“I already recognize you, Gabriel. There’s no one else.”

He kissed her intensely and paused as Besame Mucho  sounded in the air. “Will you dance with me?”

“Of course.” As if I’d ever refuse the chance to hold you in my arms…

He pulled her close, and she pressed grateful lips to his jaw.

“Is this our song?” She stroked his lower lip with one of her fingers.

“It should be. I remember everything about that night. Your hair, your dress. You were a vision. And I was such a brute. The things I said.” He shook his head. “How did you ever forgive me?”

Julia rebuked him with her eyes. “Gabriel, you’re giving me the fairy tale I never thought I’d have. Please don’t spoil it.”

He kissed her lips repentantly and held her more tightly, running his hand across her ribs. For Gabriel knew, as Julia did not, that the ribs of a woman were another erogenous zone.

As they swayed to the music, he softly sang to her, pouring his soul into the Spanish words but changing them slightly so that she would know he would never let her go. He would give her nothing less than forever and hell itself could not prevent him from keeping his vow. He just hadn’t spoken the words aloud.

Yet.

She lifted her head and stared at his mouth, memorizing its fullness and its curves, the way his bottom lip curled downward. She tugged it into her mouth unhurriedly, winding her fingers in his hair. He was sweetness and wet warmth, hunger and passionate need, love and devotion. And his kiss pressed itself to her very soul, so that even the tips of her toes felt his adoration and desire.

Two bodies pressed tightly together in a lover’s dance, eager with anticipation.

Chapter 34

Julia reclined on her back on the terrace’s banquette, staring up blissfully into Gabriel’s sparkling eyes. He’d divested himself of his suit jacket and loosened his tie, but refused to remove it, remembering how arousing it had been when Julia tugged on it at the Ponte Santa Trinita.

She was captivated by him — his nose, his cheekbones, his angular jaw, his magnificent blue eyes under dark brows, and the chest hair that peeked out over the top of his white t-shirt beneath his open collar.

He was on his side facing her, resting his head on his upturned arm, his right leg crooked at the knee, pouring champagne. They toasted their love and partook of Gabriel’s favorite vintage of Dom Pérignon before he leaned over to capture her lips with his.

“I’d like to feed you,” he murmured.

“Yes, please.”

“Close your eyes,” he said. “Just taste.”

Julia trusted him, so she shut her eyes and felt something nudge against her lower lip; then it was inside her mouth, all chocolate and juicy sweet strawberry and the feel of Gabriel’s thumb brushing across her heated flesh. Opening her eyes, she grabbed him by the wrist, pulling his thumb slowly into her mouth.

His eyes widened, and he groaned. She drew his thumb across her tongue, touching it lightly, and sucking on it determinedly, before swirling across its tip to savor any remaining chocolate. Gabriel groaned a second time at the way Julia looked up at him through her eyelashes, staring down at her with a mixture of passion and surprise.

She released him and looked away. “I didn’t mean to get your hopes up. Thumbs are one thing, but I’m terrible at — ”

He interrupted her self-deprecation with his lips, kissing her almost roughly. He stroked up and down her neck with a single finger while he explored her mouth with his tongue. When he pulled back, his eyes had a fire in them.

“I don’t want you to put yourself down anymore. I won’t hear it. What we have is ours alone. Don’t prejudge yourself or me or what the two of us can be together.” He gave her a light peck on the cheek as if to soften his severe tone and brushed his lips against her ear.

“And I have no doubt that you are excellent at that. A mouth as gifted as yours could never disappoint.” He winked at her impishly.

She flushed as red as the fruit but didn’t respond.

He returned to feeding her strawberries dipped in chocolate, interspersed with smal sips of champagne, until she declined any further dessert so that she could return the favor.

Picking up a fork, she loaded it with tiramisu and arched an expectant eyebrow at him. “Close your eyes.”

Gabriel did as he was told, and she delicately slipped the fork between his lips. He hummed loudly, for the dessert was very good. Better still was the pleasure of being fed by his beloved. She was preparing to serve him another piece when he interrupted her.

“I think you forgot something, Miss Mitchell.” His tongue swept across his lower lip.

He grasped her hand, dragging two of her fingers through a small portion of the dessert and drawing those same fingers languorously into his mouth. As usual he was unhurried, drawing gently on each finger, gliding his tongue up and down before sucking on them from root to tip.

As Gabriel adored her fingers with his mouth, Julia’s body cried out for him. She couldn’t help but imagine his most talented tongue dipping into her navel and lower down, where no one’s mouth had ever been…

“Are you happy, love?”

Julia opened her eyes and blinked. “Yes.” Her voice was shaky.

“Then kiss me.”

She pulled him by his tie, just as he’d hoped, and he complied gladly, rolling so that he was almost on top of her, his knee between her thighs.

He was warmth and wet kisses and long fingers that stroked up and down her ribs and down to her bottom, cupping it firmly. She felt the heat of his chest through his shirt as it pressed up against her breasts, and his hardness against her thigh, and she wanted more, more…on top, in between, inside…

Gabriel pulled back and took her hand in his, kissing the back of it.

“Come to bed.”

“You can have me here.”

He furrowed his brow at first, and after his smile returned he kissed her nose. “Oh, no. I want you in my bed. Besides, it’s chilly out here, and I can’t have you catching pneumonia.”

She looked slightly disappointed.

He hastened to comfort her. “If you still feel the same way, we’ll revisit it tomorrow. But for tonight, we should be behind closed doors. I’ll meet you inside. Take all the time you need.”

He kissed her with restraint and watched her very fine derrière as she walked across the terrace and into the bedroom. He leaned back on the banquette and threw his arm over his face, unashamedly adjusting himself more than once through his navy wool trousers. The anticipation was kil ing him. He’d never been this excited before, so ready to spread her out before him and take her with abandon. But that was precisely what he would not allow himself to do.

Not tonight.

How had he ever thought that fucking some woman he didn’t even know in one of the washrooms at Lobby   was exciting? How had he believed that nameless, faceless orgasms would ever satisfy him? He’d spent his life worshipping at the altar of a silent, absent god who promised everything but delivered something fleeting that always left him wanting. He’d trafficked in lust masquerading as eros. But nothing had been further from reality.

Vanity of vanities. All is vanity.

Everything had changed since he found Julia again, and especial y since he’d fallen in love with her. She’d broken him open and taken his emotional virginity, but she had done so patiently and gently. He would give her nothing less.

While Gabriel pondered the ways in which he could worship her, Julia was leaning against the vanity in the bathroom trying to catch her breath.

Gabriel’s sensuous foreplay was the equivalent of a scorched earth seduction.

There was no going back. There was no slowing the tremendous, irresistible pull they felt toward each other.

Oh God, how I want him.

She studied herself in the mirror as she fixed her hair and makeup and brushed her teeth. Minty fresh and freshened up, she reached for her nightgown and robe, only to discover that in her passion-soaked haze, she’d entered the wrong room. Her lingerie was in the other bathroom.

Merda.

She could take off her clothes and wrap herself in one of the Turkish robes hanging behind the door. But that would rather defeat the purpose of purchasing lingerie. She could try to sneak into the other bathroom, but that would mean crossing through the bedroom, and Gabriel was sure to have come in from the terrace by now. No doubt he was reclining on the bed, like King Solomon in all his glory.

Julia trembled with anticipation at the mere idea. Should I take a shower first and just wander out there in a towel? Should I strip down to my panties?

As her brain stalled on how best to make her entrance, Gabriel tidied the terrace and moved everything inside. He placed the pillar candles around the room, grouping several of them by the bed. He adjusted the music so that a playlist he’d created solely for that night filled the air. He’d entitled the playlist Loving Julia and was more than a little proud of it. He placed a few personal items on the nightstand and turned out all the lights.

Then he waited.

And waited. But she didn’t appear. He began to worry.

He walked over to the bathroom and pressed his ear against the door.

He could hear nothing, not even the sounds of running water or the rustling of silk. His heart leaped into his throat. What if she was afraid? Or upset?

What if she locked me out?

He took a deep breath and knocked on the door.

“Come in.”

He was surprised to be so invited. He opened the door carefully and peeked inside. Julia was standing in front of the mirror, looking shy. “Are you all right?”

“Yes.”

He frowned. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. I just — Gabriel, will you hold me? I had all these plans, and then I came in here and froze and…” She rushed over to him.

His face wore a concerned expression. “It’s only me, love. Maybe I’ve overdone it.”

She shook her head and pressed her face to his chest. “No, I’m over-thinking things, as usual.”

“Then think about how much you are loved, my sweet, sweet girl.

Tonight I will show you just how much.”

He kissed her tenderly, and when she smiled up at him and nodded, he picked her up to carry her to the bed.

Julia wasn’t afraid. She thought she might be, but as Gabriel held her in his arms, pausing with each step to kiss her, her nerves began to relax.

She loved him. She wanted him. And she knew that he wanted her too.

He placed her on the edge of the bed and looked down on her with kindness. Julia’s breathing stilled; that was the look he had given her in the orchard. In their orchard. Now she wanted him even more.

“You turned the lights out,” she said.

“You have beautiful skin. It will be particularly alluring by candlelight.”

He kissed her forehead. “A figure such as yours would have inspired cave-men to carve on walls.” He kneeled in front of her and slowly removed her high heels.

“Are you sure?” she whispered.

He sat back and looked up at her, pushing a lock of hair out of her eyes. “Only if you are, love.”