HE WAS beautiful.
Sam had never imagined using that word to describe a man but as Demetrios stripped off his shirt, she knew it was the only word that suited him.
His shoulders were wide, his arms powerfully muscled. An inverted vee of dark, silky hair stretched over his chest and arrowed down to his navel. Clothed, he’d looked like a man of civility and power but she’d always sensed the darker, more primitive side of him.
Now, as he came towards her, bare-chested, the top button of his jeans undone, his eyes dark and fixed on hers, she knew that this was the real Demetrios Karas. He was a man who took what he wanted—and what he wanted was her.
The realization was more exciting than anything she’d ever known. She could feel her body readying itself for his. Her nipples were tight with desire, her breasts almost aching with it. A heaviness seemed to settle low in her belly.
“Demetrios,” she whispered, as he reached her.
“Yes, sweetheart,” he said softly. “I know. We’ve waited a long time for this.”
She trembled as he slid the robe from her shoulders, moaned when he dipped his head and pressed his lips to her throat. Could he feel the hammer of her pulse against his mouth? He was whispering to her in Greek. She didn’t understand all the words. She didn’t have to. The brush of his hands, the way he clasped her shoulders, was an eloquent language all its own.
His hands cupped her face. When he took her mouth with his, she could taste the dark, smoky passion he held in such tight control. He was being gentle for her but that wasn’t what she wanted. Not from him. She wanted everything he was, everything he could make her feel, and she wound her arms around his neck as she opened her mouth to his and moved against him. He groaned, caught her wrists and brought her hands against his chest. She could feel the tremor of his muscles beneath her fingertips.
“Sam. I don’t want to hurt you, gataki. Your ankle—”
She answered by tugging a hand free, skimming it down his jeans and closing her fingers over his erection, reveling in the life and heat that pulsed at her touch.
“I want this,” she whispered. “I want you, deep inside me.”
He could feel his composure slipping away; he was closer to losing himself than he had been since he was a boy. Quickly, he shucked off his jeans. Sam had a fleeting glimpse of all that magnificent male power, and then she was in his arms again, with his mouth on her breast, suckling her, nipping her, tonguing her until suddenly she gave a high, keening cry and she came, came just from this.
Demetrios held her to him as she arched against him, her cries almost feral in their intensity, and even though he was shaking he told himself not to let go. Not yet. He wanted more, to know that she was lost to the world, to rational thought, to everything but him. Only him, and he swept his hand down her body, cupped the strip of silk between her thighs.
“No more,” she moaned, “I can’t…”
But she could. He took her higher and higher, pressing one finger into the silk, into the soft cleft of her womanhood, seeking and finding the sweet, engorged bud that awaited him. He tore the silk away, touched her, stroked her, bent to her and took her mouth so that her cries became part of him.
The pulse of her climax rocketed through him. He was damp with sweat; his muscles trembling. Still he held back, watching her, exulting in what he had done to her, for her, and then he entered her, moved, moved again. This time, when she sobbed his name, Demetrios let go and followed Sam into a spiraling explosion of light.
* * *
Sam didn’t move. She never wanted to move again.
She’d never experienced anything like what had just happened. All that passion. All that heat. And now, this. Lying beneath Demetrios, his mouth at her throat, his arms hard around her, his body pressing against hers…
Her blood still hummed with pleasure. She sighed, ran her hands down his back, luxuriating in the firmness of his muscles, the dampness of his skin. Long moments slipped past. Then he lifted his head, kissed her temple and began to move away.
She tightened her arms around him. “No. Don’t go.”
“I’m too heavy for you,” he said softly.
“I like the feel of you against me.” She kissed his throat. “Stay here. Please.”
She had said almost the same thing to him last night and he would no more have left her then than he would now. Holding her, he rolled to his side, cradling her against him so they still touched, breast to breast, belly to belly. Gently, he slid his hand under her knee, lifted her leg and brought it across his hip.
“Does your ankle hurt?”
“What ankle?” Sam laughed softly. “You’re much better for aches and pains than codeine.”
Demetrios smiled, threaded his fingers into her hair and kissed the tip of her nose. “I’m sure the medical journals would be pleased to learn that, gataki. Seriously, are you all right? I promised the doctor I’d take good care of you.”
“And you have.” She smiled as she stroked his dark hair from his forehead. “You’ve kept me off my foot, haven’t you?”
“Mmm.” He bent his head to her breast, licked the nipple until it pebbled. “I told him it would take great effort, that you would need to be kept occupied.”
Sam gave a soft moan as he slipped his hand between her thighs. “Great effort,” she whispered.
Demetrios lifted his head and looked at her face. Her skin was flushed, her lips parted with desire as he caressed her. He felt his hardened flesh stir, his arousal heighten with the need to make love to her again.
“Shall I think of a way to keep you busy?” he said softly.
“I think…” Her lips parted for his kiss. “I think that’s a fine—”
He kissed her slowly, deeply, and moved over her again. She saw the intensity in his eyes, the way the bones in his face stood out in stark relief, and something hot and dangerous skittered in her blood, something that was more than desire, more than she was ready for.
He kissed her again, kissed her breasts, her belly. She wanted to tell him to stop. She wanted to tell him never to stop, to go on making love to her until neither of them could move.
“Demetrios,” she whispered, her voice breaking, and what he heard in the way she sighed his name shook him to the depths of his soul.
“Samantha. O kalóz mou,” he said, as he put his hands under her, lifted her to his mouth, tasted the honeyed sweetness that was for him. Only for him. She came, hard and fast, and he moved up her body as she did, slid deep inside her and took her up and up again until she was weeping with the beauty of what she felt, with the knowledge that this was all she’d ever wanted, this man, this one man, forever…
Sam stopped thinking and gave herself up to Demetrios’s possession.
* * *
She awoke alone in his bed.
Hours had passed; late afternoon sunlight streamed into the room, filling it with a hot golden glow.
Sam stretched, yawned, caught her breath as she inadvertently flexed her ankle. The rest of her felt wonderful. She smiled and flung her arms over her head. She’d imagined how it would be, to make love with Demetrios, but nothing she’d imagined came anywhere near the truth. He was an incredible lover. Wild. Tender. Demanding. Generous. Just remembering made her body grow warm and soft with need.
Sam rolled onto her belly.
But she’d complicated things. She knew that. Yesterday, he’d been her employer. Now, he was her lover. The delicate balance between man and woman had changed. What would happen now? What would he expect?
She’d always been careful to keep the personal part of her life separate from the professional. Men had a way of thinking that sexual intimacy gave them the right to take over your existence. It was only logical that sleeping with the man you worked with would make things even more difficult.
Of course, some women seemed to enjoy having a protective male hovering over them. If that was their thing, fine. Sam couldn’t understand it, but who was she to sit in judgment? But to fall in love with a man like that…
Fall in love? Where had that come from?
Frowning, she sat up and pushed her hair back from her face. What had happened in this bed had nothing to do with love. Love was an illusion. A pleasant one, for as long as it lasted, but as far as she could see it was just a way of pretending you hadn’t offered your independence up like a gift.
There wasn’t much difference between a man’s involvement in a woman’s life and his eventual domination of it. She’d come close to telling that to Carin once. Her sister had been cheerfully explaining that she’d like to come to New York for a visit but first she’d have to check with Rafe.
“You need his permission?” Sam had said and even though she’d tried to mask her distaste, she knew she hadn’t succeeded because Carin had laughed and said no, of course she didn’t.
“But I wouldn’t just take off without discussing it with him, Sam. Surely, you can understand that.”
“What I understand,” Sam had replied, “is that there was a time you thought for yourself.”
“I’m going to let that pass because I love you,” Carin had said, still laughing but with an edge to her tone. “Rafe would do the same thing for me. We have a responsibility to each other. We don’t live separate lives. Nobody does, once they’re married. Not if the marriage is going to work.”
Not if you didn’t mind signing your life over to a man, was what she’d meant, but Sam had decided to keep quiet. What her sisters called responsibility, she called dependency but, hey, if Carin and Amanda wanted to delude themselves into calling it love, who was she to spoil things for them?
And what on earth was she doing, plunging into such deep philosophical water this morning? She’d made love with Demetrios. She hadn’t fallen in love with him. It was just that she’d never gone to bed with a man like him before. There was something about the way he’d taken charge that was different. There was no harm in admitting that to herself. They’d been equals in this bed but a little part of her had always been aware of the differences, of his strength and her softness, his masculinity and her femininity. He’d been gentle one moment, fierce the next. And he’d made her feel something—something she’d never sensed in herself before, something that lurked just at the edge of logic and made her heartbeat quicken, even now.
Whoa. First philosophy, then introspection. Enough, she thought, and tossed back the covers. Demetrios’s robe lay at the foot of the bed. She grabbed it and put it on.
What she’d just experienced was the best sex of her life. Why try and put a gloss to something so basic? She wasn’t a woman who’d ever shied away from the truth; she’d never been silly enough to think sex was only a matter of connecting Body Part A and Body Part B. Emotion was everything. You had to like a man, respect him, to sleep with him, but you certainly didn’t have to dream of forever after.
“Sam?”
The sound of Demetrios’s voice startled her. She turned and saw him standing in the doorway. He was wearing his jeans but his chest was bare; the stubble on his jaw had darkened. He was glowering at her and she knew it was because she was sitting up, with both her feet on the floor, that she’d ignored what he thought was advice and she considered orders…and she couldn’t work up the anger she knew his attitude deserved.
All she could think of was that she wanted him again, with a need that was frightening.
What had she gotten herself into?
He was all wrong for her. If a fairy godmother had suddenly dropped from the sky and said, “Here you go, Sam, take this pen and paper and make up a list of the things you want in a man,” nothing on that list would remotely describe him. He was too good-looking. Good-looking men were conceited and if he didn’t seem to be, now that she’d gotten to know him, surely it was only a matter of time before she discovered that he was.
Besides, he was too everything else. Macho. Demanding. Possessive. He was a man who’d drive her crazy, wanting to protect her from everything…
And she was as wrong for him as he was for her.
Was that why they’d wanted each other so badly? She’d never been with a man like him, and she’d have bet every dollar she owned that she was the exact opposite of any of the women he knew. She wasn’t docile. She had her own life. She made her own decisions, and she’d never, ever be content to live in a man’s shadow—except, that was already happening.
One night in Demetrios’s bed, one morning as his lover, and he was in charge. She was damned near a prisoner in his room. No clothes. No cane. No choice but to be completely dependent on him, and now he was closing the door, standing there with his arms folded and a look on his face as if she’d committed the crime of the century, all because she’d decided not to wait for him to tell her it was okay to swing her feet to the floor.
“Surely, you know better than to try and put weight on that foot,” he said.
“Surely, you know better than to tell me what to do.”
His eyebrows rose. He looked at her as if she’d lost her mind but if she had, she’d recovered it.
“And you might have knocked before coming into the room. I know this is your bedroom, but—”
“What has this to do with bedrooms? You cannot put weight on that leg.”
“I’m not an idiot, Demetrios. I’ll be careful.”
“You are an idiot, if you think I’m going to permit you to stand up.”
“Permit me?” Sam lurched to her feet. Her ankle popped. The sound was so loud and hideous that she felt her stomach rise into her throat but she forced herself not to so much as flinch. “I don’t require your permission. Not for anything.”
“Sam.” He smiled as he came towards her. She could almost see the gears turning inside that handsome, all-too-sure-of-itself head. If scolding a kitten didn’t work, you tried kindness. “I understand, sweetheart.”
“You couldn’t possibly.”
“But I do. Your ankle hurts. You feel irritable. You need a change of scene.”
“Yes, and I’m going to have one.” She took a breath, gritted her teeth, reached for the back of a chair and hobbled towards it. “Thank you for everything, but—”
“Get back in the bed, Samantha.”
The smile was gone. His face might have been carved from marble. So much for kindness.
“No.”
“I leave you for five minutes, and what happens?”
“I took my life back,” she said brusquely, “that’s what happens.”
“And what is that supposed to mean?”
“Look, I’m very grateful for all your help, but—”
“Grateful?”
“Yes. You’ve been very kind, Demetrios, but—”
“First, you thank me. Now you tell me that I have been very kind.” His voice was low and filled with warning. “Perhaps you would like to shake my hand.”
“I’m only trying to tell you that—that I’m—”
“Grateful. So you said.” His eyes narrowed until she could see only a flash of stormy blue. “Is that why you slept with me? Out of gratitude?”
“You get the hell out of here!”
“It’s a reasonable assumption. Perhaps it’s simpler to roll around under a man than to write a thank-you note.”
She sprang at him, her fist balled and drawn back, but he caught her in his arms before she could take a swing.
“Damn you!” Struggling against him was useless but she struggled anyway, until she was panting with frustration. “Put me down!”
“Where? In your cottage, away from me? Or perhaps you’d prefer I send for a taxi to take you to the airport so you can fly back to the States. Would putting five thousand miles between us make you feel safe?”
“Safe? Safe? What’s that supposed to mean?”
“You know precisely what it means,” he growled. “You are afraid.”
“I’ve never been afraid of anything in my life!”
Demetrios looked down into Sam’s flushed face. Dammit, how could she turn him into a crazy man with just a couple of words? He was always good with women, calm even in the face of their admittedly mercurial temperaments, but he couldn’t seem to keep his anger leashed with this one.
“You’re afraid of me,” he said.
“Afraid? Of you? Trust me, mister, you flatter yourself if you imagine I’m the least bit intimidated by your temper or your money or your size. And if you don’t let go of me—”
He muttered a word in Greek, bent his head and took her mouth with his. When she gasped and tried to twist away, he sank his hand into her hair and kept her where he wanted her until he was good and ready to end the kiss. This was what she needed. A man she couldn’t order around. A man who could dominate her, control her…
Want her with each breath, each beat of his heart.
“That’s what you’re afraid of,” he said roughly. “Me, and what I make you feel.”
Sam glared at him. “You’re insane.”
“If I am, it’s your doing.”
“You see? You really are—you really are—”
He kissed her again, this time gently, his mouth moving softly against hers. When he drew back, there were tears in her eyes.
“I hate you,” she said unsteadily. “I really, really hate—”
He kissed her again and she moaned, put her arms around him and kissed him back. By the time they tumbled to the bed together, her legs were around his hips and he was sheathed deep inside her.
The world, and everything in it, no longer existed.
There was only this room, and each other.
* * *
Demetrios stirred, groaned, opened his eyes, then shut them again.
“I think I’m dying,” he said.
Sam laughed softly. She lay in the curve of his arm, her body sprawled over his. “Can you guess what I’m thinking?”
“I’m afraid to ask,” he said, but she could hear the smile in his voice.
“Not that.” She folded her hands on the swell of his chest and propped her chin on her knuckles. “You haven’t shaved.”
“I will, as soon as I recover. Say, in five or ten years.”
“That wasn’t a complaint. I like the feel of your beard.”
“It’s stubble.”
“What’s the difference?”
“My father had a beard. I have stubble.”
She traced the hard line of his jaw with one finger. It drifted close to his mouth and he caught it between his teeth and sucked gently. “And if you keep doing that, my recovery may take less time than I thought.”
“Don’t you want to know what I’m thinking?”
He could feel her body growing softer, more pliant. His was hardening. How was that possible? He’d lost count of how many times they’d made love.
“I already know,” he said, and moved his hips.
She kissed his chest. He could feel her mouth curve in a smile.
“What I’m thinking about is…let’s see. First, a shower.”
“Mmm.” Demetrios gathered her closer in his arms, stroked one hand the length of her spine. “That can be arranged.”
“And then—” She sighed. His touch made her want to curl up against him. It also made her want to ravish him. Could you do both at once? It was an interesting postulate. “And then,” she murmured, “I want something to eat.”
“Uh-huh.” He trailed a hand over her bottom, loving the sweet curves that were warm beneath his palm. “Would that involve whipped cream?”
Sam laughed. “It involves a big steak. Or a dozen scrambled eggs. Or even a peanut butter sandwich.”
“Peanut butter.” He shuddered. “I knew I’d finally learn something terrible about you.” He slid his hands up to her shoulders, raised her towards him and kissed her. “Are you telling me you need sustenance, madam?”
“Such a clever man.”
He kissed her again, more deeply. “At this very moment? Or could you wait for just a little while?”
She sat up, her knees on either side of his hips, her smile filled with temptation. “I’m not sure,” she said softly. “Would you like to explain my options?”
God, how he loved to look at her. Especially when they made love. When he cupped her breasts, as he was doing now. Stroked her aroused flesh. He loved the way her eyes turned black. The way her breathing quickened. The way her skin took on a glaze, like the petals of a cream-colored rose under the kiss of early morning dew.
She was beautiful, this woman rising above him like a goddess.
He rolled his thumbs across her nipples. She sighed his name and he ran his hand over her belly, tried to decide which he wanted more, to enter her again or just to pull her down into his arms and kiss her sweet, swollen mouth.
What was happening to him?
He was hardly a sexual novice. There’d been women in his life since Christmas vacation in his fifteenth year when his father had given him a Lamborghini he was too young to drive and the upstairs maid had given him herself, which he wasn’t. He knew all about sex and took modest pride in knowing he’d never failed to please a woman, but to want one with such ceaseless yearning? To make love to her over and over, and then to find himself erect and wanting her again, when his brain told him such a thing was anatomically impossible?
Why question such a miracle?
And yet he’d questioned it this morning. He’d awakened with Sam in his arms and his mind, and the joy he’d felt had scared the hell out of him.
He’d never wanted a woman to the exclusion of everything else. He’d canceled today’s meeting, made, instead, tentative plans for lunch…and forgotten all about them, now that he thought about it. That was what he’d come upstairs to tell Sam, that the morning had been wonderful and he wanted her to stay here and rest while he went into Piraeus, to meet with his colleagues…and then he’d stepped into the room, found her on her feet and ready to do battle, and he’d been torn between wanting to shake her until her teeth rattled and kissing her until she understood—
Understood what? Hell, he didn’t understand. How could she?
He only knew that ships and shipyards didn’t matter, when he could have this. This, he thought, groaning as she put her hand on him, stroked him from the tip to the base of his straining erection. And this, he thought, as he clasped her hips, lifted her, then slowly brought her down onto his rigid flesh. Her head fell back; her shudder seemed to go straight through his bloodstream, into his heart.
“Sam,” he said, “Sam…”
The words were so close, so near, but he let them spin away. Let the world spin away, in a torrent of sensation.
* * *
He was almost unbearably gentle when he unwound the elastic bandage.
“Does this hurt?” he kept asking, “Does that?”
“No,” Sam told him, but he didn’t believe her and finally she threatened to hobble into the shower on her own.
He swung her into his arms, carried her into the bathroom, fussed over giving her a few minutes of privacy.
“Call me if you feel weak,” he said, and Sam rolled her eyes and said the only thing that would make her feel weak would be the sight of a peanut butter sandwich instead of a rare steak and a huge baked potato within the next half hour.
When she was done, Demetrios carried her into the shower though she insisted she was perfectly capable of getting there on her own.
“No,” he replied, in a tone that would have set her hackles on end just a little while ago.
He bathed her and that took time, lots of time, because there were so many sweet, hidden places that needed his very personal attention. Eventually, he wrapped a towel around his waist, wrapped one around her, and carried her to the bedroom where she was surprised to see some of her own clothes—underwear, shorts, T-shirt—lying on the neatly made bed.
“I phoned down to Cosimia, while you were in the bathroom,” he said with a studied nonchalance that made Sam’s nerve endings go on alert.
“Oh.” She sank down on the edge of the bed, clutching at the towel. It was ridiculous to feel modest but she did. Cosimia knew they were lovers? She would, of course; they’d been in this room for hours. Still, she wasn’t accustomed to sharing bits of her private life with others. “It was kind of her to bring me something to wear.”
Demetrios nodded. He seemed nervous. Sam wondered why.
“It is warm out,” he said.
Yes, definitely nervous. There was that accent of his again. It came and went like the tide.
“So the shorts should be fine, but it you prefer something else…”
“No, no. This is perfect. There’s no reason for Cosimia to go all the way back to the guest cottage.”
“She would not have to.” He took a breath. “All of your things are here.”
Sam stared at him blankly. “What do you mean?”
“I mean that I told her to pack everything.” He waved towards the wall of closets. “Your clothing is there, kitten. So if you wish to choose something else to wear—”
“But why? I live in—”
“This is where you will live, from now on. In this house. This room. With me.”
His tone had become tight and cool. She knew he expected a fight and that she was damned well going to oblige him.
“Did it ever occur to you to ask me if that was what I wanted?”
“No.” Demetrios folded his arms and looked down at her, his expression shuttered. “It did not.”
She wanted to hit him. She’d never hit anybody in her life—well, not unless you counted the Riley kid—and now, twice within who knew how long, she’d wanted to slug Demetrios Karas. This was exactly what she’d been afraid of, that he’d make all kinds of assumptions just because they’d slept together.
“Well, it should have because I’d have said, no, I do not want to share your room. I do not want you making decisions for me. I do not want—”
“What you want,” he said, squatting down before her and clasping her shoulders, “is me. And I want you. Why is that so difficult to admit?”
“Do not, for even a moment, assume you can think for me!” Sam pushed against his chest. “I have never once lived with a man, and I’m not about to start now.”
“Nor have I lived with a woman.”
“I’ll bet. You really want me to believe you’ve never had a woman unpack her things and settle in here?”
“Absolutely. No woman has awakened in this bed until today.”
“You’ve never had a mistress?”
He took a deep breath. “Yes, I have had mistresses.” He felt her tense under his hands and he held her harder, determined to make her listen. “But they have not lived with me. I have not awakened in the morning and shared breakfast with them in this house. I have not gone to sleep at night in my own bed, knowing that the woman who will be in my arms the next morning will have a shiny face free of makeup. I have never wanted that.”
“And now you do?” Sam’s voice shook and she hated herself for it, for wanting to believe him and wanting to throw herself into his arms when she knew, she knew, that it was a terrible mistake.
“Yes, o kalóz mou, I do.”
His arms went around her but she held herself rigid. She could almost see her life shifting, the path that had once run straight and smooth already taking a twisting turn.
“What does that mean? What you just called me? Kalóz mou.”
“It means ‘beloved,’” he said softly, and kissed her, and what could she do after that but put her arms around his neck and kiss him back?