Deserving of His Diamonds (6 page)

what she was offering so defiantly but he was not going to give her any more

reasons to hate him. He would bide his time, waiting for her to come to him,

as he knew she would. One night would not be enough for either of them. He

was counting on that. He knew as soon as she gave in to the sexual

chemistry that sizzled between them she would want more. She was bitter

and angry but he knew she would get over it. Time was a great healer and a

month was surely long enough to see if what they had shared together before

could be resurrected.

The meal he had sent up to the suite looked as if it had been barely touched.

He frowned as he looked at the selection of dishes and the undrunk wine

sitting on the dining table. Her lack of appetite could have been because of

her headache, but he suspected it was more to do with her current I‘ll-show-

you attitude. He admired her for standing up to him. Not many people did.

He had learned on the filthy backstreets of Rome how to intimidate people.

Those skills had come in handy in his professional life. What he said went.

People didn‘t argue with him. They didn‘t challenge or defy him. The

women in his life—and there had been plenty—never argued with him. They

played by his rules. He always made sure of that. And Gisele had been no

different during their time together. She had been biddable and gracious, the

perfect companion, the perfect hostess, the perfect woman to be his wife.

Emilio frowned as he wandered over to the windows to look at the harbour

view below. Some would say he had selected a trophy wife but he had never

thought of Gisele like that. He had genuinely liked having her around. She

had been easy company, at ease with him and with others. He was proud to

have her on his arm. She moved with such poise and grace, with such natural

elegance. He let out a sigh that pulled on something deep inside his chest. If

it hadn‘t been for the scandal they would have celebrated their second

wedding anniversary a couple of weeks ago. Perhaps they might have even

had a child by now. They had talked about it. That was another of the

reasons he had wanted her as his wife. She had been keen to have a large

family, having grown up as an only child. And he had been just as keen. All

those years in and out of ill-run foster homes or begging on the streets had

made him envious of all those warm, well-lit homes he had wandered past,

with their close-knit family units

inside. His envy of other people‘s homes had been his primary motivation to

become an architect. He had been barely ten years old when he had made the

decision. He had thought by designing hundreds of dream homes that he

would be satisfied, but it hadn‘t had the effect he‘d imagined. He suspected

that having his own family would be the only thing that would truly satisfy

him. That and that alone would be able to soothe the raw sore of loneliness

that constantly oozed deep inside his soul. He felt it now, the never-ending

sense of something missing from his life, of being incomplete. Was that why

he had been drawn to Gisele, because of her own previously unspoken of

loneliness? Emilio turned from the window when he heard a sound behind

him. ‗You didn‘t eat your dinner,‘ he said, just as Gisele was searching for

the light switch. She put a hand up to her throat, her eyes wide with shock. ‗I

didn‘t see you there,‘ she gasped. ‗You scared me half to death. Why didn‘t

you put the lights on?‘ ‗Maybe I prefer the dark.‘ She clutched the edges of

her wrap together close to her chest. ‗You could have said something,‘ she

said with an accusing glare. ‗I did,‘ he said. ‗I said you didn‘t eat your

dinner.‘ She gave him a testy look. ‗Maybe I wasn‘t hungry.‘ ‗You need to

eat,‘ he said. ‗You‘re too thin.‘ ‗You need to keep your opinions to

yourself,‘ she shot back.

Emilio came over to where she was standing. ‗Weren‘t you able to sleep?‘

he asked. She flicked some hair back off her face and gave him a defiant

stare. ‗What‘s it to you?‘ ‗I‘m concerned about you,‘ he said. ‗You look like

you haven‘t slept properly in months.‘ ‗Concerned, are you?‘ She flashed

her eyes at him like blue lightning. ‗What a pity you weren‘t so concerned

about my welfare when you tossed me out on the street two years ago.‘

Emilio ground his teeth together to stop himself saying something he might

regret later. He had always prided himself on his self-control but Gisele‘s

stubborn refusal to meet him halfway was testing his limits. How long was

she going to persist with this game of payback? He had made amends.

Wasn‘t it time to move on? ‗Would you like me to make you a hot milk

drink?‘ he asked. She gave a choked bubble of laughter that sounded almost

hysterical. ‗Yeah, why not?‘ she said. ‗Maybe put a shot of whisky in it for

good measure. Two shots. That should knock me out.‘ Emilio poured milk

into a mug and placed it in the microwave set near the bar. He leant back

against the counter as he studied her. ‗I know from experience that running a

business, even a successful one, is stressful,‘ he said. ‗I‘ve had plenty of

sleepless nights myself.‘ She curled her lip at him. ‗I‘m sure you‘ve found

plenty of women to distract you from your spreadsheets.‘ ‗Not as many as

you might think,‘ he said. She gave him a cynical look. ‗Well, just for the

record, I‘m

not opening my legs like one of your cheap gold-digging whores.‘ ‗You

didn‘t seem to have any problem with it in the past,‘ he said. ‗And at a cool

two million, cara, you are certainly not cheap.‘ Gisele raised a hand to slap

him but he intercepted it, holding her slim wrist with the steel handcuffs of

his fingers. ‗Don‘t even think about it,‘ he warned. ‗You might not like the

consequences.‘ She fought against his hold, clawing at him, but it was like a

kitten trying to fight off a panther. He was too strong. He was too close. He

was too everything. ‗What consequences?‘ she asked. ‗What are you going

to do? Hit me right back? Is that what rough, tough Italian guys do?‘ His

expression tightened. ‗I would never lay a finger on you and you damn well

know it.‘ She gave him a challenging glare. ‗You‘ve got five fingers on me

right now.‘ ‗And they‘re staying on you until you stop behaving like a wilful

child.‘ ‗I hate you,‘ she spat at him furiously. ‗So you‘ve said.‘ ‗I mean it.‘ ‗I believe you.‘ ‗I want you to die and rot in hell.‘ ‗I believe that too,‘ he said.

‗But trading insults isn‘t going

to make this go away.‘ Gisele felt his thighs way too close to hers. She felt

the warmth of his body, a radiating heat that her colder flesh craved. She felt

his warm brandy-scented breath move like a teasing feather over her face.

She felt her breasts go to hard aching peaks as the hard wall of his muscular

chest loomed closer. Her lashes lowered as she looked at the line of his

mouth. That mouth had kissed her so many times she had lost count. It could

be hard and yet so soft, so demanding and yet so giving. ‗I hate you,‘ she

said again, but she wasn‘t sure if she was saying it for herself or for him. She

needed her anger. She needed her rage and fury to keep herself in one piece.

It was all she had. The only armour left that she could rely on. It had carried

her through for so long. Emilio cupped the side of her face with the broad

span of his hand, his thumb moving over the hollow of her cheek, back and

forth in a mesmerising rhythm that sent every thought flying out of her head.

His eyes moved over her face, taking their time before they finally meshed

with hers. ‗Stop fighting me, Gisele,‘ he said. ‗Don‘t give up on us before

we‘ve had a chance to set things right.‘ ‗Some things can‘t be fixed,‘ she

said. ‗It‘s too late. Too much time has passed.‘ ‗Do you really believe that?‘

he asked. Gisele didn‘t know what to believe when he was holding her

against him, his hard body fitting against her softer one as if no time had

passed at all. She felt the hardened ridge of him, the surge of blood that

lengthened him in the primal preparation to mate. It was so earthy and real.

No amount of denying it could make it go away. Her body

was responding to him in its own secret way. The silky moisture of her inner

core was reminding her that she was no less immune to him than she had

ever been. It didn‘t matter how much she hated him. It didn‘t matter how

much she told him she wanted nothing more to do with him. Her body had

its own needs and wants and they were overriding every other rational

thought she tried to cling to. ‗I believe you‘re only doing this because you‘re

worried what the press and your precious business colleagues will think if

you don‘t try to make amends,‘ she said, looking at him defiantly. ‗It‘s all

for show. The one-month reconciliation. You‘ll appear to do the right thing

by me but it will all be for nothing because I won‘t come back to you for

good. No amount of money will ever induce me to do that.‘ He pulled her

roughly up against him, his expression hard and bitter and thunderously

angry. ‗Then I‘d better get my money‘s worth while I can, hadn‘t I?‘ And

then his mouth crashed down on hers. It was a blistering kiss, no hint of

softness about it. Gisele felt its impact from the top of her prickling scalp to

her toes curling into the carpet at her feet for purchase. His lips ground

against hers with bruising force, making a dam inside her break its bounds.

She kissed him back with all the fury that was inside her. She felt the

demand of his tongue at the seam of her mouth and didn‘t hesitate in

allowing him in. She wanted him in. She wanted to duel with him until they

were both breathless with need. She wanted to taste him, to savour that

essential maleness that had always sent ripples of delight through her body.

She wanted to hurt him. She wanted to remind him of

what he had thrown away. She used her teeth, and not just little nippy bites

either. She bit down on his lower lip and held on like a tigress with a prized

piece of prey. He bit her back, the alpha-male-taming-his-mate action

sending a rapid blast of heat straight to her core. She tasted blood and wasn‘t

sure if it was his or her own. She felt the rough graze of his stubbly jaw

against her face as he changed position. His hands were clutching her head,

his fingers buried deep in her hair, holding her captive to his sensual assault.

Gisele‘s hands moved up from lying flat against his chest to rediscovering

the thick silkiness of his hair. He shifted against her urgently, his body so

thick and full she felt her body quiver in reaction. Raw need clawed at her,

an ache that was so tight and ravenous it burned inside her.

She wanted him.

She wanted him even though she hated him. She wanted the savage thrust of

his possession to make her feel alive again. Oh, dear God, please make her

feel alive again … Emilio suddenly pulled away from her, his hands

dropping from her as if she were a carrier of some deadly disease. He wiped

at his mouth with the back of his hand, grimacing as he saw a smear of

blood. ‗Is that yours or mine?‘ he asked. ‗Does it matter?‘ Gisele asked with

an arch look. ‗Actually it does,‘ he said, frowning darkly. ‗I didn‘t intend to

hurt you.‘ She challenged him with her gaze as she touched a finger to where

her bottom lip had borne the brunt of his kiss. ‗Didn‘t you?‘

He took a clean folded handkerchief out of his pocket and stepped back into

her body space, lifting her chin as he gently held the cool cotton against her

lip. His eyes were unfathomable coal-black pools as they held hers. ‗It

doesn‘t have to be this way between us, Gisele,‘ he said in a husky tone. She

took the handkerchief from him and moved away, turning her back on him.

‗It‘s not going to work, you know,‘ she said. ‗Nothing is going to change my

mind. I will never forgive you.‘ She heard the rustle of his clothes as he

moved. Then she felt his hands come down on the tops of her shoulders and

her whole body shivered in reaction. She closed her eyes, summoning her

resolve. Where was it? What was happening to her that she wanted to turn

around and melt into the warm protection of his broad chest? ‗Don‘t …‘ she

said, squeezing her eyes even tighter. ‗Don‘t what?‘ he asked. ‗You know

what,‘ she said, suppressing a sigh of delight when his fingers began to

massage the tightly knotted muscles of her neck and shoulders. If he was

running true to form, any minute now he would slip the wrap from one of

her shoulders and press his warm lips to her needy flesh. God help her if he

did. She would have no power left in her to resist him. ‗You want me,

Gisele.‘ His still-aroused body brushed against hers from behind. ‗You

think.‘ ‗I know.‘

She turned and glared at him hotly. ‗I want this month to be over so I can

finally be free of you.‘ His eyes roved her face, looking for what, she wasn‘t

quite sure. She schooled her features into cool indifference, her version of it

anyway. ‗You should go to bed,‘ he said, brushing his thumb ever so gently

against her bottom lip. ‗It‘s a long flight tomorrow, even when travelling

First Class.‘ ‗What?‘ she said with a mocking look. ‗No private jet any