<Do you actually intend on showing up? Are you even in Italy?> Tapping an impatient foot, Rachel let her arm fall to her side and took another drag off the slender Italian cigarette—her third in the last fifteen minutes. The nicotine rush temporarily soothed her fury. Three days. Three damn days she’d been in this God-forsaken country, trying to get from point A to point B to rescue a stupid client. And she’d barely made it out of the airport. She’d slept in the goddamn bus terminal last night, just to ensure she got out of Venice today, for Chrissakes, and she didn’t need lip from Dex about it! Glancing over her shoulder, she flashed a tight smile at another couple on her bus, returning from the truck stop with their purchases, then paced a few steps away to stand in the shade and reply to her mouthy duke. <Of course I’m in Italy.> Trying to reign in her temper, she lifted the phone and snapped a quick photo of the parking lot with the po

“Caitlyn? Darlin’?” Duke ran his fingers along the bumpy ridge of her spine, gently calling her back from where her dreams had taken her. Where he couldn’t follow, he thought jealously. Rising from the bed, he padded the short distance across the bedroom and picked up his phone, utterly unselfconscious about his nudity.A quarter ‘til four. There was still time to get back to the Piazza del Duomo, and to climb the cathedral’s dome, if she was up for it.Up for it. He snorted to himself, setting his phone down.When wasn’t she up for something? For as delicate and fragile as she looked, the woman had the stamina—and interestingly, the drives—of a hormonal teenaged boy, chest-deep in the throes of puberty. His gaze swiveled to where she lay in the bed, barely covered by the tangled sheet like the Ninfa Arnina.A slow smile curled his lips and he prowled towards her, taking a seat on the edge of the bed. He liked thinking about her drives. He liked engaging them even more.He grazed his

Rachel barely recognized the hollow-eyed face of her transparent reflection in the glass doors of the hotel as she approached them, dragging her luggage behind her. She wasn’t the kind of woman who made a habit of being miserable, but at this point, she was giving it serious consideration. The life-sustaining nicotine-coffee-chocolate buzz she’d subsisted on since the truck stop earlier in the day had long since worn off and she’d been running on fumes for hours. Her skin felt gross and she was sure she must stink after two days without a shower, even if she’d been blessed to spend most of it in refrigerated air. She’d long since passed the point of hunger, and now, she was fairly certain she’d be too exhausted to eat, regardless of the quality of the meal presented her. The automated doors slid open as she triggered their sensor and she turned exhausted eyes to the front desk. “Rachel?” Pausing, she pivoted toward the sound of her name. Dex.

Her heart leapt joyfully at Duke’s encouraging words. Basking in the warmth radiating off of him, Caitlyn drew nearer, pressing her body lightly against his. What had happened at the door had been frightening—she’d never seen him with so little control. Even swept as she was into the storm of passionate sensations he stirred, she still retained at least that much presence of mind to hear what he was saying, to know what he was doing.So much instinctive drive was flattering too, she had to admit. To hold a man like him so enthralled. Even now, he was responding—his fingers leaving hers to caress along the bumpy ridge of her spine, his head dipping to nuzzle her neck. To control him—and herself—she was going to have to be firm.“Duke,” she pressed at his tattooed forearms insistently, forcing him to release her, and pulled out of reach of his lips. “I love what you do when you touch and kiss me, but I want to learn what you like too.”With a wry grin, he tucked his hands behind his bac

What escaped him was something between an agonized howl of pain and a bitter growl of frustration. But he yielded. Setting her on her feet gently, Duke separated them. Then he took an unsteady step back, pivoted so his back was to her and took a seat on the side of the bed. He ran a frustrated hand through his hair, then fell back to stare blankly at the ceiling, his chest heaving and ropey veins standing out along his neck and shoulders, down into his tattooed forearms. His eyes slammed closed and he exhaled a sharp breath. He could have overpowered her like he had at the door. But he’d given her his word, and he’d kept it. Now he’d given her infinitely more. He’d set her free. Liberated her from her own insecurities. Unshackled the bonds of the past that had kept her prisoner. Elated, Caitlynn pushed herself off the wall and stumbled to the side of the bed. Duke’s breath left him with a soft ‘oophf’ as she fell upon him, but there was no tim