LITMIR.BIZ

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      About half an hour later when they were in familiar countryside, he drove up a winding mountain road and, turning into a stony lane, he switched off the engine. When she looked at him in surprise, he shrugged and said lightly, ‘I’m afraid we have to walk from here.’

      Topsy climbed out into the sunshine and hung over the door, enjoying the view of the forested slopes and the city now far in the distance. ‘Where are we?’

      ‘On the edge of the Leonetti estate.’ Dante emerged from the boot gripping a substantial picnic basket and he tossed her a rug to carry.

      Topsy gave him a startled glance. ‘We’re picnicking?’

      ‘I think the food will be a cut above the usual picnic. Though I say it myself, my chef is unbeatable.’

      Topsy anchored the rug uncertainly beneath her arm. ‘I didn’t think you were the picnicking type.’

      ‘Blame yourself. I needed a good reason to put on jeans,’ Dante quipped, striding off into the cover of the trees and leaving her to follow the rough trail through the long grass.

      Her figure-hugging cotton dress rode up her thighs as she broke into a stride in an effort to keep up with him. She smoothed it back down, breathless in the heat, perspiration beading her brow. ‘Wish you’d warned me. I’m not really dressed for the occasion.’

      ‘I know but I wouldn’t have missed that outfit for anything, carissima mia,’ Dante confided. ‘Clinging to your truly spectacular curves that dress is a show stopper.’

      It was a grey stretchy cotton dress teamed with a colourful scarf but he made it sound like something else entirely and she flushed, unaccustomed to such masculine candour. Spectacular curves? She had long envied her siblings’ whippet-slim frames. Clothes hung on her sisters as though they were elegant models while Topsy’s infinitely fuller figure was much more of a challenge to dress.

      ‘Why...a picnic?’ Topsy asked, drawing level with him in a clearing below a spreading mature chestnut tree as broad in proportion as a bus. Beyond the clearing the ground fell away steeply into dense woods but the view over the quiet valley was amazing.

      ‘I thought it would be more your style than a trendy city lunch.’ Setting the basket down, he took the rug from her and spread it.

      The silence but for the birdsong crept round her like a cocoon. She kicked off her shoes and sat down on her knees, determined not to betray her nervous tension. ‘Where are your bodyguards?’ she asked abruptly.

      ‘I gave them the day off. After all, I’m still on the estate and this was a last-minute decision that nobody else knows about.’ Pouring the wine, he passed her a glass, the tips of his long elegant fingers briefly brushing hers. ‘Drink up...relax.’

      Relax? Topsy almost laughed at that impossibility. Being alone with a man who fascinated her to the degree that he did was deeply unnerving. She sipped the wine and let him pile a plate with a selection of the many delicacies he unpacked from the basket. She ate wafer-thin ham, dainty crostini snacks and Panzanella, a refreshing tomato salad. Lemon tart followed by a rich spicy slice of cake finished the meal. Having drained her second glass of wine, Topsy flopped down flat on her back with a sigh to gaze up through the sun-dappled canopy of leaves above her.

      ‘I’ll never move again,’ she swore ruefully. ‘I’ve never eaten as much at one sitting.’

      ‘My chef will be flattered.’

      A window of clarity briefly shone in her sunlight-and-wine-dazed mind. He had brought her into the woods to seduce her. He had even put on jeans. Topsy froze and then hurriedly sat up, deeming it unwise to lie horizontal like a sacrifice and encourage him. She collided with iridescent green eyes and a quiver of response shimmied through her. ‘I know why you brought me here.’

      Dante shifted fluidly closer. ‘We both know why.’

      ‘This is so not going to happen,’ she warned him ruefully.

       CHAPTER SEVEN

      A RELUCTANT SMILE tugged at the corners of Dante’s beautifully shaped mouth. ‘But why not?’

      Topsy sighed. ‘When I was eighteen I made a list of exactly what I wanted from a man. I watched my sisters get involved with unsuitable men and getting hurt and I swore it would never happen to me.’

      ‘What’s on the list?’ Dante prompted, silkily confident. ‘I love a challenge.’

      ‘Can you cook?’ Topsy studied his face and the bemused frown forming there before sighing. ‘I can’t cook, so I decided I needed a guy who could.’

      ‘I can provide a chef,’ Dante pointed out with deadly seriousness. ‘And obviously I can microwave stuff but I usually eat out when I’m working.’

      ‘You can’t beat the list, Dante. You just don’t match. You’re not modest or romantic or caring.’

      ‘But I’m also not asking you to marry me,’ Dante declared with staggering candour. ‘And by the sound of it, your list was drawn up to road test a potential life partner.’

      Topsy tilted her head to one side, long black waves sliding over one bare shoulder, dark eyes reflective because she had never thought of that angle before. ‘You’re right. You don’t need to be Mr Perfect.’

      ‘You choose me to have a good time in and out of bed, gioia mia,’ Dante proposed silkily.

      ‘No, you’re definitely not modest,’ Topsy commented with a helpless little laugh as she studied his face, marvelling that just looking at that precise arrangement of features could give her such an extraordinary thrill.

      ‘Modest types lose boardroom battles,’ Dante confided with immense assurance and leant forward to bridge the gap between them. ‘And they probably lie about their performance in the bedroom.’

      ‘How do I know you’re not lying?’ Topsy asked breathlessly because he was so close now a faint hint of citrusy cologne was tugging at her nostrils, instilling a powerful recollection of what it felt like when she was in his arms with his mouth on hers. An ache stirred deep down inside her and her tummy flipped.

      ‘I aim to prove it.’ Knotting one bronzed hand into the hair falling down her back, he eased her closer and sealed his sensual mouth to hers. It was like dying and being reborn in a burst of fireworks and celebration. Her awareness of her body shot from zero to overload in the space of seconds, every part of her reacting to the heat he generated.

      Smouldering green eyes scanned her flushed face in the aftermath. ‘Together we burn, gioia mia,’ Dante savoured. Long fingers smoothed up over her taut ribcage to caress the swell of a rounded breast, ensuring that her breath shortened in her throat.

      He reached for the hem of her dress and began to lift it and she literally froze at the threat of being naked in broad daylight. Suddenly she wanted lights she could switch off, a bed she could huddle in beneath a sheet.

      ‘Che cosa hai? What’s wrong?’ he asked.

      ‘Nothing’s wrong!’ Her throat convulsed on the denial as she struggled to get her nerves under control again. A certain amount of clothing had to come off, there was no getting round that requirement, she told herself. She closed her eyes, reached down to close her hands into her dress and tugged it up and off in one determined movement. It made her feel much better than the alternative of sitting there like a doll for him to undress; it made her feel that she was taking control. She glanced at him from below the rumpled mane of her hair, dark eyes provocative, her brain refusing to dwell on the reality that she was stripped down to a lacy bra and knickers.

      ‘Time to take your shirt off,’ Topsy told him instead.

      His stunning eyes gleamed with amusement and he unbuttoned his shirt and shed it. The corrugated slab of his flat abdomen as he stretched took

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