Текст книги "Italian Kisses"

Автор книги: Lucy Lambert

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He took me silence as a tacit agreement with him. "I think that maybe we've both made some mistakes. But are they really worth throwing this away?"

This time I did turn to face him. Passion had flushed his skin. His hair was in slight disarray, as though he'd forgotten to roll the windows up in his rush to get over here.

Despite the fight, I felt myself run hot and cold for him. Maybe my body knew something my heart and mind didn't. I tried to ignore it.

"What is it that you think we have? You've known me for, what, a week and half? Newsflash, we have nothing."

"You're wrong," he said, "I am good at seeing people for who and what they are. And I knew as soon as I saw you that you are different, special. I knew that instantly. And I know now that it's something worth fighting for, something worth nurturing. Something so not worth throwing away like this. Look me in the eye and tell me you don't feel the same damn thing."

I burned for an answer, for some quick quip to rock him back on his heels. None came. Because the truth was, as soon as I looked him in the eye I knew that I couldn't say that I didn't.

And I could tell that he knew that I couldn't, too. That galled me.

Except then the door swung open again. This time it disgorged the rather squat figure of Mrs. Rosselini. She had her hair pulled back into its usual tight bun, a bit of netting over that to keep stray strands from getting into the dough.

Smudges of flour dusted her bared forearms, her white apron, and most notably from the large wooden rolling pin she clutched confidently in one hand, in prime clobbering position.

"Get out," she said to Liam. She squinted up at him, not caring about the way she had to arch her neck to do so, not caring that Liam was more than head-and-shoulders taller than her.

"Madam, please, this isn't what you think. I would never..."

"Go," Mrs. Rosselini said. She shook the rolling pin for emphasis, some flour dust floating and eddying to the floor.

Even my heart melted at that. And no matter how part of me would feel oh so satisfied at watching him catch a couple good whacks, I knew that wouldn't be right.

Even I couldn't help but smile at the sudden maternal display.

"It is okay, Mrs. Rosselini. We were just having a discussion. It's okay. But thank you, really."

"You cannot trust the handsome ones," she said, still squinting up at Liam, who still wasn't certain how to react to her, "My husband, he was handsome. But the handsome, it goes away with the years. Then you see what is left behind. Yes, then you will see."

She prodded Liam in the shoulder with the rounded handle of the pin. It left an irregular flour smudge on the fine tailored jacket that had me cringing.

Liam could have easily shooed her back down the stairs, rolling pin or not. But he didn't. And then I got an inkling of what I would see should the years ever take from him his "handsome," as Mrs. Rosselini put it.

In order to defuse the situation I had to get up and lead Mrs. Rosselini back to the door, assuring her as she went slowly down the stairs that I could take care of myself. She smelled of fresh baked bread and the icing sugar she used on some of the pastries.

"Take it," she said, offering me the rolling pin, more flour dust floating away from it.

"I will be fine," I insisted, waving away the offer. I listened with some amusement as she mumbled a few particularly colorful Italian curses as she rounded the corner. The door to her shop opened and closed and I knew Liam and I were alone again.

My anger rekindled when I turned and saw Liam there still. There was the ghost of a smile on his laps. Enough of one to stir the embers of my anger.

"That was... unexpected," Liam said, his anger also apparently deflated in the face of Mrs. Rosselini's display. He wiped at the smudge of flour on his jacket.

"Next time I won't send her away," I said.

"So there will be a next time, then?"

I grabbed my messenger bag from my bed, slung it over my shoulder. The weight of the books had it biting into my skin, but I didn't mind. Seeing Mrs. Rosselini disappear at the bottom of the staircase had given me an idea. And Liam here was a perfect excuse to leave my suddenly cramped flat.

"Not any time soon. I am still angry with you," I replied.

He'd moved so that he stood in front of the door, so that I'd have to get past him to leave. I shouldered him aside, Liam taking a step back to maintain his balance. I grabbed the latch and yanked the door open.

"Don't go," he said.

"Don't try and stop me."

He grabbed my upper arm as I set foot on the landing, his grip not quite painful, but close.

"Let me go," I said, baring my teeth.

"I'm not letting you slide back into your rut, all comfortable in your misery again. I care about you, Emma."

I tugged at his grip, but he held firm. That fire started inside of me again. No one, it seemed, could make me run as hot and cold as Liam Montgomery could.

"Let. Go!" I said, tearing savagely.

"Not until we finish this conversation." He tugged me closer. Close so that I could smell the musk of his aftershave, see the wild glint in his baby blue eyes, the way his pulse pounded in his throat.

I grabbed the loose knot of his tie, squeezing it so hard my knuckles went white. I couldn't believe the nerve he had, not letting me go, grabbing me like that. Looking at me with eyes so blue they should have been frozen but instead burned with an incredible intensity.

I don't know who pulled the other closer, me or him. Maybe it was both of us at the same time.

In any case, it came to the same result. One moment we stared each other down, the next I felt the heat of his mouth pressed against mine, his arm snaking around my waist to pull my body against his.

I kissed him just as hard as he kissed me, pulling his bottom lip between my teeth and relishing the way he groaned when I bit down on him.

That fire inside me I'd mistaken for rage earlier was something else. Desire. My inner thighs burned with the heat of it.

"This doesn't mean anything," I said, my chest and shoulders suddenly heaving as I gulped in air, trying to meet my body's increased demand.

My breath hitched in my throat when I felt how much he wanted me, too.

"Keep telling yourself that," he replied.

"Just shut up and kiss me." I grabbed the back of his head, my fingers squeezing cruelly when I pulled his face to mine again.

He wrenched my messenger bag off my arm and threw it to the other side of the room. Then he started tearing at my clothes. Rather, we began tearing at each other's clothes.

His jacket dropped into the flour dust on the floor, not caring about it one bit. He popped the button on my jeans and then shoved his hands down the back of my pants, manhandling me, picking me up off the ground, his fingers digging hard into my ass with the sudden ferocity of his desire.

Somehow, I had the presence of mind to reach out and swing the open door shut before inquiring eyes could see what all the commotion was about. More surprising, I remembered to throw the deadbolt into place as well.

But then all bets were off.

He had me stripped down entirely seemingly before I could blink again. His mouth found my throat, leaving a trail of hot, wet love nips that traveled down to the spot where my shoulder joined my neck, all the while trying to strip out of his own clothes.

It was like all those pent up feelings, all that angry and frustration, all chose that moment to burst out. And there was only one thing to quench that fire.

He managed to shrug and step and shake out of everything without dropping me. My legs fit so perfectly around his waist, and he held me there effortlessly.

I'd already thrown his hair into disarray, running my fingers through it as our faces moved this way and that while we kissed.

And then his mouth moved lower, enveloping one nipple so hot and erect it hurt. I sucked in a breath at the heat of his mouth, at the way his tongue rubbed against my sensitive flesh.

He wasn't stingy with his desire, either, moving from one nipple to the other, then kissing up between my heaving breasts. His lips moved up my throat, then found my mouth again even as he bore me down onto the bed.

It creaked alarmingly beneath us, but didn't give. Not that I think it would have mattered. We nearly beyond any sort of control by that point.

Every instant we spent not together tore at me. My need was real, palpable. Painful in its intensity. I nearly took him right then and there, and damn the consequences.

He, somehow (I still don't know), pulled his mouth away from where he worried at the sensitive skin of my throat. "Where?"

I managed the barest of nods towards my tiny nightstand which had somehow not fallen over when we fell onto the mattress.

My back arched beneath him, my body writhing and my hips grinding back against the mattress. Every instant without him inside of me was agony. Delicious, suspenseful agony.

He found the foil wrapper in the narrow drawer of the end table. Tearing it, he rolled the contents down his length.

Then I grabbed him and guided him inside of me, impatience demanding immediate action. He groaned at my touch, the noise deepening into a growl as he sunk himself into me.

My ankles locked at the small of his back, keeping him captive inside of me. My back arched again as he filled me, the feeling of it bordering on that razor line between pleasure and pain.

His arm shot around my waist, keeping me arched like that while his mouth again slid down to envelope one nipple and then the other. He sucked until I hissed, then moved to the other.

I ran my fingernails over his broad shoulder blades again and again, every tingle and shudder of pleasure he wrung from me makes me scratch him harder. He liked it, the strong muscles of his core slamming our bodies together again and again, pounding me into submission beneath him.

When I came I grabbed my pillow and stuffed it into my mouth, stifling the scream and the little groans and whimpers that followed.

Liam tore it away from me so that he could kiss me, riding me hard through my climax.

Given the intensity of our flaming passion, it lived a short life. We writhed together until again every muscle in me began clenching as my second orgasm wracked my body.

Liam lost control then, too, flinching at the intense pleasure of that moment, throbbing inside me again and again.

He rolled off me perspiring and shaky, his arm hanging over the side of the narrow bed. I was in worse shape, my toes refusing to unclench, beads of sweat rolling down from my temples, wetting my hair, darkening it with moisture.

"I think we understand each other, now," he said.

"I think so," I replied, rolling onto my side. He put his arm beneath my neck, and I rested my cheek against his chest.

Right away I heard it. Thump-thump, thump-thump. As strong and vital a sound as I'd ever encountered. Also comforting and real, so real. Liam was there with me.

Not the Mr. Liam Montgomery the world saw, the billionaire playboy who seemed to go through women like a scythe through wheat, or the Liam who'd taken the business world by storm.

No, none of the ones the public could claim familiarity with.

This was the real Liam, the one left when you stripped away all those facades. This was the Liam who'd tried to find the wisdom hidden in the bronze eyes of Marcus Aurelius, the Liam who'd held me while I shared the most painful experience of my life with him.

And this Liam was mine. Just as surely as I was his.

Chapter 10

Isabella and I sat at one of the tables in the quad outside the building where I had a class coming up in half an hour.

It was a nice day. Lots of sun. Slightly cool with the encroachment of fall. More a threat of coolness than an actual presence. The air even had those hints of the changing seasons in it.

Lately, over the past week, I'd found myself observing people more. Watching the way they interacted, the little intricacies of their lives.

The Romans around me, for instance, they seemed to be always doing one of two things: eating or arguing. Sometimes both at the same time. It was clear to me why so much history happened here, why so much art had been created on between, and around the city's seven hills.

They were a passionate people, and they let it show. When I say they spent so much time arguing, I don't mean that as a criticism, either. They did it in a loving way, and more often than not those arguments ended in laughter, or food. Both, usually.

Mercurial was the best term I could come up with. They flowed from one extreme to the other quickly and smoothly.

It was beautiful, really. So beautiful it was almost frightening, and definitely overwhelming. But then again, I'd begun to learn that just because something was frightening or overwhelming it didn’t mean that I couldn't stand up to it.

"Again, you look so happy," Isabella said. I realized that she'd been studying me while I'd been studying everyone else around us. Today was English day, the crude, Germanic language lent a lyrical quality by her accent.

I looked at her. "What does it mean when your heart skips a beat when someone steps into the room?"

She blinked as though the answer were as obvious as the smile on my face, and I suppose that it was. "Love. What else could it mean?"

My heart did more than skip a beat when Liam walked into the room. It broke free of the constraints of my ribs and danced. It did its best to launch itself up my throat.

But then, Isabella's answer frightened me. It wasn't possible to fall in love with another person so quickly, was it?

"I think I may have," I said.

"Have what?"

"Fallen for him."

"I am happy you have finally seen this," Isabella said, a small smile parting her perfect and full lips. Out here under the Roman sun she seemed to glow.

It was such an apt term, I realized. Falling in love. Just closing my eyes now was enough to give the barest hint of vertigo, as though I stood on the lip of a tall cliff and could sense the gulf of empty air so close to me.

And while that, too, was frightening, it was a tempered fear. I knew that Liam would be down at the bottom of any drop to catch me, and I, him.

But at the same time, it seemed as though all I needed to do was jump and I'd be flying away, soaring through the clouds. Like nothing could drag me down.

No one ever said that how you feel has to make sense.

"How are your courses?" Isabella said, deliberately ignoring a handsome, dark-haired young man who'd tried to get her attention.

That single question was enough to put some lead weights into my wings. I grimaced.

"Not great," I said.

Isabella frowned, dark eyebrows knitting together so that a small dimple formed between them. "How could that be? Haven't you been working harder?"

"Yeah, I have." Tendrils of worry formed in my stomach to accompany the lead in my wings. "That paper on Giulio Romano came back with a sixty."

Isabella blinked again. The dimple between her eyebrows deepened. "That cannot be correct. Maybe your mind saw a nine and flipped it to a six?" She made a quick flipping motion with her forefingers.

"No, it was definitely six-zero."

I understood her confusion. I'd had her read that paper for me. She'd given me a few tips for revisions that I thought really made the work stand on its own legs. I'd been expecting an 85 at the very least. And like I said before, Isabella was at least as smart as she was beautiful, and a grad student to boot. She knew her stuff and she'd given good feedback.

I'd pretty much gone into shock when I got the essay back.

"And this is not Dr. Aretino's course, yes?"

"And there's the rub," I said. She quirked an eyebrow at my idiom, so I filled in, "That's why I'm so confused."

I had that course with Professor Giovanni Di Cenzo, not Dr. Aretino. I'd had my highest mark in that course, and I'd been hoping that getting an awesome grade on this paper would nudge my average that much higher so that I could stay in the program.

"There must have been some mistake," Isabella continued.

I shook my head, "That's the thing. I went to see Professor Di Cenzo at his office hours and he said there was nothing wrong with the grade. And that he'd been expecting better work from me."

Her lovely eyes narrowed, her full lips compressing into a thin line. "I will go to him and make sure he knows that he has made a mistake."

Then she stood up, apparently preparing to storm Professor Di Cenzo's office then and there.

And while it warmed my heart that I'd apparently made a friend here willing to stand up for me like that, I also knew it wasn't her battle to fight.

"That's okay," I said, trying to stifle a laugh and only half-succeeding, "I'm going to go over the paper and the assignment tonight and then prove to him that the paper is worth more than a 60 at his next office hour."

I figured that would be it. That maybe he'd been in a bad mood while marking, and that perhaps I'd put him too much on the defensive when I went to confront him about it.

However, I couldn't quite shake the suspicion that there was more to it than a few simple lapses in judgment. But then again, I was trying to be happy, trying to be reasonable.

"Make sure that you do," Isabella sat again. It was implicit in that statement that if I didn't, she would.

A quick glance at my phone showed me that time had managed to sneak by quite quickly and stealthily. There was also a text from Liam saying that he looked forward to seeing me today after class.

A winking smiley-face concluded his message, and I wondered what he was up to.

"Gotta go," I said, re-shouldering my messenger bag even as I tapped out a quick reply to Liam, "Class."

"Please tell me how he reacts to your list," Isabella said.

"Will do."

It was only a few steps out of the quad and into the building. The air conditioner had been set too cold and I shivered as I moved from the warmth of the outside air into the cool embrace of the hall.

Though that wasn't the only cause of my shiver. I'd spent several hours writing up a list of 10 possible extra credit assignments that Dr. Aretino could choose from, if he hadn't come up with any by now.

If he chose any at all. I knew that college wasn't like high school. Professors weren't teachers with your best interest at heart. You couldn't count on them to take pity on you.

I also knew that Dr. Aretino liked me. Far more than was appropriate, of course. But if he truly cared about my academic performance, he'd give me another chance.

Or so I hoped. I planned on presenting him the list after this lecture. A lecture I'd studied my butt off for, intending on impressing him with my knowledge, on proving that I wasn't just begging for a pass.

I entered the lecture hall with about five minutes to spare. Pretty much all the other students had already seated themselves. I also noticed that the air conditioner was much less intense, though this was a mixed blessing.

It wouldn't be good if I ended up sitting in my seat near the end of the lecture sweating bullets.

My nerves died when the lecture started. As usual, Dr. Aretino stuck to his normal style of the dynamic discussion, presenting us with slides and facts, posing questions, allowing the students to interject and to argue with him on points.

It was rather like that lecture I'd had with him after Liam's secretary had told me the truth. I'd studied well, and I knew everything Dr. Aretino touched on. I made sure to add what I could, to answer his questions when he posed them.

By the end, even I felt impressed with my performance. This is in the bag! I thought.

We reached that restless point about ten minutes before class ended. That point where even the professor notices the clock and becomes eager for the ordeal to reach its conclusion.

Other students began packing away their texts and notebooks. I rifled through my clipboard until I reached my neatly-typed list. And then I had to fight to keep my hands off it. I knew it shouldn't be crumpled or creased when I handed it to him.

"Dr. Aretino," I said, approaching the lectern while he flicked the locks on his briefcase open.

"Emma, yes?" he said.

Something was different. Something that set my heart racing and tickled the nerves at the base of my spine.

"Do you have a few minutes? I have something I'd like you to look at."

"Yes, yes. I will see it."

He didn't tell me to call him Giuseppe, I realized. But that wasn't it. He seemed eager to leave. Usually every other class he demanded I stay and talk to him.

Feeling considerably less confident than before, I handed him the piece of paper. "This is the list I was talking about. I wrote down 10 ideas for extra credit assignments. I was hoping maybe you could approve one or two. I can have them all to you by..."

He waved a dismissive hand at me after glancing at the list. "These are no good."

If I'd had lead in my wings before this, his words sheared through them and left me plummeting towards the ground, vainly flapping my arms.

"Oh. Well, I can think of a few more possibilities. Or maybe there are other assignments you have in mind?"

"No."

"But if you just give me a chance. You saw how well I did during the lecture..."

Dr. Aretino slammed his briefcase shut. "All of your grades are slipping, Emma. I know; I have spoken with the rest of the faculty. You cannot save your grades now. Not without my help."

My gorge started rising. That paper should have been an easy A. "You talked to them? Or you told them to lower my marks?"

Dr. Aretino shrugged, the corners of his mouth drooping. "I don't know what you mean."

His eyes lied, though. The look in them, the way they glinted and flashed, told me that it was a lie.

A cold sensation crept through me, starting in the pit of my stomach and slowly working its way up my innards.

He saw the realization spread across my face. "You know I will always help you."

"If I pay your price."

Another shrug. "It is not so much, is it, really?"

I couldn't take any more of this. Crumpling the list into a ball, I tossed it into the bin beside the lectern. Then I went for the doors.

Dr. Aretino's voice stopped me. "The exchange program board will review your progress in two weeks. If there is no improvement, you will be asked to leave the program. They will also revoke your student visa. You will have to leave Italy."

Then I ran from the lecture hall. Straight to the women's restroom where I splashed cold water on my face until my cheeks went numb and the pressure behind my eyes faded to a dull ache.

Two weeks, I kept thinking. What can I possibly do with only two weeks?

It took me fifteen minutes to get home after that. There, I sat on my creaky bed and let my messenger bag slide off my arm.

Two weeks.

Dr. Aretino knew he had me. I had two choices. I could give in, give him what he wanted. Which in this case was me. Or I could accept the review board's judgment, tuck my tail up between my legs, and run back to Missouri and the tatters of my life that I'd left behind there.

A mirthless smile spread across my lips when I realized a cruel irony. Wasn't it only a little more than two weeks ago that I wanted nothing less than to leave this ancient city behind?

And now that I wanted to stay, they wanted me to leave.

I'd finally begun to reconcile with my grief over my father, with my guilt over the money he'd given me to come here, to not make it so that it was given in vain. And now he may as well have burned that cash for warmth for all the good it did me.

Except for Liam, I thought, I wouldn't have met Liam if not for coming here. Except that multiplied the guilt. I'd have to tell him I'd be leaving the country soon, and why.

It was one of those times when your brain just doesn't want to deal with anything. Just shut down for a few blissful hours to remove your consciousness from reality, at least for a little while.

My lead-weighted eyelids started drooping shut. The thin, worn out pillows on the bed beckoned.

Normally I liked to pull my hair into a quick ponytail before sleeping. But this wasn't normal. My head hit the pillow and I waited for sleep to pull me away.

But then Liam knocked once on the door and came in. My heart lurched; I'd forgotten he'd be coming by.

"Hey, I hope you've been in suspense all day, because..." he started, smiling. The smile fell from his face when he saw me. "What is it? Tell me."

The bed groaned again when he sat beside me.

I started telling him, but then I cut myself off. An embarrassed heat rushed up my neck. I wanted to Liam to think I was smart, a good student. A success in my field just like he was a success in his. What would he think of me if he knew that I'd just been put on defacto academic probation, and that my days in Rome were numbered?

He took my hand in both of his and squeezed it gently, surrounding me with the warmth of his palms.

"Don't clam up on me again."

Finally I nodded. I told him the whole story. He'd gleaned parts of it himself. He'd known about Dr. Aretino's interest in me since the night of the fundraiser. He hadn't, however, suspected that interest had blossomed as it had.

His expression tightened as I told him, his fingers squeezing my hand tighter. I finished with getting back to my flat. "And that's when you knocked on the door."

"That has to be illegal. Against school regulations. Something..."

I braced myself, waiting for him to offer to do something for me. Lately everyone wanted to intervene on my behalf, it seemed.

Liam's eyes searched for the answer in my tiny flat, as though my laptop or the text on paintings of the Italian Renaissance beside it could solve my problem.

"The dean," he said, "Go to the dean. Aretino will be out on his ass before he can say, 'Leonardo.'"

"That might have worked before, when it was only him. But now that he's got my other professors in on it, the dean would probably just think I'm crying sexual harassment to fix my grades."

In this battle of he-said, she-said the He side would definitely be the victor.

Then I saw it in his face, that desire to help me, to fix all my problems for me. Money could solve any problem, provided you threw enough at it.

However, he swallowed the words back down. He knew I wouldn't accept the help.

"What will you do?" he asked.

I shrugged, tried to look like it wasn't a big deal. "I guess I'll be on my way back to St. Louis in two weeks."

I tried smiling, but my lips started trembling. A combination of anger, frustration, and despair pushed hard against the back of my eyes.

Liam pulled me close just as the first hot tear streaked down the curve of my cheek. "Your jacket!" I said, trying to pull away. I didn't want to ruin his expensive suit.

"I don't care about the suit," he replied, pulling me close again. The silk absorbed that tear, the next, and the ones after that. "You know I'll help. All you have to do is ask."

"I know."

"You also know that I'll be on the first plane to St. Louis after you."

I couldn't help but laugh at that. There was something funny in that. That image of the ultra-rich, ultra-successful man chasing after the girl who couldn't even get passing marks in an art history program, a bird course.

Except that Dr. Aretino had clipped my wings. Clipped them right from my wing bones with no chance to grow back.

"It's not funny. I mean it," Liam said. Then he drew my face away from his chest, plunged his hands into my hair so that he could tilt my head back, and kissed me.

I tasted the saltiness of my tears, knowing he could too.

When we parted, he run the pads of his thumbs gently over my cheeks, brushing away the moisture.

"So I imagine that you've completely forgotten about that surprise I hinted at earlier?"

Mostly I couldn't stop thinking about how puffed up my eyes had to be, how red my cheeks were. Or the dark, irregularly shaped smudge my tears had left on his jacket.

"Is it a time machine so that I can go back to the beginning of the semester and drop Dr. Aretino's course?"

That got me a crooked smile. "Unfortunately, no. But I think it will take your mind off things for the rest of the evening. You can start thinking up a solution tomorrow."

A distraction? I could use one of those. "What is it?"

That crooked smile grew, and mischief flashed in his eyes. "If you want to know, you'll have to come with me."

"Then I suppose I have no choice but to stay here."

That earned me a couple confused blinks. Then the other side of his mouth quirked up, completing the smile. "Funny."

"I thought so. So, what is it?"