Bargain Bride, Billionaire Groom Read online

  With his cock aroused and hard as a brick, he was a man on fire for his woman—a man who couldn’t keep his hands off her at the moment.

  “Should you…mmm…be doing that right now?” she panted.

  “He can’t see a thing,” Jio assured her, sensing that her mind fretted over the driver handling the horses, even as her body grooved out half a dozen yes’s to the antics of his fingers.

  “Why?” He gazed down at her in mock worry, and asked, “Shall I stop?” He teased his fingertip ever so lightly across her soaked knot of nerves, as much in sexual torment as she.

  “I’ll scream if you do.” Her hips and pelvis deepened their sensual motion. So did his fingers, sliding, gliding, wiggling around those delicate strips of flesh between her thighs.

  He laughed and cuddled her close. “Kiss me.”

  She kissed him, closed her mouth over his and stabbed her tongue between his lips in a bold in-and-out tease. Her body’s corkscrew moves against his fingers tempted him to give her more.

  When he slid one finger inside her tight channel, he smothered her moan with his mouth, and rubbed the column of his sex against her thigh like a useless school boy.

  “Jio, yesss…” she whimpered, dragging her lips from his, her lungs starved for a breath. As her fingertips dug into his upper arms, her thighs tipped open in a way that invited an in-depth exploration from another finger sliding in her cache.

  She moved her hips in rhythmic response to his fingers’ sensual strokes. Her lips puffed out broken little breaths of pleasure that goaded and coaxed him into speeding up the tempo in and out of her wet, velvety tightness.

  Suddenly, the sleigh hit a bump in the snow and the jolt nearly threw him into an orgasm. Unfortunately, the word ‘nearly’ didn’t apply to his wife.

  Jio rushed to control the sensations wrenching through her body by jamming his lips against hers, and burying her shriek under his mouth. There was no stopping an earthquake, or a whirlwind, so he held her tight and cuddled her close…and let her ride out her accidental climax.

  As a wild rush of feeling convulsed throughout her body, she pulled at his hair and her hips writhed sensually to the tune of his lips and his fingers.

  Jio enjoyed every second, discovering an erotic heaven on their journey back to the chalet. That he’d be able to visit this place to enjoy it—to enjoy her anytime he wished—made him feel something so profound, he didn’t think there could be a name for it.

  “Jio…” her whisper of his name and her body’s fading shudders signaled to him.

  Ever so gently he broke contact with her lips. “Shhh…” he whispered back, and showered tiny kisses all over her flushed features. “Breathe, darling.”

  She nodded, keeping quiet while her tremors subsided.

  “Okay?”

  “Mm,” she murmured, and sighed. “Thank God for sleigh bells!”

  Jio laughed and withdrew his soaked fingers from between her legs, for if he didn’t pull his hand and his entire body back… Underneath the blankets, he tugged her gown around her kneecaps and smiled when he felt her thighs twitch beneath the palm of his hand.

  “Forgive me, sweetheart. I was all over you like an animal, and look what happened.”

  Golden would have laughed if she wasn’t already frustrated by the loss of his mouth and her unruly climax that his fingers, and a bump in the snowy lane, wrought on her poor body. Their separation of space lasted no longer than it took for her to wiggle up against him.

  “I loved it!” she declared, and kissed him. Her ungloved hand loosened up the center buttons of his shirt and slipped inside. “I need to touch your skin, Jio—I need to feel you, please, please…” she whispered against his lips. She clutched the cotton fabric of his undershirt and tugged it up.

  “Darling?” he murmured against her mouth. Her fingers crept up along his chest. She pinched his nipple, extracting an ‘mmm’ from her husband. As her hand drifted down, those muscled knolls built up along his stomach bunched beneath her palm.

  Her hand skimmed lower still as his lips dove onto hers with aggression. He sucked and nibbled on them, then he dipped his tongue inside her mouth and drove that kiss to a succulent plateau.

  She rubbed her hand against his lower stomach. His happy trail of hair and skin quivered beneath her touch, just before her fingers delved inside his trousers and found the ramrod core of him, ready to go. She stroked his penis, wrapped her fingers around him and adored his thickness.

  “Stop that,” he groaned against her lips.

  She drew her mouth from his and dropped bunny soft kisses along his throat. “Hmm, how big you are here…” She rubbed and squeezed harder.

  Jio dragged her hand out of his pants and wrapped restraining fingers around her wrist.

  “We’re almost there. Okay?” he gruffed at her.

  “I can’t wait,” she whispered, elated. Even after what just happened.

  Jio studied her as she settled back into the seat, breathing easy for the bit of space this wildcat placed between them. Good Lord! Ten more seconds and he’d have unzipped his fly, spread her legs open and sailed on home!

  Moonlight filmed across her cheeks as light flakes of snow flurried around them. “You’re a little animal, you know that?”

  Golden pulled the blankets tighter around her and looked at him. A smile of satisfaction rode her lips—lips that were kissed free of all lipstick and plump and tousled with his use of them.

  “Am I? Your brother—” she broke off. “No other man ever said so.”

  “My brother is not here tonight.” He rubbed her lower lip with his thumb. “What happens next makes our marriage real. What happens next makes you mine. Are you ready?”

  “So ready.”

  The sleigh pulled up to the stone and log chalet and the driver came around to remove their blankets. Jio asked him if he wouldn’t mind opening the front door for them.

  “I’d be delighted to, sir,” the driver replied with a smile, accepting the house key Jio slipped him.

  Jio stepped out of the sleigh first, then held his hand out to Golden to assist her. Holding hands, they walked up the steps to the front doors that their driver propped open for them.

  Jio scooped her up in his arms and carried her over the threshold.

  “Congratulations again, Mr. and Mrs. Falcone,” the driver said cheerfully, handing the keys back to him. Without either of them taking their eyes off each other, they wished him a warm goodnight.

  Jio kicked the door shut. “You must be cold.”

  “Uh-uh.” She shook her head. “You’re hot enough to melt a glacier!”

  While making a beeline straight to his master suite, his mouth tasted, sipped on and adored his wife’s lips. It was a short walk to his suite, but long on the promise of pleasures yet to come.

  She was his. How she got him to this moment—how they both arrived in his bedroom on this starry night—no longer mattered.

  Not tonight.

  ~~*~~

  Fragrant ruby rose petals littered the king-sized bed.

  Whoever prepared Jio’s bedroom had come in just before they arrived to light dozens of tea-candles. Their soft glow captured the wolfish gleam in his eyes. Golden shivered and thought of the painting in his suite at the lodge, of a wolf ready to claim its mate.

  Then she thought about him getting dressed in this very room, preparing to exchange wedding vows—and tossing handfuls of rose petals on a bed he planned to share with her.

  “Sweetheart.” Jio lay her down on the mattress. He unclasped her arms from around his neck and kissed each pinkened cheek. “Three minutes, yes?” His accent had thickened from the anticipation that hummed between them. “I need to uncork the champagne.”

  She nodded, shrugged her cloak from her shoulders and looked around. Her eyes widened for perhaps the dozenth time in as many hours. Tucked into the built-into the wall bookcase above the bed, a rectangular glass vase displayed tiered rows of large, red rosebuds.

&nbs
p; Their fragrance drifted around the room and scented her fairy-tale enchantment. Could all this have come from her clay-footed groom? From the man happily plucking the champagne bottle out from its nest of ice in a beaten copper bucket?

  Jio popped the cork. A burst of honey-colored bubbles spilled out from the bottle’s opening. Golden champagne frothed across his fingers and down his hand. He arched a brow and angled a humored look her way.

  Her gaze melted over him when he flicked out his tongue and lapped at the dribbles leaking through his fingers and down his hand. She pressed her thighs together, anxious to feel that tongue of his sliding all over her.

  “You like my technique?” Jio poured each of them a glass of champagne.

  “What cork-popping skills you have,” she crooned, taking the glass of champagne he handed to her.

  “I can’t wait to see your technique at popping a cork,” Jio teased back, and joined her on the bed.

  “I’m a very talented cork-popper,” she purred.

  He arched a sexy eyebrow. “You are?” he asked, stretching his body out on the space alongside her.

  As he nudged his shoes off his feet, Golden heard the thumpity-thump of each one falling on the area rug next to the bed.

  “I look forward to being the judge of that.” Adjusting himself on a propped up elbow, he admired her legs, gleaming in nude stockings. In the position she lay, the slit in the dress exposed their lengths far past mid-thigh, just shy of the panel of her panties.

  She licked her lips when he placed his glass on the nightstand. Then he tugged the tiara off her head and set it down next to his champagne.

  Off came the pins holding her up-do in place. As her hair cascaded down her shoulders, she leaned into him and brushed her lips against the column of his neck, glimpsing the jerk of his Adam’s apple.

  “You smell like heaven, Jio.”

  “Thank you. You smell and look so very nice, too.” He reached down and smoothed his palm along her hip, then his fingers cruised on over to the center of her thighs. Shaken breaths whittled from her lungs at the feel of his fingertips drifting along her skin.

  “Well, what have we here, Mrs. Falcone…?” His fingers met, and then paused, at one of the clasps that locked her thigh-high nude stockings to her black lace garter belt.

  “It’s from Pandora’s Box, a-a lingerie boutique in town,” she stammered, suddenly shy.

  “Mmm,” he draped a soothing kiss on her lips. “May I?”

  She nodded. Her breath stuck inside her throat to feel his wonderful touch graze lazily along her inner leg. He smoothed the flap of her dress back over her hip and studied the captivating arrangement of black lingerie. She’d hoped that the garter belt, sexy and modern with silk laces crisscrossing up the sides, would twist Jio’s mind up in knots.

  Skinny eyelash straps clasped into the tops of her nude, thigh high stockings. She’d made it a point to slip her panties on last—over the enticing arrangement of straps, stockings and willing body.

  “How intriguing,” he murmured.

  She thought he would find it erotic to peel her panties off her body, then make love to her with her garters and stockings still on. But now? Now she had something else in mind…

  He traced the smooth, waxed skin along her bikini line. Then he slipped his finger underneath.

  “Aahh!” His luscious, knowing fingers caressed her skin and aroused her senses. She balanced her champagne glass between her fingers so it wouldn’t spill.

  “How soft you are here, darling…”

  “The better for you to touch.” She closed her eyes and her head fell back. Her thoughts floundered and her thighs tilted open to the fingers Jio used to thrust aside the front panel of her panty.

  “…and what lovely lips you have down here.”

  Her eyelashes drifted up. “The better for you to kiss,” Golden whispered to her bad, sexy wolf.

  Slender fingers combed through her patch of silky curls—then Jio slipped one finger to the hilt inside her wet channel while his thumb swished over and around her clitoris, moistening that throbbing gem with her body’s juices. His free hand caught the back of her head as she looped her arms once more around his neck.

  He stared into her eyes. His gaze darkened with the reality of how damp and prepared for him she was. “You are quite ready for me.”

  “So are you.”

  The ledge of his cheeks reddened. His rock-hard arousal nudged her thigh through his clothes.

  Taking a drink of her champagne, she set the glass down on the bedside table behind her. Then she turned to him and said, “But, our first night together,” she dragged his jacket off his shoulders and tossed it to the floor, “has only just begun.”

  Golden tugged the bow at his throat loose and undid the rest of the buttons of his dress shirt to reveal the broad chest underneath, encased in a white undershirt.

  Determined to make good on the promise she made herself, to give him a wedding night to remember, she wound the flaps of his shirt in her fists and pulled him down into the pillows with her, landing hard enough to send up a drift of rose petals.

  Beyond their windows, blackness filled the night. Far from sleepy, she wondered how she would ever sleep again. Knowing this lay next to her, that Jio belonged to her—that she was free to help herself to his lips. His body. Anytime she wished.

  To prove it, she welded her lips to his, buried one hand in his hair and squeezed his scrumptious butt with the other, wriggling her body to get closer to his thickness.

  Jio wrenched his lips from hers and raised himself up long enough to take both his shirts off.

  “My oh my…” The muscled wedge of chest bursting from his clothes pleasured her eyes. Power contoured his shoulders and as candlelight rippled along his naked skin, she couldn’t resist scratching the pearled tip of her French manicure playfully along his nipple. A throaty groan rumbled from his throat.

  With a siren’s smile on her lips, she slid out from beneath him.

  “Hey—” Jio protested.

  In a fluid move, she grasped the small train of her dress and stepped away from the bed.

  Frowning, Jio watched as she swung around to face him. Flicking the skirt of her dress back, she reached behind her neck and unsnapped the delicate, jeweled halter collar that circled her throat. Then she pulled down the zipper of her gown. Inch-by-inch she bared her breasts, her waist, her hips to him in a slow tease, loving the way his lips curved up in appreciation.

  He reached for her again, his gaze clinging to the bounty of skin newly exposed to him,.

  “Ah, ah, ah! You can look, but you can’t touch, husband.”

  He suspended the reach of his hands and shrugged. Lying back in the pillows, he clasped his hands behind his head. “I’ve been doing that for over a year. What else is new?”

  She smiled at her bare-chested man relaxing on a flotilla of rose petals. He’d wanted her for that long? The rampaging bulge that chuted up his pants, the heat in his gaze falling along the silken rosy skin of her body being revealed to him told her all she needed to know.

  His chest rose with an anxious breath, and while his wolf-like stare soaked up the sight of her breasts, each one of her nipples jeweled to the size of two carat rubies.

  The sound of her gown clouding around her high-heeled feet prompted him to growl, “Why don’t you come on over here?”

  She shook her head. Stepping out of her gown, she presented him with a full frontal view of her in her panties with sexy garter straps holding up the tops of her stockings, and her mile-high heels with their crystal-studded straps still looped on her feet. “I will, but you can’t touch me, Jio. You have to keep your hands to yourself.”

  “Have you lost your mind?”

  “You heard me.”

  “I ache to lick and suck your breasts,” he murmured. “Let me have a taste those little ripe nipple-berries.”

  Her skin flooded with warmth. He was trying to rattle her, and making her sound quite tasty in his
efforts. His flushed cheeks and the way his tongue licked at his lips warned her this wolf planned to move in for a one-man buffet! But she wasn’t ready to allow it. Not yet.

  Tonight, by God, she would have her way!

  He reached down to undo his belt.

  “Change the rules and I’m sleeping upstairs,” she threatened, and picked up her dress, planning to do just that.

  “Hell! I’m not even touching you. I’m just getting things…er, ready.”

  “I want to get you ready.”

  He hesitated undoing his fly. “What do you want me to do? Lay here and be driven out of my mind?”

  “Why not?”

  He shrugged. “Fine with me. But just so you know? Rome wasn’t taken in a day.”

  “Thank you for the history lesson, Jiovanni.” She draped her gown over the bedroom settee and walked over to him. He shifted his body, his gaze focused her.

  Her legs trembled so much she could hardly stand, but laying out some rules for him this night would set the tone of their marriage. A good tone, she hoped, and took up the space next to him where he waited.

  She started to undo his belt buckle where she’d forced him to leave off. Her hands brushed the hardened knots and smooth planes of his waist. He hissed in a breath, and her fingers shook at the sound. Maybe this wasn’t such a good idea after all.

  Jio must have sensed her flash of insecurity. “You are beautiful, Golden,” he said softly. “What you’re doing takes my breath away.”

  Without touching her, he built her up and sent her confidence soaring. She drew his cock out of his briefs and her gaze indulged in the impressive column of flesh. Unable to hold back, she dipped her head and tasted him with delicate licks.

  “Mm…” She traced the soft ridge of him with her tongue. Then she took his tip into her mouth. Slowly, with lazy circling strokes of her tongue, she savored the salty drops of him and discovered one highly aroused male. The curves of his skin, swollen against the brush of her tongue, heightened the pleasure coursing through her body.

  His hips crested up, and her mouth and tongue pulled him in between her lips in this highly erotic foreplay that gave her as much joy to give as it must have given him to receive.