Bedded by the Italian Playboy by Emma Shortt

presence wasn’t questioned.
    Of
course Penny could have snuck into his office and picked the lock herself,
lifting the cash before Dominic even realized, but when the sisters had agreed
on their plan, they’d all agreed to
do their parts. It could not all be left up to Penny. Her mission was already
difficult enough. She was stealing the majority of the cash they needed
straight out of Sebastian Demetrious’ safe, and she was picking locks, not pockets,
because pickpocketing was, and always had been, Rachel’s specialty.
    Pickpocketing.
    She
sighed. It would be worth it in the end, she thought as she looked around the
suite. All those teenagers left to fend for themselves, they would have
somewhere to go, people to count on, and all it was going to take to make that
dream a reality was for her to act the part. You can do this! How many times had she thought that? But those
words were harder to hold on to now, and all because he’d kissed her.
    Just
a tiny little kiss but the worst part was that Rachel just knew that a full-on
kiss might well have been enough for her to let him do whatever else he wanted.
The moment his palm had rested against her face, her stomach felt like it had
hit the floor, and then the moment his lips had touched hers everything
changed. Her breasts seemed to grow in size. They ached, her nipples hardened,
and she’d felt moisture wet her panties.
    All
sensations she’d felt before, only never like this. And never had she wanted to
do something so desperately to assuage them. She did now though. She wanted him
to kiss her again…and God help her, more than that.
    “How
is your salad?” Dominic asked, interrupting her frantic thoughts.
    She
looked up and met his eyes. The intensity in them made her shiver all over
again and she was suddenly glad she’d put one of the little cardigans Lucinda
had sent over her T-shirt. God knew she didn’t want Dominic to realize that her
nipples were stiff.
    “Lovely,”
she replied. “I love avocados.” She didn’t but it seemed that she, the
character she was playing—one she had to hold on to—should, so Rachel chewed on them even as she wanted to spit them
out.
    “They’re
a favorite food of mine,” he said. “The salmon I’ve ordered for our main course
is also delectable. You will enjoy it.”
    Salmon?
Rachel hated fish of any sort and yet again she smiled and nodded. “I’m sure I
will.”
    They
made it through their starter and main with a minimum of conversation. In
truth, Dominic supplied most of it. Rachel simply smiled, shivered, and added a
word here and there. She got the impression that this approach worked quite
early on which was good, because truthfully she wasn’t sure she could manage
much more. Still Dominic was a confident, powerful man, and didn’t all such men
like to talk about themselves? The thought made her smile and Rachel lifted her
water glass to her lips to disguise it.
    When
their dessert was brought out by the waiter who seemed to just sort of hover
with a deferential smile, Dominic switched topics, and Rachel paused, her spoon
in her fruit sorbet, the moment she realized what he was saying.
    “A
long weekend seems hardly long enough to really see everything
London
has to offer,” he
was saying. “It seems to me that you would do better with a week minimum.”
    “It
was all I could afford,” Rachel replied carefully. “
London
is an expensive city.”
    He
shrugged. “Yes, when you had to pay for a hotel, I can understand that. But you
are staying here now and I would be happy to put this suite aside for the next
two weeks for your use. Two weeks should be more than long enough to do
everything.”
    She
lowered her eyes, looking into the swirls of iced fruit even as her heart
thudded. Two weeks would certainly give her enough time to get what she needed.
Certainly she’d worried that her self-imposed weekend was going to be cutting
things close. She’d decided on that early on, though. Keeping up her