leaned over her, into her, caging her where she stood with his hands on either side of hers. She shuddered in that deep, luxuriant way that seemed to roll all the way through her and then into him, and when he bent to press his mouth to the nape of her neck, they both sighed.
She was so warm, so delicately fragrant. He could smell that particular scent that was only hers, a sultry blend of her skin and her sex, and layered over that the hints of bathing products and stylist’s tools, cosmetics and the faint touch of something not quite slate that made him think of the snow outside.
And the skin beneath his lips was so soft. So very soft. She shivered, and he wanted to inhale her. All of her.
“La tua pelle e’ come seta,” Rafael murmured, right there against that sensitive spot at her nape, knowing full well she couldn’t understand him. Enjoying that fact, if he was honest. Your skin is like silk.
“Why can’t I turn around?” Her voice was little more than a breath.
He smiled against her skin. “Because this way, there can only be honesty between us. No harsh words to confuse the issue. No lies or make-believe memories. You will either respond to me or you won’t.”
“You don’t seem worried that I won’t,” she said, almost ruefully.
He grazed her lightly with his teeth and heard the sharp little noise she made in response, music to him the way it always had been, and he leaned in closer and indulged himself.
“No,” he said against her soft, warm skin, “I’m not.”
Rafael laid a trail of fire down the length of her neck, then across the delicate ridges of her finely wrought shoulder blades. He explored one with his mouth, his hands, then the other. He kept her caged there by his much larger body, drinking in every little sweet and helpless sound she made—far more intoxicating than any whiskey.
And only when he’d relearned every sweet inch of her upper back did he pull back. She was shuddering again, her head low between her shoulders, breathing as hard as if she’d been running.
“You might want to brace yourself, cara,” he told her, making no attempt to hide the sheer male satisfaction in his voice. “I’m only getting started.”
He heard a hitch in her breath and it took him a moment to realize it was a laugh. Low, husky. Infinitely sensual. It wrapped around him and pierced his bones, shaking through him like a quiet little tsunami.
“Promises, promises,” she taunted him softly.
She was lethal. Rafael would do well to remember that.
He reached out then and found the hidden zipper closure of her dress, unhooking it and then beginning to pull it down, exposing the long line of her spine and the acres of her soft skin. His mouth watered, but still he unzipped her, letting the dress fall from her mouthwatering curves to foam around her feet, effectively caging her there in yards and yards of fabric so soft to the touch that the only thing that could possibly be softer was her.
She was like a feast spread before him, and he let himself breathe her in, exposed at last to his view. His own personal miracle. He took in the wavy tangle of her strawberry blond hair, the elegance of her lovely back and the scrap of scarlet he’d shoved out of his way at the party that was, from this angle, a mere hint of fabric circling her hips and then disappearing between the high, proud curves of her bottom. Then he took his time on the way back up, lingering on that tattoo he’d believed he’d never see again, that tattoo that had proved she was who he knew her to be at a glance, that tattoo that marked her his Lily forever.
He touched her there, tracing the winding black lines that curled this way and that, the tendrils reaching down almost to the top of her thong panties at the bottom and then nearly to what would have been her bra line, had she been wearing one, at the top. Then he worked his fingers over the delicate lily blossom some stranger had lovingly drawn into her skin, the arched petals and the sweet bud within, as if he was painting her with his possession.
“Rafael...” Her voice cracked on his name, and he smiled at the raw need in it. “Please.”
“Please, what?” he asked. “I’ve hardly begun. And I think this tattoo is yet another lie you’ve told.”
She shook her head, lifting herself up but still, he noticed, maintaining her position. Staying where he’d put her, and he didn’t know what made him want her more, her obedience or her need. Both.
“A tattoo is the opposite of a lie,” she said, still in that breathy, needy way of hers that was messing with his resolve. “It’s ink on skin and unchangeable.”
“And if you hated it as much as you claimed you did,” he murmured as he leaned in closer, then sank down so he could set his mouth against the center bud of that pretty red blossom, “you would have had it removed by now.”
He heard her shudder out another breath that was edging toward a sob, and he continued to taste that delicate flower while he let his hands wander, smoothing their way over her hips and then testing the sweet curves of her bottom. And only when he could feel her shake did he tease his way into the hidden hollow beneath, where she was molten and hot and more than ready for him.
Rafael knew her body better than his own. He knew her taste, her shape. He knew exactly how to touch her to drive her slowly, slowly insane. And if it killed him too, well—resurrections were going around. He was certain he’d survive, somehow, if only to find her again. He stroked his way into her heat, tracing her folds and the center of her need until she was surging back to meet him.
“Tell me something,” he said darkly, moving as he spoke from the sweet tattoo to the sweep of her spine, relearning that perfect curve, that tempting shape. “How many men did Alison have in those five years?”
He could feel her stiffen at that, but he had two fingers deep inside her, and there was only one truth that had ever mattered between them. It didn’t matter what he said to her, or what lies she told. It didn’t matter how furious she was with him or what she’d done. What he’d done with all those other women, for that matter, or how much he regretted every one of them. He could feel her, molten and sweet, clenching tight around him even so.
This was the only truth. This heat. This need. This was who they were.
“You’re a hypocrite,” she panted out, sounding as desperate as she did furious, and yet her hips moved in wild abandon, meeting every stroke. “You must know that.”
“I have never claimed otherwise,” he said, his voice rough. “Especially not to you. But that doesn’t answer my question, does it?”
“What does it matter?” she demanded, and then she let out a small cry when he changed his angle and drove deeper within her. Harder.
“How many?”
He felt her shudder beneath him, and he stopped pretending he was anything but an animal where this woman was concerned. Or that he’d ever been anything else. Or would ever be anything else. Five years apart, thinking she was dead, hadn’t changed this. Nothing could.
“Tell me,” he gritted out at her.
“None, Rafael,” she cried out as he pressed hard against the center of her hunger with one hand and stroked deep with the other. “There has never been anyone but you.”
And there never will be, he thought, feeling something clawed and fierce inside him, fighting its way out through his rib cage.
“For that,” he said, moving up higher and setting his mouth against her ear, exulting in the way she bucked and writhed beneath him, “you get a reward.”
Then he twisted his hand and hit her in precisely the right spot, and held her as she broke apart.
And he was only getting started.
* * *
Lily hardly registered it when he lifted her, sweeping her out of the dress that was now crumpled on the floor and up into