Italian’s Christmas Acquisition

Chapter Six

CHAPTER SIX

S HE COULDN ’ T brEATHE . Being in the room with him when he didn’t have a shirt on like that was... It was terrible. Because he was half-delirious, it was obvious. The stories that he had been telling about his childhood didn’t make any sense. She had tried to figure out what the truth of that could possibly be, what the whole truth could be from the little bits and pieces that he had tried to tell her.

There was something in his words that was just so tortured. Whether everything he’d said was true or not, she didn’t know, but it made her chest hurt.

He was just so... He was so gorgeous and masculine and feral, and she had never seen anything like him. He was like an old-fashioned movie star. Broad-chested and muscular, dark hair sprinkled over golden skin. She had wanted to rub his chest. That was just a mess. She couldn’t be lusting after a man who was half out of his mind.

A man she didn’t even like. Yes, it was nice that he had taken care of her while she was ill, and now he was ill probably because of her, no matter that she had tried to blame it on outside forces, but that didn’t mean that she should be... Thinking about him that way.

Her grandmother would be shocked. Shocked to know that her granddaughter was alone in a house with a man, first of all, and second of all, ogling his bare chest.

She had always been so well-behaved where men were concerned.

Because you never met one that you wanted.

Well, what good did it do to want this one? He might be beautiful, but he was... Incomprehensible. He thought that caring about things, that sentimentality was a defect of some kind.

He clearly cared for nothing and no one.

And then when he had talked about women...

They always wanted him? He was so incredibly full of himself.

And yet, she could believe it. That, she didn’t think was from illness delirium. That, she was afraid, was the truth of it.

That women were quite interested in him, everywhere he went, always. And that if he said that he wanted them, then... Well, then he could have them.

What would you do if he wanted you?

She shoved that aside.

He couldn’t consent right now. He was half out of his mind.

She tried to busy herself in the kitchen. She made homemade soup, and thought about him saying he didn’t like leftovers. He had an issue with fresh food. But then he had said he was rich. And he had talked about locking his bedroom door and escaping through secret passages.

His story didn’t line up or make sense, and she mused on that as she quickly delivered him soup.

She decided to google him. She didn’t get any more information from there. In fact, she got far less. The family was wealthy, Italian, and had been in property development for nearly a century. His mother had been a brilliant businesswoman. Beautiful, too. There were pictures of her online, but only to a point. He had said that she had retreated from public life. That they hadn’t left their house.

While no articles stated that directly, it was definitely implied. But there were no further details. None whatsoever.

But if she connected the dots, and filled in the blank spaces using what she knew of him—sophisticated and wild all at the same time—she had no trouble believing...

That he’d been a child left on his own. That he hadn’t learned how to connect with people, not really. That he was a man who needed control because his mother had controlled so much of his life until that moment.

She sighed and pushed back away from the computer. Then she went into the kitchen, and stood there at the counter. She shouldn’t want to go back upstairs so badly. She shouldn’t miss him. He was her enemy .

Except that didn’t feel like the right label, and it should.

Was she that stupid? A man was handsome so it didn’t feel right to label him the bad guy? He was the bad guy. He was a property developer who devoured adorable, unique places like Holiday House. He didn’t care about her. He didn’t care about what she wanted. Except he had taken care of her, even though he had no idea how to do it. And now he was lying upstairs all feverish. And handsome.

More than handsome.

She chewed on her thumbnail.

She made another cup of tea, and decided to go back upstairs. When she walked through his bedroom door, she saw him lying there on the bed, one muscular arm thrown up over his face, his body completely out of the covers, his chest bare. Every time he took a breath, the muscles on his chest and stomach shifted. She was fascinated by him. Surely there was no harm in looking, just for a moment. At the well-defined muscles, the tanned skin and dark hair that covered them. At just how very masculine he was. She had no experience of this. And she didn’t wish that she did. Because it was a sort of magical thing for it to be him. Because he was so singular. So glorious.

She let out a sharp breath, and walked over to his bedside, putting the cup of tea down on the side table.

And she let herself take in all that masculine beauty. She felt outside herself in that moment, even in this very familiar room.

As she looked at every dip and hollow of muscle on his chest, his stomach.

Just looking at him made her feel...bold.

What if...

Her breathing quickened.

What if he was the first? What if he was...for her. Not forever, obviously, she wasn’t that silly. But there had to be a first, didn’t there? And he was definitely the only man who had ever made her feel like this.

She wanted her same life, she did.

But what if she could be different in it? Just for a while...

He shifted, lowering his arm. Sweat beaded on his forehead, and he looked... In pain. Which she hated.

She frowned, and put her hand against his face. He was burning. Without thinking, she let her hand drift down his cheek, the line of his jaw. The dark shadow of his beard was rough against her finger. He had been clean-shaven when he had arrived, but not so now.

She hadn’t realized quite how fascinating men were. Quite how different.

Her admiration of them had always been distant. Mostly fictional. The problem with the men in town was that she had known them since they were boys. And they were distinctly uninteresting. It was difficult to see someone as sexy when you could so clearly remember them from middle school. Middle school was the least sexy phase of life.

And it had badly damaged the way that she saw every local guy.

It didn’t seem to inhibit many of the people that she knew from school. So many of them had married each other.

It was just that... It had never been right for her. She was very clear on that. She’d wanted to find someone who captured her imagination.

So here she was, snowed in with a mysterious, handsome stranger. No one would ever think that would happened to Noelle Holiday. No, she was staid and boring. She was a homebody. She was old before her time, basically a cat lady without cats living on top of the mountain by herself.

And she was happy with that.

Mostly.

She realized that she was still touching his face. He moved without warning. Like lightning. And suddenly, his iron grip was around her wrist. She gasped and tried to pull away, but with his eyes still closed, he yanked her toward him. “Why are you so far away?” he asked.

His breath was hot against her cheek, and her breasts were crushed to his chest. She didn’t even know if he was conscious of what he was doing. Or if he was absolutely and completely delirious.

“Rocco...”

“You smell good,” he said.

She shivered. He was so hot. And she knew it was because he was feverish, but this felt... It felt like more. It felt like something else. Something that it wasn’t.

She couldn’t let herself get carried away by this. It was a sickness. Psychotic.

But her heart was pounding wildly, and it wasn’t because she was afraid.

“You should be in bed with me,” he said.

And any resistance that she had access to before was gone. She felt herself melting into him, and then he shifted, and his mouth connected with hers.

She had never been kissed before.

It was so... Disruptive. She had always imagined that a kiss would be sweet. That it would be a lovely, comforting sort of thing.

She did not feel comforted.

His mouth took no prisoners, it moved over hers with expert precision. And she found herself parting her lips for him, allowing him to push his tongue between her lips and stroke it over hers.

She gasped, and that only let him take the kiss deeper.

And she wanted it.

What did that say about her? The man was in a delirium. A feverish haze, and he also was supposed to be her enemy. No matter that she couldn’t seem to cement that idea in her mind.

Enemies.

But he kissed like every dream she hadn’t been experienced enough to have, and she couldn’t bring herself to move away from him. She let him claim her. Let each pass of his tongue make her into something new. Into someone she didn’t recognize.

She wanted him. She wanted this.

He moved his hand to the back of her head, holding her to him as he kissed her, on and on. She shivered, the sensual haze spreading from where his mouth met hers, through her limbs. She felt drugged in the most delicious way. Like she had just had a hot toddy by the fireplace, and everything in her was languid and warm.

She moved her hand down to his chest. Remembered what he had said. About wanting her to rub his chest.

She let her fingers drift over him. The prickly hair, firm muscles, hot skin...

What are you doing?

She gasped, and ripped herself away from him.

“Don’t go,” he said.

“You’re sick,” she said. “You don’t even know who I am. You don’t even know what you’re doing.”

“Sure I do,” he said.

But he never opened his eyes.

“You can’t consent,” she said.

His eyes did drift open then, dark and furious, and connected with hers. “Excuse me?”

“You’re out of your mind. You’re on cold medicine, and you have a fever, and I’m taking advantage of you.”

“I think you will find, cara , that I am more than able to consent and to act.”

She shook her head, and took a step away from him, she bumped against the side table, sending the cup of tea down onto the floor, the porcelain clattering, thankfully not breaking, but the hot liquid going everywhere.

“Oh, fiddlesticks,” she said. “Now look what you did. Look what I did. I... I’m sorry. I’m very sorry. I... I’ve never done this before, and I don’t...” She picked the cup up. She would come back with a cloth. Her heart was pounding so hard, humiliation, thwarted need, and everything else, leaving her completely out cold. She went back down to the kitchen, and put her face in her hands.

She had kissed him.

Or she had let him kiss her. It wasn’t entirely material, she didn’t think. Which thing it was. He had a cold, a fever, and she was supposed to be taking care of him.

Does it feel better, if you make it your fault, if you make yourself feel guilty?

Tears sprang into her eyes, and she dashed them away.

Maybe it did. Maybe it felt better to make herself feel like she was some undersexed virgin who had taken advantage of a man in her care, rather than a woman who had responded to mutual attraction. No. Because that was too dangerous. The whole situation was far too dangerous.

They were working in opposition to each other. There was nothing that could be done about that. He wanted to try and manipulate this property away from her. She was refusing.

And if she showed him she was attracted to him, well...he’d undoubtedly think he could use that against her.

Her cheeks suddenly went hot. Because she worried he might actually be able to use it against her.

She was a virgin after all, and woefully inexperienced with men and even though it had been a choice, even though she wanted to believe that she was savvy...

There were no guarantees that an actual real-life love affair wouldn’t change her, just enough, that she could be manipulated in ways she couldn’t foresee now.

There was no compromise to be had there.

She let out a long, slow breath. She would make dinner.

And she would hope that when he woke up he didn’t remember what had happened.