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‘I wanted to eat you alive again the instant I saw you standing behind that bar,koukla mou,’ he growled. ‘I don’t know what it is about you—’
‘Or I you,’ Cleo cut in, slender fingers stroking down over his bronzed torso and the cut lines of his muscles with a tactile delight that she could not help savouring.
Ari lifted her top over her head and embarked on her skirt. She wriggled out of it, her heart racing with wicked anticipation. As her bra fell away, he cupped her full breasts and groaned, pressing her back on the bed to explore her lush curves, lingering on the stiff little buds of her straining nipples and then lowering his mouth there. As he captured a straining peak between his lips and gently tugged, she gasped out loud and her back arched. He lingered there, grazing her with the edges of his teeth, licking the hard buds with hungry energy before he shifted down the bed to pay attention to an even more sensitive area.
Cleo’s head whipped back and forth on the pillow as her breath sobbed in her throat. Waves of increasing delight were gripping her pelvis. Her fingers were locked into his black hair, shock at what she was allowing silenced by the amount of pleasure flooding her. And then it came, the ultimate wash of sensation that lit her up like a firework display, and she cried out, her body convulsing and writhing in ecstasy. Liquid heat and relaxation surged in the moments afterwards.
‘No, you’re not going to sleep on me now,’ Ari warned her, lifting her with strong hands and turning her over, urging her up onto her knees before reaching for the top of the nightstand to grab a foil wrapper and tear it open with his teeth.
He tugged her hips back to him and plunged boldly into her tingling damp channel in almost the same movement, and a charge of indescribable excitement roared through her as her body stretched to accommodate him. She felt possessed, dominated, and it was a huge turn-on that added to an already intense experience. His hands firm on her hips, he quickened his pace. Claiming her with fierce thrusts, he made her body hum and pulse with raw hunger and impatience for the satisfaction that only he could deliver. As the sensual tide of sensation swelled and overwhelmed her on every level, another orgasm engulfed her and she cried out his name, helpless in the hold of that thundering charge of elation.
As she slumped flat on the bed beneath him, Ari snatched in a shuddering breath and flung himself back on the bed beside her. He snaked out an arm and gathered her to him. ‘That was amazing,’ he muttered thickly.
‘I should go home,’ Cleo announced with conviction, spooked by a sudden clingy craving to turn into the shelter offered by that arm of his and embrace that closeness.
His hold tightened. ‘Stay—’
‘I have a shift in the morning. I need a change of clothes—’
‘I’ll take you home early to change,’ Ari spelt out insistently.
But Cleo had already made up her mind. They were having a fling. They were not in a relationship. The way she saw it, that meant she shouldn’t stay overnight. Observing those limits would keep everything tidier and ensure that she never forgot where she stood with him. She couldn’t afford to get too comfortable with Ari Stefanos. She didn’t want to get attached to him and then get hurt. Sleeping over was a step too far in the wrong direction. Her warning was that dangerous desire to cuddle him! Best to keep everything casual, she reasoned ruefully, troubled by her craving to stay with him longer.
‘No, I’ve got to go,’ Cleo spelt out briskly in defiance of an instinct that she interpreted as weak. She slid out of bed, still half concealed by the sheet, and reached for her discarded clothes.
‘You’re not even staying for a shower?’ Ari shot at her.
‘I can freshen up at home,’ she told him firmly.
Seated on a corner of the bed, she dressed, only as she stood registering that the silence that had spread was leaping and bouncing with hostile undertones. She turned her head and encountered brooding dark golden eyes that glittered like the heart of a fire.
‘If you walk out of here now, you don’t come back...ever,’ Ari framed in a deceptively quiet voice.
Cleo froze in shock at that warning. ‘I don’t respond well to threats—’
‘Then be reasonable, rather than offensive,’ Ari advised, pulling himself up against the pillows.
He looked so beautiful lounging there against the white bedding that he stole the very breath from her lungs. Black hair wildly tousled by her clutching hands, she recalled in mortification, dark deep-set eyes fiercely intent on her below his slashing ebony brows, his bronzed muscular perfection never on more magnificent display.
A knot formed in her throat, threatening to choke her, and tension held her fast. ‘You don’t mean that—’
‘Walk away and find out,’ Ari invited in a raw undertone of challenge she had never heard from him before.
‘Why are you behaving like this?’ Cleo demanded in consternation. ‘I haven’t done anything offensive!’
‘You won’t be seen out in my company. You won’t spend the night either? That’s offensive,’ Ari contradicted without hesitation.
‘Are you telling me that you a-always spend the night with the women you—?’ she began, stumbling over the words that she did not wish to say out loud, and even that sensitivity inflamed her. Ari Stefanos didn’t belong to her. She had no right to feel remotely possessive about him.
‘We’re not talking about me right now. We’re talking about you and your hang-ups,’ Ari cut in smoothly.
Cleo bridled. ‘I don’t have hang-ups—’
‘Maybe I should have called themtrust issues,’ Ari countered drily. ‘But yes, it doesn’t take a rocket scientist to see that you definitely have those.’
Outraged at her insecurities being read that accurately, Cleo thrust her feet into her shoes.
‘The car will be waiting outside for you,’ Ari completed quietly.
