I should be here because he is here. I should be with him.

  We lean together, tight and close, barefoot and holding what’s left of our clothes and shoes to make our way through along the wet sandy shore back to the hotel.

  I’m touched and I can’t believe they’ve been kind enough to lay out bathrobes for us. Inside, the lights are low and the hotel seems completely deserted, apart from a night porter who’s almost asleep at the desk.

  Lucas’s suite is like a palace. Of course.

  My dress looks bad, but I think it will wash up okay. I hope so. I love this dress. There may be a little tear or two, but nothing I can’t deal with.

  His suit is wrecked. His shirt and his shoes are ruined, too. It’s surprising, when women’s clothes seem so light and decorative—by comparison, men’s suits and shirts look like armor—but dresses and skirts always seem to be repairable. Men’s clothes, if they’re torn or even badly scuffed, it spells doom.

  But he looks so good in the loose, heavy bathrobe. If there were a way to keep him like that forever—or at least forever while he’s with me—I’d never let him wear anything else. If there was a way, I’d have us both stay here forever.

  On a table by the balcony, a silver dome covers pastries, little cakes and fruit. An ice bucket is on a stand and a bottle inside is chilled and frosted with bubbles.

  Out on the balcony, we kiss under the moon. The moon that watched us make love on the beach.

  And he asks the question I’ve been dreading.

  “How long can you stay, Poppy?”

  Chapter Seventeen

  Lucas

  With the scents of Sicily in the air, the pale moonlight highlighting Poppy’s skin and the taste of her still dancing on my tongue, I want nothing more than for this moment to last forever.

  In the back of my mind, I’m trying to plot a way that we could stay here.

  It’s a fantasy for now, but what if I handed the reins of the family over to Giovani? How soon could he be ready, really?

  If Poppy could stay, I could stay. We could make a start right here.

  But she puts a hand on my chest and says, “Only a couple of days, Lucas. My client was very understanding, like I told you, but I still have a lot of work to do.” We chink glasses and I take a sip of the champagne.

  She says, “I did make a bit of an idiot of myself. Chasing after you like this.”

  I kiss her. “Don’t even think that. It was the most fantastic thing you could have done. And the bravest. You really are amazing. I’m so glad that you came. At least I’ll have a little time to show you some of my home country. And I hope you’re going to love it.”

  “I like what I’ve seen so far.” She stretches up to kiss me. “And tasted.”

  “I loved watching you eat. Especially when you insisted you weren’t hungry.”

  “Mmm.” We kiss again, sweetly at first. Then hungrily. Obscenely. She says, “I wish I had some more ice cream right now.”

  I reach for a house phone, call the desk and order ice cream. I ask her, “What flavors?”

  Her eyebrows raise. “At this time of night?”

  “In a hotel of this quality, you can order diamond earrings in caviar. At any hour of the day.”

  Her face brightens. “Chocolate and vanilla.” I tell the night porter and hang up, turning all my attention back to her.

  I ask her, “Do you like caviar? Not everybody does.”

  “I don’t know. I never had it.”

  That gives me an idea. “Maybe we should find out.”

  She purrs, “Not now, though. Now I want ice cream. And when the ice cream comes, I’m going to eat it off you.”

  I lift the phone again and say, “Double the amount of ice cream. And send more champagne. And two ice buckets.”

  She twirls around me. “Why do we need twice as much ice cream?”

  “For what I’m going to eat off you.”

  I kiss her lips and hold her. Her body moves under the towel robe, dancing to press and fit with mine. I kiss her neck and breath in the hidden scents of her body as she heats up.

  “It’s so good to taste you.” I suck her breast. “I was afraid for a while there that I would never taste you again. The taste of you drives me insane. I want to taste every part of you.”

  She slides her hands inside my robe. “I want to taste you. Now. With the smell of the sea air. Here on the balcony. I want to lick you and remember the tide lapping at us.”

  She presses her hands on my chest and rubs, from my neck all the way down. Wiggling her head, she buries her nose into my chest.

  As she presses my mouth on me, she asks, “Are you afraid someone might see us?”

  “No.” It’s dark, and the balcony is shaded. In my life, I’ve learned an instinct for when I can be seen. “Are you?”

  I stand back. “I am. And I’m not.”

  My lip tightens. “I want you.”

  “I want you too.”

  A knock at the doors to the suite tells me the ice cream has arrived. I still take precautions and check the spyglass before I let the bell boy push in the trolley.

  I tip him and dismissing him, taking the trolley from the door.

  A highlight of moonshine frames her in the doorway to the balcony.

  I tell her. “I’m in love with you. In case I didn’t know, a man told me this afternoon.”

  She laughs and takes the cover off the bowls of ice cream. She scoops some vanilla with her fingers and licks it before she pushes it into my mouth. “My client told me. And I think the receptionist at the hotel knew, too.”

  I suck the sticky sweet vanilla from her fingers. “And your taxi driver.”

  She takes a scoop of chocolate and puts it on my face, smearing it over my mouth. She pulls back to admire her handiwork, and it makes her giggle. Then she starts to lick it off. “Did you know?”

  I have to lick my lips, and our tongues meet. Her hands, cold and sticky, run over my ribs and grab at my ass. Her robe falls open and her breasts spill out.

  I reach for vanilla from the bowl. It’s cold on my fingers and she trembles and squeals as I paint ice cream down her neck and over her tits.

  She shudders. I want to gobble it all of immediately, but I let her tremble with the chill for a moment.

  I tell her, “I only knew what I said. That you were important, and I needed to be with you. I didn’t understand what it was until, well, until today.”

  “I feel the same.” Her voice shakes as I smear more ice cream on her stomach. “But I still don’t know if I really understand what it is.”

  “I’ll show you.”

  Slowly, I lick the ice cream off her body. She shakes. “Oh, my god.”

  The taste of her under the sweetness of Sicilian ice cream is almost enough to make me come. My wildest nature wants to take over and I have to hold it back.

  I lick her. Thoroughly. Until I’ve got it all off.

  Poppy wipes more ice cream down my body and I open my robe the rest of the way. She smears and presses and laps the ripple of my muscles, bronzed in the moonlight.

  Then I take her hand. Hold it to my face. “This,” I tell her, drawing her fingers over my cheeks, “this is yours.”

  I put kisses in the palm of her hand. “These,” I move my lips. “They’re yours too.”

  I put her hand on my throat. “This,” then on the bulge of my pecs, moving it across the hard mounds of my chest, “All that is yours.”

  I slide her palm, her fingertips over my ribs and my hard, velvety abs. “These…”

  She reaches for more ice cream before she pushes her fingers down. Down inside my boxers. I jump at the shock. Cold ice cream on my cock!

  “I remember that you’re huge, but, my god!” She gulps as she curls her fingers around me, covering it with ice cream. I’m expecting my rod to shrivel under the cold. But my love for her keeps it pumped hard.

  She asks me, “This?”

  A groan escapes from my throat. “That and all it can produce. That is so completely yours, I’ll have ‘Property of Poppy Donleavy’ tattooed on it for you, if you want.”

  “Lucas,” her knees sag. She’s gripping me harder. Almost like she’s holding on to a brass handle.

  She sounds drowsy as she licks her lips. “All of it.”

  I tell her, “You might have to come to the tattooist to keep it big enough for all the words.”

  Moving her fingers around my cock, she says, “I’m going to taste you now, Lucas.”

  “We can both taste together.” I snap back her bathrobe.

  Reluctantly letting go for a moment, she lifts her arms to let me undress her.

  We kiss. Dirty, sticky sweet.

  She slides my boxers down. Thrills spark and jangle down my thighs from contact with her breath. As she leans to pull my boxers down, the heft of my massive cock bounces hot and hard in front of her face.

  I move a bowl of ice cream and the ice bucket with the open champagne bottle onto the floor.

  She looks up. “You’re so wicked.”

  I grab more ice cream and press it around her lips. Then mine. Then kiss her.

  Our tongues meet, and she writhes as I pinch and tug her nipple.

  Pulling back, she seizes my cock and plunges her lips over the head. Slowly, she slides her mouth down my length, nibbling along as she slides me against the roof of her mouth, pressing up as I slip across her tongue.

  Her lips stretch to clasp around me.

  I reach down. She squeals as I lift her by her waist and lay her down on the rug in the same movement.

  She’s shaking from head to foot. I pull her on top of me. My mouth is heading up between her legs. My tongue flicks up her thighs, making her judder and shake.

  Her soft lips and her wet mouth go straight back on my cock.

  While she works her way back along the length, I’m reaching for ice cream. She jolts when I draw a line of chill up the inside of her thigh.

  “You bastard,” she shouts. At least I think that’s what she says. I can’t hear her too well with my cock down her throat.

  Chapter 18

  Poppy

  Ice cream, I’ve decided, should always be served around his cock.

  While I’m still on top of him, swallowing his fabulous cock, He’s driving me insane with cold ice cream on the lips of my pussy, and his tongue. Then he pours champagne on my ass, and lets it dribble and trickle between my legs, to cascade and run into his open mouth.

  And then he pops an ice cube into my opening. Holds it there. The cold air curls up inside me, like a trailer for what’s to come. Which is me.

  I’m fixed on his cock as the ice shocks me. The cold mingles with my hot juices. I erupt inside in spasms. He pokes ice cubes, slowly, one at a time, into me. I’m more unbearably turned on with each one. I twist my nipple so hard it scares me. But I love it.

  He fingers my ass, and sucks and teases hot and hard on my clit. I break open and gush into his mouth. And he adds more cold, fizzing champagne, all over my shivering ass, into my folds. And trickling inside me. Where the ice cubes are melting.

  “What the fuck are you doing to me?” I’m practically wailing. But even I can’t hear the words. I can only feel the vibrations on his cock.

  He takes my toy away too soon. Lifts me up and spreads me on the big, soft bed.

  And we make slow, gentle, sweet love, rocking together. Starting and stopping. Cuddling. Kissing. Holding. All night long.

  He comes inside me three times. And I gobble him and suck until his balls pump into my throat and finally I get the true taste of him.

  I feel like I’ve fought him for it forever. And I’ll have that food fight again and again. Forever.

  Epilogue

  Poppy

  Next morning Alex’s vintage limousine with long, curved running boards and an elegant, uniformed chauffeur named Stefano, waits for us outside the hotel.

  I sit close to Lucas in the back, still relishing every scent, every touch and every little taste of him, as we ride in the bright sunlight, up into the spicy, scented air of the mountains.

  I’m a little afraid to ask him about Alex. I think I want to know, but I have to be sure before I ask. Do I really want to know, either way, or do I only want to hear what I want to hear?

  I decide that I want us to be clear and open, so I have to ask.

  He tells me, “She lived a long way away, on the other side of the island. I was very young when I left, so I have no memory of her from back then. There’s a lot I never knew about her. And, no, I didn’t know I was coming to meet my aunt until I arrived.”

  I watch his eyes as he tells me.I snuggle closer. “I want to know more about your family.”

  “Better brace yourself.” I’m flooded with a feeling that I can trust him. That he will always tell me the truth, whatever it is. I never felt so sure of anyone before.

  Lucas tells me he has two meetings, one this morning, one just after lunch. He hopes he’ll have time to meet me for lunch in between, but he can’t promise. He’ll call me.

  But I’m to take the car, and Stefano will show me the finest shopping in Sicily. He kisses me, long, and soft, and deep, then he hands me a Platinum American Express card, and a MasterCard Black.

  “Have fun. Find extravagant things.”

  “What can I buy?”

  “Anything you want. If you buy cars, it can be a pain having them shipped, but if you find one that makes you happy, go for it.”

  The village that Stefano drives me to is high up and obviously very wealthy.

  I lean forward to say to Stefano, “Senor Moretti told me to go shopping. Where should I go?”

  In the mirror, I can see him restraining a smile. He takes me to a little huddle of bright, narrow cobbled streets on steep slopes.

  The buildings are all smart, white with pale woodwork, and they look about two hundred years old. Soft, golden glows shine from all the shiny windows. The streets are lined with jewelers, dressmakers, gloves, shoes, hats, and accessories, a fabulously decadent chocolatier, and a lingerie store that looks like a florist on the outside. Inside, oh, my God!

  Lucas is unable to get away in time for lunch, but he promises to be finished and ready to meet me by four o’clock. Meanwhile, it is my duty to shop.

  “I expect you to shock me with what you find to buy.”

  I do the best I can. This is a lifestyle I could get used to very easily.

  Back at the hotel bar, overlooking the beach, he says, “What I would really love is to take a yacht.” I’m looking out wistfully at the clear sapphire and emerald sea. “Cruise the Mediterranean with you. Maybe the Aegean. Perhaps even cross the ocean and take a couple of weeks over it.”

  I’m drawing a breath, but puts his hand on mine and he goes on. “I know you can’t do that. Not now. So, instead, I adjusted my plans. I was able to get all that I need done today. We’ll have tomorrow here together, and tonight, of course.”

  “And then?” I’m apprehensive.

  “Then tomorrow, I’ll fly back with you to Vegas.”

  “My ticket…”

  “Don’t worry about that. I have a little plane that will be ready for us tomorrow at dinner time. If that suits you.”

  He wants to know what I bought. I tell him about all the lace and trimmings and little decorative jewelry that I found for my bridal boutique. He’s pleased, of course. But he asks, “Did you buy anything for yourself?”

  “Some chocolate. And some small things that I think we can both enjoy.”

  He orders caviar. It causes a stir in the bar as the waiter brings the plate with a pile of crushed ice, holding black caviar in a round box with a mother-of-pearl spoon. “Some people love it, some hate it. But this is Caspian triple zero grade blue beluga.” Small pancakes are served on the side.

  The caviar itself, I tell him honestly, “I don’t hate it. It’s distinctive and I would probably eat it again. But I don’t love it.”

  He nods. “Never mind. Maybe there’s something else in the ice. Something more to your taste. Have a look.”

  Intrigued, I peer into the ice crystals and I see a sparkle of silver. In the middle of the pile of ice, a pair of diamond earrings sit in a cellophane wrapper. On top of a box. A small black cube.

  “The earrings…” they take my breath away.

  “Would you hand me the box?”

  My heart pounds. My breath is thick. I watch as he stands, moves in front of me, and he drops to one knee.

  “Poppy Donleavy,” my whole body trembles. “I didn’t know what life was before I met you. Now, I know that mine would be nothing without you, and I want you, I need you to be with me for every one of the rest of my days. All that I have, all that I am, is yours to command. Would you consent to making me the happiest man alive, Poppy Donleavy, and be the most perfect and beautiful bride ever to say, ‘I do’?”

  DO YOU WANT TO READ WHAT POPPY BOUGHT ON HER SHOPPING TRIP AND HOW SHE LIKES BEING THE CLIENT IN HER OWN BRIDAL SALON? Click Here…

  POSSESSIVE TOUCH

  is The next part in the Filthy, Dirty, Deeply series…

  Preorder NOW!

  About the Author

  Alice May Ball loves storytelling far more than is good for her, and has for as long as she can remember.

  Alice loves bourbon and a certain hunky hero of her own, and she lives high in the mountains with a big, soppy Labrador and a noisy keyboard.

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  Alice May Ball, Wicked Tastes: A dark Mafia romance (Filthy Dirty Deeply Book 1)