Postcards From Rio. Tina Beckett
shaft towards her moist opening. Instinctively she spread her legs wider to allow him to settle his hips between hers, and he slowly eased forwards, entering her inch by careful inch until he possessed her utterly.
Clare caught her breath as she experienced a moment of mild discomfort, but the brief stinging sensation was over before she really registered it. Diego hesitated, but she curved her arms around his back and pulled him down on to her at the same time as she lifted her hips in invitation for him to take her virginity that she offered willingly.
He waited until her breathing had steadied before he moved, slowly at first, pulling back so far that she thought he was actually going to withdraw. He laughed softly when she clutched his shoulders, and pushed forwards again, then drew back, then forwards, increasing his pace with each thrust and going deeper into her so that she was filled by him, overwhelmed by him and felt that he had taken ownership of her body.
In this primal dance of sex he was her master and her tutor. He slid his hands beneath her bottom and tilted her hips, forcing her to accept each devastating thrust of his body into hers. But he countered his strength with gentleness and there was no question of him forcing her to do anything she did not feel ready to experience. She wanted everything he gave her, wanted more, wanted quite desperately the something that hovered frustratingly just out of her reach.
‘Easy, querida,’ his deep voice soothed her. ‘Don’t be in such a rush. Relax and let it happen.’
She looked into his eyes and saw a familiar glint of amusement at her impatience. But as she watched him make love to her she saw heat and hunger in his predatory wolf’s gaze, and she heard the hoarse sound of his breaths coming faster and faster as he increased his pace.
And then it did happen. Suddenly. Spectacularly. He gave a powerful thrust that made her gasp, but before she could drag oxygen into her lungs, the tight knot of tension deep in her pelvis exploded without warning and sent her soaring and sobbing into the stratosphere. Her vaginal muscles contracted and released as wave after wave of intense pleasure swept over her so that she could not breathe or think, could only feel the shattering ecstasy of her orgasm.
Diego waited until she came down before he immediately took her higher again, driving into her with an implacable intent that made her realise he was nearing his own nirvana. She let him ride her fast and hard, instinctively knowing that he needed it like this and the time for gentleness had passed. His passion was raw and elemental. But when he paused and tipped his head back so that the cords on his neck stood out, before giving a harsh groan that sounded as though it had been torn from his soul, Clare was overcome with tenderness for him and pressed her face against his shoulder to hide the tears that inexplicably filled her eyes.
* * *
Diego pushed his hat off his face where he’d placed it over his eyes before he’d fallen asleep and was instantly aware of three things. The fire had gone out, the slice of sky that he could see through the cave’s entrance was a couple of shades lighter than pitch-black and Sister Clare was lying beside him, as naked as the day she’d been born and, fortunately, fast asleep.
Santa Mãe! He’d found himself in some awkward situations in his life, mostly after he’d drunk more beer than was good for him. But he doubted that all the saints in heaven could help him out of this one. His eyes dropped to the delectable curves of Clare’s buttocks and he cursed softly beneath his breath and pulled the sleeping bag over her.
There was no point wasting time in recriminations. He couldn’t despise himself any more than he already did anyway, and deflowering a nun simply added another black mark against his name. An image came into his head of the overcrowded prison cell where he had spent two years of his life. His mind flashed back further. He saw the figure of a man sprawled on the floor of his mother’s apartment, and a pool of black congealed blood.
Diego swallowed convulsively and forced himself to look at his hands. There was no blood on them now. He breathed easier. Of course there wasn’t; he only saw the blood in his dreams. It had been years ago, and Father Vincenzi had said he hadn’t killed the guy. But how could the priest know for sure, Diego brooded, if he had no recollection himself of what had happened the night he had found his mother being beaten up by a drug dealer? The only person who knew the truth was his mother, but the last time he had seen her he’d been seventeen, and she had told the police he was a murderer.
Deus. He snapped a shutter down on his memories and quickly pulled on his jeans, taking care not to disturb Clare. She looked angelic as she slept with her lips slightly parted and her auburn curls spread across her shoulders. But, thanks to him, she was no longer innocent. After she’d mentioned an ex-boyfriend, he had assumed that she wasn’t a virgin, and by the time he had discovered her inexperience, he’d been unable to stop himself from making love to her.
Other memories assailed him, not of the distant past but the previous night. He visualised Clare’s curvaceous body, her round, creamy breasts topped with pointed, cherry-red nipples that had been ripe for his mouth. The taste of her still lingered on his lips from when he’d kissed her between her thighs and dipped his tongue into the honeydew of her arousal.
He swore beneath his breath and walked out of the cave before he succumbed to the temptation to kiss her awake and instigate an early morning ride. It would be a first for him because he had never spent an entire night with a woman to be able to have sex upon waking. It was curious that he had slept dreamlessly with Clare cuddled up against him, her body all soft and warm like a kitten, he mused. But he had a feeling that in the cold light of day his little cat would reveal her sharp claws and accuse him of seducing her.
Because undoubtedly, and not entirely unfairly, Clare was going to blame him for leading her astray from the life of pious devotion she had chosen. She was unlikely to believe he hadn’t intended for things to go so far. But it wasn’t all his fault, Diego tried to convince himself. The way she had thrown herself into his arms would have tested a saint, let alone a mortal man.
He tried to dismiss the voice in his head, which said that he should have been stronger and given Clare time to decide if she wanted to give up her life with the church and give her virginity to him. Instead he had lost control and made love to her mindlessly and without a care for the consequences, and it was that which concerned him more than anything else. No other woman had ever made him feel as desperate for sex as Clare had done last night. He didn’t do desperate or, God help him, needy. He was a lone wolf without cares or commitments as far as his numerous temporary mistresses were concerned. It was better that way. Safer.
The sky was lightening with the arrival of dawn as Diego followed the path through the trees towards where he had left the Jeep. He rubbed a hand over his rough jaw and decided he needed a shave. Maybe taking a shower beneath the powerful waterfall would help him to think straight and answer a vital question: What the hell was he going to do with Clare now?
The answer slipped unexpectedly easily into his head. He would have to take her back to Rio with him. He felt partly responsible that, now that they had slept together, she could not make her final vows to become a nun. But really he had done her a favour. Her uninhibited response to him last night proved she wasn’t cut out for a life of chastity. He would set her up in an apartment near to his penthouse overlooking Copacabana beach, and then he would take her shopping. He was looking forward to seeing her dressed in sexy clothes that made the most of her gorgeous figure, instead of her drab grey nun’s habit.
His erotic fantasy of watching Clare parade around his bedroom wearing a see-through black negligee came to an abrupt halt when he heard a noise that instantly put him on his guard. The snap of a twig on the floor of the rainforest could have been made by an animal, but Diego knew that only humans moved so clumsily.
He jerked his head in the direction of the noise and saw the dull silver gleam of a gun aimed at him through the trees. His first instinct was to warn Clare she was in imminent danger but, as he gave a shout, he felt something hard hit his skull, followed by searing pain and nothing more.
* * *
She hurt everywhere, Clare discovered when she stretched and became aware of a slight soreness between her legs. Her back ached from where she had spent the night