party or an auction for some charity, it was surely one with a good cause. Jessica had probably filled him in on it, but the craziness of the past couple of days had driven everything else from his head, which wasn’t like him at all.
He prided himself on being organized. On being logical.
His mouth thinned.
There’d been nothing organized or logical about his behavior today…
Forget that.
Today was history.
Concentrate on tonight.
Tux or dark suit? Dark suit. He hated the stodgy formality of tuxes, always half-expected somebody to come up to him and say, you look good in that tux. Where’d you rent it? even though his tux was custom made.
The fact was, his family had been raised knowing they had to spend every lira and euro with caution. Had their father’s money gone to the American family he’d acknowledged? Did it really matter?
Maybe Bianca was right.
What was the sense in condemning the children for the sins of the father?
All six of the American Wildes had determinedly made it on their own. They’d worked themselves through school and attained success through their intelligence and determination.
There would be people like that at tonight’s whatever-it-was, people with money but with good instincts. Oh, there’d be the usual contingent who’d want to show the world that they were part of the fabled one or two percent, but most of them had a genuine interest in Doing The Right Thing.
Some few might even hope that an act of charity might cleanse their souls of past transgressions.
Still, he’d bet not one of them had transgressed as he had today.
The shabby motel room. The quick, no-emotion sex with a woman who was a stranger…
And, Dio , what was wrong with him?
Sex with a stranger? He’d done that before. Once at a masked ball in Venice, another time at a dinner high in the clouds at a Manhattan penthouse.
Exciting, each time.
As for what had happened today…
No emotion? There’d been plenty of emotion. Hunger. Heat.
And release.
He was a man, not a boy. Consensual sex of any kind was not a sin.
The jet was picking up speed.
He could feel the plane gathering itself for takeoff, for that power-pulsing climb that would leave the earth beneath its wings.
What had happened between him and the McKenna woman had been like that. The urgency. The rush. The sense of leaving all reality behind. Two people who’d just met, who had treated each other with cold removal…
But there’d been nothing cold about what happened in that room.
The sex had been like fire. Like flame. He had burned for her and he knew damn well that she had burned for him.
She used you.
Well, so what? They’d both gotten what they wanted.
She’d taken control of everything, from start to finish.
Yes, and what about it? He wasn’t a male chauvinist. He believed in gender equality.
Most men he knew would have been elated. Dammit, he should have been elated! A beautiful woman had driven him to a motel, torn off her clothes and his, and ridden him into ecstatic oblivion.
Still, there was something incredibly hot about a woman losing control under the stroke of a man’s hand. He thought about what it would be like to undress her with slow deliberation, to watch her eyes blur as he bared her, to hear her moans as he slid his hand between her thighs and felt her turning slick and wet for him…
No.
If he were with her now, he’d take her fast and hard, never mind those images of slow seduction; he’d tear off her jeans, her panties, bend her over the table, push himself into her again and again until she wept for mercy, for release, for him…
“ Merda! ”
Matteo looked up. “You okay?”
“Fine,” Luca said. “I’m fine.”
The hell he was!
The plane was big for a private jet, but not big enough for what he needed. A long walk. A five-mile run. A workout that would shut down his head, his hormones…
His insanity.
He unbelted, rose from the leather chair, went to the bar and poured himself
He prided himself on being organized. On being logical.
His mouth thinned.
There’d been nothing organized or logical about his behavior today…
Forget that.
Today was history.
Concentrate on tonight.
Tux or dark suit? Dark suit. He hated the stodgy formality of tuxes, always half-expected somebody to come up to him and say, you look good in that tux. Where’d you rent it? even though his tux was custom made.
The fact was, his family had been raised knowing they had to spend every lira and euro with caution. Had their father’s money gone to the American family he’d acknowledged? Did it really matter?
Maybe Bianca was right.
What was the sense in condemning the children for the sins of the father?
All six of the American Wildes had determinedly made it on their own. They’d worked themselves through school and attained success through their intelligence and determination.
There would be people like that at tonight’s whatever-it-was, people with money but with good instincts. Oh, there’d be the usual contingent who’d want to show the world that they were part of the fabled one or two percent, but most of them had a genuine interest in Doing The Right Thing.
Some few might even hope that an act of charity might cleanse their souls of past transgressions.
Still, he’d bet not one of them had transgressed as he had today.
The shabby motel room. The quick, no-emotion sex with a woman who was a stranger…
And, Dio , what was wrong with him?
Sex with a stranger? He’d done that before. Once at a masked ball in Venice, another time at a dinner high in the clouds at a Manhattan penthouse.
Exciting, each time.
As for what had happened today…
No emotion? There’d been plenty of emotion. Hunger. Heat.
And release.
He was a man, not a boy. Consensual sex of any kind was not a sin.
The jet was picking up speed.
He could feel the plane gathering itself for takeoff, for that power-pulsing climb that would leave the earth beneath its wings.
What had happened between him and the McKenna woman had been like that. The urgency. The rush. The sense of leaving all reality behind. Two people who’d just met, who had treated each other with cold removal…
But there’d been nothing cold about what happened in that room.
The sex had been like fire. Like flame. He had burned for her and he knew damn well that she had burned for him.
She used you.
Well, so what? They’d both gotten what they wanted.
She’d taken control of everything, from start to finish.
Yes, and what about it? He wasn’t a male chauvinist. He believed in gender equality.
Most men he knew would have been elated. Dammit, he should have been elated! A beautiful woman had driven him to a motel, torn off her clothes and his, and ridden him into ecstatic oblivion.
Still, there was something incredibly hot about a woman losing control under the stroke of a man’s hand. He thought about what it would be like to undress her with slow deliberation, to watch her eyes blur as he bared her, to hear her moans as he slid his hand between her thighs and felt her turning slick and wet for him…
No.
If he were with her now, he’d take her fast and hard, never mind those images of slow seduction; he’d tear off her jeans, her panties, bend her over the table, push himself into her again and again until she wept for mercy, for release, for him…
“ Merda! ”
Matteo looked up. “You okay?”
“Fine,” Luca said. “I’m fine.”
The hell he was!
The plane was big for a private jet, but not big enough for what he needed. A long walk. A five-mile run. A workout that would shut down his head, his hormones…
His insanity.
He unbelted, rose from the leather chair, went to the bar and poured himself
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