Pride (In Wilde Country Book 1) (16 page)

She whimpered against his mouth.

He groaned and his lips parted over hers.

For a heartbeat, just a heartbeat, Cheyenne let herself respond. She couldn’t help it. Returning his kiss was everything and she leaned into him, let him taste her, let herself taste him and when she did, he gathered her to him, the length of her body against his, his arms around her, the sensation of being his enough to make her heart beat faster.

What if she said yes, she’d go with him? What if she stepped into this new world for just a handful of days?

Maybe he sensed her hesitation, because he drew her even closer.

“Come with me,
dolcezza
,” he whispered. “I will make you happy. I will make you forget everything but me.”

Reality flooded in on that soft, oh so masculine promise.

She jerked back, slapped her hands against his chest and tore her mouth from his.

“Is that what you think I want?” she asked. “To become your sex toy?”

He raised his head. The passion in his eyes became bewilderment.

“What?”

She moved quickly, before he could reach for her again.

“Goodbye,” she said. “And thanks for an interesting night.”

Anger replaced bewilderment. An interesting night? Was that what she thought they’d spent together?

She swept past him, her head high.

His swung around and watched her, his jaw knotted.

He could go after her.

Catching her would be easy. Forcing her to take back those words would be even easier. She’d made the night sound like nothing, but that last kiss had made a lie of her words.

She’d been on the verge of surrendering again.

Another kiss. Another caress. She’d be in his bed…and this time, binding her wrists would not be enough.

She needed to be taught who was in charge.

She needed punishment. The sweetest torment. With his mouth, his hands, his body…

“
Cristo.
”

Luca sank down on the edge of the bed, lowered his head and plowed his fingers through his hair. What was happening to him? He was turning into a man he didn’t know, and it was her fault, all her fault, all her doing.

He snarled something ugly in the language of his youth. Then he shot to his feet, took his iPhone from his pocket and punched up his contact list. It took seconds to choose a name and number. He barely remembered the face that went with it—she was a banker he’d met a couple of weeks ago at a meeting; they’d talked and flirted and when she’d offered to enter her number on his phone—
in case you want to discuss finance
, she’d said, with a sultry smile—he’d said he was certain that he would.

Minutes later, he had a date for the evening.

By tomorrow morning, Cheyenne McKenna would be little more than a bad memory.

CHAPTER NINE

H
is date didn’t
go as well as he’d hoped.

In fact, it was pretty much a disaster.

Aldo took him to the lady’s brownstone in Brooklyn. And, of course, he had to double park. There was no parking in Brooklyn. There was no parking anywhere in the city, for that matter. No surprise there, but Aldo—Luca, too—knew Manhattan’s ins and outs.

Why hadn’t he taken a taxi?

Because you aren’t thinking straight,
he thought grimly,
that’s why
.

His date was pretty, he thought as they killed time in a traffic snarl on the approach to the Brooklyn Bridge. Actually, she was beautiful, but she didn’t have hair the color of midnight and eyes the color of a summer sea. She was smart, too, and probably charming, but how could he know that if he didn’t pay attention to what she was saying?

Concentrate
, he told himself.

He tried, but he lost half of what she said because instead of listening to her, he was listening to that last exchange with Cheyenne. He had offered to take her to Milan. She had told him she wasn’t going to be his sex toy.

His what?

Was that what she thought the night they’d spent together was about? Him, wanting a sex toy? What about how she’d responded to him? Her moans? Her sighs? Her cries of pleasure?

Dio
, what about it? A one-night stand. Okay. A one-day stand. He’d had those before, and he sure as hell hadn’t tormented himself with memories or regrets when they ended.

“…never can be sure how things will turn out,” his date said, and laughed.

No, Luca thought, you never could.

His date raised her eyebrows. She was waiting for a reaction. He had no idea what she’d been talking about, but laughing seemed appropriate so he laughed and she got a strange look on her face, meaning either laughing had not been appropriate or his laugh had sounded as phony to her as it had to him.

They reached the restaurant where he’d made reservations. It was quite a coup because the place had only recently received four stars from the
Times
and you had to call months in advance to secure a table, but Luca and the chef-owner had grown up together in Sicily, so he’d had no difficulty getting the reservation. Giovanni came out from the kitchen to greet them and Luca supposed the food was amazing, but he might as well have been eating at a neighborhood grill for all the attention he paid it.

How could he, when Cheyenne’s voice was ringing in his head?

He’d made breakfast. And she’d said,
I never eat breakfast.

Really? Not even after hours of passion? Not even when her lover made it for her? Not that he was her lover, but the idea was the same. He’d prepared a meal for her and she’d reacted as if he’d offered her a bowl of gruel. Did she know that he had never cooked for a woman in his life? Never. Not once. Nor had he wanted to…

“Luca?”

He blinked. His date was staring at him. Evidently, they’d gotten through most of their meal because their plates were being cleared. Hers was, anyway; the busboy was looking at him expectantly.

“Are you finished eating, sir?”

Luca looked at his plate. He seemed to have moved the food around, but most of it was still there.

“Yes,” he said briskly. “I am.”

“Was everything all right, sir? If you’d prefer something else…”

“No,” Luca said quickly. “Everything was fine. I’m just—”
Think. Think, before Giovanni comes out.
“I’m afraid I have a slight headache.”

His date looked baffled.

Who could blame her?

A slight headache. Was that the best he could do? But he needed a way to explain why he hadn’t been able to concentrate on her or make simple conversation unless you counted
Sorry, what did you say?
as scintillating banter.

Not that she bought the story.

She was quiet during the endless drive to Brooklyn—as they crossed the bridge, it occurred to him that this was his first time in the borough.

“I’ve never been in Brooklyn before,” he said in a desperate attempt to fill the silence.

Bad move.

“And probably your last,’ she said icily.

“No. Not at all. I mean—”

Aldo pulled to the curb in front of her brownstone. Luca started to get out of the car, but she beat him to it.

“No need to see me up,” she said.

And she was gone.

Luca sat back and let out a long sigh of relief.

Aldo looked at him in the mirror.

“Are you all right, sir?”

He had to look pretty bad for Aldo to ask him such a personal question. Their relationship was polite though distant.

“Fine,
grazie
. Just a—a headache.”

Aldo nodded. “Where to, sir?”

“Home,” Luca said. “Straight home,
prego
.”

When they reached his condo, he dismissed his driver for the night, went to his bedroom, put on all the lights and stared at himself in the mirror.

Cristo.

He looked like hell.

Eyes burning. Mouth thinned. Forehead furrowed. Shoulders tensed. He looked like a man who’d scare little kids—and it was Cheyenne’s fault.

She’d walked out on him. Again.

Insulted him. Again.

Now he really did have a headache. It felt as if someone were playing a kettledrum behind his left temple.

Calm down.
Take a deep breath. Hold it. Now exhale.

Alessandra had gone through a phase in her teens when she’d driven them all crazy, lauding the benefits of meditation. He and Matteo had teased her unmercifully, but years later they’d admitted—to each other, not to her—that they’d finally both tried it and maybe it had its uses.

Inhale. Hold. Exhale.

Every now and then, he still did the breathing thing. It came in handy when he was stressed by a tough business negotiation or after an exceptionally long flight. He’d never done it because of a woman, but what was that old saying?

There was a first time for everything.

Two firsts in one night, he thought, as he undressed. Brooklyn. And now, this.

He tossed his suit coat on a chair, did the same with his shirt. Maybe a shower would help.

His jaw knotted.

He thought back to the shower he’d taken with Cheyenne.

She hadn’t wanted to shower with him, so he’d permitted her to think she’d won the argument. He’d waited until he heard the water pulsing down. Then he’d stepped into the stall and taken her in his arms.

He’d half-expected protests, but she gone into his embrace willing, gladly, burrowing against him as if she belonged there.

He hadn’t made love to her then. Sex was usually what happened when he showered with a woman, but holding her had seemed enough.

Enough? It had seemed perfect.

Yeah, well, maybe all the sex the last couple of days had taken its toll. Matteo had ribbed him about old age at his thirty-second birthday party. For all he knew, there was truth to the jibe. It might even have been the reason he’d paid such scant attention to his date tonight.

Luca toed off his shoes, stripped off the rest of his clothes and looked at his reflection in the mirror.

The last time he’d stood here, Cheyenne had been in his encircling arms.

Seeing herself in the mirror had been another thing she hadn’t wanted to do, but he hadn’t even pretended he’d permit her to win that argument. Instead, he’d clasped her hand and drawn her to the wall of glass.

“Look at how beautiful you are,” he’d said. cupping her breasts.

He’d seen the color rise in her face as she watched him play with her nipples.

Her breathing had quickened. His cock had sprung to swift, powerful life and she’d gasped when she felt it probing at her from behind.

“That’s what you do to me,” he’d whispered. “And this is what I do to you.”

He’d slid his hand between her thighs.

Her head had fallen back against his shoulder; he’d cupped her, stroked her, kept stroking her until he’d driven her toward a climax that had shattered them both, and then he’d taken her back to the bed…

Merda!

His erection was swift and enormous.

So much for being too worn out for more sex.

Just the memory of what had happened in this room hours ago had given him a hard-on any man would be proud of.

Except, pride was not what he felt.

How had he permitted her to do this to him? Make him—what was the American word? Make him a patsy. And there it was again.

That word.

Permitted.

There were only certain things he should have permitted her to do. Wresting control from him was not one of them.

If he had it to do over, he would change the way he’d dealt with her.

He would permit her to be obedient in his bed. To touch him when he told her to do so. To submit to him when he ordered it.

To feel pleasure when he commanded.

His head told him those thoughts were insane.

His body told him they were what he needed to survive.

What
she
needed, to become his.

Not that he wanted her to be his. A stranger. A woman he hardly knew. Besides, thinking of a woman as his woman was foreign to him.

Why would he want such a drain on his emotions?

The answer was simple.

So he could have her whenever he wanted her.

He saw her in the mirror, the length of her pressed against his chest and legs. Her head thrown back against his shoulder, watching as he teased her nipples, then sought the heat between her thighs.

His penis throbbed.

He should never have allowed her to walk away. She didn’t want to be his toy? Too bad. She’d agreed to a game of his devising, but she had not played by the rules.

The game would end when he said so, not she.

And,
Dio
, if he didn’t get some relief, he was going to explode.

Luca swung away from the mirror, strode into the bathroom, switched on all the lights and stepped into the glass shower stall. He adjusted the sprays so they would all hit him hard, turned the water to cold, and gasped at the shock of it against his fevered skin.

Useless.

He was still as hard as a thirteen-year-old boy with a purloined copy of a skin magazine in his hands.

He gritted his teeth. Grimly, in search of release, not pleasure, he called up an image of Cheyenne, hair spilled over his pillow, eyes blurred with passion, hands tied above her head.

Luca,
she whispered,
Luca…

He came instantly, shuddering as his climax tore through him. As the last drops of semen left his body, he bowed his head, flattened his hands against the glass wall, let his heartbeat return to normal as the icy water continued to pelt him.

Then he stepped out of the shower, returned to his bedroom and dressed.

Jeans. A pale blue shirt with the sleeves rolled up. Moccasins. No underwear, because he damn well wouldn’t need any. He stuffed his wallet in his pocket and then he was gone.

* * *

It was eleven o’clock. Still early by New York standards, and taxis were plentiful. The night doorman whistled one up in seconds.

“Soho,” Luca told the driver. He still had her address in his phone and he read it to the guy.

Traffic was light. Fifteen minutes and he was standing outside her building.

It was only a few stories high, a big, well-kept Victorian, the kind of architectural gem that had escaped the wrecker’s ball. Another evening, he’d probably have spent some time admiring it. Now, his only thought was how to get inside.

Was there a doorman?

There wasn’t.

Instead, there was an unlocked glass front door that led into a handsome vestibule that—dammit—ended in another glass door.

That one was locked.

Luca looked around.

Built-in mailboxes adorned one wall. Call buttons were lined up on another. He checked the names. James Andrews. Alfred Bernstein. Lucy and Thomas Chang. Another few names and then he saw hers.

C. McKenna.

That ridiculous first initial thing again. Did she really believe that could protect her from predatory men?

From him?

The only problem now was how to get past that second door without pressing her buzzer and letting her know that he was coming, except it really wasn’t a problem at all.

He had not always been rich. Going to Columbia University on a skimpy scholarship right here, in Manhattan, he’d spent a couple of semesters delivering pizza.

One of the first things he’d learned was how often somebody called in an order and gave you an apartment number without bothering to add that the downstairs door would be locked and if it were, which of half a dozen generally unlabeled buzzers was the correct one to press.