Luca's Bad Girl - By Amy Andrews Page 0,16

shook her head. ‘I went through a stage where I liked it a little too much.’

‘Ah,’ Luca said, intrigued by the nugget of information. Was this what Pete had alluded to? ‘Care to elaborate?’

Not bloody likely! Mia couldn’t believe she’d told him that much. Damn this man! But there was something about him, a recognition that they were the same, that seemed to loosen her lips around him. Still, she had absolutely no intention of reliving two years of booze and bad men with him.

The past was the past.

‘No,’ she said. He quirked an eyebrow at her and she said, ‘It’s complicated.’

They walked in silence for a few moments. ‘I suppose a man from Marsala probably doesn’t understand that.’

Luca tensed. He’d been enjoying the build-up between them as each footstep took them closer to their apartments. To their beds. The footpath had narrowed and their arms brushed; her body warmth mixed and flirted with his. Their footsteps matched, their breathing synchronised.

But suddenly that was forgotten.

Mia turned her head to face him. ‘How long ago did you leave?’

Luca bit down on the urge to laugh at her choice of words. Leaving implied consent. He hadn’t been given a whole lot of choice. ‘I was sixteen.’

She whistled. ‘That’s a long time.’

Luca chuckled, trying to divert the conversation. ‘Are you implying I’m old?’

Mia laughed too and let it peter out. ‘You’re a long way from home, Luca,’ she mused.

Although she, more than anyone, knew that geographic proximity had nothing to do with that sense of ‘home’. She’d grown up a twenty-minute drive from here and it may as well have been Italy for all the connection Mia felt to the brick and mortar house where her mother still resided. Mainly on the couch.

Luca kept his gaze firmly fixed on the illuminated arch of the Sydney Harbour Bridge he could just see through the treetops. ‘Yes.’

Mia smiled. ‘Care to elaborate?’

‘No.’

‘Word on the grapevine is you studied medicine in London. I thought Italian mamas liked to keep tabs on their sons. No decent universities in Italy?’

Luca saw his mother’s broken face again on that horrible day that had changed everything. The sorrow and disappointment etched in lines that had seemed somehow instantly deeper. He schooled his expression as he looked at Mia and repeated her response.

‘It’s complicated.’

Mia nodded. If anyone understood that, she did. And she understood the underlying message—butt out. She got that too.

They lapsed into silence again but she was aware of him large and silent beside her. Aware of his tension and his potent, brooding masculinity.

‘Here we are,’ she announced unnecessarily as the doors to the ten-storey apartment complex loomed ahead.

Luca dragged himself out of the sticky web of his past. ‘Yes,’ he murmured. He looked down at her. ‘Your place or mine?’

Mia swallowed. She should have been outraged at his assumption. But he was looking at her intently with that devil mouth and heat was flooding through her belly and tightening her breasts.

She didn’t do repeat performances, that was her golden rule, but, heavens above, she wanted him.

‘Yours,’ she murmured huskily. ‘I share with Evie.’

He held her gaze for a moment before opening the door for her and following her to the lift. They rode it to the ninth floor in silence, Luca propped against one wall, staring across at Mia propped against the opposite wall. The bold way she returned his gaze tugged at his groin and his whole body tightened in anticipation.

Mia felt utterly dominated as Luca lounged against the wall, arms crossed. His gaze raked her body lingering on her breasts, her thighs, her boots. Then travelled all the way back up again to rest on her mouth.

The seconds ticked by as his eyes locked on her lips. Her tongue darted out to moisten them, a nervous gesture.

His nostrils flared. She swallowed.

His arms dropped. Her heart skipped a beat.

He took a step towards her. She tensed.

The lift dinged. He stopped. She breathed again.

‘Ladies first,’ he murmured. ‘Number nineteen.’

Mia walked on legs made of Plasticine to the indicated apartment, aware of his eyes on her the whole time. She could barely breathe by the time she pulled up in front of his door.

Absently she reached for the doorhandle the same time he did. He sucked in a breath. ‘Your hands are freezing,’ he murmured.

‘Yes,’ she agreed. That was because all her blood had drained to her belly and breasts. In fact, apart from her torso she felt cold right through to her bones. She even shivered involuntarily.

Luca grinned at