No incendiary statement designed to make me walk out? That’s what you want, isn’t it? Do you think I don’t know that?’ The sleeves of his shirt flopped over his strong hands and he folded them back and pushed them up his arms. She remembered those arms holding her and immediately looked away, rejecting the powerful surge of need. She’d always found it unfair that someone with such a casual attitude to his appearance could look so good in every situation.
‘You can stay or go, I don’t care. I don’t need you.’
‘Need and want are two different things.’ He looked at the inhaler clutched in her palm. ‘So your attacks are brought on by stress. That’s interesting. You weren’t stressed when we were together.’
‘As I said, that’s because I never saw you,’ she said sweetly. ‘I’ve seen more of you in the last twenty-four hours than I ever did during our marriage. Probably why I’m stressed.’
‘I’m stressed too. You are enough to drive a man crazy.’ His low drawl connected with her insides and suddenly that melting feeling low in her pelvis was back.
‘You only have to survive my company until Sunday. My flight leaves first thing in the morning.’
‘We have a meeting with the lawyers tomorrow morning.’
‘I don’t need to speak to them. Agree whatever you want and it will be fine by me.’
The mattress moved as he sat down next to her. ‘If you’re that angry with me then this is your chance to bleed me dry.’
‘It was never about the money, you know that.’
‘I don’t know anything because you never share anything. A relationship with you is one big guessing game.’ He sounded tired and witnessing that was a thousand times more unsettling than his anger or sarcasm because she’d never seen him tired. Cristiano had more energy than any man she’d ever met.
‘If you’d been around more you wouldn’t have had to guess.’ On that terrible day—the day he’d missed—her feelings had been there for all to see. Except the only witnesses had been the staff of the private hospital. Competent but brisk, they’d had no idea of the extent of her desolation. ‘I’ll fly home tomorrow. The last thing you need right now is your ex-wife at your sister’s wedding.’
‘Wife.’ The words were soft but firm. ‘You’re not my ex-wife.’
‘Soon will be.’ It was so dangerous, being this close to him. She didn’t dare look at him. Didn’t dare move in case she brushed against him, so she held herself rigid.
‘Your breathing is better.’
‘So now you can go back to the party.’
He didn’t rise but he did give her a warning look. ‘I’ll sleep on the sofa in the living room. Leave the door open. If you need anything you can call out.’
A lump settled in her throat. ‘Honestly, you don’t need to do this. Just go and answer the thousands of emails that will undoubtedly be waiting for you on your phone.’ She didn’t want him to behave decently now. It was too late.
‘So now you’re giving me permission to be insensitive?’
Yes, because anything different would complicate her feelings and she didn’t want that.
Her mind was straight. She wanted it to stay straight.
Laurel gave a shrug that was supposed to indicate that she didn’t care what he did. ‘If acting like a guard dog makes you feel better about yourself then at least let me be the one to sleep on the sofa.’
‘Why? I can sleep anywhere, you know that.’
She did know. In the middle of tough negotiations there had been nights when he’d slept in the office to avoid coming home in the middle of the night and waking her. ‘In that case, do whatever pleases you.’
When he reached out to switch off the lamp by the bed she caught his arm. ‘Leave it.’
It was such a cliché, but she hated the dark.
On her own, she always slept with a light on. Only with Cristiano had she been able to feel safe at night.
He frowned, his gaze steady and disturbingly perceptive. ‘I’ll stay with you for a few minutes, just until I’m sure you don’t need a doctor.’ As he pulled off his shoes and settled on the bed next to her she wanted to ask why he was doing this. Why he was he staying with her when they were no longer together. When it was much, much too late for their marriage.
They sat together in silence, close but not touching. As her breathing grew easier and the panic lessened, so her awareness of him grew. The length of his powerful thigh next to hers and his deep, even breathing. The connection between them, that dangerous indefinable chemistry that should have died along with her dreams, sprang to life.
Slowly, she turned her head and looked at him.
He turned his head too and his eyes fixed on hers.
Both should have looked away but neither of them did.
The inevitability of it was as sweet and sharp as the desire that stabbed through her body.
His hand lifted and his fingers dragged lightly over her jaw. The stroke of his thumb over her lower lip was gentle. When he lowered his head he did it slowly, as if he wasn’t sure he was actually going to follow through. His mouth brushed against hers. A teasing prelude. It was insane and she should have moved, but she couldn’t. Anticipation exploded inside her. For a few thrilling seconds his mouth hovered close to hers and then he lost his grip on control and took her mouth in a hard, devouring kiss that blew every thought from her brain. She tried to hold herself back, not to become involved, but his kiss drew her in until they merged, until she couldn’t tell where she ended and he began, until her whole world centred on what they became together. His tongue was in her mouth, his hands in her hair and they feasted on each other like animals driven wild by deprivation. It was intoxicating, the rush of sexual excitement as heady as any drug and just as dangerous.
Time passed unnoticed and then he gave a growl of self-denial and dragged his mouth from hers, regret visible in every plane of his handsome face. ‘No.’ The raw emotion in his voice reflected her own feelings.
‘No.’ The kiss had shaken her and it was no consolation to know it had shaken him too. This wasn’t what she wanted. She wasn’t trying to tempt him back. She wasn’t trying to instigate a reconciliation.
Her future didn’t include him and yet now everything was stirred up inside her. And even while she was cursing herself a tiny rogue part of her was thrilled at the fact he’d given in to temptation because she knew he exercised ruthless control over his impulses. She’d wanted this encounter to be difficult for him but what they’d just done had made it a thousand times more difficult for herself.
Laurel pulled away, dizzy with the contradictory thoughts that fought for supremacy in her head. She didn’t want him to want her. She didn’t want to want him. How was that going to help? It was just going to make an already difficult situation worse.
Cristiano sprang from the bed, lithe and supremely fit. ‘You’re right. I should sleep on the sofa. If you need a doctor in the night, call me.’ With that terse instruction and not even a glance in her direction, he left the room, leaving her body buzzing and her heart breaking.
‘CRISTIANO, are you even listening to me?’
Cristiano turned, disconcerted to realise he hadn’t heard a single word his lawyer had spoken.
He’d left the villa at sunrise, attempting to relieve his rocketing tension levels with a punishing run before the warmth of the new day turned to blistering heat. After that,