Noemi barely had time to take a breath before they kissed, but she didn’t care. It was everything she had dreamed of: soft, then rough as they both moaned with pent-up desire. Rafael picked her up, and she wrapped her legs around his waist as he pushed out of the side-door and into the back alley of the bar.
Noemi’s fingers were tangled in his hair, and she had no idea where he was taking her, but she didn’t care. She could not get enough of his mouth on hers, his fresh, clean cologne flooding her senses.
Then, in a flash, they were in his Mercedes and driving through Seattle’s streets. Neither of them said a word, but their fingers linked. Rafa drove to Noemi’s apartment and, hand-in-hand, they walked up the stairs together.
He followed her in, slipping his hand onto her waist. “Are you sure?” He said at last and she nodded.
His lips were against hers again then, and she sunk into the kiss. With his broad build and height, she felt tiny in his embrace, and when he swept her up into his arms, Noemi found she couldn’t look away from his gaze. Oh, how I want you…
She nodded along the hallway to her bedroom and Rafa walked quickly. In the bedroom, he set her down on her feet, and they embraced again, tenderly this time. Noemi’s fingers, trembling, moved to the buttons of his shirt. She pressed her lips against the skin of his chest, then laid her head against it. She could feel the quick, hammering beat of his heart and she sighed. Her own heart was banging hard against her chest.
Rafa tilted her chin up with a finger and kissed her. “You don’t know how long I’ve waited for this,” he murmured, and a thrill ran through her.
“Rafa…”
“Shh…” He kissed her again and then he was sliding the spaghetti straps of her dress down her shoulders, and the dress fell to the floor.
Rafa sucked in a deep breath. “Christ, you’re exquisite.”
He swept her onto the bed, quickly stripping down to his underwear and covering her body with his. Noemi kissed him hungrily, not wanting to miss a moment of this. She reached down to cup his cock through his underwear, feeling the hot length of it stiffen as she stroked it. Rafa groaned and buried his face in her neck, his lips against her throat. “Noemi…”
She hooked her legs around him, sliding her hands into his dark curls. She made him look up at her. “I want you so much, Rafa. Fuck me, please, just… fuck me.”
He gathered her to him as each explored the other’s body, skin against skin, their gazes locked. Rafa slid her panties down her thighs, moving down her body, his lips trailing down her belly until they found her sex.
Noemi shivered with pleasure as his tongue lashed around her clit. He expertly teased her until it became so unbearably sensitive that the merest flick of his tongue sent powerful waves of ecstasy through her body. Her skin felt like it was on fire, and she begged him to be inside her.
Rafa snagged a condom from his jeans. “Help me with this, would you, my darling?”
My darling… Noemi felt giddy like a teenager, and her fingers were trembling as she rolled the rubber down his huge, thick cock. Rafa smiled down at her as he pushed inside her, and Noemi moaned at the sweet sensation of him filling her.
They moved together, finding their rhythm easily. Rafa’s lips were rough against hers, his need for her seemingly animal and feral. He murmured her name over and over as they made love, and when Noemi felt her climax explode through her body, she gasped, giving a long moan of release. “Oh, Rafa… Rafa…”
His body shuddered with his own orgasm, his green eyes intense as he came, and then as they recovered all-entangled, he smiled down at her. “Hey, beautiful.”
Noemi, much to her eternal embarrassment, burst into tears.
Rafa held her as she sobbed, his lips pressed against her temple. He wasn’t fazed by her tears—it was just as emotional for him. He hadn’t slept with anyone since Thomasina and now, with this beautiful woman in his arms, he knew he had been right to wait. He hadn’t been able to stop thinking about Noemi since that day by Thomasina’s grave. Noemi, so injured, her lovely face etched with guilt and grief… he’d wanted to comfort her, but at Tomi’s grave, and with the wound so raw, he had turned away from her.
Now, he waited until she had cried herself out. “Okay?”
She nodded. “Sorry, I’m so sorry, I don’t know what came over me.”
“It’s okay, baby. This has been… intense.”
She gave a choked laugh. “You can say that again.” She looked up at him, her dark eyes huge. “I’m still not sure it actually happened.”
Rafa laughed. “Trust me… it did.”
She stroked his face. “I can’t stop thinking about you. I wish I could; it just doesn’t seem right. Thomasina…”
“… is gone. There’s nothing for us to feel guilty about. She adored you, Noe. I adore you.” He kissed her. “Look, I loved Tomi with all my heart. Nothing will ever change that. But who says you only get one chance of love in a lifetime?” He sat up, running a hand through his hair. “For a long time, I tried to deny that what I felt for you was anything but a crush. I’m forty years old but when I’m near you, I feel like a teenage boy.”
Noemi curled her body against his, and he wrapped his arms around her. “Rafa… my head is a mess. I just don’t know if I’m good enough for you.”
“Don’t ever say that.”
“I mean it. My head is a nightmare. The accident. Tomi. What I saw in Syria. We have to think about Bepi, what’s good for him. And—” She sat up now. “I’m not sure I can handle the… gossip.”
He looked vaguely confused. “What?”
“If I’m seen to be fraternizing with the man who donated a billion dollars to our hospital…”
Rafa looked at her askance. “Okay, now you’re not making sense. What does that have to do with anything?”
“People could make the link between Thomasina’s death, the donation, the accident, you and I…”
“Listen to me. This is crazy talk. Tomi died two years ago, and it had nothing, nothing to do with your accident. Christ, you nearly died! I saw you when they brought you in, Noe—”
“—you saw me?”
Rafa nodded, his eyes on hers. “They let me sit with you for a while until your family could get to you.”
Noemi stared at him. “I never knew that.”
Rafa smiled sheepishly. “I don’t think your sister approved of me. She thought it was a conflict of interest. Also, I think she thought… no. I don’t know what she thought.”
“Leo?” Noemi shook her head. “Leo can be, let’s say, judgmental. And protective. But she could have mentioned it.”
Rafa cupped her face with his palm. “So…?”
“So, for now… this stays between you and me.”
He nodded. The kid was obviously mixed up and who could blame her? He hadn’t meant to seduce her—guiltily, he’d recalled that he had been at that bar to meet someone on a blind date a friend had set up.
But his dreams had been haunted by Noemi Castor for so long. “If that’s what you want, Noe. You and me. For now.”
Noemi leaned in, obviously relieved, and kissed him. “This is a dream, I swear it is.”
He drew her close, her soft, pillowy breasts against his chest, her fresh, clean scent in his nostrils and the taste of her skin on his lips. “Then let’s keep dreaming. At least for tonight.”
“You don’t have to get back for Bepi?”
“He’s with Tomi’s parents for a few days.”
Right on cue, Mouse gave a plaintiff whine. She had been shut out of the bedroom long enough. Noemi and Rafa laughed. “Hold that thought, gorgeous man.”
Mouse leaped onto the bed as soon as Noemi opened the door and curved her furry body into Rafa’s. Noemi made a face at her dog. “Such a slut, Mousie.”
Rafa grinned at her and patted his other side. “I’m greedy, I want two beautiful girls next to me.”
Because of Mouse’s presence, they didn’t make love again, but chatted until Noemi fell asleep.
Rafa lay awake, gazing at her perfect face. He wondered whether he was doing the right thing; she was so young, so vulnerable, and yet it seemed impossible that they couldn’t be together. Making love to her had been sublime, exhilarating—just being inside her, he was in heaven.
But he could tell the young woman in his arms was damaged, and knowing he was as damaged… was this responsible?
Maybe he should concentrate on getting Noemi’s head right before he looked at himself. Or was that overstepping?
“Hell, I don’t know,” he whispered. Before Tomi, he’d always been terrible at figuring out relationships.
He tightened his arms around Noemi. They’d figure it out. He couldn’t imagine his life without her now.
The man outside the woman’s apartment waited but Rafael Genova did not emerge. So, he was sleeping with the pretty girl—he wondered who she was.
It didn’t matter. If she got in the way, then she’d suffer the same fate as Genova.
Time’s up, beautiful people, he thought, and got back into his car, driving away into the Seattle night.