The Spanish Billionaire's Hired Bride (12 page)

“That’s all your fault.” He quickly pulled open the towel that was covering her. “And you’re all wet now, so I’m going to have to dry you off as well.”

He dabbed and stroked her breasts dry with the soft Egyptian cotton towel, ignoring her small cries of protest as he buffed her nipples gently into stiff peaks again. He kissed her and then went to work between her legs. The friction of the thick fabric was hugely erotic as he rhythmically stroked it backwards and forwards igniting the nerve endings of her sex until she couldn’t stand it much longer. “Let me touch you now,” she pleaded and reached towards him.

“No,” he said softly. “It’s all about you this time. I want to make you feel amazing. Indulge your fantasies. Tell me exactly what you want me to do and I will.”

Helen closed her eyes and shivered as his mouth brushed over her breast and the towel slid back and forth. “Anything?”

“Anything.”

She heard his breath stall as he watched her fingers trail to her other breast and start to stroke. “I’d like to watch you.”

“Watch me?”

“Yes.”

“You mean—”

“You know what I mean,” she said huskily. “Like when you’re on your own.”

“Naughty girl,” he said as she flipped onto her side and patted the bed.

She couldn’t believe she was doing it, suggesting he do
that
, but she could push the limits as far as he could. Maybe further. “Come on,” she whispered. “If you want to…”

He’d been hot, hard and ready ever since they’d got under the shower and her spine felt as if it was melting as he began. He closed his eyes, long lashes black against the smooth bronze of his skin and his lips parted slightly. She dared not blink as she watched his fingers, long and slender with square tips, and her breasts ached as they curled around and started to move.

He was beautiful and the scene unfolding in front of her was taboo, but he was letting her watch it, letting her into his secret world. The silence intensified her arousal. No talking or touching allowed as his rhythm became steady. Long, slow strokes just like with the bath towel and the shower gel. His mouth opened wider and she willed him to make a noise, but he didn’t, just his breath growing harsher and more feverish. His chest and shoulders grew tense, his movements more jerky, and she could stand it no more.

“Condom,” she muttered and put her hand over his to stall him. His eyelids opened with surprise, large black pupils circled with gold. “Now.”

“Top drawer.” She leant over him, and as she grabbed the handle he took a nipple into his mouth and sucked hard. He held her there for a few seconds and then bit down gently until she quivered. He let her breast drop free. “I should say no to you after what you just made me do.”

“Say no and I will have to kill you,” she gasped as she fumbled with the protection. “Christ, how do you ever get this thing open.”

“It’s a skill.” He snatched it from her fingers. “Now kiss me.”

She heard the condom rustle and then snap into place as her tongue tangled with his, and then felt the thick head of him pushing upwards against her entrance. She groaned against his lips as his hands came around her hips and pressed her buttocks up the length of his body and down until she was impaled with half his length. “Christ…”

“Too much for you, mistress?” He flexed his hips and pulled her down further, his eyes now flashing dangerously. “Can’t take what you hand out?”

“I can take it.” She moaned deeply as she braced her hands on his chest and took him all in. Stretched wide and deep, the sensation of him forced tight against the neck of her womb was intoxicating. Her breasts trembled as she tentatively began to ride him. “I can take everything you’ve got.”

“Then do it quickly.” He closed his eyes, the muscles of his neck straining as she slid back and forth, teasing his mouth with her nipples as her breasts swung against his face.

She closed her own eyes, reveling in the hedonism of their act, the feel of his balls tightening against her bottom and then his fingers dipping between them. “No,” she said as he flicked mercilessly beneath the soft hood of her clitoris. “Not yet.”

“Yes,” he said in a harsh voice, and thrust his hips upwards and increased the friction, exciting every inch of her until she began to tip over the edge.

She cried out as she arched her back, pressing into his hand and down hard on his huge penis. The image of him masturbating flashed into her mind as she felt him flex deliberately inside her, igniting the nerve endings at the front side of her vagina and making her gasp with the agony of it. She heard him cry out as his orgasm began, and the primal sound of him mating with her was too much for her to hold back any longer. Her body was strung tight with a thrilling pleasure she would never be able to forget or deny herself again, and she tumbled helplessly into a blazing ecstasy of mutual climax.

Chapter Ten

“What do you think of our day out so far?”

Relaxing in the shade of a cool vine-covered restaurant terrace, Helen lifted her sunglasses and propped them on top of her head. He’d promised at breakfast to bring her somewhere she’d simply love that morning, and she hadn’t been disappointed. Her first sightseeing tour of the island had been exhilarating and now she was looking forward to a good lunch. “It’s been fabulous, although I must say the drive up that mountain was pretty hair raising.”

“Monte Toro?” Ricardo laughed and his eyes twinkled with mischief. “It’s only the highest mountain in Menorca.”

“Yes, so you said as I was cowering with fear on the way up! A mere three hundred and fifty seven meters, wasn’t it?”

“Well remembered. But you did get to see the entire island from up there, so you mustn’t complain.”

“Not complaining. Very impressed. You even arranged for it to be a beautifully cloud free day.”

He feigned a cough. “And the breeze helped blow the last of Tino’s smoke out of our lungs.”

“Good job too. You snored last night…”

“I shall ignore that. Now what would you like to drink. Beer? Wine? It’s a limited tariff but all sourced from around here, local and very good.”

“White wine would be nice.” Helen ran her fingers over the scrolled edge of the table and picked up a white plastic covered menu. She turned it over in her hands curiously. “This is an intriguing place, you’d never know it was here. No sign outside, tucked away in a side street through a low archway. I thought it was someone’s house.”

“It
is
someone’s house. Antonio’s house. It’s not listed anywhere, doesn’t need to be. His reputation as a chef is legendary on the island, one of our best kept secrets.” Ricardo winked. “He doesn’t speak a word of English, and if Antonio doesn’t like the look of you, you won’t be served. So best behavior, please.”

Helen formed her mouth into a silent O and resisted the naughty urge to poke her tongue out. As Ricardo disappeared through an archway into the dark and mysterious interior of the old town house she looked around the empty terrace full of neatly set tables. They must be the first customers of the day. She certainly hadn’t been expecting this gem in the middle of nowhere. The little town at the foot of the mountain was unremarkable, but quaint and pleasant, off the tourist trail, though, if Ricardo’s description of it was accurate. The former hometown of a notorious gangster, where sunbathing and mini-skirts were frowned upon.
So
not like Ibiza and Marbella.

Ricardo returned, carrying an ice bucket in one hand and two large, chilled glasses in the other. Helen watched him approach, the fabric of his white shirt stretching over hard knots of bicep as he moved. Just looking at him made her heart beat faster, and those long, muscular legs and narrow hips in black chinos made her mouth feel suddenly dry. The man was driving her to drink.

“I hope you don’t mind, but Antonio insists on preparing us a selection of today’s
specialties
.” Ricardo filled their glasses from the condensation-beaded wine bottle. “I don’t think we’ll be disappointed.”

“I’m not going to question Antonio after what you’ve told me. I’m hungry and don’t want to find myself out on my ear.” She took a sip of the golden liquid and shivered with pleasure as its sweet freshness trickled down her throat. “Although I’m really going to have to start easing up on the food out here. Lucia’s pastries every morning are bound to start taking a toll.”

“I forbid you to even think about going on a stupid diet,” Ricardo said sternly. “Not only do we have some of the best food in the world here, but I have plenty of money to pay for it out here in the sunshine. So enjoy it all while you can. In three months you can go running back to your baked beans or whatever you normally eat in the rain in England, and all this will be a distant memory.”

Helen appreciated the sentiment. Her nose suddenly picked up some intensely savory aromas. “Baked beans? Black cabbage, if you don’t mind. And a vast assortment of root vegetables.”

“Exactly.” Ricardo folded his hands into a tepee shape and rested his chin on the points of his fingers. A small smile flickered across his lips as a young boy arrived with a wooden serving trolley. “Besides, I can’t think how you’re possibly going to be able to resist any of this.”

“You may well have a point.” Helen felt her mouth begin to water as she scanned the delicacies being placed on the table in front of them.

The shy-looking boy gestured towards a steaming bowl of gondola-shaped pasta with scampi, rocket and cherry tomatoes,
cortecce
, and then swept his long, thin arm grandly towards the second. “
E benfatti
.”

Helen closed her eyes for a second and breathed in the unctuous steam coming from the plates. “Oh my God, they both smell amazing. Which one’s mine?”

“We’re starry
-
eyed lovers. We share.”

“Thank God I don’t have to make a decision.” Helen eyed the shiny pile of creamy linguine hungrily and breathed in the delicious aroma.

“Smoked Monte Toro goat’s cheese, honey mushrooms, and basil from the back garden,” Ricardo said, as if he had been reading her mind.

“So you really
have
been here before,” she said and adjusted her cutlery as Ricardo served them a large helping of each dish.

“Of course,” he said with a crooked smile. “I know that all the pasta is freshly made by Antonio’s Italian wife and daughters. If you pop inside later, you’ll see them making it on a great big wooden table in the hall. It’s cool in there, so nothing dries out too quickly.”

The boy scuttled off at the sound of a woman’s raised voice from indoors, and Helen took her first bite of food. The
benfatti
melted in her mouth and left a lingering tang of pungent wood smoke on her palate. It would be impossible not to eat the lot.

“Good?” Ricardo speared a dark, silken mushroom with his fork.

“Unbelievable.” Helen closed her eyes in reverence to the sweetest shellfish she had ever eaten. The flavors burst on her palate and sung of the sea and the pine forests. “I’m going to be the size of a semi-detached house in three months at this rate.”

“Just make sure you make a fuss of Antonio when he comes out.” Ricardo chuckled. “He responds very well to praise, and he’s a devil when it comes to the ladies.”

Helen shot him a cheeky look. “Aren’t you all?”

“Some worse than others.” He tore open a crusty bread roll. “And I’ll go to extraordinary lengths to get a reduction on the bill, so lay it on thick.”

Helen giggled as she examined the pea
-
pod shaped piece of pasta on the end of her fork. “This is lovely.” She bit slowly and thoughtfully on to the saucy morsel. “I’ve quite a long-standing interest in pasta, actually, so I’d really like to visit the kitchen later, if I may.”

“I’m fascinated,” Ricardo said sardonically. “I thought pasta only came in tins in the UK.”

“Ignoramus.” Helen frowned at him. “There’s durum wheat growing not far from our house I’ll have you know.”

The young boy returned to collect their plates that had been wiped clean with pieces of rustic bread.

“Don’t rush off, Pirro,” Ricardo said in Spanish. “Say hi to Helen. She won’t bite.”

Pirro’s foal-like eyes flickered from Ricardo to Helen and back again. Then a shy smile spread across his face.

“How’s school these days?” Ricardo winked at him. “Still turning up for your lessons, I hope?”

Pirro nodded and his black hair trembled endearingly as he took the empty plates and put them on the bottom shelf of the trolley. “Papa got me a bike, so I can ride like the wind down the back lane,
Tio Ricardo.”

Ricardo eyes widened with drama. “And back up it again?”

Pirro giggled and sneaked a quick glance at Helen. “Sometimes, but I usually cheat. Senor Garcia lets me hop on his bus when no one’s checking, just as long as I remember to bring him one of Mama’s cakes for his afternoon coffee.”

Ricardo laughed and ruffled the boy’s head until he squeaked with protest. “Lazy toad! Let’s hope all that soccer practice is keeping you in shape, then!”

Pirro puffed out his chest like an opera singer. “I am team captain, Ricardo,” he said proudly. “I told you I’d make it!”

“Good lad! I knew all that hard work would pay off. Bravo!”

Helen watched as the man and the boy became ever more animated, cuffing each other and joking like the old friends they obviously were, until a woman’s voice called out for the third time. Impatience was creeping into her tone.

“You’d better scoot or Maria will be out to tell me off again,” Ricardo said as he took the new steaming plates Pirro had uncovered on the trolley and was now quickly handing to him.

“Like a couple of weeks ago!” Pirro laughed over his shoulder as he trotted back towards the kitchen.

Helen propped her chin on her hands and watched as Ricardo served them both from two enormous platters. One was filled with a plait of white fish on fried potatoes, scattered with walnuts and rosemary oil. The second was a fillet of pork on what looked like cottage cheese, drizzled with a sage cream.

“Wow! Things just get better and better.”

“I’m glad you’re impressed,” Ricardo said as he piled up their plates. “So tell me about Ibiza. What were you doing in town before Antonella got her shiny claws into you?”

“A short-term contract in a salt company’s office. They needed translation support done on some promotional material. I think I managed to get in because my Spanish and computer skills are passable, and I was in the right place at the right time.”

“So you said your contract was terminated. A bad girl, were you?”

“You wish. No. Financial problems somewhere along the line, apparently. The office needed to be relocated to the mainland, that’s all I was told. Along with
adios
.”

“It happens,” Ricardo murmured as he concentrated on his food. “How many languages do you speak? Spanish, Mandarin, Russian…”

“A bit of Italian, French and a few words of German.”

“Quite the achiever! It sounds like your talents were wasted in the Ibiza salt mines anyway.”
Helen flicked away an insect. “It sounds impressive, but my degree was in Spanish, French
,
and Agriculture. The rest are what I’ve picked up on the side, just for the fun of it. There’s very little money in it, but languages come easily to me. Mum says I must have been a parrot in a previous life.” She shrugged and opened her eyes deliberately wide. “See? I’m chattering on and boring you silly without even trying.”

“On the contrary. I’m fascinated.”

He shot her a suggestive look and she couldn’t be sure if he was being sarcastic or if he really meant what he’d said, but either way her mind had now melted into jelly. “So you must come to this restaurant often?”

He smiled. “Yes, as often as I can. The food is excellent, no one is nosy or sticking a camera in my face. It’s like being Mr. Average Anonymous for once. Sometimes there are definite downsides to being rich, influential and, dare I say it, an Almanza.”

“It must be difficult guarding your privacy.”

Ricardo stared into his wine for a moment. “I also like to visit often to keep an eye on Pirro. Poor kid had a really tough start in life. I’ve known him since the beginning. But Antonio and Maria have brought him up well—fresh air, freedom and honest work. The odd clip around the ear too, I expect.”

“Never did you any harm, eh?” Helen said, her composure returning.

“Sadly not. My papa was never around long enough to deliver the discipline. He’d always be back from business with gifts and kisses. Mama used to get very angry. But of course, we adored him for all that indulgence. He was more of a grandfather figure than a dad, I suppose. It was great at the time, but—” He thoughtfully ran a finger up the stem of his glass. “I don’t think it did us much good in the long run. Having to accept the word no is one of life’s hardest lessons. I still don’t like it.”

“I could make a sarcastic remark, but I won’t.”

Ricardo began to laugh as Pirro arrived with their desserts. “Got a girlfriend yet?” he asked as the boy put down the glass dishes.

Pirro giggled and a color rose on his shiny round cheeks. “Not yet, Ricardo, but…” He leant to whisper something in Ricardo’s ear while pretending to rearrange the cutlery, until Ricardo sent him packing back off to the kitchen whooping with laughter.

Helen’s eyebrows rose questioningly.

“He said he likes the look of
my
girlfriend.”

“Serves you right.”

“For what, exactly?”

“For being such a dreadful man.” She took a spoonful of
turrón
ice cream and grinned. “Although you do seem a lot more relaxed and cheerful in Menorca. Or is that my imagination?”

“It’s the wine,
querida
,” he said with a lethal grin and refilled her glass. “So let’s have some more.”

Helen watched appreciatively as the wine bubbled into her glass, sparkling with hints of lime green in the sunshine. “Thank you.”

“I think you’re pretty nice all the time,” he said quietly before scooping cinnamon mousse onto a sweet wafer biscuit. “Now that you’ve stopped snarling at me, that is.”

“Have I ever done that?” Helen replied cautiously. “Snarled at you?”

He gave her a serious look “It’s felt like it at times, considering we’re just helping each other out.”

“Then I apologize.”

“No need. I probably deserved it anyway.” He wiped his fingers on a napkin and then scraped back his chair. “I’ll get these back to the kitchen and see how my other favorite ladies are getting on. I won’t be long.”

She watched as he walked back towards the house, dishes in hand, his dark head held high. Every movement he made sent bolts of awareness shooting through her. She shivered with the delicious sensation. No man had a right to be so damn attractive.

She saw a gr
a
y-haired woman in the shadows of the main building entrance, presumably Maria, wipe her hands on a blue
-
and
-
white
-
striped apron. Ricardo bent down to kiss the top of her head and her short, shaky forearms reached up to cup his face. He submitted totally as the old lady fussed over his clothes, his hair, and if Helen wasn’t mistaken, she could hear Maria berate him for being too skinny and in need of a decent wife to feed him up.