in the way that had always sent spirals of desire straight down to his toes, he knew that everything he had done—bringing her here, sweeping aside his plans to find her an apartment and instead settling her into his home, was right.
The idea had come to him while the doctor was with her. Gabriella was sick; she had the baby to care for. No way could he let her be on her own just yet. She’d simply have to stay with him for a couple of days. Just a temporary arrangement, of course, but even so, the baby would need things…
Except that now, looking down at the woman in his arms, he knew those were all pathetic rationalizations.
“I want you here,” he said softly, when he finally ended the kiss. “Here. With me. You and the boy—you and Daniel belong here.”
“Dante.” Her voice shook. “Please. Don’t say that and not mean it.”
“We’ll take things one step at a time.”
It wasn’t quite the answer her heart wanted but it was an honest answer. How could she fault him for that? she thought, and she nodded and said, very softly, “Okay.”
He leaned his forehead against hers. “Starting with that bathroom stuff you were positive I couldn’t handle.”
She smiled into his eyes. “Somehow, I can’t picture you changing a diaper.”
“Who says? Put your money where your mouth is.”
Her smile became a grin. “A buck says you can’t.”
“You’re on.”
She lost the bet.
Dante could do everything. Run a powerful corporation? Sure. Make every man in a room defer to him? That, too. Be the man all the women in the world wanted? Easy.
She’d known all that from experience.
What she’d never known until now was that he could diaper a baby as if he’d done it all his life. Take care of her. Brew her a cup of tea. Stand over her until she gave up and downed another couple of Tylenol. Whip up a meal—though as he pointed out, heating a can of chicken broth for her, taking a steak from the freezer and broiling it for himself wasn’t exactly gourmet cooking. But it was much, much more than she’d ever seen him do in the past. Back then he’d been a whiz at making restaurant reservations and, once or twice, phoning down for Chinese take-out.
Dante Orsini, doing kitchen duty?
Never…until tonight.
Hours later she and Daniel were both yawning. Dante offered to give the baby a bottle but she said no, she’d nurse him. “Are you sure?” Dante said and she nodded and decided that telling him she really had to do it, that her breasts would be swollen and heavy unless she did, was more than she wanted to discuss. It was too private, too intimate…
Too much.
She nursed Daniel, sitting in the beautiful rocking chair in his room while Dante cleaned up the kitchen. When she was done, they bathed the baby together. Dante said he felt too clumsy to do it, but he took over halfway through, laughing when Daniel splashed water all over him, wrapping the baby in a big bath towel, then diapering him and dressing him in a blue onesie.
Dante lowered him gently into his crib. Gabriella kissed her son’s head. Dante stroked his dark hair.
“Good night, pal,” he said softly.
Out in the hall, for the first time all day, they were alone. The penthouse seemed wrapped in silence. Their eyes met. She felt the heat rise in her face. He took a step toward her. She took a quick step back.
“No. We can’t.” Her voice was breathless. “It would—it would only complicate things.”
He nodded. Hadn’t he already reached that same conclusion?
It was her turn to nod. “So…so, good night.”
“Good night, sweetheart,” he whispered. And then he reached for her and she went into his arms.
SHE went into his arms as if she had never left them.
A dozen thoughts raced through his head.
He wanted to tell her how he had missed her. How it felt to hold her again. But the need to kiss her, taste her, the need to possess her, make her his again had a hot urgency that drove away reason.
It was the same for her.
He could tell by the little sounds she made, the way she clung to his neck. By the motion of her body against his; that long, elegant body he had, yes, never forgotten.
And her mouth.
Sweet. Soft. Giving. A man could lose himself, just taking her mouth again and again, but it wasn’t enough, not now, not after all these endless months. He drew her away from the door, backed her against the wall, tore open her robe and swept his hands over her silken skin. Her hands were on him, too, at his jeans, undoing the closure, unzipping him, and he groaned as she closed her hand around him and said his name in a broken whisper that almost drove him to his knees.
“Yes,” he said, “yes, sweetheart.”
He hooked his fingers in her panties. Eased them down. He knelt; she put a hand on his head to steady herself as she stepped free of the scrap of silk. He clasped her ankle. Rose to his feet, his hand moving up and up her leg. His touch was warm and possessive and it made her tremble.
“Open for me,” he said in a strangled voice, and when she did, he put his hand between her thighs.
A cry burst from her throat. She was wet and hot for him, only for him, and he couldn’t wait. Not anymore. He had wanted this without knowing it, waited for this for more than a year, and if he didn’t have her now, he’d be lost forever.
He reversed their positions so that the wall was at his back. And as she sobbed his name, he lifted her, brought her down onto his rigid length. Her arms tightened around his neck, her legs wrapped around his waist. She buried her face against his throat and he could feel the heat of her breath, hear her breathy moans of ecstasy.
Too fast, his fevered brain told him, dammit, too fast….
She cried out. Sank her teeth into his flesh. And as she convulsed around him, Dante drove deep, rode her even harder, and flew off the edge of the world.
They stayed that way for long minutes, breathing hard, letting the aftermath of their passion ease. Then Gabriella gave a soft laugh. He remembered that laugh, low and delicious and earthy.
“What?” he said, his lips curving in a smile against her forehead.
“All those years of yoga that I took…” Another husky laugh. “Turns out they were worth it.”
He grinned, let her down slowly. She looked up at him and she was so beautiful…the tightness in his chest almost overwhelmed him.
“Gabriella.”
“Mmm?”
He shook his head. “Nothing,” he said quietly, “just…” He bent his head and kissed her. Then he lifted her in his arms and carried her to his bed. She lay with her head on his shoulder, her hand playing with the dark curls on his chest.
“What are you thinking?”
Gently he stroked a tousled mass of golden curls from her cheek.
“That I’ve missed you.”
She turned her face, pressed a kiss to his skin. “Me, too.”
In truth he was thinking far more than that. He was thinking that a man went through life certain he knew what he needed to be happy. Success in his work. The love of his family. Friends who stood by him. Things that seemed simple