One Summer at The Villa: The Prince's Royal Concubine / Her Italian Soldier / A Devilishly Dark Deal

Until Cristiano began the sweet torture again.

Twice more she gasped his name into the candlelit air, her body shivering and melting and reforming in the aftermath of stunning climaxes.

“Do you still wish to go forward?” he asked a few moments later.

She opened her eyes to look at him. At his handsome face, his concerned expression. She had the feeling that if she said no, he would stop right now.

And he’d be in agony, she was certain. Because she would have been, had she not reached her peak three times already.

“Show me more, Cristiano.”

“Grazie a Dio,” he said. “With pleasure.”

He stretched out beside her, used his fingers to stoke her passions again. She was no longer surprised at how quickly he was able to push her toward completion.

Just when she was ready to come for a fourth time, he stopped and retrieved a condom from a pocket in his suitcase. She tried not to imagine why he carried condoms with him. And yet he was irresistible to women, as she’d heard more than once. No doubt it was wise to always be prepared. But it took a little of the joy out of it for her, knowing this wasn’t his first time and wasn’t in any way special to him.

It was just sex.

And isn’t that what you wanted?

It was. She had no right to get upset because this was a casual encounter to him.

“Antonella,” he said, the sexy timbre of his voice stroking into her razor-sharp senses. “You are thinking too hard again.”

She blinked up at him. How did he always know? “It’s nothing.”

“Do you want to stop?”

“No,” she replied honestly. She really didn’t. Her body, while satisfied, was still keyed up in a very elemental way that she knew would never be fully appeased until he was inside her.

He leaned forward and kissed her again. “I was hoping you would say that. But if you change your mind…”

“I won’t,” she said, winding her arms around his neck to kiss him back.

Very quickly, the heat and need fanned higher until all she wanted was him. The past didn’t matter. The future wasn’t a guarantee. Now, right now, was all they had.

“Cristiano, please…” Her body was achy, ready. She reached between them, grasped that hot, hard part of him she wanted.

He gasped. “Cara, you will undo me before we begin—”

“Then we need to begin.”

Cristiano swore, but he rolled the condom into place in a quick, smooth motion. And then he settled between her thighs. The weight of him, the hot press of his skin against hers, the blunt tip of his manhood sliding into her wet heat—

It was so much to process, and yet she didn’t want to miss a single moment of it in her rush to fulfillment. She closed her eyes, tried to feel everything at once.

“This will probably hurt.”

“I know,” she breathed. “It’s okay.”

“Look at me.”

She did. Cristiano smiled at her, and she felt as if she’d suddenly swallowed the sun whole. It was both a frightening and exhilarating feeling.

“Thank you for trusting me,” he said. “I hope you will not regret this moment.”

“Kiss me…”

He did, so gently her heart turned inside out. A second later, he pushed forward, sliding into her so far that she knew she was no longer a virgin. The pain was less than she’d expected, but startling enough that she cried out. He drank in her cry, then lifted himself on his elbows and gazed down at her.

“You are okay?”

She tilted her hips, getting used to the size and feel of him. Sensation blazed through her with each small movement.

“I—” She swallowed, tried again. “It’s amazing, Cristiano. I had no idea.”

His laugh was rusty. “Dio santo, it is a crime. And yet I am thankful I am the first.”

Slowly, he retreated—and then he slid forward again, filling her more fully than before. Her scalp tingled. Her toes. Everywhere, there was heat. Heat and awareness that she’d never known existed.

Yet he was so careful she wanted to scream. Innately, she knew she could take more. Wanted more. Antonella tilted her hips up to meet him and Cristiano growled low in his throat. The sound thrilled her.

He began to move faster, though he took his time to do so. She knew he was being careful with her, trying to make sure he didn’t hurt her, and her heart soared with the knowledge.

Soon, he anchored an arm behind her back, tilted her hips even higher—and Antonella gasped. How could it possibly get any better?

“Yes, Antonella,” Cristiano purred, his voice like a sizzling brand in her psyche, “like that. Move like that. Dio, yes.”

“Kiss me again,” she pleaded, surprised at how badly she wanted him to, and at how fast she was spiraling toward a culmination that she sensed would be bigger than the last.

Cristiano’s lips fused with hers, his tongue mingling with hers. He tasted of sweat and of her—earthy, sensual, and so overwhelmingly male she wondered how she’d ever thought she’d been kissed before he’d first kissed her.

Her climax hit her with a force that stole her breath away. She wrenched her mouth from Cristiano’s, shocked at the speed and intensity with which her release hit her. She’d had warning the last time, a gathering of tension into a tighter and tighter knot—yet this time, the tension imploded in a flash, rocketing outward again in a blinding burst of sensation that had her crying his name in wonder and surprise.

“Antonella, mia bellisima Principessa,” he said between wet kisses to her throat, her jaw, her lips. “You amaze me. So beautiful, so sensual.”

She couldn’t speak. It took too much effort just to breathe, to recover.

Cristiano’s hips moved, and she realized he was still hard. Still ready. They weren’t finished yet. The thought made her shiver in anticipation.

“Please,” she whispered when she had the power of speech again. “Please…”

His gaze was raw—tormented?—but his eyes were suddenly hooded, as if he realized he’d shown too much emotion.

“Anything you desire, cara mia,” he said. And then he began to move.

It didn’t take long before she was gasping at the top of another peak. Cristiano’s climax followed hard on the heels of her own as he gripped her hips and ground his body into her one last time.