Bedded by the Italian Playboy (15 page)

“There
is no escape,” he grated. “Not for you.”

“Dominic,
please. I promise not to leave,” she whispered and what little self control he
had left fled.

He
turned around, stalked back over and halted mere inches from her. “You promise?
You fucking promise? Just like you promised me you were truthful? Honest?
Decent?

“I—”

He
slashed a hand across the air, silencing her. “You had me just where you wanted
me, didn’t you?” he said. “Down on my knees offering everything you planned.
You kept those virginal little legs of yours clamped shut until you were sure I
would place a ring on your finger. Smiled and flirted and blushed and fucking
waited!”

“It
wasn’t like that,” she whispered. “You have to believe me. I had no idea you
were going to propose.”

“So
what was the end game, if not a proposal? Tell me that? The safe, no? And then
what?”

“I—”

“Tell
me,” he roared.

A
pause and then, “I would leave,” she said, the words almost too low for him to
hear. “I was going to steal from your safe and disappear.”

It
was worse even than he’d imagined. She wasn’t a gold digger. She was an
out-and-out thief. Dominic shook his head, unable to comprehend it all. “
Dios
.”

“I
didn’t mean…I didn’t know…Dominic, please, I’m sorry. You have to believe me. I
didn’t know you then.”

“Believe
you?” He clenched his fists, anger surging through him once more. How dare she
even ask that of him? To stand there lying after everything?

He
raked his gaze over her, from the top of her tousled blonde locks all the way
to her heaving bosom. And even now, even when he wanted nothing more than to
never have met her, his cock hardened, stiffened to the point of pain.
Lust—insane lust—gripped him. Fed by the anger and without even thinking it
through, Dominic pushed Rachel back onto the couch. She fell with a gasp and
her eyes widened.

“What
are you doing?”

He
didn’t answer her. His gaze continued to travel. Down her belly, across her
thighs, all over, and he almost groaned. She was just so perfect! And even
knowing it was all a lie made no difference. He wanted her so badly. Wanted to
unzip his fly, nudge her thighs apart and bury himself inside of her until he
forgot the last hour. Until he forgot everything.

 
Perhaps she knew what he was thinking, or
maybe she’d caught sight of his raging hard-on because she shook her head. “No,
Dominic, not like this.”

“Like
what?” he asked, taking a last step forward so that he was flush with the
couch.

“You’re
angry….”

“Angry?
I am well beyond that. Well beyond it.”

“Don’t
do something you’ll regret,” she said, and he laughed, a harsh sound that
echoed around the cavernous room.

“I
regret every single fucking moment since I caught sight of you. Every single
bit of it.”

“That
isn’t true.”

“Do
you want to bet on that,
Putana
?”

She
blushed a nasty shade of red at the derisive name and bit down on her plump
bottom lip. “Do not call me that.”

“Why
not? It’s true.”

“You
took my virginity, Dominic. You know it’s not true.”

“Who
knows how many other men you’ve played with?” he asked. “You may have been a
virgin physically but I doubt you were in any other way.”

“You’re
wrong.”

“And
you’re a slut. A lying little slut.”

“That
isn’t true.”

Almost
as if he was watching someone else do it Dominic found himself kneeling down
onto the couch, her legs now either side of him, his hands running up and down
her thighs. “I want you still,” he hissed. “I don’t care if a million men have
lain between your legs, I’ll fuck you until you remember no one but me and then
when I’m done I’ll cast you aside.”

“There’s
only been you,” she said slowly. “You know that’s true whether you want to
admit it or not, and clearly you’ve forgotten something.”

“Oh,
yes?”

“That
it takes a certain sort of woman to even think of playing a man like you.”

Before
he could even reply or think to ask what she meant, Dominic found himself flat
on the couch a scorching pain in his stomach. “You bitch….”

“I’m
not going to let you do something we’ll both regret,” she said, scooting across
the couch, putting some much needed distance between them. “To spoil what we’ve
shared.”

“What
we shared?” he spluttered. “Sex. Just sex.”

“It
was more than that.”

“It
was a fucking lie!” he roared. “You lied to me to get your gold digging claws
into my money!”

“And
you were so blinded by my looks you didn’t even think about what else there
might be.”

“What?”

“You
acted as though I’d been dumped on that street readymade and waiting for you. Like
there was nothing else to me but to be your playmate. This”—she pointed down at
her body—“it’s all you saw, all you wanted. Even now you hate me, and yet if I
called you over here, you’d open my legs and fuck me some more.”

“You—”

“You
saw what you wanted to see, Dominic, nothing more.”

It
was then that he noticed the tears sparkling in her eyes. That fact made
Dominic’s anger increase even further. He hated the feelings running through
him. Hated that his chest was tight, that his heart was racing, that he wanted
to turn walk right back across the room, pull her into his arms and kiss the
sadness away. She’d tied him in fucking knots. She was making him her slave.
She was playing him! Lying to him! Nothing but a gold digging little whore.

 
“One more word from you and I won’t be
responsible for my actions,” he grated. “One more fucking word.” And then he
did what he should have done the moment he’d read that message. He walked out
the door.

Chapter Twenty-One

The
moment Dominic left the room Rachel grabbed her Blackberry and fled to the en
suite. With shaky hands she locked the door and leaned against it. In all
honesty, she sort of slumped against it. The look on Dominic’s face! She
swallowed against the sudden lump in her throat and closed her eyes. Over the
last few days she’d seen him passionate, indulgent, even tender, but never had
she seen him angry. And now she had? Well, it was worse than she’d ever
imagined and she never wanted to be on the receiving end of it again.

Opening
her eyes Rachel looked down at the Blackberry clenched in her left hand. There
right next to it the huge diamond winked, glittered, shone. It was perfection.
It had all been perfection, only now it was ruined.

It was never real.

At
that thought she lifted her right hand and pressed it against her mouth to
contain the sob that might erupt any moment only to halt as her Blackberry
vibrated. Ridiculously her heart leapt and Rachel fumbled with the phone,
tapping the touch screen until the backlight came on, until she could see what
had caused the vibration. For one wild moment she thought it might be from
Dominic, a text or something but then…her heart dropped. It was just an email
welcoming her to the messaging service.

It
was the generic messaging service though, not the one she’d be using. Not the
one that had exposed everything.
Stupid,
stupid, stupid,
she thought. How could she have been so stupid? Leaving it
there where he could see it. Ruining everything!

But
she needed that messaging service now and could only be thankful that Dominic
hadn’t thought to take her Blackberry with him. His anger clouded his thoughts
obviously. Because it wasn’t like him to leave such a loose end.

Not
at all.

She
had it now though. It had been instinctive, of course, the need to find a way
out of the mess even as her heart pounded and a nasty kind of panic wound its
way around her heart. And so she did what she’d done her entire life. She
thought of her sisters. Lyra. Penny. She would contact them for help. They
would come just as they always had.

Flipping
the screen upwards she opened the internet browser and deleted the message—that
fateful fucking message—then opened a new one. A message to her sisters all
over again. They’d agreed to it all weeks and weeks ago of course. Each, when possible,
would drop an email in the shared messaging service letting the others know if
anything went wrong. The account was set up in a fake name and had been
activated from a friend of Penny’s flat. Rachel didn’t quite understand the
mechanics but he had a programme which routed the ISP signal so it could never
be traced to who’d set it up. Plus it was a free system so everything they’d
given it, name, address and so on, had been fake.

It
was perfect. A vital part of the mission.

The mission.

The
words whispered through Rachel’s mind and she shuddered. That was what was
important. Not the look on Dominic’s face or his anger, or even her own
feelings.
The mission.

And
nothing else was real, was it? It never had been. But her heart was telling a
completely different story. It didn’t even feel part of her anymore. Almost
like Dominic had taken it with him when he left the room, leaving her panting
and gasping and hurting so bad. She’d thought she loved him. Had sat and
considered it. The fluttering, the weird feelings. What else she’d asked
herself
could
it be but love?

She’d
had no fucking clue.

Only
now did Rachel realize that, of course, it was love.

Only
now that she’d lost him did she understand that there was never a question.
She’d been captivated from the moment he’d helped her up off the ground. And it
wasn’t just the attraction or the sex, it was the donuts and the walks along
the
Thames
and the moments when he’d smiled
and made her heart leap.

But it’s not real. Not for him, at least.
Not anymore.

As
those words whispered through her mind, it was all she could do to hold the
Blackberry steady, and the sobs threatened all over again. And the worst part
was that he was completely right to be angry. To feel betrayed. She
had
lied. She
had
cheated. If only she could start over. A sob escaped and Rachel
almost dropped her Blackberry but no, she needed help and there was no one else
she could ask.

“Send
the email, Rach,” she whispered around the lump. “You have no choice.”

The
email programme had timed out and so with shaky fingers Rachel started typing
in the username and password. The first time round she typed in a “g” instead
of “h” and then had to start all over again. Was it any wonder, though? Her
fingers were shaky and her palms were clammy. Then there was Dominic himself.
He could come back at any moment, she thought but then shook her head. It was
unlikely. Maybe even just wishful thinking on her part. Dominic would not be
back. Not for quite some time. Not until his anger cooled at least. And
then…what then? Rachel bit down on her lip until it stung. She couldn’t bear to
hang around to find out. To see the anger replace all the passion, all the
indulgence. To see just how much he hated her now.

The
email account opened and Rachel breathed a sigh of relief when she saw there
were no emails from either Penny or Lyra. They were fine. As always, she was
the one in trouble.

She
started a new message and her fingers flew over the keyboard as she tried to
explain what had happened. It was only when the message was complete and Rachel
had sent it that she wondered who would come first. Or who she even wanted to.

Penny
or Lyra…or Dominic.

Chapter Twenty-Two

Dominic
walked around in a daze. Past his suite, down the stairs, down until he found
himself in his office. Vaguely he knew that his Blackberry was vibrating in his
pocket and he thought he’d heard some of his staff say hello, ask after him,
but he’d just walked on past. His head was pounding, his balls throbbing and
worse, much worse than all of that, his chest was unnaturally tight.

How
could she have done this?

The
question whirred around his brain as he slumped down behind his desk, the
leather chair creaking as it accepted his weight. He played back the words of
her email in his mind, half trying to convince himself that he’d read them
wrong, but the more he thought about them, the more he knew what it all meant
and his chest got tighter.

She
was a liar.

A
gold digger.

All
of this had been nothing more than a ruse.

She,
like so many others in the past, was out to trap him. Worse, she’d nearly
succeeded. Another few weeks and he’d have ushered her up that aisle and
planted that ring on her finger. In his mind she was his. No one else could or
would have. And she fucking knew it.