Postcards From Rio. Tina BeckettЧитать онлайн книгу.

       CHAPTER FOUR

      DIEGO’S SILVER WOLF’S eyes gleamed with a feral hunger as he drew Clare’s face down to his and angled his mouth over her lips. His kiss was like no other she had ever experienced—deeply sensual and so utterly irresistible that she did not stand a chance against his skilful seduction.

      Still half-dazed with sleep, but more dazzled by him, her lips parted of their own volition when his mouth exerted subtle pressure. Like a connoisseur of fine wine, he tasted her slowly and unhurriedly, yet with such bone-shaking eroticism that she melted against him.

      The sense of unreality she had felt since she’d arrived in Brazil increased, and she sank into a dreamlike state where she was only conscious of the strength of Diego’s arms around her, the divine smell of him, and the taste of him when she dipped her tongue into his mouth. He overwhelmed her and the feel of his hand smoothing up and down her spine evoked a languorous warmth in her veins.

      It seemed perfectly natural when he rolled her on to her back so that she was lying beneath him. His weight crushed her and she felt the slight abrasion of his chest hairs brush against the upper swell of her breasts above the neckline of her chemise.

      He deepened the kiss, and the languorous feeling was replaced with a fierce pull of desire in the pit of her stomach so that she lifted her hips, unconsciously seeking to assuage the ache inside her. She sensed a new urgency in Diego, a barely controlled savagery as he ravished her mouth with his intoxicating mastery, taking everything she offered him and demanding more.

      Molten heat pooled between Clare’s legs when she felt the hard ridge of Diego’s arousal straining beneath his jeans and pushing insistently into the cradle of her hips. She heard him mutter something indistinct and the sexy huskiness in his voice scraped her sensitive nerve endings. He was so male, hard against her softness, his passion without frills, without subtlety, a primal hunger that threatened to consume her in its fiery flame.

      She lifted her hand and touched the blond stubble on his jaw. It was not rough as she had expected, but felt silky beneath her fingertips. Utterly engrossed, she moved her hand higher to stroke his hair back from his cheek—and froze.

      The top of his right ear was missing.

      In an instant she was hurtled back to reality as she thought of Becky and the ghastly contents of the box the kidnappers had sent her. Shame engulfed her as she realised that while Diego had been kissing her she had forgotten about her sister’s plight.

      Diego’s jaw hardened when he saw her shocked expression and he flicked his head so that his hair fell forwards to cover his mutilated ear. What did it mean? Clare wondered numbly. Why did he have the same injury that the kidnappers might have inflicted on her sister?

      She pushed against his chest and when he rolled off her she snatched a breath and groped for her sanity in a world that had gone mad.

      ‘You were having a nightmare and I was trying to wake you.’ She bit her lip as she remembered the indescribable horror in his voice when he’d shouted out. ‘What was your dream about? You sounded like you were being tortured.’ Her own voice shook and she was incapable of making light of what had happened.

      ‘I don’t remember dreaming about anything.’ Diego swore silently. He knew what his dream had been about because it was always the same dream. The other inmates had called it the initiation, when new prisoners were beaten until they were a bloodied pulp and the prison guards looked the other way, or sometimes joined in. His horrific nightmares were a legacy of when he had been in prison and, although it was many years since he had been released from what had been a living hell, time had not erased the memories.

      ‘You spoke in your sleep but I couldn’t understand you.’ Sister Clare’s lovely face looked troubled. ‘I wonder if something traumatic happened in your past that you relive in your dreams.’

      She was too close to the truth for Diego’s comfort. He shrugged. ‘You may be right,’ he drawled. ‘I was deeply traumatised when Brazil lost the football World Cup.’

      ‘I was being serious.’ She firmed her lips that moments ago had softened when Diego had kissed her. He dragged his eyes from the temptation of her lush mouth and opened the door of the Jeep, pausing to grab his rucksack containing his wash kit before he jumped down and walked away.

      His nightmares were the reason why he had never spent an entire night with a woman before, Diego brooded as he strode through the tribal village. When he visited his mistresses in Rio he always left them after sex and went home to sleep alone. During daytime hours he could control his mind and suppress his memories, but while he slept the demons inside him tortured his subconscious so that sometimes he woke up believing he was back in the prison cell he had shared with ten or more other men. The cell had been so small that the inmates had been forced to take it in turns to lie down on the floor to snatch an hour of sleep if they were lucky.

      The experience had left him with an irrational fear of confined spaces which made him come out in a cold sweat whenever he rode in an elevator. Even being in the Jeep sometimes made him feel claustrophobic, and he kept the windows open so that he could feel fresh air on his face. He was sweating now, partly from his nightmare and partly because, as the sun burned through the mist, the humidity in the air rose rapidly. He walked through the trees to where a tributary of the river made a natural pool, which was safe to swim in.

      Why the hell had he kissed Sister Clare like that? He had only intended to tease her and brush his lips lightly over hers, but when she had opened her mouth for him and he’d felt her ardent response, he had been powerless to resist her. It had never happened to him before. He was always in control.

      Diego’s jaw clenched. He had just proved that his self-discipline was not infallible and the discovery that he could be tempted to act without restraint shook him badly. If he could succumb to passion, he might just as easily succumb to anger and violence, like he had done when he was seventeen.

      He stripped and dived into the pool, relishing the cool water washing over his heated skin. He felt more at home in the rainforest than he did in a city. Here, he was free to live his life on his terms without the need to bow to social conventions. Compared to the favela where he had spent his childhood, and prison where he had lost his soul, the tropical wilderness, although dangerous in its own way, provided him with a sense of peace. He would not allow a novice nun with the face of an angel and the body of Aphrodite to disturb his sanctuary, he assured himself.

      He looked up at the sky and watched a bank of clouds roll in above the tree tops. Experience told him that another day of heavy rain lay ahead, and flooding would make the road from Inua village up to the border virtually impassable. He shrugged. His task was to escort Sister Clare to Torrente so that she could teach at the Sunday school and prepare to make her final vows and, although he felt she was making a mistake by committing her life to the church, it was her choice and none of his business.

      * * *

      Clare was conscious of Diego’s brooding gaze as she stepped out of the guest hut and walked over to where he was leaning against the Jeep. She assumed he had swum in the river as his hair was damp, but it was drying quickly in the stifling heat and turning blonder by the minute. At least he was fully clothed, but his tight-fitting white T-shirt clung to the hard ridges of his abdominal muscles and evoked memories of when she had run her hands over his naked torso.

      Although she was too hot in her nun’s habit, she was glad that her body was hidden from his view, especially when she felt her hard nipples chafe against her bra. She was shocked by her wanton response to Diego and determined to keep her distance from him for the second leg of their journey to Torrente.

      As