Brazilian Nights

“Who says? Put your money where your mouth is.”

Her smile became a grin. “A buck says you can’t.”

“You’re on.”

She lost the bet.

Dante could do everything. Run a powerful corporation? Sure. Make every man in a room defer to him? That, too. Be the man all the women in the world wanted? Easy.

She’d known all that from experience.

What she’d never known until now was that he could diaper a baby as if he’d done it all his life. Take care of her. Brew her a cup of tea. Stand over her until she gave up and downed another couple of Tylenol. Whip up a meal—though as he pointed out, heating a can of chicken broth for her, taking a steak from the freezer and broiling it for himself wasn’t exactly gourmet cooking. But it was much, much more than she’d ever seen him do in the past. Back then he’d been a whiz at making restaurant reservations and, once or twice, phoning down for Chinese take-out.

Dante Orsini, doing kitchen duty?

Never…until tonight.

Hours later she and Daniel were both yawning. Dante offered to give the baby a bottle but she said no, she’d nurse him. “Are you sure?” Dante said and she nodded and decided that telling him she really had to do it, that her breasts would be swollen and heavy unless she did, was more than she wanted to discuss. It was too private, too intimate…

Too much.

She nursed Daniel, sitting in the beautiful rocking chair in his room while Dante cleaned up the kitchen. When she was done, they bathed the baby together. Dante said he felt too clumsy to do it, but he took over halfway through, laughing when Daniel splashed water all over him, wrapping the baby in a big bath towel, then diapering him and dressing him in a blue onesie.

Dante lowered him gently into his crib. Gabriella kissed her son’s head. Dante stroked his dark hair.

“Good night, pal,” he said softly.

Out in the hall, for the first time all day, they were alone. The penthouse seemed wrapped in silence. Their eyes met. She felt the heat rise in her face. He took a step toward her. She took a quick step back.

“No. We can’t.” Her voice was breathless. “It would—it would only complicate things.”

He nodded. Hadn’t he already reached that same conclusion?

It was her turn to nod. “So…so, good night.”

“Good night, sweetheart,” he whispered. And then he reached for her and she went into his arms.

Chapter Ten

SHE went into his arms as if she had never left them.

A dozen thoughts raced through his head.

He wanted to tell her how he had missed her. How it felt to hold her again. But the need to kiss her, taste her, the need to possess her, make her his again had a hot urgency that drove away reason.

It was the same for her.

He could tell by the little sounds she made, the way she clung to his neck. By the motion of her body against his; that long, elegant body he had, yes, never forgotten.

And her mouth.

Sweet. Soft. Giving. A man could lose himself, just taking her mouth again and again, but it wasn’t enough, not now, not after all these endless months. He drew her away from the door, backed her against the wall, tore open her robe and swept his hands over her silken skin. Her hands were on him, too, at his jeans, undoing the closure, unzipping him, and he groaned as she closed her hand around him and said his name in a broken whisper that almost drove him to his knees.

“Yes,” he said, “yes, sweetheart.”

He hooked his fingers in her panties. Eased them down. He knelt; she put a hand on his head to steady herself as she stepped free of the scrap of silk. He clasped her ankle. Rose to his feet, his hand moving up and up her leg. His touch was warm and possessive and it made her tremble.

“Open for me,” he said in a strangled voice, and when she did, he put his hand between her thighs.

A cry burst from her throat. She was wet and hot for him, only for him, and he couldn’t wait. Not anymore. He had wanted this without knowing it, waited for this for more than a year, and if he didn’t have her now, he’d be lost forever.

He reversed their positions so that the wall was at his back. And as she sobbed his name, he lifted her, brought her down onto his rigid length. Her arms tightened around his neck, her legs wrapped around his waist. She buried her face against his throat and he could feel the heat of her breath, hear her breathy moans of ecstasy.

Too fast, his fevered brain told him, dammit, too fast….

She cried out. Sank her teeth into his flesh. And as she convulsed around him, Dante drove deep, rode her even harder, and flew off the edge of the world.

They stayed that way for long minutes, breathing hard, letting the aftermath of their passion ease. Then Gabriella gave a soft laugh. He remembered that laugh, low and delicious and earthy.

“What?” he said, his lips curving in a smile against her forehead.

“All those years of yoga that I took…” Another husky laugh. “Turns out they were worth it.”

He grinned, let her down slowly. She looked up at him and she was so beautiful…the tightness in his chest almost overwhelmed him.

“Gabriella.”

“Mmm?”

He shook his head. “Nothing,” he said quietly, “just…” He bent his head and kissed her. Then he lifted her in his arms and carried her to his bed. She lay with her head on his shoulder, her hand playing with the dark curls on his chest.

“What are you thinking?”

Gently he stroked a tousled mass of golden curls from her cheek.

“That I’ve missed you.”

She turned her face, pressed a kiss to his skin. “Me, too.”

In truth he was thinking far more than that. He was thinking that a man went through life certain he knew what he needed to be happy. Success in his work. The love of his family. Friends who stood by him. Things that seemed simple and attainable.

It wasn’t enough.

He needed this.

Gabriella, in his arms. Winding her arms around his neck as he gathered her closer, returning his kisses as if nothing in the world mattered but him.

He gathered her closer. How had he lived without her?

Without warning, a thought raced through him like a gust of cold air. This could be dangerous. There was so much to discuss, to work through. But then Gabriella sighed, kissed his throat and he knew that nothing mattered but her.

The swift tide of desire rose inside him again.

Kissing her, he rolled her onto her back, caught her hands in his and laced their fingers together. He drew back a little, just far enough to see her.

She was exquisite.

Her hair was a tangled mass of gleaming golds, her eyes were wide and luminous, her lips were softly swollen from his kisses. Everything had happened so quickly that she was still wearing his robe and, under it, his T-shirt. He bent his head, kissed her throat, the pulse racing wildly in its hollow. His tongue dipped into her mouth, capturing the honeyed sweetness he had never forgotten.

“Gabriella.”

His voice was thick, his breathing ragged. He ached, not only to make love to her again but to see all of her. Gently he eased the robe from her shoulders and slid his hands under the hem of the shirt. Her skin felt like silk; the scent of her arousal made his blood pound even harder.

The back of his hand brushed against the soft curls between her thighs. She moaned; the sound inflamed him. Watching her face, he parted her labia with the tips of his fingers. Her head fell back, her lashes drooped over her eyes.

“Do you like it when I do this?” The words were thick, raw with need. “Gabriella? When I touch you here?”

“Yes,” she sobbed, “yes, yes…”

His finger stroked her clitoris. It was the most perfect flower imaginable. He loved the feel of it, the desperate little sounds she made when he caressed it. But it wasn’t enough. He wanted to kiss her belly, her breasts.

“Sweetheart,” he whispered. “Sit up. Let me get this damned shirt out of the way…”

“Dante…”

“Just lift your arms and I’ll—”

“Don’t!” She caught his wrists, her eyes pleading with his. “Don’t,” she said unsteadily. “Please.”

“What is it? What did I do? Gaby. Baby…” Hell! What a fool he was. He exhaled sharply, gathered her in his arms, kissed her temples, her eyelids, her mouth. “Forgive me. I should have realized. It’s too much. You’re sick….”

“No. Oh, no. I’m fine.”

Even worse. Dante cursed himself for being a fool. She’d had a baby only four months ago. He should have thought, should have asked.

“It’s…it’s—”

“The baby. Daniel. I understand. Just tell me I didn’t hurt you because if I did, God, if I did—”

She put her fingers against his lips.

“No. It isn’t that.” She took a deep breath. “It’s…it’s that I’ve changed.” She hesitated. “My breasts. My body.” The tip of her tongue swiped lightly over her lips. “Maybe…maybe if you just leave the shirt—”

He silenced her with a kiss. “I want to see you,” he whispered.

Gabriella shook her head. “My breasts aren’t the way they used to be. And…and there are stretch marks on my belly.”

He kissed her again, framing her face with his hands, then gently stroked her hair back from her face.

“You are the most beautiful woman in the world, sweetheart.”

“No. I’m not. Having a baby changes things.”

“Yes. It makes you a woman. My woman.”

She offered a tremulous smile. “I know I must sound silly. But I don’t want to disappoint you. I couldn’t stand it if—”

“Gaby. How could you ever do that?” His mouth twisted. “I’m the one, not you. I disappointed you. I hurt you. I left you alone to face the hardest days in your life and—”

“You didn’t know.”

“But I do now. And I want to see you. Please…”

He waited, wondering how he would survive it if she refused him, knowing he would never force her to do anything even if it meant he had to spend the next twenty-four hours under a cold shower.

She took a breath. Nodded. And let go of his wrists.

Even more slowly, he drew the cotton T up, eased it carefully over her head. He could feel her trembling and he wanted to gather her in his arms, rock her against him, tell her she would always be perfect in his eyes whether she thought so or not.

He tossed the shirt aside. Her hands flew to her breasts. Dante shook his head and drew them away. He looked at her, and the breath caught in his throat.

She was more than beautiful, she was heart-stoppingly lovely.

Her breasts were fuller and all the more feminine for it. Her nipples, a pale pink that had always reminded him of summer roses, were a duskier shade than in the past.

His eyes moved down her body. The elegant indentation of her waist. Her belly, not flat but delicately convex and faintly, all but invisibly, striped with silver.

Yes, her body was changed. His seed, his son, had changed it. She was the essence of femininity.

And she was his.

Pride, primitive and male, the same emotions that must have driven the earliest man when he first emerged from his cave, swept through him. Mine, he thought, and he reached for her and brought her close against his heart within his encircling arms.

“Gabriella. You are exquisite.”

“You don’t have to say—”

He drew back. Kept his eyes on hers as he cupped a breast, traced the erect crest with a finger. She moaned; he thought he had never heard a more exciting sound.

“Your breasts are beautiful.” He dropped his hand to her belly, curved his fingers over her warm flesh. “And this, your skin gilded with silver…” His gaze narrowed. “You are mine, sweetheart, and I have never wanted you more than I want you now.”

He kissed her, parting her lips with his, kissed her throat, the slope of her breast, and when he drew the ruched pink tip into his mouth, her cry of pleasure shot through him. He teased her with his tongue. Licked. Nipped. Sucked…and suddenly there was a new taste, a taste even sweeter and richer—

Her hands flattened against his shoulders, pushed him away.

He lifted his head, saw panic in her eyes.

“I am hurting you,” he said gruffly. “Baby, I told you. We’ll stop—”

“You’re not! The feel of your mouth is…is wonderful.” Color leaped into her cheeks. “But I should have realized. I should have known. Sometimes, after I feed the baby, there’s…there’s a little milk still left. I should have warned you that…that—”

“Warned me?” He caught her wrists as she tried, again, to cover her breasts. “You’re a woman, sweetheart. My woman. I love knowing that you can do this for Daniel.” He paused. “For our son.”

She gave a little sob, slid her hands into his hair, brought his lips to hers for a long, deep kiss and fell with him into the flames.

Dante stroked her breasts. Her belly. Her thighs. She cried out, sought his mouth. Her hand cupped his straining erection. The breath hissed through his teeth and he kicked free of his jeans.

Too fast. Way too fast. How could he, a man who was almost arrogant about his sexual control, how could he be so close to losing that control now? Because, dammit, he was.

He could feel the tightening in his scrotum, the tension building in every muscle. He was racing to the edge, heart pounding, holding back, holding back, because his Gabriella deserved more. More of his mouth at her breasts. His hand between her thighs. His fingers parting her, finding her clitoris. More of this and this and this, he thought fiercely, as she cried out and arched off the bed.

“Please,” she whispered, and he groaned, thrust into her. Deep. Hard. Fast. She reached up to him and he kissed her, rode her as she wrapped her legs around his waist.

“Dante,” she sobbed. “Oh, Dante…”

She climaxed; he felt it happen, heard the trill of joy that broke from her throat, and he threw back his head and knew that what was happening to him had never happened before.

He was with her as they flew into the burning heart of the universe.

They slept in each other’s arms, legs entwined, her head on his chest, his arm curved around her, his hand lightly cupping her breast.

And awoke to the darkness of the night, the wonder of being together, the sweetness of it.

The deep, hungry need for fulfillment.

He caressed her. Feathered his fingertips over her nipples. Kissed them. Stroked his hand down her body, between her legs, sought and found the very heart of her.

She moaned. Arched against his seeking hand. Used every feminine motion of her body to beg him for more. Still he hesitated. All the mysteries of a woman’s body after childbirth, he had learned tonight. She said he couldn’t hurt her, but for all he knew, in his ignorance, he could. Making love more than once, God, more than twice, might be a mistake.

“Are you sure you can do this?” he said, his lips a breath from hers.

She gave that wonderful laugh again, wrapped her hand around him and said, “You tell me.”

He growled, rolled her on her back, lifted her leg and brought it high over his, opening her to him but entering her as slowly as he could bear.

It was agony.

Exquisite agony.

So was her soft moan of pleasure.

A shudder gripped his powerful body; he buried his face in her throat as he filled her, deeper, deeper, until he couldn’t tell where he ended and she began. Until they were one. One, he thought, his heart filling with joy…

And then she moved.

His mind emptied.

She moved again and he groaned, moved with her and she cried out, sank her teeth into his shoulder and they let go together, shattered together, fell off the edge of the world together.

He held her until her breathing eased and he knew she was asleep. Then he kissed her, checked the baby monitor, smiled at the sight of his sleeping son. He drew the duvet over them both, gathered her close again.

He had never felt so complete in his life.

He slept, too.

They woke. Made love. The moon rose and set. And the night slipped away and became morning.

Gabriella opened her eyes to the soft patter of rain.

Rain, this time of year? It was too soon. Rainy season didn’t come to the Pantanal until—

But she wasn’t in the Pantanal. She was in Manhattan. In Dante’s home.

In Dante’s bed.

Memories of the long, incredible night rushed in. She tried to remember how many times they’d made love even as she chastised herself for the effort. It didn’t matter…But, somehow, it did. Dante had always been an amazing lover. Tender. Savage. Giving and demanding all at once. Indefatigable. She’d been with only a couple of men before meeting him, so she was far from an expert. Still, Dante’s virility was, well, amazing.

And yet last night the frequency with which he’d wanted her had shocked her.

She had wanted him, too, each time. And that had shocked her, as well, that her need for him had seemed insatiable, her desire for him endless. But then, it had always been that way with him. She’d always wanted him; even these past endless months, unable to imagine feeling a need for sex ever again, even then, if she were honest, there’d been nights she’d dreamed of Dante. Hot dreams. Dreams from which she’d awakened empty and shaken, an ache low in her belly, her breasts full and sore…

Her breasts, full and sore…

Deus! The baby! She shot a look at the baby monitor, but it showed only an empty crib. Quickly she rose from the bed. Dante’s robe, the one she’d worn yesterday, was neatly draped over the back of a chair. She yanked it on, hurried to Daniel’s room…

And saw Dante by the window, holding his son in his arms.

He smiled when he saw her. “Good morning, sweetheart.”

“I overslept. I don’t know how. The baby—”

“He’s fine.” He looked down. “Aren’t you, buddy?”

Daniel offered an enormous grin. Dante did the same.

“See? He’s great.”

“He must be starving…”

“Well, we were starting to think we’d have to wake you. I mean, a snack’s a snack but when a guy wants his breakfast…”

“What snack?”

“He woke up at five.”

“You mean, I slept through it?”

Dante smiled. “Yeah,” he said huskily. “Imagine that.”

She blushed, tore her eyes from his and looked at the clock. Jack and Jill were going up the hill, carrying a huge wristwatch instead of a pail of water. Her mouth fell open.

“Ten?” she said, bewildered. “It’s ten in the morning?”

“It’s okay. I gave him a bottle at six.” Dante gave a modest shrug but it was impossible not to notice the self-satisfied smile on his face. “I diapered him, too.” He shuddered. “It was, uh, an interesting experience.”

She really tried not to laugh but a giggle escaped, and then another, and finally she was guffawing at the thought of her sophisticated, urbane lover changing a diaper full of poo.

Her lover, she thought, and her laughter faded. Dante was her lover again, her foolish heart was in his hands.

“Hey,” he said softly, “honey, what is it?”

“Nothing,” she said, and forced a smile. “Here. Give me the baby. I’ll feed him.”

Daniel went into her arms. She sat down in the rocker, started to open her robe…and hesitated.

“May I stay?”

Dante’s voice was low and soft. No, Gabriella thought, no, he could not stay. Every act of intimacy would be that much more difficult to forget after this time together ended. This was temporary. Dante might want her in his bed but the rest—permanency, fatherhood…

“Gaby? Sweetheart, if you want me to leave—”

“No,” she said, in rushed whisper. “Please. Don’t go. Stay with us.”

The look that swept across his face made her want to weep with happiness. He kissed her upturned face, then sat down on the floor, cross-legged. She opened her robe. The baby turned his head, latched hungrily on to her nipple. She smiled at her son, then at her lover.

And knew that this time, when Dante left her, there would be nothing left of her heart.

Chapter Eleven

IF THERE was one thing all the Orsini brothers knew, it was that no one walked a straight path through life.

There were sideroads and missteps, deep currents that threatened to suck a man under, chasms that might take a lifetime to bridge.

All the Orsinis had experienced those things.

It was how Rafe had ended up in the Army, Nick in the Marines, Falco in Special Forces. It was how Dante had found himself in the far reaches of Alaska, doing dangerous work in the oil fields. It was, in the end, how all four of them had returned to New York, taking one hell of a deep brotherly breath and invested everything—Nick’s and Rafe’s savings, Falco’s poker winnings and Dante’s fat oil field paychecks—in what had eventually become one of the most successful private investment firms in the world.

Chasms. Deep currents. Put bluntly, jumping in with your eyes closed.

That was what Dante was thinking Monday morning, as he shaved.

He’d done that this weekend. Bringing Gabriella and Daniel to New York was one thing. Moving them into his life was another. And, yeah, he had done that, changing a guest room into a nursery, moving Gabriella from the guest suite into the master suite. She’d protested, come up with all kinds of reasons it was a mistake, and maybe because a tiny piece of him worried she might be right, he’d swept her into his arms, kissed her concerns away and switched her clothes, her makeup, all her stuff, from her room to his.

Chasms and currents, all right. And, sure, sometimes you didn’t make it, but sometimes you did. And when you did…Dante smiled, turned on the water, cupped it in his hand and rinsed away the last dollops of shaving cream.

When you did, man, life was terrific.

He reached for a towel, dried off as he looked around his bathroom. A day ago it had been an austere male kingdom. Nothing on top of the long marble counter except his shaving brush, an electric razor he hardly ever used, a plain comb and brush. Everything else was in the deep drawers of the vanity. Now, little glass vials and jars, a perfume bottle, a mother-of-pearl-backed hairbrush and half a dozen other things stood on the countertops.

He ran a fingertip lightly over the hairbrush where a few strands of gold glittered among the soft bristles.

It was Gabriella’s stuff. He loved seeing it here and wasn’t that a hell of thing coming from a guy who had to count to ten if some woman left a tube of lipstick behind?

But Gaby was not “some woman.” She was…she was special. Beautiful. Bright. Sexy. It had rained yesterday and they’d ended up spending most of it before the fireplace, reading the Times, tackling the crossword puzzle together. The baby, Daniel, lay on the antique Rya rug between them, cooing and smiling, kicking his arms and legs, suddenly sobbing as if his small heart would break.

“What?” Dante had said, panicked.

“He’s hungry,” Gabriella had replied, smiling, and she’d nursed him right there, sitting in the curve of Dante’s arm, and what he’d felt, watching the baby at the breast of his woman, had almost overwhelmed him.

It had been her turn to look at him, raise her eyebrows and say, “What?”

“Nothing,” he’d told her, because what happened to him when he saw her nurse the baby was too much to put into words.

Their baby.

Daniel was his.

He knew it, had known it from the start. There was no question about it. That path, the one that led through life, was, for once, straight as an arrow. He and Gabriella had been lovers, he’d made her pregnant and absolutely the road was straight…

Straight as the road that ended at a house surrounded by a white picket fence, a station wagon, a dog and a cat and…

“Dante?”

A light tap at the door startled him.

“Yes,” he said. His voice sounded strange, even to him, and he cleared his throat and tried again. “Yes. Okay. Just give me a couple of minutes.”