Nacho Figueras Presents (5 page)

S
omehow they made it into the house, Noni giggling and wearing only his shirt, never happier about the fact that her little cottage was sheltered and private on all sides. Enzo had pulled his trousers back on, but his magnificent sculpted chest was still bare.

As soon as they opened the door, the dogs came slipping out, making happy, whining sounds of greeting and brushing in circles around their legs. The sisters knew and loved Enzo almost as much as they did Noni, but when they turned their ice-blue eyes up at him and grinned their wolfish grins, it seemed to Antonia that they were exceptionally pleased to see him this evening.

“Shhh,” soothed Enzo as he bent to pet them. “
Quieta, tranquilas
. Shhh, shhh.”

Noni moved inside the cottage, inwardly groaning at just how messy it was. Even though Enzo had seen it in this state hundreds of times over the years and she had never cared before, there was something different tonight. She felt shy all of a sudden and wondered if he might think less of her due to her apparent inability to pick up after herself.

She decided he didn't care after he followed her in and then immediately folded her back into his arms. “
Mi corazón
,” he breathed as he kissed the top of her head and then her cheeks and then her mouth again.

God, she'd known he would kiss like this. Like he did almost everything, with utter care and precision and mastery. She felt absolutely melted by his expertise. She had actually lost track of how many times she had just climaxed, and here she was, mere moments later, wanting him all over again.

He broke the kiss and looked at her, gently sweeping her face with the palm of his hand. She gazed back, noting his straight glossy black hair, just slightly long and jagged at the edges. She traced his angled black brows with her thumb and looked into his hooded caramel-colored eyes, admiring the faint laugh lines that radiated from their corners, the length and thickness of his lashes. His skin was polished and gorgeous, the color of dark brown sugar. His cheekbones were high and sharp. His nose was strong and hawkish, in contrast to his full, sensuous red mouth. His jaw was pronounced and just slightly shaded with stubble. She knew from experience that even after his closest shave, the five o'clock shadow would return within hours.

She sighed to herself in admiration. “Are you hungry? Thirsty?”

He shook his head and smiled at her. That sexy smile that unfolded so slowly over his face.

“Let's go to bed,” he said gruffly, pulling her closer. “I'm not done with you,
mi
amor
.”

Her knees practically buckled and she knew that to be taken to bed was all she wanted as well.

She led him to her bedroom, pushing aside the piles of clothes, glad that she had at least changed the sheets recently.

He started to lay her down under him, but she shook her head and pushed him onto the mattress first. He smiled and rolled onto his back, watching her with a hooded gaze as she primly took off his shoes and socks and then reached for the button on his pants and shimmied them off him.

Her breath caught. This was the first time she had seen him fully naked, and she couldn't help but stare. He was extraordinary. He smiled at her, perfectly at ease, and put his arms behind his head. She had to keep herself from laughing out loud with joy and wonder.
Finally
, she thought.
Finally he is here
.

She had dreamed of this moment so many times, never really believing that it would actually happen.

He stirred, and his muscles stretched and flexed under his golden brown skin. She reached out to touch him, tracing the width of his shoulders and chest and the way his body tapered to his narrow waist and hips. She followed the hair on his chest, down the treasure line on his stomach, and wrapped her hand around his hard, pulsing length.

His breath stuttered, and he closed his eyes for a moment. She dipped down and took him as far into her mouth as she could, loving the slight taste of herself on him, loving the way he got even harder, the way his breath hissed out, and then he groaned with pleasure as she sucked and licked the length of him.

She climbed up on the bed and straddled him, dragging her borrowed shirt over her head and then leaning down to kiss him. He reached up and tangled his hands in her hair, answering her kiss with his own, pulling her down on top of him.

He wrapped his arms around her, and she wriggled against him, neatly fitting her body to his. She lay her head upon his chest, listening to the loud and steady beat of his heart. His skin was soft over the rigid planes of his muscles, his chest hair scratched pleasantly against her cheek, and he smelled of sweet hay and salt. She smiled when she recognized a trace of her own scent on his skin. His hands wandered down and cupped her rear, pushing her more firmly against him.

She pressed herself to him for a moment, savoring the way his skin against hers sent flares of pleasure throughout her body. She propped herself up on one elbow and fumbled in her nightstand for a condom, ripping it open with her teeth and unrolling it onto him. She lay back on top of him again, pushing her body against his, and then she opened her legs, and he slid into her.

That first thrust sent sparks of heat blazing through her body, making her stomach clench, her cheeks burn; even her hands and feet tingled with pleasure. She felt him everywhere. It was like she was home. He filled her in a way that no man ever had.

They moved together, slowly at first, and then faster, and then, without breaking contact, he rolled her over onto her back and hovered over her, his eyes searching hers. They were silent, lost in each other, the intensity of the moment only building. He rained kisses on her forehead, her cheeks, her mouth and jaw. She raked her nails over his back, grabbing his hard, muscular behind and pulling him even deeper still.

He shuddered, obviously fighting for control, and she locked eyes with him and then slowly reached down to touch herself.

They were carried away together. She was slammed with a flood of sensation, even stronger than the first time. She felt him pulsing into her, heard his voice calling out her name, closed her eyes and saw stars. Hot, electric pleasure flowed through her, cresting and subsiding and then crashing into her with even more strength. She felt herself lost in the waves, taken over by the frantic bliss, as if her heart and head might burst. She climaxed one last time just as Enzo groaned her name and then collapsed, spent, atop her.

They lay there unable to move, breathing in tandem, their hearts slowly coming back to their normal paces, their skin cooling as the night breeze swept through the windows.

Enzo rolled off her but immediately pulled her into the shelter of his arm, kissing the top of her head and stroking her back. Noni was as relaxed as she'd ever felt, her mind filled with a pleasurable humming blankness.

Luna nudged the bedroom door open with her nose and padded into the room, closely followed by Mojo. They both leaped lightly onto the bed and curled up at the bottom of the mattress, raising their heads in unison and looking curiously at Enzo. He laughed and started to get up.

“Okay, girls, I can take a hint.”

But Antonia grasped his arm and pulled him back down. “No,” she said softly. “Stay. Sleep.”

T
he room was awash in moonlight when one of the dogs nuzzled her cold nose against Enzo's ankle and woke him up.

He turned his head and looked at Noni, who was burrowed against him, her strange heat radiating about him, her breath warm against his shoulder, her hair and skin gleaming in the pale silver light. He reached out and gently ran his hand over the curve of her hip and almost laughed when he felt himself tighten and throb all over again at the feel of her velvety skin under his fingertips.

She murmured in her sleep and moved closer to him. Unwilling to wake her up, he moved away and slipped out of bed, pulling on his boxer shorts. The dogs raised their heads and watched him with glittering eyes as he left the room. He stepped out onto the back porch, which overlooked a small cove of bright white sand and, beyond that, the vast and silvery sea.

It was a warm and sticky night, and Enzo was perfectly comfortable in his scant clothing. He stood and watched the water, listened to the sound of the waves hissing in and out, and tried to take measure of how he felt about what had just happened between him and Antonia.

He was, he had to admit, flushed with contentment. There was no doubt that being with Noni in this way made him happy, fed some part of him that he had purposefully been starving for ages.

But, he reminded himself, he'd thought himself happy before, and that had ended disastrously for everyone involved. Keeping his distance had never been just a whim. He had starved this need for a reason.

He had been ready to leave, but how could he now, after all this? He inwardly cursed his weakness. More than anything, he never wanted to hurt her, but what had happened between them tonight was all but certain to lead to someone getting hurt.

The screen door slid open behind him and he turned to see her standing there, wearing a black cotton kimono and sleepily rubbing her eyes.

“There you are,” she said with a shy smile. “I woke up and you were gone.” She joined him on the porch, leaning her back against his chest and sighing contentedly when he wrapped his arms around her.

They silently watched the moon on the sea for a moment. He took in her warm scent and fought the urge to slip a hand under her robe.

“Just think,” she said, teasing, “of all the time we wasted. We could have been doing that for years.”

He kissed the top of her head. Remained silent.

She burrowed closer to him. “We'll have to make up for all those missed opportunities.”

He kept his eyes on the sea. He clenched and unclenched his fist. “I'm not so sure, Noni,” he said softly.

She looked at him. “What do you mean?”

“You know I was married before, right?”

“Yes. You told me.”

“I made mistakes,
niña
.”

“Meaning what?” Her voice suddenly lost its brightness.

“Meaning I swore that I would never make those same mistakes again.”

She turned to him, her eyes flashing. “Are you saying that what we just did was a mistake?”

“No,” he said. “I mean, I don't know. Maybe.”

She broke away from him, crossing the balcony and turning to face him. She stood silhouetted against the ocean, with her silvery hair drifting in the breeze.

She was so beautiful, it made his heart hurt to look at her.

He frowned, quiet for some time, thinking. Then he took a deep breath. “My father managed the horses for the Flores family. They lived on a ranch outside Buenos Aires. I spent most of my childhood on their farm. My
papá
taught me everything I know about the ponies.”

She raised an eyebrow. “He must have been very good, then.”

“
Sí
. He was. But he died when I was sixteen.”

“Riding accident?” she said quietly.

He shook his head. “Auto accident, actually. A truck driver lost his brakes and smashed right into him.”

She flinched. “I'm so sorry.”

He swallowed. “My younger brother was in the car as well. He was thrown through the window. He ended up in a wheelchair, quadriplegic, but at least he survived.”

She exhaled and crossed back to him, taking hold of his arm. “Oh, Enzo. I didn't know.”

He nodded, watching the sea. “Anyway, after my father died, it was on me to support my family. My mother had to stay home to take care of my brother, and the medical bills just kept coming. So I dropped out of school and started working full-time for the Flores family.

“They were good to me. I'm sure they helped out my mother even more than I knew. And they had a daughter…”

He felt Antonia's breath hitch.

“Her name was Agustina Flores. She was a year younger than me. From the beginning, she was determined that we would be together…”

“Was she very beautiful?” asked Noni.

He shrugged his shoulders. “Oh,
sí
. And very spoiled and strong willed. She was used to getting whatever she wanted.”

“And she wanted you.”

He laughed harshly. “For some reason, yes.”

He felt Noni tighten her hand possessively on his arm. He smiled. “Believe me,
niña
, she couldn't hold a candle to you. What woman could?”

Antonia snorted. “You don't have to flatter me. Go on.”

“We were married by the time I was nineteen. I think her family would have chosen someone else for her if they were able to—I was not of their class, you see—but they knew how hardheaded their daughter was. They were a bit afraid of her, really. So they made the best of it and accepted me as one of their own.”

“Did you love her?”

He paused, tracing his finger across the scars on Noni's hand. “I don't know. I very much wanted to. Even if I wasn't entirely sure”—he sighed—“how could I say no when it meant that my brother and my mother would be taken care of? I was so young, and the weight of my responsibilities seemed very heavy.

“My father-in-law brought me into his import business. After all, his daughter's husband couldn't very well be a hired hand anymore, could he? And it turned out I was good at it. I had a head for numbers. Within the first two years, I nearly doubled the revenues. Señor Flores was delighted. He promised me that if I kept it up, I'd be made partner by the time I was twenty-five and that I would inherit the entire business once he retired.”

“But the ponies…Did you get to—”

He shook his head. “No. I probably could have played polo—but there was no question about me ever going back to the
piloto
path. I didn't have the time to do what I really loved, what my father had taught me—the training and the day-to-day caretaking. I worked all the time. I was at the office from morning until night, and if I wasn't working, I was attending parties and dinners and fund-raisers. The Flores family was very prominent. I needed to help keep up appearances.”

He paused for a moment, leaning toward the sea.

“I was a millionaire many times over even before I was made partner. I had everything anyone could ever want. A beautiful house, a wife any man would envy, my mother and brother were taken care of for life…All I had to do was keep pretending to be someone I wasn't. To be the man that Agustina and her family wanted me to be…”

She nodded, understanding. “You were—”

“Miserable. I was miserable. And I was trapped. Every day felt the same—put on a suit, go to the office, stare at numbers, go home, put on another suit, go out, make small talk with people I barely knew, go home, say good night to my beautiful wife—who, to be honest, I had nothing to say to—go to sleep next to her, and then wake up in the morning and start all over again. The only time I felt free was when I could sneak down to the stables, spend a little time in the barn, just smell the hay and the horses, you know? Get my hands a little dirty and drink
maté
with the other grooms.”

She smiled.

“I would go back home—to my mother and my brother—every Sunday. And I would talk to my little brother. Diego, his name was. He was a funny kid, always joking about being stuck in the wheelchair. Never complained, though. And he could see that I was unhappy. He tried to bring it up many times, but I'd always brush him off. I never wanted him to feel guilty. I mean, compared to his life, what was so very hard about mine, right?”

Noni shook her head. “There are a lot of different ways to be trapped.”

He smiled ruefully. “That is true.” He took a deep breath. “In spite of all the best medical care, in spite of everything I could pay for, Diego was still weak. His health was always precarious. He could catch a head cold and it would turn into pneumonia within a day. He had no resistance left…”

He swallowed the sudden lump in his throat.

“He died the year I turned twenty-five. The year I made partner. He developed a sore on his back—one he couldn't feel—and it got infected and…”

He stopped talking for a moment, clenching his jaw. Noni slipped her arms around him and held him tight. He bent his face to her head for a moment, took a deep breath of her scent.

“Before he was gone, though, he made me listen. He told me that he was sick of seeing me so unhappy, that I couldn't keep living the way I was living. That our father would have been so disappointed to see me this way. That I had to promise him that I would try to change things…”

He cleared his throat. Was quiet for a moment.

“I tried. After Diego was gone, I told Agustina that I didn't want to work for her father anymore. That I wanted to work with the ponies again, that I needed to. She laughed and thought I was joking. When she realized that I wasn't, she threw a temper tantrum and said that I would have to choose between her and the horses. So…I did.”

“I would have made the same choice,” whispered Antonia.

He looked away from Noni, remembering the expression on his young wife's face when he told her he was leaving. The look of heartbreak and bewilderment. The tears. The shock and recriminations from his in-laws…

He shook his head. “It was a selfish thing,
niña
. Nothing I am proud of. I hurt that family. I hurt my wife. It was not their fault. They had brought me into their circle and offered me everything they had. They had done nothing but love me in their way. They couldn't understand why I had to leave. But I felt that I was slowly dying there. I didn't recognize myself any longer. I knew that I would never survive in their world.”

Noni lay her head against his chest. “I understand,” she said. “I really do.”

“I suppose I could have taken half of everything. I had earned a lot of money for the company by that point. Agustina and I had made sound investments. We owned many properties. But I didn't want it. I didn't want any of it. I had just enough money left to make sure
mi mamá
would always be taken care of, and then I left town.

“For a few years, I hired on at whatever ranch would take me, until I knew enough so that when I landed at the Del Campos', I was ready to be a
piloto
like my father had been.” He smiled at her, touching her face with his fingers. “Then, of course, I met you. And now I am in trouble.”

Antonia stared up at him, chewing her lip. “Of course, I'm…I'm glad you told me all this, Enzo, but I still don't see what it has to do with us.”

He stroked her hair. “
Niña
, there are rules. Alejandro is very clear about what is acceptable for those who work for him.”

She made an exasperated sound. “That's ridiculous. What about him and Georgia? He hired her himself and then he ended up marrying her. Besides, Alejandro is my brother, not my father. And I'm a grown woman. Why would my brother tell me what to do?”

“But that's just it. He is your brother. In little more than a month, you are about to inherit hundreds of millions of dollars. Everyone knows this. Whether you can admit it or not, you
are
a Del Campo. You are part of a family so powerful and wealthy that they make the Flores clan look like
peones
in comparison. You are destined to be part of the exact same world that I left behind.”

“What are you talking about?” said Noni. “The Del Campo world revolves around horses. You of all people know that. It's not the same at all. You're not making any sense.”

He shook his head and stepped away from her, quiet for a moment. “Why should you trust me?” he finally spit out. “I just told you what I did to Agustina and her family. Why should I get another chance? What if I hurt you the same way? I made a mistake tonight. I never should have…”

She turned her huge, dark eyes on him. Her face was livid was anger. “You never should have what? Been with me? Don't play stupid, Enzo. I know you felt what I felt. I also know that it's not always like that. That it's almost never like that. That people can go their whole lives looking for something like what we just felt between us—and die never finding it. We are best friends—and we can make each other feel like that? Do you know what a gift that is? That is not something you throw away. I don't care what happened in your past. I am not Agustina Flores. And you are not that same trapped young man. Everything is different now. You've changed.”

He couldn't take seeing the hurt and anger in her dark eyes. He turned his face away from her. “But what if I haven't? You've gone through so much. I don't want to—”

“Stop,” she barked. “You don't have a clue what I've gone through. You don't have any idea. Don't you dare try to tell me that you're just protecting me or whatever ridiculous excuse you have ready. I want you, and I know you want me. So you can just cut the bullshit and accept what I'm offering with your arms wide open.”

She stepped toward him and stood up on her tiptoes, taking his face in her hands. “Kiss me,” she demanded.

He could not help himself. He kissed her. And she was hot and sweet and made him dizzy with need.