered with mocking arrogance, because he already knew the answer.
But even so, I couldn’t prevent myself from giving him the permission he sought as my answer popped out in a heady rush of breath. ‘Y-yes…’
His smile turned feral, but it only made him look hotter as he lifted his hand to glide his thumb over the thundering pulse in my neck.
I gasped and trembled, his touch like a lightning rod to senses too long denied.
‘Brava ragazza,’ he murmured as he caressed my collarbone—watching my reaction, intently—then slid his thumb under the strap of my mini-dress.
My nipples swelled into tight peaks, and I sucked in a shallow breath, already yearning for him to move his roaming thumb lower, the shockingly possessive touch intoxicating.
‘I am returning to my estate in Naples. Would you like to come with me for tonight?’
Wh-what?
Was he saying what I thought he was saying? And how did I feel about it? Shouldn’t I be insulted? He’d made me feel like nothing a moment ago.
But the truth was, I was too shocked by his bold invitation and my live wire reaction to his touch to focus.
I blinked, stalling for time, until I could regain the power of speech—and critical thinking. Not easy when the hottest guy I had ever laid eyes on had just propositioned me. My usual caution was struggling to play catch up with my over-stimulated libido.
This wasn’t me… I’d never been reckless.
I didn’t like anything to be out of my control.
I was a micro-manager, a planner, a plotter, an over-thinker, someone who always had to be sure of her next move before taking it.
All thanks to my mum—a nineties wild child with daughters by two different deadbeats—whose philosophy of life had been, ‘Everything will work out in the end if you don’t take responsibility for anything. ’
Newsflash: It won’t.
If you don’t pay your rent, the bailiffs will turn up at your door. And you and your daughters will end up climbing out the window in the middle of the night.
I had never wanted to return to the endless chaos of my and Evie’s childhood, but this trip…and the Dave debacle…had forced me to realise I might have over-compensated.
Because hadn’t my play-it-safe strategy led to a long, boring relationship with the first boy to ever ask me out?
And all my over-planning and never making a move before I was one hundred percent sure of a positive outcome had not prevented me ending up engaged to a man who had not only turned out to be a rat but had never come close to satisfying me in bed.
Sometimes life threw you curveballs, which you couldn’t plan your way out of.
Evie was right. It was time I kicked myself out of my comfort zone.
Time to take a risk and have the wild night I had been aiming for when I’d agreed to come on this trip and spent a fortune on this dress, so my life never got so boring again.
Then maybe I’d be better prepared for the next curveball.
I was just debating, though, whether it would be fair to jettison Evie and her friends for the evening, when he placed his hand on my hip and drew me close enough to press my breasts against his chest. My nipples hardened even more and my frantic heartbeat slowed to throb painfully between my thighs as he clasped my neck and pressed his forehead to mine.
‘You are fierce, Mia,’ he said. ‘Taming you will make this night all the sweeter. But first I must kiss you.’
Heat charged through my body. His confidence as hot as his demand.
The fact he had found my attitude a turn-on was addictive—and surprisingly validating.
I’d never been able to let my badass side loose before, but it had always been there, seething beneath the surface, every time my mum made another selfish decision, or Evie did something reckless, or Dave left me unsatisfied…
‘You are the most arrogant man on the planet,’ I murmured.
He let out another gruff chuckle. ‘Si, naturalmente,’ he announced without an ounce of shame.
Then, without waiting for an invitation, he slanted his lips across mine—taking my mouth in a demanding kiss as if it were his right.
His lips were firm and warm, his tongue coaxing but insistent.
I opened for him instinctively, and he thrust deep as his other hand slid under the hem of my mini-dress.
I gasped, clinging to him now, my whole body vibrating with want, the desire to feel his hands on me as intoxicating as his kiss.
He explored the naked flesh with scalding entitlement, his thumb hooking under the string of my thong. He gave it a sharp tug, rubbing the lace against my aching clitoris. I rose on tiptoe, desperate to ease the pressure, even as his tongue continued to command my mouth, demanding my surrender.
I was panting, groaning, already close to orgasm and struggling to control the sensations powering through my body when he dragged his mouth away abruptly.
I stood gasping for more, caught between the need to come and the need to exert control over what was happening, too fast. I grasped his forearms to steady myself.
The inked flesh bunched beneath my fingers, the surprise at how quickly he had got me worked up almost as shocking as the raw ache in my sex still tormenting me.
He released the thong string with a sharp snap, then tugged down the hem of my dress.
‘Now you must tell me, Mia,’ he said, his tone raw as he continued to caress my shoulders. ‘Yes, or no?’
I swallowed, not quite able to speak, the shock of sensations he had conjured and controlled so effortlessly still playing havoc with my common sense.
But while I couldn’t resist leaning into his touch, I couldn’t banish my usual caution completely.
Maybe it was the tats, or the scars, or just the aura of power and wealth which clung to him, and which I had never encountered before…
but I didn’t want to throw myself into the arms of an actual panther.
‘How do I know I’ll be safe with you?’ I asked.
His eyes flashed with something fierce, his scarred eyebrow lifting. Then he laughed. The deep, appreciative rumble reverberated in my abdomen.
‘Safe?’ He let out another rusty chuckle. ‘If you want safe, I am the wrong man.’
Why did that sound like a promise rather than a problem?
His caressing hand slid over my shoulder and trailed down my spine to flatten against the small of my back, setting off a firework display en route. Then my belly connected with the prominent ridge in his trousers.
He brushed his lips across my ear, giving me another intoxicating lungful of pine and orange and laundry soap.
‘But you will not be hurt…’ he murmured. ‘You have my word.’ The gravitas in his tone was contradicted by the feral heat in his eyes as his gaze met mine—and the liberties he had already taken—but I believed him.
Then it occurred to me that I wasn’t sure I wanted to be safe tonight.
‘What about my sister and her friends?’ I asked, not quite able to let go of the responsibility that had defined my life for so long. ‘I should let Evie know where I’m going…’
He nodded. ‘Of course.’ His lips quirked in another dangerous smile. ‘As long as you do not take too long.’
I let out a breathless laugh. My mind—or rather, what was left of it after that incredible kiss—was made up.
Tonight, I wanted to be wild. And free. And listen to my instincts instead of my insecurities. Because my body was telling me—no, screaming at me—that however dangerous this man was, this could be the most exciting night of my life.
‘Okay, then, I’d like to accept your invitation,’ I said.