breast.
She felt ridiculous. Humiliated. She knew she looked absurd, standing half naked, shrieking like a fishwife.
If he laughed, she would kill him.
“Kate.” There was no amusement in his voice.
Bloody hell. A tear trickled down her cheek.
“Ah, bella.”
“Don’t. Call. Me. That,” she choked out.
“Why?” He took a step closer.
She shrank away, hating how vulnerable she felt. She had spent all her life being strong and sure of herself. This sharp, painful need, twisting like a steel blade inside her, was a new and unsettling emotion.
“I can’t help calling you that, Kate.” Through the sin-black fringe of his lashes glimmered a flicker of jewel-tone blue. “It was la Belladonna who stole my affection,” he murmured.
“I stole your purse,” she whispered. “Your heart is untouchable.”
“You wouldn’t want it. It’s far too black and shriveled to be of any appeal.” He reached out and touched her lightly on the cheek. “But as for the rest of me, cara, I am yours.”
“Oh, si. You belong to me—and any other lady who bats her lashes at you,” she blurted out.
“Are you jealous?” he asked softly.
“No,” she said through a trickle of tears. “I am furious. You… you…”
Before she could think of something suitably scathing to say, Marco swept her into his arms and in two quick strides was at the bed.
“Put me down!” she demanded, thumping her fists to his chest.
“As you wish.”
Her bum bounced against the mattress and then sank into the plump eiderdown coverlet with a feathery sigh.
“Go away,” muttered Kate, hugging a pillow to her chest.
Marco made no move to comply. Instead, he calmly unfastened his shirt and started to draw it over his head.
Whooph. The missile caught him smack in the chest.
Marco stepped back and waved the white sleeve of his shirt. “Might we cease hostilities for a moment and try to negotiate a truce?”
“To hell with peace conferences,” she cried. “Go draw up terms of surrender with the Baroness of Bare-Breasts.” Groping for more ammunition, she caught hold of the second pillow.
“A declaration of war?” He dodged the flying feathers. “Then I shall have to go on the offensive to defend myself.”
Her blood was up now, anger sizzling away her self-pity. The next thing she grabbed was a book from the bedside chest.
“Diavolo!” He flung up an arm to deflect the blow.
“Lucifer doesn’t have a prayer in hell of fighting back,” she retorted.
“A woman scorned is a dangerous thing.”
“Scorned!” scoffed Kate. “As if I want you in my bed.” The next book was a weighty volume of Byron’s poetry, perfect for doing some damage.
Let the wretch try to flirt with a blackened eye.
As if reading her mind, Marco swore a low oath and ducked just as she hurled the new missile. Flinging his shirt to the floor, he spun closer and pounced, fire-gold light rippling over the taut stretch of bronzed muscle.
The air whooshed from her lungs as his body pinned her to the mattress. Momentarily robbed of breath, she twisted in wordless fury, trying to squirm free of his enveloping heat.
“Oh, no,” he growled, catching her wrists and dragging them up over her head. “A husbandly prerogative is to demand that my wife cease trying to pummel me to a pulp.”
“You don’t want to be a husband,” said Kate in a fierce whisper.
His eyes glittered through the tangle of dark hair. “And what of you, Kate? Do you want to be a wife?”
She ceased struggling, and for a long moment the only sound between them was the ragged rasp of their breathing. The air swirled, hot and heavy with unseen sparks.
“Are you regretting Fate?” His tongue traced the swell of her lower lip. “The vagary of life that forced you to accept a wanton wastrel as your spouse?”
“I…”
Her flesh was now between his teeth. The nip sent a lick of fire through her limbs.
“I can think of only a few worse things,” she mumbled thickly, trying to hold on to her anger. Any other emotion would leave her too naked to need.
“Such as?” he asked, moving his wicked mouth along the ridge of her cheekbone.
“Being tied to the mast and left for the seagulls to pick out my eyeballs,” she murmured, as he kissed the salt from her lashes.
“Torture,” he agreed. “Stuck up against a long, hard post sounds like a fate worse than death.”
Kate couldn’t help it. A low laugh vibrated in her throat. “You impossible man.”
“Si. Incorrigible.”
One wide, strong hand kept her wrists imprisoned while the other found the folds of cotton bunched at her hips. Slowly, slowly