The Millionaires' Cinderellas: Playing the Greek's Game / The Forbidden Innocent / Too Proud to be Bought
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She nodded. ‘Yes.’
‘Tonight we’re going to be very honest with each other. You’re going to tell me exactly what it is you want, and I’m going to give it to you.’
His words both thrilled her and scared her because how was she supposed to know what she wanted? How on earth could she tell him that she didn’t know? Nerves momentarily threatened to overwhelm her, but then he had pulled her into his arms and was grazing his lips over hers and she began to shiver in helpless response.
‘Zak,’ she breathed as he flicked her lips open with the arrogant lick of his tongue and she could feel the warm mingling of their breath.
‘Tell me, what is it you want, Emma?’
‘I want …’ Her words trailed away. How could she articulate what had only ever been a fantasy?
‘This, perhaps?’ His hand cupped her breast, luxuriantly circling the rocky nipple so that she moaned.
Against his shoulder, she squirmed with excitement, swallowing down the paper dryness in her throat. ‘Yes,’ she whispered.
‘I thought so. Now let’s try this …’ His hand skated over her belly, his fingers drifting over the delicate silk-satin of her white dress until, with blatant possession, they rested at her crotch. Briefly, his fingers whispered over her sensitive mound, and he ignored her little gasp of protest as he drifted them further down to splay over her thigh.
‘Zak,’ she murmured brokenly, her eyes tightly shut, scared she was going to crumple to the carpet and give away just how useless she was at all this.
Assessingly, he ran his gaze over her as she clung to him, his heart beating with an excitement he hadn’t felt in a long, long time. She was certainly very turned on. Enough for him to just push her down onto the carpet and do it to her right there—and part of him was angry enough at her deceit to want to do just that. To take her in as swift and as perfunctory a way as possible and then to get rid of her as fast as he could.
But even though it had been less than a month since he’d met her, he could never remember feeling quite like this before—as if he would die if he didn’t possess her. Was that the power of the forbidden? Because for so long he’d thought he couldn’t have her? What was it they said—that forbidden fruit was the sweetest? Yet through the dying waves of his anger he realised something else—something which was far more dangerous than acknowledging the allure of the forbidden. He didn’t want it fast and furious, with him just unzipping his fly and thrusting into her eager flesh. If it was only going to be once, then it was going to last all night. One unforgettable night.
He picked her up with the minimum of effort, enjoying the way her eyes snapped open and registering her delighted gasp with a grim satisfaction. So she, who had expressed disbelief that women liked masterful men, was discovering that she’d been wrong all along, was she?
He carried her into the bedroom, where he set her down on her high heels and sucked in a deep breath while she steadied herself, her hands holding on to his shoulders.
‘Take off your shoes,’ he said.
He was so … so in control, she thought as, shakily, she bent down to slip each foot free. Without the added inches of the gold stilettos, she was suddenly much shorter, and once again a feeling of vulnerability swept over her—particularly when she heard his next comment.
‘Is this dress new?’
‘Yes.’
‘So you bought it especially for me,’ he mused, his lips hardening. ‘That’s interesting. Was it expensive?’
She shrugged. Did she look foolish, buying a new dress for what was supposed to have been an innocent date all along? Did it seem as if she’d been expecting this to happen all along? ‘It was enough.’
‘Then bill me for another,’ he said savagely as he peeled it unceremoniously from her body and threw it to the floor, where it pooled in a silken white puddle. He shrugged off his dinner jacket, and it joined the dress on the floor, black against white—as stark as the contrast between his dark skin and her pale flesh. ‘Now unzip me,’ he commanded unsteadily.
The dark eroticism in his voice filled Emma with an urgency she’d never felt before. And once again the dizzy realisation hit her that this was how it was supposed to feel. As if nothing else in the world mattered at that moment other than what was taking place between this man and this woman.
Tremblingly, her fingers struggled with the zipper, which was straining against his hardness. She was terrified that she would ruin it. But he gave a groan of what sounded like satisfaction as his erection sprang free—though he clamped his fingers around hers when she attempted to stroke his steely length through the black silk of his boxer shorts.
‘Don’t,’ he warned. ‘Not this time. Just unbutton my shirt. Leave the rest to me.’
This time? What was he talking about? But there wasn’t time to think—not to do anything—because now Zak was removing his shoes and socks and kicking off his trousers and she was busy sliding free the buttons of the fancy dress shirt.
His hand skimmed its way down the side of her body as if he was learning her through touch alone and Emma was suddenly aware that they were both wearing nothing but their underwear. That she was standing in front of him in her bra and pants and that soon they would reach the part where it might go as hopelessly and as disastrously wrong as it had in the past. Would it? Would Zak Constantinides turn to her and snarl his frustration and his rage at her? Hotness flooded into her cheeks and he lifted her chin to meet the blaze of his eyes.
‘Blushing?’ he questioned in a thoughtful voice, his thumb tracing the curve of her jaw.
‘It’s all been a bit … sudden,’ she prevaricated. ‘It feels … fast.’
‘If you want me to be slow, I’m not sure that I can.’ His eyes narrowed. ‘What is it you want from me, Emma?’
‘I just …’
Her words tailed off because she was unsure of how to express herself. Even she knew that it would be madness to warn him that it might all go terribly wrong. Because what if that made him stop? So instead, she just spoke the words which came straight from her heart. The ones which were inspired by the desire she felt for this daunting and powerful man. ‘I just want you to be you,’ she breathed.
There was a brief pause. ‘Oh, do you now?’ His soft words to her were at odds with the hardening of his mouth. How like a woman, he thought bitterly. Couldn’t she see the irony in what she’d said? That all this time she’d been deceiving him and now she had the temerity to make a breathless little request like that!
Through the beat of desire he felt another flicker of fury, but he sublimated it by concentrating on undressing her, recognising that rage would get in the way of his enjoyment. And one thing he was certain of was that he was going to enjoy this. Theos, but he had waited for it long enough!
He unclipped her strapless bra—a skimpy little thing, which was having to fight against gravity to contain her luscious breasts, and he was unable to stem his instinctive murmur of appreciation when they sprang free. Urgently, he turned his attention to a tiny white thong, which skimmed the pale curve of her hips and which he slid down over her thighs before kicking off his own shorts so that they were both naked. For a moment he sucked in a deep and unsteady breath, because this was happening—something he had never envisaged happening, other than in his tortured dreams.
Her pale green eyes looked blurred and he wondered if he imagined the faint wariness which lurked at their depths. And he knew that he didn’t want her to have any doubts. That nothing was going to stop this. Not her. Not him. Nothing. He put his arms around her and dipped his face so that it was close to hers.
‘You want this?’ he questioned urgently.
‘I do,’ she whispered back.
With a small groan he tumbled them down on the bed as skin met skin, their bodies sinking into the deep mattress as his fingers threaded through the pale spill of her hair.
‘Oh, Emma,’ he groaned. ‘Emma. I’ve dreamt of doing this. Every night, this has been my forbidden fantasy and now it’s finally coming true.’
He kissed her lips. Her neck. The lobes of her ears. He kissed her until she made sweet little sounds in the back of her throat. Dragging his lips downwards to her breast, he weaved his tongue over the puckering pink of her nipple, his hand drifting irresistibly down over her belly towards the soft fuzz of hair at the juncture of her thighs.
‘Zak!’ she moaned as his hand moved to cup her intimately and all her shyness and fear was banished by the expert way he was strumming his fingers against her moist heat. Pleasure rushed through her in a warm, unstoppable stream. She could feel the powerful beat of his heart and smell the scent of her own arousal as her body thrilled to his touch. And something made her fingernails dig into his back—some urgent need to have more than this. To have Zak as close as it was possible for him to be. To see whether this time …
‘Please …’ she breathed.
Briefly, he released her—reaching out to the drawer in the antique locker next to the bed, until he had found what he was looking for.
He couldn’t remember ever having quite so much difficulty slipping on a condom and it wasn’t helped by Emma planting urgent little butterfly kisses all over his shoulders. But when he had sheathed himself he moved over her, savouring that last brief moment against her moist heat before he entered her long and hard and deep.
Her gasp was unlike any other he’d ever heard because wasn’t it tinged with a note of what sounded like … surprise? He stilled as, briefly, he felt her stiffen.
‘Emma?’ Confusedly, he stared down at her, but she had now closed her eyes tight shut, her chin lifted upward—like a flower reaching for the sun. ‘Emma?’ he questioned again.
‘Just make love to me, Zak,’ she urged fervently against his warm damp skin. ‘Please.’
His bewilderment was dissolved by that throaty little plea, his conscience appeased by the dig of her fingernails into his shoulders. With a moan, he began to move again, thrusting deep into her molten heat—his body so dark against the paleness of hers. Her mouth was on his and he held her close as their bodies rocked together in perfect rhythm. She was so tight, he thought as he deepened the kiss. Tighter than any woman he’d ever known.
He wanted to come. He’d wanted it from the moment he had entered her and never had it seemed so difficult to hold back. He felt as if he were a teenager. As if it were his first time. As if there had never been any other woman but her. He wanted to come like never before! But somehow he clung on until he heard the shudder of her breathing and felt the change in her body as it began to arch and then to splinter around his. And only then did he let go, spilling his seed in an orgasm which went on like no other, sending him orbiting into some crazy new dimension.
He clutched her still-shuddering body and buried his mouth in her silken hair. For a moment there was no sound in the room other than their ragged breathing and Zak wished he could just hold on to this feeling and turn over and go to sleep.
But he hadn’t got this far in life by ignoring the screamingly obvious and he rolled off her and lay on his side, his eyes watchful as he stared at her flushed face and wary eyes.
‘So, Emma,’ he questioned unsteadily, ‘was that some kind of erotic game-play done to heighten your enjoyment?’ His grey eyes bored into her. ‘Or could you really have been a virgin?’
CHAPTER NINE
‘TECHNICALLY,’ said Emma, ‘I suppose I was.’
‘What the hell are you talking about—technically?’ Zak demanded as he stared at her flushed face. ‘Either you’re a virgin, or you’re not.’
Trying not to recoil from the accusation blazing from his eyes, Emma felt her pleasure evaporate. Their love-making had been so incredible—like she’d never dared dream it could be. She wanted to just lie there and relive it—second by glorious second—only now Zak was about to ruin it with some intrusive Q and A session. Uncomfortably, she wriggled. ‘Do we have to talk about this now?’
‘Damned right we do!’ he exploded, because he felt as if she’d somehow tricked him. Again! As if she had revealed one secret when she’d told him the truth about Nat—only for him to discover that there was another one lurking, just below the surface. How many secrets did this woman have? he wondered furiously. ‘When would you like us to discuss it? When you’re hanging drapes with Cindy listening on the sidelines?’
‘Of course not!’
‘So start talking!’
‘What is there to say?’ she questioned tiredly. ‘Except that my marriage was never properly consummated.’
‘But Louis Patterson was known as a sex god!’
‘He was also a heavy user of drugs and alcohol!’ She met his eyes, the hurt and the pain spiralling up inside her and threatening to spill out in angry tears. But she swallowed them down, damned if she would come over as any more vulnerable than she already did. ‘Can’t you work it out for yourself, Zak—or do I have to spell it out for you?’
There was silence for a moment. ‘He was impotent?’
Emma nodded, her throat thick with emotion—because even though at the time she’d pored over medical books, which had told her that such a side effect was normal for addicts, that hadn’t stopped her from feeling a failure, had it? As if it was somehow all her fault. If she’d been stronger, she’d have been able to get him clean and sober. If she’d been more attractive, he would have been able to consummate their brief marriage. And Louis had only compounded those feelings of guilt—telling her that he’d never had problems with any woman before her.
‘Yes,’ she answered bluntly. ‘He was.’
For a moment Zak didn’t say anything, just shook his head. He felt like a man who’d just opened his early-morning shutters and seen the night-time sky outside. ‘I just can’t believe it,’ he said.
‘Is it such a crime to be a virgin then, Zak?’
‘That’s a naïve question and you know it.’ He stared at her golden fingernails, which gleamed against the pristine white of the duvet. What a mass of contradictions she was, with her tumble of pale hair and her siren’s body—yet beneath all that she’d been concealing an innocence which had shocked him profoundly.
‘It wasn’t an assumption I would ever have made about you,’ he continued. ‘And part of you must have realised that. But either you didn’t think to tell me, or you decided deliberately not to tell me. And I would have liked to have known, Emma—to have been given some kind of choice in the matter about whether I wanted to take your virginity. Why me? And why now?’
Any trace of post-orgasmic euphoria had now completely vanished and Emma shivered, reaching for the rumpled duvet and pulling it around her. Maybe she had been wrong not to tell him—but hadn’t one of the reasons been fear that he would have walked away? That some misplaced sense of ‘honour’ would have stopped him from making love to her? And hadn’t she felt as if she’d die if he didn’t?
‘Why you? I’m sure you don’t need me to tell you that. You’re a very attractive and charismatic man, Zak, and I couldn’t stop myself, if you must know,’ she said in a low voice. ‘How’s that for honesty?’
He mulled this over in silence for a moment. ‘And there’s never been anyone else?’
She could hear the incredulity in his voice. ‘Never.’ Because hadn’t her experience with Louis reinforced all her jaded views about men—views which had been formed by watching her mother operate? Louis had left her feeling inadequate and a failure and yet, in a way, it had been a relief to believe that she was frigid. To reassure herself that men were nothing but trouble and that she no longer had to venture down that particular road. Shunning the opposite sex hadn’t been a problem at all—at least, not until the day she’d walked into Zak’s office. And from that moment on, her feelings had given her nothing but trouble. ‘I thought there might be something wrong with me. That maybe I was frigid.’
‘Only now you’ve discovered that you most definitely aren’t?’ He gave a short laugh. ‘I must say this is the first time in my life I’ve ever felt like a stud. Like I’ve been used to prove a point—and I’m not sure I like it very much.’
Emma realised that he’d added yet another accusation to the fast-growing list of complaints against her. And yet, why was he acting so hard done by? It wasn’t as if it had been some long and slow candlelit seduction, was it? It had been fast and furious, almost angry sex—and surely for a man like Zak that must be something of a relief. It wasn’t as though she was going to start reading too much into it—not when it had been motivated by anger and lust.
‘Okay, it was a big mistake and we should never have done it,’ she said, wriggling over to the side of the bed. ‘So I’ll get out of your hair and out of your bed and we can both try to forget it ever happened.’
The supple movement of her pale body made him harden. ‘I don’t want you to get out of my bed,’ he said savagely. ‘I don’t want you going anywhere!’
‘Don’t feel you have to sugar-coat your disgust to try to spare my feelings!’
He leaned across and caught hold of her, and as the duvet fell away to reveal the lush spill of her breasts he sucked in a deep breath. ‘I’m not sugar-coating anything,’ he said unevenly. ‘And I can assure you that disgust is the very last thing on my mind right now.’
Hating herself for her compliance but unable to resist him when he looked at her like that, she allowed him to pull her into his arms. ‘Really?’
‘Really. I’m just a little dazed by my discovery and hoping that …’ His words faded as he turned his lips and began to kiss the soft skin of her upper arm.
Fighting to prevent her eyelids from fluttering to a close, Emma stared at the tangled black gleam of his hair. ‘Hoping that wh-what?’
He heard the waver of uncertainty in her voice and suddenly he felt anger for all she had endured. A mother who had been an appalling role model and who, it seemed, had pushed her into an unsuitable marriage when she was still heartbreakingly young. And then some thoughtless junkie of a husband who’d made her believe she was frigid. His voice softened. He didn’t have to add to that list by being such a brute, did he? ‘That you enjoyed what just happened, after what has been a very long wait.’
Now Emma was wide awake. Was that sympathy she heard in his voice—or was it the dreaded pity, which she’d always gone out of her way to avoid? Maybe he looked on her as some kind of freak because she happened to have reached the age of twenty-nine before losing her virginity. She looked at him suspiciously. ‘Are you asking me to mark you out of ten?’
‘No.’ He laughed as he pulled her right back against him. ‘I’ve never felt it necessary to request a scorecard.’
Probably because he’d get a gold star after every performance, she thought. She tried to hold on to what she felt was righteous indignation, but it wasn’t easy. Not when he had drifted his lips to the curve of her jaw, an area she wouldn’t have ever dreamt could be erogenous. But how wrong could she be? Because when Zak gave that tiny, barely there flick of his tongue, she was unable to stop the helpless tremble of her body. And suddenly she couldn’t stop herself from wrapping her arms tightly around his neck and putting her face very close to his.
‘Zak.’
‘Shh.’ He lifted his head so that his lips were soft against hers and he teased them open with his tongue. Shouldn’t he delight her again—to reinforce that she was a deliciously healthy and normal young woman? Couldn’t he give her the gift of physical enlightenment, even if he wasn’t emotionally equipped to offer her any more than that? ‘The second time can be even better.’
‘B-better?’
‘Mmm. Slower. More …’
‘Zak!’
‘Mmm?’
‘What … what are you doing?’
He raised his head from its current location just south of her belly, his eyes gleaming in a way which made Emma’s heart give a powerful kick. ‘I’m about to lick you where every woman likes best to be licked and which might make conversation a little difficult. So you’ll forgive me if I don’t answer any more of your questions for a while.’
She wanted to protest that mentioning what other women liked wasn’t the most diplomatic thing to say in the circumstances. She opened her mouth to tell him so but by then his dark head was buried between her thighs and his tongue was darting into her … Oh, God! He was actually kissing her … there—and the only sound she made was a gasp of disbelief that something could feel this good.
Softly, she moaned as his mouth worked some kind of sensual magic—her inhibitions melting away as she squirmed beneath the precision of his questing tongue. For a moment, she couldn’t believe that this was really her—uptight Emma Geary writhing as her boss kissed her in the most intimate place imaginable and made her feel as if he was feasting on her.
Her second climax surprised her almost as much as the first—but then, she hadn’t been expecting either. And she suddenly realised that sexual fulfilment didn’t have to be something which hovered frustratingly just out of range. That if you were with the right man, it could happen as easily as breathing.
‘Zak,’ she whispered, wondering if it would be the wrong thing to do to fling her arms around his neck and to thank him. But he still didn’t seem in the mood for any kind of conversation because he didn’t even wait for the sweet spasms to subside before moving over her and thrusting deep inside her again.
Acutely aware of her own inexperience, she wondered if he was enjoying this as much as she was. But then the rhythm of his body changed and she felt him shudder. Heard the muffled exclamation he made in Greek and revelled in the way he kissed the top of her head afterwards, his hand snaking possessively around her waist, and he gave a deep sigh of contentment.
Silently, she clung to him—not wanting to break the warm spell which made it ridiculously easy for her to start wondering what this might be like on a full-time basis. Would it always be this amazing? Zak had been tender and considerate as a lover, even though she’d known he was angry at her deception. Just imagine what it might be like if he was in a good mood!
‘Zak?’ she questioned softly, when she realised from the sound of his steady breathing that he was fast asleep.
Slowly, she turned her head to look at his soft, parted lips and the starkness of his ebony hair against the snowy pillow. How completely relaxed he looked. His big body was sprawled out, all gleaming olive skin and honed muscle as he took up most of the bed. She thought he was the most beautiful thing she had ever seen and she could have lain there looking at him for hours. But even as she was revelling in the visual feast, dark thoughts began to eat away at her precarious self-esteem.
What had he said? I’m about to lick you where every woman likes best to be licked. Emma bit her lip and turned her gaze up to the ceiling. He had made her sound as if she was just the latest in a long line of lovers—and maybe that had been his intention.
Because that was exactly what she was. In fact, she probably only qualified for one-night-stand status.
She forced herself to confront the facts, no matter how painful they might be. His proud, Greek nature was appalled by her background, he’d told her that himself—and that much hadn’t changed. Why, he’d even gone to the trouble of shipping her across the Atlantic so that he could separate her from his brother.
So what did she think was going to happen now that she’d had sex with him? That he’d take her to that very expensive jewellery shop situated on the eighth floor of his hotel and purchase one of those whopping great diamond rings which glittered so enticingly in the window? She winced. Not all men made ridiculously over-the-top gestures, the way Louis had done. And hadn’t she learned the hard way that those gestures were empty ones? Zak had been fired up by lust and anger and they were no basis for anything solid, or lasting.