"I--I don't know."
His hand reached out and a single finger moved softly, back and forth, over her collarbone as he spoke. "There will be a car waiting for you at ten in the morning. Take the card and go buy whatever you need. It's only a semi-formal event-- a cocktail dress will be fine. Shoes, bag, make-up, hair--get whatever you want--spend whatever you want. Call Joy before you leave--she's made the arrangements. She'll know what you should do and where to go."
Her heart hammered and she barely understood a word he said. The single brain cell left inside her head was focused entirely on the finger that was stroking her. Her tongue reached out and dampened her dry lips and she felt his eyes drop to her mouth. "I don't think that's such a good idea, Marco--"
"It's just a small charity thing that the bank supports. You'll be fine." His hand reached out and lifted her chin and his eyes tangled with hers. "How could you not be? You're beautiful." His thumb swiped her bottom lip and she trembled and felt herself swaying toward him as her entire being flooded with desire. "So pretty." His eyes left hers, running over her hair, down her body, all the way to her toes and then back to her face again. "So very, very pretty," he whispered.
Marco reined in the lust that clawed through his guts when Natalie gripped his shoulders with hands that trembled. He knew she didn't realize the top she'd been covering herself with had slipped and fallen between them. Her naked breasts were pressed against his stomach, and the soft feel of them after weeks of wanting her and not being able to touch her was almost too much to bear. He should have ended it with Tanya the moment he'd met Natalie. He might as well have done it; he hadn't slept with her since he'd set eyes on Natalie.
Natalie disturbed him in every possible way a woman could disturb a man. He recognized that much; but didn't intend to fight it any longer. He had to have her, and soon. He didn't much care what it would take--getting her into his bed had become the number one goal in his mind. It was more important than anything else in his life at the moment; he wouldn't be able to concentrate on the bank or anything else for that matter, until it was accomplished.
But he had to go slow. There was something soft and gentle about her, something almost innocent and naive that was telling him that seduction was in order. He knew her age--knew it would be almost impossible for her to still be a virgin. But the girl shaking in his arms--this young woman who had been retreating from him since the first day they'd met--there was no way she could be very experienced.
She was like a fine wine, delicate and silky, going to his head at once and making his brain spin. He desperately wanted to touch her breasts, wanted to feel their soft weight in the palms of his hands. He wanted to taste them, lick them and suck them--until she begged him for more. And then he wanted to give her more. He wanted to give her more until the ache he felt all the way to his soul went away. It had slowly been building since the day he'd met her. He'd wanted her then--and it had only grown worse with each passing day. Seeing her, smelling her, watching her.
It didn't escape his notice that in all his thirty-two years, he'd never wanted another woman living in his home. He'd never wanted anyone to get close to him. Since he'd been a teenager, growing up in his grandfather's home, with his grandfather's name and money, he'd been a mark for grasping women. He'd lost his virginity at fifteen--to a woman fifteen years his senior who had walked into his bedroom on a night his grandfather had been hosting a party. She'd been beautiful and worldly and he'd fallen under her spell that night--for a few hours.
He'd found out later that she hadn't come alone to the party--she'd left her escort downstairs when she'd wandered off to find him. The experience had left a sour taste in his mouth--made him feel naive and stupid, but it had taught him a lesson. Sex was sex. It was a bodily function--a need that had to be quenched. The women he'd dated in college had been grasping as well--every one of them out for the money. He'd made the mistake once, in his senior year, of thinking someone wanted him--just for him. But then he'd overheard a conversation that had hardened his heart forever. It was the same old song and dance again. Rich boy--grasping woman. And since then, he'd never let anyone come even remotely close to changing his mind. He'd learned a long time ago never to let a woman get close to him.
He wasn't proud to say that he'd walked on the dark side when it came to his sex life since then. He'd done things that, if he let himself think about them, he'd be ashamed of. But he'd learned a long time ago, not to think of sex when it was over. He always tried to find partners who were as--hungry--as he was. Nothing was off-limits to him--except for other men. He'd even been so disillusioned from the cheating he'd seen all around him that even matrimony wasn't an institution he respected anymore. He only allowed himself to go after experienced women; women who knew the score and were happy to play the game--in fact--were usually the ones who instigated the game.
He didn't have girlfriends; he had sexual partners, and sometimes, more than one. There had been women in the past, women like Tanya, who had wanted to label themselves as his girlfriend, even though he'd told them bluntly at the beginning what his requirements were.
He'd never thought of any of them as his. Not Tanya, not any of them. He'd never had a woman of his own. How could Tanya have thought for even half a second that if she'd belonged to him, that he would share her? Soon after they'd met, she'd taken him to a party that had managed to shock him--cold and cynical as he was. It had become obvious to him immediately that the event was an excuse to switch sexual partners. He'd known right away what his choices were. He could leave--or he could stay and go with the flow. If he stayed his heart would become even blacker. But by that time, he'd already damned himself in his own mind and he couldn't come up with a compelling reason to leave. He cared nothing for Tanya, and after that night and all the nights like that since then, saw her and the myriad of women he'd slept with, as nothing more than sexual relief.
He'd always protected himself against pregnancy and disease as well as he could. He used a condom religiously. He had regular blood work done--had himself tested several times a year. In fact, he'd just gotten a clean bill of health in the last few weeks.
And now Natalie had entered his life and he was feeling things for her that he'd never thought possible. Had he ever wanted a woman this badly? He couldn't remember a time in his life when he'd ever wanted anything as much. It was taking over his brain, infiltrating every waking moment of his life. Having her in his house and not being able to touch her--God.