Scandalous Heroes Box Set (9 page)

However there was no denying one fact. Renaldo’s aloof manner should make her cautious. In the office they called him ‘The Enforcer’. The women constantly whispered about how ominous his presence felt. He shadowed the Battaglia women. Scowled at anyone who came inappropriately close with a hard unblinking glare. Where Kyra found his dark presence sexy some women went as far as to say he was creepy.

The elevator doors opened.

“Oh shoot.” Kyra hesitated. Clearly she hadn’t thought this through. How would the evening end? On her terms or his?

The doors to the elevator began to close.

“Oh, forget this!” Kyra threw up her hand and stopped them. She sucked down a breath of bravery and stepped out into the hall. The plaque on the wall pointed left for the suite number she sought. As soon as she ventured in that direction she was met with an unexpected sight. A tall man dressed in a tailored suit leaned against the wall. He was one of the two men that followed the orders of Renaldo.

He didn’t appear surprised or disturbed by her arrival. Kyra kept her hands down in her coat pockets and maintained his stare as she approached Renaldo’s door. She knocked three times before she heard soft footfalls draw close.

The door unchained. As soon as the door parted she lost all her nerve. The butterflies she carried in her gut since she arrived incinerated and her face flushed hot with excitement under his leveled stare. She swallowed the lump in her throat. He appeared before her without a shirt, in his boxers, body ripped with chiseled perfection. And eyes the deepest shade of cognac with piercing intensity solely focused on her.

How could Kyra be brave and foolish enough to think seducing a stranger could secure her dreams? What was her plan?

Kyra gulped down the dryness in the back of her throat. She drew in a careful breath and summoned her voice. “Hi,” she said.

Renaldo gave a half-smile. There was tightness in her chest again. She loved his olive skin, his dark hair, and those topaz brown eyes of his that blazed with smoldering intensity.

He took her hand and she was pulled inside. It was as if she moved on autopilot under his instruction. Kyra expected she would have to do some talking, maybe some convincing as to why two consenting adults should explore the physical attraction they shared. She had to do neither. He shut the door. Thanks to his close proximity she pressed her back against it to keep standing.

Ut-oh
, Kyra thought. What a foolish little girl she had been to believe this man would turn the woman before him away. Every glance, every stare, and every lingering look she’d ever perceived from him brought her to this moment. At that very moment he swept her body with that intense gaze of his as if she arrived at his door stark naked.

It was Renaldo she wanted and not the promise of what he could do to help her further her career aspirations with the Battaglias. He had invited her in. No matter where passion led them tonight she’d go the distance.

“
Ho un debole per te,
”
he said in a low husky whisper. She wished she knew the meaning of the words that rolled off his tongue with such rich flavor. Her voice failed her. But she pleaded with her eyes for him to continue. Renaldo smiled. He kissed her nose and her brow. He whispered something so deeply sensual she wasn’t certain if it was Italian or English. In the past Kyra took the lead with her lovers. A spin around the bedroom, an invitation to lie between her thighs was always extended on her terms, and for her pleasure. Tonight she had little doubt that she controlled anything once she walked over the threshold.

“Maybe we should set some ground rules. I have only one,” she said in her best, confident voice.

He brushed his thumb in a slow drawn line across the length of her jaw.

One touch from this man and she was breathless.

She struggled to keep focused.

“What is this rule?” he asked.

“Translations. You speak Italian. I speak English. You have to tell me the meaning of the words you say. And I’ll do the same for you,” she explained.

“Is that all?” Renaldo’s heated stare flickered up from her breasts to snare her. “Shouldn’t there be more to this?”

“So far that’s it,” she replied over the quiver in her voice.

His left hand dropped to the right side of her face and pressed flat against the door. He leaned in and looked deeply into her eyes. Renaldo’s mouth curled into a reluctant smile and she knew he had warmed to the idea of them sharing a night together.

A drift of a clean soap smell gently passed her nostrils. He had just showered. Scrubbed sudsy water over that broad muscle packed chest of his. There were tiny crystals of water glistening in his black hair, which had been slicked from his face with the short hairs smoothed down his nape. Moisture gathered over his brow. He brought his mouth close to hers and there it lingered for a moment. It was a sweet decadent moment full of naughty promise.

“Say it again,” she said. Hoping he’d speak in his native tongue and warm the seat of her panties. Renaldo exhaled. His breath breezed over her upper lip. Their faces were that close.

Again he spoke with that brisk Italian brogue.
“Vorrei fare l’amore con te,”
Kyra waited for the translation. He gave none.

“I told you my rule, Renaldo. I don’t speak Italian,” she replied.

“You will after tonight,” he answered.

“How, if you don’t teach me?” she teased.

“First lesson.
Baciami.
Say it,” he commanded of her.

“Baah-chi-ami,”
she repeated. “Now what does the word mean?”

“Kiss me,” he replied. His lips enticed hers to part and just before their tongues met he drew a breath away to gaze down at her breasts again. He cupped one in his hand and the slow squeeze was as if it was tightening in a vice. Yet it pleased her so. Kyra captured another strained breath into her lungs and looked up at him with confusion. Oh God he really is gorgeous, she thought helplessly before his mouth descended on hers once more, and his thumb did a circular caress of her nipple from over the cover of her dress.

She was ready.

She received his tongue eagerly once it smoothly eased in and swept over her own. His large hands tugged down on the sleeves of her coat and the suede that had kept her warm was enticed off her shoulders and arms before the coat dropped to the floor. Kyra lifted her chin. She hungered for more of his kiss and instinctively she knew he held back. The pursuit of passion was supposed to be a shared one. Why was he slow in indulging in the pleasure? Would they tease each other all night or seal the deal?

Though she imagined him to be a rough, impatient lover because of his brutish manner, she found his touch soft and masterful. He eased his open palms up and down her hips causing the silky fabric to lift up her thighs. Slow and easy his touch went and so did her breathing. Slow and easy. His hands smoothly went round her curves to cup the rounded swell of her left and right buttocks. And next came the push. His hard chest crushed into hers as she was forced to embrace him. The unmistakable pressure of his arousal pulsed against her stomach. The muscles in her legs went as weak as jelly. Her arms circled his waist and her hands caressed up his back. His erection now present and persistent dispelled all doubt.

Kyra gasped. Not just from passion, but in the pursuit of a much-needed breath, a long denied breath that she dragged into her lungs. Renaldo’s lips brushed down her chin and then the column of her neck leaving the most lovely of kisses.

No he was gentle, careful, and aware of her. There was nothing hurried in his manner. And she was grateful.

“One word. You must learn it, before we begin,” Renaldo said. He traced his finger now across the outline of her lip.
“Rallenti,”
he said.

“Rah-lehn-tee,” she pronounced the word and smiled. “What does it mean?”

His gaze once again lifted from her breasts in the plunging neckline of her dress. Those beautiful brown eyes ringed in dark lashes connected with hers. “It means slow down.”

Kyra’s brows lowered with concern. “Slow down?”

“Say
rallenti
, and I will. If not you’re mine,” he warned.

He withdrew.

“Turn for me,” he said. “Face the door.”

It was a request she didn’t expect. So far she hadn’t made it any further than a few steps into his suite.

He stepped close behind her. “Do as I ask,” he said.

She turned and faced the door, more than curious as to why she hadn’t been brought to his bed yet. She could feel his body heat through her dress. Renaldo’s hands slowly went down her arms and when his fingers grazed her knuckles and then fingers she exhaled. He covered her hands and lifted them both for her to place her palms flat against the door. She was now in a position for a full body search.

“Is this an occupational requirement?” she chuckled.

“Che?”
he asked.

“You’re a bodyguard right? Do you search every woman that shows up at your door in the middle of the night, or just me?”

“Just you,” he said. He ran the tab of her zipper down. The material peeled away from her skin. He traced the tip of a single finger down from the middle of her spine to the dimple above her ass. Jamie said she shouldn’t wear thongs or panties for fear of the lines against the silk. She wondered what he thought of her secret nudity.

“Why? Why come to my room?” he asked.

Kyra dropped her forehead on the door. She closed her eyes. She could confess that seducing him was part of the plan. She’d get the interview and scratch an itch she had since she first laid eyes on him. She could confess her restlessness. How much she wanted to find solid footing in her career, family, and love life. But a woman should never confess all vulnerabilities with a man she barely knew. The irony of wanting to share her body but not her soul with him struck her hard in the gut.

“Answer me,
bella,
” he asked now palming the side of her ass and giving it a firm squeeze.

“Unfinished business,” she glanced back over her shoulder at him. His gaze flickered up from her backside. Apparently he liked the view. She made sure to stand in her heels in a way that gave her ass a little more of a lift. “Do you want me to go?” she queried. There was a slight tremor in her voice. Not from fear. It was due to the sweet chill that tickled her skin from the gentle graze of his finger up and down her spine.

“No. You stay,
cara.
We conclude this business tonight.” He leaned in, took hold of both sides of her hips. The weight and pressure of his chest pressed her flat to the wall. His lips brushed her ear and her lashes fluttered. He whispered words. “Do you remember your first lesson?”

“Rallenti,”
she replied.

“Bravissima,”
he said.

Kyra smiled to herself but kept the evidence hidden.

“The dress.
Spogliati.
It comes off. Slowly,” he requested.

Renaldo walked away from her. Kyra opened her eyes and her breathing regulated to a slow easy rhythm. She held the front of the delicate fabric of her borrowed dress to her breasts. She had to give herself a moment to collect herself. They’d done nothing and yet she felt everything. From the bottoms of her feet to the erect points of her nipples, she felt everything. Slowly her gaze went over her shoulder. She was alone.

She stepped over her coat and followed. The en suite was dark. There was no evidence that he now resided here. Kyra sought his luggage, a briefcase, maybe a pair of shoes with her eyes. She saw nothing.

The door to the bedroom was to the right of the suite instead of the left. And it was open. A final edge of caution sliced through her mind and she considered what lay behind that door.

Renaldo and his safe word:
rallenti
.

After she breached his chamber her courage returned. In the bedroom Renaldo occupied a large wingback chair pushed off near the drapes. He’d shed his boxers. Exposed was the expansive length and thickness of his semi-erect dick. The sight of him staring at her in the dark, waiting, stirred her arousal beyond any man’s touch in the past. Kyra realized that though she considered herself free of the restraints of her cultured life she had dealt with nothing but boys. Renaldo was a man. He stared at her as one. And he’d fuck her like one. Of this she was sure.

Kyra walked into the room. The only light was from the half opened door to the bathroom. She wondered if it was enough. He didn’t seem to be bothered by the shadows that cloaked them.

“Can you teach me another word?” Kyra asked as she lowered her hands. The front of her dress fell away to reveal her medium sized breasts. He’d been fixated on them since her arrival at the door. Jamie convinced her to wear pasties as nipple covers instead of a bra. Kyra peeled off one circular pasty and then the other to reveal her dark nipples. This drew his attention as well. He sat forward and stared at her.

“Sei bellissima,”
he replied.

“I think I know what that means,” she teased.

Slow and easy she pulled the dress down her heart shaped hips where the garment fit snug. And then she let the dress drop to her sparkling stilettos. She and Jamie were proud of the pair of shoes she modeled. They hand glued hundreds of tiny Swarovski crystals over each shoe. This pair was the best in her designer collection. In the dark they glistened like polished emerald chips covering her feet.

Renaldo noticed.

His gaze lowered to her feet. “Keep those on,” he requested.

Kyra bit her lip in a daze over the anticipation of his next move. And then he made it.

Renaldo stood.

The sparse light in the room only sharpened one side of his tall form. Tattoos of both a religious and dark nature evenly spread over his skin. She barely noticed them before, now she was intrigued. The most striking was a skull. It had a savage looking blade rammed into the crown exiting the left jawbone.

Kyra stepped over her dress and to him. She felt compelled to touch it. “What does this mean?