“Yes?” He prompted, but his hands were already behind her back, searching for the zip to the dress. She stepped closer to make it more easy for him to reach.
“I just met you,” she finished, sweeping her eyes shut on how lame the demurral sounded. “I mean … I don’t … this isn’t …”
He began to slide the zipper down, and the already scattered thought she was trying to express evaporated.
“It’s sex,” he said simply. “You walked on to stage and I knew I wanted you.”
Her blood was an out-of-control torrent in her body. “And is this how you do things? You buy what you want?”
His eyes clashed with hers; he held the dress so that she could step out of it. She did, placing a hand on his shoulder for support. The heels were ridiculously high, and she moved to release her feet from them but he shook his head.
“Leave them.” It was an order.
A spark of annoyance flooded her and she stared straight at him as she kicked first one shoe off and then the other. She thought she was making a point, and she was, but not the one she’d intended. Benedetto believed Kate to be spoiled, indulged, reckless and amoral, and everything she had done that night had played right into his beliefs.
Even the recalcitrant expression as she freed her feet from the stilettos.
He didn’t care.
He wasn’t looking to get to know her. He wanted to sleep with her and then use the fact to hurt her father.
It was simple. Cruel, yes, but perfectly appropriate as well. After all, Augustine, of all people, had no right to expect Benedetto to respect the bonds of family, did he?
He knelt before her and gripped her ankle. Holding her foot steady, he pushed the shoe back in place. “I am going to show you pleasure you have never experienced,” he murmured huskily. “But only if you do exactly as I say.”
She was quivering inside; her nerves were so threadbare she found it amazing she could actually speak clearly. “You seem pretty sure of yourself,” she said finally, but she let him slip the second shoe back in place.
He stood slowly, his eyes focused on her body. Without so much as a glint of emotion, he unclipped her bra and freed her breasts. They were small and pale; she was not at all like his usual lovers but then again, he was not making love to her for pleasure.
This was a means to an end; and if the sex itself wasn’t satisfying, the end result would be.
“Shall I show you?” He said, and though it was a question, he didn’t wait for an answer. He brought his lips crashing down to hers; it was a kiss designed to punish and to form submission.
She moaned against his mouth. Her fingers lifted and twisted in the dark hair at his nape. But he reached up and pulled them from him, trapping them instead behind her back. He kissed and she received.
His meaning was obvious. She was not to touch, only to be touched.
He was in complete control.
Benedetto unhooked his bow tie while still holding her hands behind her back, breaking their kiss simply so that he could spin her around. He used the bow-tie to secure her hands behind her back. He moved deftly and before Kate really comprehended what was happening her arms were drawn tight.
A crack of common sense seemed to knife its way into the situation. “I don’t know enough about you,” she said, lifting her head so she could see him over her shoulder.
“No,” he agreed, running a finger slowly down her naked back. She pulled at her hands but they were as firmly bound as if he’d handcuffed them.
She shuddered. “How do I know you’re not some incredibly gorgeous serial killer?”
His laugh was husky. His fingers crept lower, to the waist band of her underpants. “That is a question you perhaps should have asked before coming to my home.”
She spun around, her face stricken. And even though he wished to hurt her father, he had no interest in hurting her unduly. Oh, he hated her for her blood, and he was disgusted by women like her, but he was not, essentially, a cruel man. “I’m not going to hurt you,” he promised huskily, and such was the strange sense of surreal connection between them that she was instantly mollified.
She watched as he moved towards a stainless steel bench in the corner. There was a fridge beneath and he pulled another bottle of champagne from it. His words came back to her now; his promise that he wanted to drink from her.
She stared, her heart rate increasing, as he poured only one glass. His eyes didn’t leave her face as he walked back to stand in front of her. “For you.”
She looked at the bubbles and nodded. Her nerves were back with a vengeance; maybe it would calm her down? She opened her mouth and closed her eyes. He surprised her by inserting his finger between her lips.
Immediately she blinked open to find him staring at her. The night breathed a cool wind over her and Kate’s skin flecked with tiny goose bumps.
