The Muscle Part One (5 page)

S
he wasn’t even
aware of making the decision to drop her dress to the ground. It had been instinctual. She had seen Luca standing there, felt the need in his eyes. It was a need that matched her own, and she knew suddenly that whatever was between them was inevitable.

She heard him suck in his breath when the dress hit the floor, saw his blue eyes darken, turn molten with desire. Then he walked toward her, his steps slow and deliberate, like he was purposefully dragging out the moment before he would reach her when all she wanted was to be in his arms.

He stopped only an inch away, so close she could feel the heat of his bare chest without even touching it. He raised a hand to her cheek, held it against her skin while he searched her eyes. She leaned into his palm, wanting him to know that she wanted this, wanted him.

Then his other hand was coming up, slipping into the wet hair at the back of her head.

“You’re the most beautiful thing I’ve ever seen.” He sounded anguished. Like he didn’t want it to be true but couldn’t deny that it was.

“Shhhh…” She put a finger to his lips and wrapped the other arm around his neck, pressed her still damp body against him until she felt his cock, hard and urgent, against her belly.

He groaned, pressed his forehead against hers, like he was still trying to decide what to do.

Like either of them had any choice.

She angled her head, touched her lips gently to his, and it was like releasing a floodgate. He growled, backing her up against one of the pillars on the palazzo, his mouth closing around hers with so much speed she was still reeling when she felt the pressure of his tongue seeking entrance to her mouth.

Opening it to him was the easiest thing she’d ever done. It was primal, an instinct that came from some primitive part of her she hadn’t known existed. He cupped her head in his hands as she clung to him, meeting his tongue, exploring his mouth like she was dying of thirst and he was the last drop of water on earth.

The heat of his bare chest seared her skin, her breasts flat against his muscular pecs. His big hands trailed gently down her neck, and he kissed the corners of her mouth, his lips a flutter against her skin as they traveled to the sensitive spot behind her ear. He licked the skin there, then took her earlobe in his mouth and tugged. She felt an answering pull between her legs, a rush of heat, a powerful call to his body.

She trailed her hands down his chest, over the chiseled plane and down his flat stomach to the press of his erection. She needed to touch him, and she undid his jeans and slipped her hand inside, closing her hand around the shaft of his cock.

He hissed like he’d been burned, almost pulled away, then settled back against her, leaving a trail of kisses across her collarbone. He paused to look at her, his eyes bright with need as he took in her naked body before meeting her gaze.

“Goddamn you’re beautiful, Isabel.”

She squeezed his cock in answer. She didn’t want to talk. Didn’t want to hear his sweet words or wonder if he meant them or think about where this would lead. What he would think when he knew the truth about her. If only they didn’t talk it would be like a beautiful dream, something to hold close in her darkest and loneliest hours.

She stroked him, relishing the way he lengthened and hardened in her hand, and he lowered his lips to her breasts, cupping one of them and squeezing so the hard peak protruded for his mouth. He flicked his tongue over it, and a lick of fire raced to her center. She saw it behind her eyelids, a streak of scarlet paint igniting to orange and yellow. Then he took the nipple in his mouth, sucking and flicking it with his tongue, biting gently so that she writhed against the pillar, her body opening and opening to him.

He was out of reach to her now, his cock too far away for her to hold while he worked her breasts, sending waves of heat and wetness to her pussy until she thought she would die from the torture of it. Then, just when she thought she couldn’t stand it anymore, he moved downward, getting on his knees in front of her, his jeans still unbuttoned as he kneeled between her legs. She knew she should stop him as he ran his hands up her thighs, knew it even as he touched his lips to the crease at the top of her legs.

But somehow she couldn’t say the words. She was on fire for him, her sex swollen and throbbing. Rational thought seemed far away, and it drifted even further out of reach when he draped one of her legs over his shoulder and leaned in, running his tongue through her slick folds on his way to her clit.

She moaned as her head fell back against the pillar, and then there was no more thought of telling him to stop. Just his tongue and his hands against her engorged heat, the pulsing of her body as he took her clit in his mouth and sucked. She bit down on her hand to keep from crying out, and he slid two fingers inside her, still working her clit with his tongue while he finger-fucked her.

She was moving against his mouth, too lost to be ashamed. Too lost to worry about the secret that lay between them. She rocked her hips in time to the thrusts of his fingers, pressed her clit against the heat of his mouth, wanting him to take all of her as the orgasm expanded at the center of her universe.

She felt it building steam as he pressed against her G-spot, his fingers and mouth working together to occupy every part of her. For the first time in forever, she wasn’t thinking. There was no room for thought; it was crowded out by sensation, by bliss, by the impending explosion igniting in the deepest, most secret parts of her body.

“Oh, god…” The words escaped her mouth and she bit her tongue, forced herself to stay quiet while she rocked into his mouth, his fingers moving faster as he lapped at her clit, rolling it against his tongue, working her to a fever pitch.

She wanted him. Wanted him to fuck her until she screamed. Wanted him like she’d never wanted anyone. But she’d passed the point of no return. Her body was on its own journey now, and it wouldn’t be stopped.

“Let go, baby. Come for me. Let me taste you.” Luca pulled his mouth away just long enough to murmur the words. Then he lapped at her clit, burying his face at her center until she fell into a void of light and bliss, gasping as her body shuddered against his mouth, coming so hard she felt like she was being broken into a million pieces only to be made whole all over again.

When it was over, she reached blindly for him. Her orgasm had only served to prime her body for his cock. She wanted him inside her. Now.

He stood, taking her mouth in his, sweeping her tongue so that she got an erotic taste of his mouth mixed with her own juices. The fire of need was stoked inside her all over again, and she reached for him, gasping at the sheer size and weight of his cock in her hand. “Please…”

“Are you sure?” he said. “Because once you say yes, I’m going to make you mine, Isabel, and there will be no going back after that.”

“Yes,” she gasped. “I’m sure.”

He lifted her off the ground, bracing her against the pillar as he positioned the thick crown of his head against her opening, soaked with pleasure.

And then she didn’t know what happened, but she got another image. Another man between her legs, this one someone she didn’t want, someone she didn’t like. Except she couldn’t say the words, couldn’t make him get off her, couldn’t make him stop. Someone was laughing in the background and she turned her head, wanting it all to go away, wanting to disappear inside herself until she dissolved into nothing.

She shoved against his chest. “Stop… I can’t…”

Luca froze, his eyes full of confusion.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “Just… please. Put me down.”

He did it without hesitation, and she immediately missed the warmth of his body, the strength of his arms.

“Isabel?” He trailed one big knuckle gently down her cheek. “What’s going on?”

She bent down to pick up her dress, clutched it against her chest. She wanted more than anything to disappear into the ground. She didn’t want Luca’s eyes on her. He saw too much, and she couldn’t afford to let him see everything. Once he did, he would never look at her the same again. Like she was special. Something rare and important. Something to be treasured.

“I can’t…. I can’t explain it.” He buttoned his jeans while she pulled the dress over her head. “We shouldn’t have done that.”

“Hey,” he said. But she couldn’t look at him. Didn’t want to know what was in his eyes. Didn’t want him to see what was in hers. “Hey.” He was more insistent this time, and she met his gaze. “Talk to me.”

“I can’t,” she whispered.

He glanced around the darkened terrace, then spoke softly. “I can help you.”

She smiled at the earnestness of his words, the affection in his eyes. Then she placed a palm against his cheek, trying to memorize the way he looked at her.

“No one can help me,” she said. “Not even you.”

She hurried for the house before he could say anything else.

I
sabel swept
her brush through the paint on her palette, then made an arc across the canvas. She was in the art studio, forced to move out of her room by the size of the piece. She needed room to move without fear of bumping into something, without worrying that she would knock over a vase or smear paint on the furniture.

She was on the verge of understanding the project. On the precipice of the reveal that every piece made at some point in its creation. Then she would know what had birthed it, what it had to say. She was in that other place now, the place she disappeared to when a piece was speaking to her, whispering its secrets, showing her the way. Her mind could wander while her subconscious did the work, and she was unsurprised to find her thoughts turn back to Luca.

It had been two days since their encounter by the pool. Two days in which she had throbbed with need for him virtually every minute of every day. Worst of all, it wasn’t just her body that wanted him. It was all of her. She wanted to hear his voice and feel his arms around her, wanted to see his eyes darken with that powerful mixture of affection and desire and longing that seemed created just for her.

Instead she’d been avoiding him. Of course, they couldn’t avoid each other completely. They had to take Sofia to school in the morning, pick her up. Diego still wouldn’t let Isabel out of the house without a bodyguard, ostensibly for her own safety (a lie), and even now there was no one else on staff that she dared be alone with. Definitely not Hector. She could hardly look at him without feeling sick, and she felt a twisted kind of gratitude that the other one — Juan — had been fired shortly after the night that had shattered her hope and every sense of herself.

She pushed the thought away. She wouldn’t think about that night. It was in the past. There was nothing she could do about it now, and while she knew intellectually that it hadn’t been her fault, she couldn’t seem to get past the shame and guilt that flooded her when she thought about it. She hadn’t known Luca long, but she knew he was good. Could sense it deep in her bones. Maybe he could see past it when he found out.

Maybe.

Except she didn’t want to see it reflected in his eyes every time he looked at her. Didn’t want it to define whatever relationship they might have. Yet she knew it was already defining their relationship. It was what had made her push him away by the pool when all she’d wanted a moment before was for him to fill her. It’s what made her hesitate to tell him anything too personal, too important.

But none of that mattered. Because she was not going to become involved with Luca Cassano. It was a complication she didn’t need while she was trying to figure out a way to save herself and Sofia.

And whether Luca knew it or not, it was a complication he didn’t need either.

Her eyes were pulled away from the canvas as the door opened, and every muscle in her body tensed when Diego entered the room. This was why she didn’t like using the art studio. It was too open, too accessible to anyone in the house. And while Diego could technically come and go as he wanted in every room of the house, Isabel’s bedroom included, he avoided her private quarters. She felt safer there. And she felt like her work was safer, too.

She stopped painting as he came around to her side of the canvas, studying the piece with a disdainful eye.

“Maybe you should go to school with Sofia,” he said. “This looks like something she would do.”

It was meant to be an insult, but it didn’t hurt at all. Diego had all the culture of a swamp rat. It had been Isabel who loved to go the museum with their mother when she’d been alive. Isabel who had lain on the couch in Papa’s office, listening to La Boheme and Madame Butterfly, tears rolling down her cheeks while her father held her hand in silent understanding. She didn’t expect Diego to get her work.

He started pacing around the canvas, Isabel the captive animal at the center of his predatory prowl.

“How is the new guard?” he asked. “Do you like him?”

She searched his voice for signs that he knew what had happened between her and Luca and didn’t find any. He was fishing; she just didn’t know why.

“He’s fine,” Isabel said. She didn’t want to give any indication that she liked Luca more than anyone else in her brother’s employ. Any ally of Isabel’s was a target for Diego, and she didn’t want that for Luca. If she could trust her brother to fire someone without bloodshed, she would have suggested Luca wasn’t working out. But she couldn’t, which meant that Luca was in danger if she did anything but show bland acceptance of his presence.

Diego ran a hand down her canvas, smearing some of the fresh paint, and Isabel had to fight not to scream.

“I’ll have some more papers for you to sign soon,
nena,
” he said.

“That’s fine,” she said, forcing her voice steady.

“Good,” he said. “Good. I like that you’re so… accommodating. I’m glad our arrangement is working out.”

“It’s not like I have a choice.” The words were out before she could stop them.

He reached out, smeared his paint-stained hands against her cheek. The paint was cool and wet on her skin. “Everyone has a choice.”

She turned on him, her cheeks flaming, heart beating like a wild bird in her chest. “Not everyone. Not all the time.”

He smiled, and she hated him for the pleasure in it. He liked seeing her hurt. He got off on it. In fact, she would bet nothing and no one got him off like seeing her in pain.

“Yes,
punta
, even you. Even now.” He crossed the room to the door. “We could have been allies, you and I. You did this.” He turned back to look at her. “I’m still getting to know your new bodyguard, but I have a feeling he will have a special… appreciation for your work. And I’m not talking about the pieces of shit in this room.”

He stepped into the hall and shut the door. She stood there, breathing hard, tears stinging her eyes, for what seemed like hours. Then she took her palette and threw it against the closed door.