Cassie relaxed into Ares’s steely strength. She believed him. He wasn’t just helping her to tick off her ‘last days of freedom’ wish list.
He said now, ‘I might have tried to deny it but I knew as soon as you told me you were innocent that I wanted to be the one.’
Cassie smiled. ‘I’m glad you were. I wanted you to be too.’
A smile tipped up one corner of Ares’s mouth.‘Wanted?’
Cassie bit back a grin. She loved seeing him smile so much. She waved a hand airily and said, ‘Oh, yes, I’ve moved on now. Twice was enough for me.’
Ares’s arm tightened around her and his free hand delved under the opening of the robe she’d changed into after her shower to cup her breast. She sucked in a breath.
His smile grew and turned wicked. ‘Are you quite sure about that? Not even one more time?’
Breathless now, Cassie said, ‘Well, just to be sure, maybe one more time.’
Ares shook his head. ‘Not here. Next time, I want to take you on a proper bed, where I can lay you out and explore every inch of you.’
Cassie’s insides clenched at the thought of that, and of being able to do that to Ares. To have him spread out for her delectation. ‘That sounds nice.’
His expression turned serious. Seriously sexy. ‘Oh, it’ll be more than nice.’
‘This big bed…where would we find it?’
‘Spetses.’ Ares named another Greek island, in the Saronic chain of islands.
‘Spetses,’ Cassie repeated.
Ares nodded. ‘I have a villa there.’
‘That sounds…perfect.’ She felt a little giddy at the thought he didn’t want to run away from her at the first opportunity. She stood up from Ares’s lap, dislodging his hands from her body. ‘There’s one more thing I want to do here before we hand the boat back.’
He looked up at her and he was so beautiful and wild against this oceanic backdrop that he took her breath away. Cassie undid the robe and let it fall from her naked body. She went and stood at the stern of the boat and glanced back over her shoulder. ‘I’ve never been skinny-dipping before.’
And then she turned and executed a perfect dive off the boat into the clear blue-green waters. When she surfaced it was just in time to see an equally naked Ares poised to join her. He said, ‘You’re going to kill me before we even see another bed, aren’t you?’
Cassie grinned and flicked water up at him and then watched with very feminine appreciation as he also executed a perfect dive into the sea.
Cassie breathed in, taking in her idyllic surroundings. Dusk was bathing everything in a lavender hue, and lavender scented the air as Cassie walked down a path lined by bushes and shrubs and cypress and olive trees.
A sprawling villa lay behind her and the sea glistened at the end of the path. She walked all the way to find steps leading down to a private beach.
She looked at Ares, who had come to stand beside her. ‘This is just stunning. How long have you had it?’
‘A few years.’
They’d landed on a helipad not far away a short while before in the helicopter that Ares had organised from Mykonos, after docking the boat at a small private marina where it would be picked up by the boat company.
Ares’s estate on the Spetses coast was completely secluded and protected by trees and a perimeter fence. He’d shown her a beautiful infinity pool on the other side of the villa set at the end of a series of rolling lawns.
It was utterly quiet and still and it soothed something inside Cassie. The palace on Sadat was beautiful too but it was always busy and full of people. There was no corner that was truly quiet. She hadn’t even realised until now how much she appreciated this kind of space and peace.
‘Let me show you around the villa.’
He led her back up towards the building with its white walls and terracota-hued slate roof. One end of the villa was two-storey and Cassie could see a room with a balcony that would give views out to the sea. The master bedroom, she presumed.
The rest of the villa seemed to be one-storey and there was a patio on one side.
Ares walked in through open French doors, muslin curtains fluttering gently in the warm breeze. Cassie thought back to the moment earlier that day when she’d been in the sea, the water silky against her naked skin, after Ares had joined her, and how he’d swum under the surface, catching her legs and pulling her down, kissing her under water.
