“I thought it might make me feel less nervous.”
His eyes narrowed. “Why are you nervous, Elodie?”
Her tummy looped at the way he spoke her name.
“Because you don’t do this often?”
“Actually, I’ve never done this.”
At that, his mask slipped slightly, his face showing genuine surprise. And fear? “Had sex?” he clarified.
She shook her head. “No, no. I mean, I’ve had sex. I’m just not…I don’t go home with random men I meet in bars.”
“Ah.” He relaxed visibly. “But there’s a first time for everything.”
“Yes,” she agreed, her gaze dropping to the stubbled column of his throat. “You have a tattoo.”
One tiny sip of Scotch surely couldn’t have affected her, but she felt lightheaded and a little under the influence when she made the observation. Except, both of those feelings had more to do with the man standing directly in front of her, than anything else.
“I have several, in fact. Would you like to see?”
Her breath hitched in her throat and before she realized what she was doing, she found herself nodding her agreement. Yes, she wanted to see. She wanted to see everything.
With eyes still latched to hers, he lifted his hands to his jacket first, removing it from his body and letting it fall to the floor. A moment later, his tanned fingers began to work the buttons of his shirt, so breathing became almost impossible as the fabric sides separated slowly and then revealed his chest in full. A burst of breath hissed from beneath her teeth as she stared at the image of a snake across his pecs and flicking up towards his throat. Beneath it, in a curving script, were words written in Italian.
Elodie had been learning Italian through an app on her phone for two years, in preparation for their month-long honeymoon, but the words were unknown to her.La fiducia è un veleno.She lifted her gaze to his. “What does it mean?”
His smile was cynical. “Trust is a poison.”
It speared right into her heart. “Never truer words were spoken,” she murmured, immediately contemplating getting a tattoo all of her own, to serve as a reminder for why she needed to avoid ever letting her guard down again.
“I’m glad we’re in agreement.”
And before she could stop herself, she was lifting a trembling hand towards his chest, so her finger could trail the snake’s tail, her eyes shifting from the ink to Raf’s face and back again, while her heart thumped hard to her ribs. She knew what was happening, and yet the longer it took for him to kiss her, to touch her, to take her to bed, the more agonizing the waiting was becoming.
“Did you bring me here to show me your tattoo, or…”
He smiled then—a genuine smile that even brought a hint of light to his eyes. “Amongst other things,” he said, shrugging casually. But she was already moving closer, to remove any distance between them.
“It is a very impressive tattoo.”
“I’m glad you think so.”
The air between them seemed to spark.
“Take me to bed, Raf.” Before I change my mind, she thought, inwardly, aware that her commitment was hanging by a thread.
And yet, when his eyes flared and his head dipped lower, and his mouth claimed hers in a kiss that was as ferocious as it was desperately skilled, any doubts flew from her mind. It was like a fire had been lit in her soul, for the first time in her life, and she was ready to be burned to a crisp by it…
What chance was therefor regret, when her soul had been delivered to the gates of heaven, Elodie thought to herself as she silently pulled her clothes back on, in the small hours of the morning. Raf was fast asleep on his enormous, luxurious bed, which they’d eventually made their way to. But not beforean incredibly passionate, borderline debauched few hours in his palatial lounge room. He’d worshipped her body, let her worship his, had driven her wild with his touch, his kiss, his skillful handling of her, so that by the time he’d thrust into her, her nerves had been stretched almost to breaking point with the most intense need she’d ever known.
And then, when she was still floating on cloud nine, he’d carried her to the bedroom and begun all over again, stirring her once more, building that same flame of need, until she’d been incandescent with longing and capable only of screaming his name at the top of her lungs, over and over again, into the darkness of his bedroom.
She’d been exhausted afterwards, but simultaneously, too wired to sleep. She hadn’t expected to feel that pull; she hadn’t expected to feelanythingremotely like that. To compare sex with Raf to sex with Aaron would have been akin to comparing night and day, or life and death. Polar opposites. One was perfunctory and practiced, lacking in spontaneity, and, she now had to admit, true pleasure; the other was a masterclass in sensation.
For the first time since Aaron had ended their engagement, Elodie found herself wondering if he’d been right. He’d said they were settling for each other out of habit, and at the time, those words had cut her deeply. But was he right?
La fiducia è un veleno.Trust is a poison. The etching beneath Raf’s tattoo kept tumbling through her mind though, so she knew that whatever demons were in his past, they were equal to hers. One night was all this could ever be. Rather than face an awkward conversation in the morning, or risk asking him for more, Elodie took the coward’s way out, and crept from his home under cover of darkness. Grateful for the best sex of her life, and already regretting that it could only be one night…
