Mia:
‘Mia, one of Vittorio Rocco’s security guys is coming our way…and he’s looking directly at you.’
When my kid sister Evie whisper-shouted that in my ear, the neglected spot in my panties throbbed in time with the dance music and the strobe lighting and my palpitating heartbeat on the superyacht we’d boarded two hours ago. The superyacht owned by Rocco, which had looked more like a small cruise ship when we’d arrived at the dock in Naples with Evie’s best friends, Jessie and Becca.
After two days in the city, doing all the touristy things we could fit in around eating as much pizza as was humanly possible, the four of us had spent all day today shopping for the perfect frock, then getting mani-pedis and our hair done at a tiny salon near our budget hotel. But nothing could have prepared me for an event, or a location, this glamorous and exclusive.
This was the first foreign holiday Evie and I had ever been able to afford. I’d maxed out my credit card buying our dresses this afternoon at a boutique on the Via Toledo. Evie and I had been surviving on our own since we were teenagers, and our mum had skipped out on us, so this wasn’t a regular experience.
We’d rubbed shoulders for two hours—like, literally—with a string of European celebrities, A-list film stars, supermodels and social media influencers, and those were just the people I recognised. But I still felt as if I were floating in a weird alternative reality—an exhilarating, breathtaking dream which made me feel like a total imposter.
‘Oh. My. God! Mia, Evie’s not wrong. He must be coming to get you for his boss after “the look”,’ Becca supplied with additional air quotes. Becca was the one who had somehow finagled an invite to this event for us all through her work. ‘We should make ourselves scarce, so he knows you’re available.’
‘Don’t you dare disappear!’ I whisper-shouted back while grabbing Evie’s arm to keep my sister by my side.
The sultry spring evening scented with sea salt and expensive perfume was almost as breathtaking as the spectacular view across the bay, gilded by moonlight, from the open deck of the yacht, where a world-famous DJ was performing.
Nothing, though, had been as breathtaking as the man I’d first seen standing alone on the top deck of the yacht while we were having our IDs checked and photographed by the phalanx of security personnel before being allowed on board.
We’d figured out from the whispers in the line of guests the man was our host, Vittorio Rocco. Becca, who worked for a brand marketing consortium in the City of London—hence the invite—said no one knew much about him, except that he was an immensely rich local businessman.
But then, twenty minutes ago, he’d strode through the crowd with a couple of bodyguards—greeting a few of the guests but ignoring the rest—before I got ‘the look’ I was still struggling to decipher. Was he into me, or was he aware I was a total imposter?
As he passed our group, his gaze had locked on mine for what felt like an eternity… Good thing it wasn’t an eternity, because I had stopped breathing, my heart slowing to pound between my thighs.
Up close, he was the hottest man I’d ever seen… His gaze was like a heat-seeking missile, scorching everything it touched.
At six-foot-three or -four, with a cut body perfectly displayed in an expertly tailored designer suit, and the sort of tanned, chiselled features which wouldn’t look out of place on a catwalk, he had literally oozed sex and dominance. After that heart-stopping eye clash, the four of us had been dissecting and analysing ‘the look’ in exhaustive detail while the DJ kicked off his set…
But—even though I was wearing my first thong, a mini-dress I’d spent a month’s salary on, a push-up bra which made my boobs look like a work of art and killer heels I could barely walk in—I had never expected ‘the look’ to lead to anything.
Why would this man notice me when there were so many other, more stunning and sophisticated women here?
Supposedly, I was here to cut loose, live a little after spending the last seven years being a stand-in mum to Evie, and finally shake off the shackles of a three-year relationship which had ended in humiliation and heartbreak six months ago…and hopefully finally get laid by someone who knew where a clitoris was, so I could forget about my cheating ex-fiancé Dave and our vanilla sex life.
Or rather, that’s what Evie had talked me into when we’d agreed to come on this girl trip together with her friends and make the most of Becca’s invite.
But what if ‘the look’ had been real—and not just something we’d embellished with our fertile imaginations? What if the billionaire owner of this superyacht had really been checking me out?
Evie was the hopeless romantic. Not me.
I sucked in several deep breaths to build up the courage to glance over my shoulder.
‘Is he still headed our way?’ I whispered to Evie.
‘Yes,’ she hissed back. ‘And it’s definitely you he’s headed for. He has to be here on Rocco’s orders. We told you he was checking you out. You look spectacular in that dress, Mia. Why are you even surprised?’
A bubble of laughter eased past the tightness in my ribs.
Evie had been trying to rebuild my confidence ever since I’d kicked Dave to the curb, so she was definitely exaggerating.
In a super casual move, I swept my hair behind my ear and inched my head around.
Then all the air sucked out of my lungs. Because one of the bodyguards Rocco had walked through the crowd with earlier was standing right in front of me, wearing a sharp suit and a frown.
‘Will you come upstairs with me, Signorina Taylor. Signor Rocco would like to meet you,’ the man said in heavily accented English.
I blinked, feeling light-headed. Was this actually happening? Had my vanilla life finally located some much-needed spice? Or was this all just an illusion caused by oxygen deprivation?
Then Evie woke me up by squealing right in my ear. ‘He was checking you out. I told you so. The dress totally worked.’
‘Umm,’ I replied, trembling now with a mix of exhilaration and panic, still struggling to breathe and wanting to kick Evie, because—subtle much, little sis? ‘That… Okay, if you’re sure it’s me he wants to see.’
‘Si, it is you,’ the messenger replied, then held out his arm, directing me towards the spiral staircase which led up to the top deck where his boss had disappeared ten minutes ago. ‘Follow me, per favore.’
I grasped Evie’s hand, intimidated now as well as dazed. ‘Can I bring my sister?’
He glanced at Evie, but before he could make a decision, Evie said, ‘Rocco doesn’t want to see me.’
‘No way am I going up there on my own. This was your idea,’ I murmured as I tightened my grip on Evie’s hand.
But then the bodyguard spoke. ‘Don Vito has not asked to see her, only you.’
Evie eased her hand out of my grasp. ‘You don’t need me with you, Mia. This is your moment. Enjoy it.’
Then Becca weighed in. ‘Don’t overthink this, Mia. You should totally go for it.’
‘But…’
‘No buts, Mia. We’ll be here waiting to hear all the dirty deets when you get back.’ Jessie grinned while wriggling her eyebrows at me.
I breathed out a heavy sigh.
‘Don Vito does not like to be kept waiting,’ the bodyguard said impatiently.
Don Vito sounded super arrogant, I decided. But even so, I forced myself to turn to the guard and nod. ‘Okay, I’m coming.’
After all, the guy was our host, and he was the hottest man I’d ever seen. So, there was that.
Becca and Jessie and Evie were hooting in triumph and toasting me with their champagne flutes as I followed the guard, which would have been embarrassing in front of this crowd of uber-sophisticated people, but I was too busy struggling to breathe and not trip over my killer heels.
He led me up a spiral staircase behind the DJ booth, to the top deck, where a small group of men in suits was gathered around an opulent bar area. Some of them appeared to be bodyguards. I could see wires coming from their earpieces.
The view of the bay was even more spectacular from this level, the lights of Naples sprinkled over the hills in the distance, while Capri and the Amalfi Coast sparkled like diamonds in the darkness. Inquisitive stares followed us as the guard and I walked past the bar and along a walkway to an isolated area at the back of the yacht, cut off from the rest of the party. A floodlit hot tub stood at the far end—steam rising from the open top—but there was no one in it.
Vittorio Rocco sat alone on one of the leather bench seats which circled the deck, tapping out something on his phone, but as soon as I stepped into the space, he put the phone down and watched me approach. My breath clogged in my lungs, but having his eyes on me added a seductive sway to my hips they’d never had before…or maybe it was just the heels, which required a balancing act to walk in I must have finally mastered.
Too soon I found myself in front of him. He made no move to get up. Instead, he inclined his head towards the bodyguard. ‘Vai via, Lorenzo.’
‘Si, padrone,’ the man replied. And suddenly we were alone on the secluded deck.
A soft breeze brushed my nape, making the tendrils hanging from my chignon dance across my neck. I shivered, but I wasn’t cold.
Even from his position on the couch, our host looked overwhelming—sleek, muscular and devastating. He’d lost the suit jacket and wore a pec-hugging black T-shirt, making the array of tattoos on his arms and around his neck visible. With his face lit by the lights from the yacht’s wheelhouse above us, I could also see a couple of scars, one cutting into the stubble on his chin, the other slicing through his eyebrow. The silver cross he wore around his neck seemed incongruous, because he looked like a panther…an extremely hot panther, ready to pounce.
The intense cerulean blue of his irises glittered as he dipped his head to do a roll-call of my entire body.
‘Ciao, Mia,’ he murmured. That he knew my name didn’t really surprise me. After all, the guard had addressed me personally downstairs. But on his lips, it sounded impossibly intimate.
‘Hello, Mr Rocco,’ I replied, deciding I probably shouldn’t address him as Vittorio if I didn’t want to start hyperventilating.
Maybe this was too much excitement for a teaching assistant from West London, because I was becoming light-headed.
He tilted his head to one side. ‘How do you know my name?’ he asked, confusing me even more.
‘S-some of the other guests mentioned it,’ I murmured. I knew his name hadn’t been on the invitation, because even Becca hadn’t known who was throwing the party until we’d arrived. But was his identity supposed to be a secret?
‘And how did you get an invitation to this event?’ he asked, his gruff tone cutting through the hum of sound from the DJ set below us…and my chaotic heartbeat.
The question threw me again. Probably because I was still struggling to draw air into my lungs. But then the significance of it hit me…and what that ‘look’ had really been about. My chaotic heartbeat sank into my killer heels, humiliation washing over me.
He had spotted me in the crowd and realised I didn’t belong.
‘B-becca. I-I mean Rebecca…’ I hesitated, racking my brains to recall Becca’s surname, even though I’d known her and Jessie since Evie was in primary school. ‘Garner.’ Thank god. ‘My friend Rebecca Garner got an invite. She’s here representing her brand marketing firm in London.’ Whose company name I could not have remembered right now if he paid me a billion quid.
One eyebrow arched. Then he leaned forward and placed his forearms on his knees, making his biceps and triceps bulge distractingly under his T-shirt. ‘And who are you here representing, Mia?’
The heat in my thong surged into my cheeks. And the humiliation which had been incinerated with everything else at the sight of those inked forearms came surging back.
‘My-myself,’ I said, because there was no point in pretending I knew anything about brand marketing. Or that I really had any right to be at his very exclusive party.
His lips quirked. ‘I see,’ he said, but I couldn’t tell whether he was amused or astonished by my gall.
I forced myself to maintain eye contact even though I was dying inside.
Was he about to kick me off the yacht?
I was crestfallen but also determined not to show it as my silly hopes and dreams for the night crashed and burned into a bonfire of embarrassment under that inscrutable gaze.
‘And what of the other women with you?’ he asked.
‘One of them is my sister Evie, the other a friend of ours,’ I murmured.
God, he was going to kick us all out. While I was resigned to leaving myself, I felt sick for Evie and Jessie, who were having so much fun…and Becca. What if she lost her job? For bringing us along on her invite? From what she’d told us, this man was extremely powerful.
‘It’s okay, Mr Rocco. We’ll leave,’ I said, suddenly desperate to get us all out of here before this got any worse.
I turned, keen to get off the yacht. But before I could take a single step, a strong hand captured my wrist.
I swung back round, and my nose connected with a slab of muscle covered in black cotton. Rocco was no longer sitting on the couch but standing close enough to make the air back up in my lungs.
The panther has pounced.
He touched a knuckle under my chin to lift my gaze to his, then leaned in. I sucked in a lungful of his intoxicating scent—woodsy cologne, clean laundry detergent and a hint of orange from the negroni he must have been drinking.
‘And how will you leave, Mia?’ he whispered, so close to my ear lobe that sensation streaked down my spine and turned my thong into a vibrator. ‘Will you swim back to Naples?’
I drew my head back and saw his amusement at my expense. Had he been baiting me all along? That he had humiliated me intentionally had irritation replacing my embarrassment.
‘If I have to, yes!’ I announced, tugging my wrist free of his grasp. ‘I won’t stay where I’m not wanted. And I’m not here to be the butt of your jokes.’
Something flashed in his eyes which looked like admiration. ‘Who said you are not wanted here, Mia?’ he murmured.
My indignation increased at the mocking tone, even as the throbbing in my panties became catastrophic from the sparkle of approval in his gaze. ‘You did…or you implied it.’
He chuckled, the sound full of masculine arrogance. ‘You have spirit. I like this in a woman.’
Heat swelled in my abdomen. Embarrassing me. How could I be turned on—when he was making fun of me?
He murmured, ‘You are also molto bella, Mia.’ The compliment came so far out of left field, it stunned me into silence. ‘I like this, too, in a woman.’
‘If you like me so much, why did you ask me to leave?’ I managed, even as I could feel my resistance losing ground fast.
His scarred eyebrow quirked, but the sensual smile oozed confidence. ‘This I did not do, Mia, when I want to touch you very much.’
My indignation dissolved in a heartbeat as I stood under that startlingly intense gaze, mesmerised by his compliment. And the glitter of approval in his eyes. The surge of validation—that feeling of being seen and wanted by this man, the way I’d never really been wanted by Dave—was so intoxicating, I felt as if I had just chugged five tequila slammers in a row.
‘Do you want to be touched, Mia?’ The question was delivered with mocking arrogance, because he already knew the answer.
But even so, I couldn’t prevent myself from giving him the permission he sought as my answer popped out in a heady rush of breath. ‘Y-yes…’
His smile turned feral, but it only made him look hotter as he lifted his hand to glide his thumb over the thundering pulse in my neck.
I gasped and trembled, his touch like a lightning rod to senses too long denied.
‘Brava ragazza,’ he murmured as he caressed my collarbone—watching my reaction, intently—then slid his thumb under the strap of my mini-dress. My nipples swelled into tight peaks, and I sucked in a shallow breath, already yearning for him to move his roaming thumb lower, the shockingly possessive touch intoxicating.
‘I am returning to my estate in Naples. Would you like to come with me for tonight?’
W-what?
Was he saying what I thought he was saying? And how did I feel about it? Shouldn’t I be insulted? He’d made me feel like nothing a moment ago.
But the truth was, I was too shocked by his bold invitation and my live wire reaction to his touch to focus.
I blinked, stalling for time, until I could regain the power of speech—and critical thinking. Not easy when the hottest guy I had ever laid eyes on had just propositioned me. My usual caution was struggling to play catch up with my over-stimulated libido.
This wasn’t me… I’d never been reckless. I didn’t like anything to be out of my control. I was a micro-manager, a planner, a plotter, an over-thinker, someone who always had to be sure of her next move before taking it. All thanks to my mum—a nineties wild child with daughters by two different deadbeats—whose philosophy of life had been, ‘Everything will work out in the end if you don’t take responsibility for anything.’
Newsflash: It won’t.
If you don’t pay your rent, the bailiffs will turn up at your door. And you and your daughters will end up climbing out the window in the middle of the night.
I had never wanted to return to the endless chaos of my and Evie’s childhood, but this trip…and the Dave debacle…had forced me to realise I might have over-compensated.
Because hadn’t my play-it-safe strategy led to a long, boring relationship with the first boy to ever ask me out? And all my over-planning and never making a move before I was one hundred percent sure of a positive outcome had not prevented me ending up engaged to a man who had not only turned out to be a rat but had never come close to satisfying me in bed.
Sometimes life threw you curveballs, which you couldn’t plan your way out of.
Evie was right. It was time I kicked myself out of my comfort zone. Time to take a risk and have the wild night I had been aiming for when I’d agreed to come on this trip and spent a fortune on this dress, so my life never got so boring again. Then maybe I’d be better prepared for the next curveball.
I was just debating, though, whether it would be fair to jettison Evie and her friends for the evening, when he placed his hand on my hip and drew me close enough to press my breasts against his chest. My nipples hardened even more and my frantic heartbeat slowed to throb painfully between my thighs as he clasped my neck and pressed his forehead to mine.
‘You are fierce, Mia,’ he said. ‘Taming you will make this night all the sweeter. But first I must kiss you.’
Heat charged through my body. His confidence as hot as his demand.
The fact he had found my attitude a turn-on was addictive—and surprisingly validating.
I’d never been able to let my badass side loose before, but it had always been there, seething beneath the surface, every time my mum made another selfish decision, or Evie did something reckless, or Dave left me unsatisfied…
‘You are the most arrogant man on the planet,’ I murmured.
He let out another gruff chuckle. ‘Si, naturalmente,’ he announced without an ounce of shame.
Then, without waiting for an invitation, he slanted his lips across mine—taking my mouth in a demanding kiss as if it were his right. His lips were firm and warm, his tongue coaxing but insistent. I opened for him instinctively, and he thrust deep as his other hand slid under the hem of my mini-dress.
I gasped, clinging to him now, my whole body vibrating with want, the desire to feel his hands on me as intoxicating as his kiss.
He explored the naked flesh with scalding entitlement, his thumb hooking under the string of my thong. He gave it a sharp tug, rubbing the lace against my aching clitoris. I rose on tiptoe, desperate to ease the pressure, even as his tongue continued to command my mouth, demanding my surrender.
I was panting, groaning, already close to orgasm and struggling to control the sensations powering through my body when he dragged his mouth away abruptly.
I stood gasping for more, caught between the need to come and the need to exert control over what was happening, too fast. I grasped his forearms to steady myself. The inked flesh bunched beneath my fingers, the surprise at how quickly he had got me worked up almost as shocking as the raw ache in my sex still tormenting me.
He released the thong string with a sharp snap, then tugged down the hem of my dress.
‘Now you must tell me, Mia,’ he said, his tone raw as he continued to caress my shoulders. ‘Yes, or no?’
I swallowed, not quite able to speak, the shock of sensations he had conjured and controlled so effortlessly still playing havoc with my common sense.
But while I couldn’t resist leaning into his touch, I couldn’t banish my usual caution completely. Maybe it was the tats, or the scars, or just the aura of power and wealth which clung to him, and which I had never encountered before…but I didn’t want to throw myself into the arms of an actual panther.
‘How do I know I’ll be safe with you?’ I asked.
His eyes flashed with something fierce, his scarred eyebrow lifting. Then he laughed. The deep, appreciative rumble reverberated in my abdomen.
‘Safe?’ He let out another rusty chuckle. ‘If you want safe, I am the wrong man.’
Why did that sound like a promise rather than a problem?
His caressing hand slid over my shoulder and trailed down my spine to flatten against the small of my back, setting off a firework display en route. Then my belly connected with the prominent ridge in his trousers.
He brushed his lips across my ear, giving me another intoxicating lungful of pine and orange and laundry soap.
‘But you will not be hurt…’ he murmured. ‘You have my word.’ The gravitas in his tone was contradicted by the feral heat in his eyes as his gaze met mine—and the liberties he had already taken—but I believed him.
Then it occurred to me that I wasn’t sure I wanted to be safe tonight.
‘What about my sister and her friends?’ I asked, not quite able to let go of the responsibility that had defined my life for so long. ‘I should let Evie know where I’m going…’
He nodded. ‘Of course.’ His lips quirked in another dangerous smile. ‘As long as you do not take too long.’
I let out a breathless laugh. My mind—or rather, what was left of it after that incredible kiss—was made up.
Tonight, I wanted to be wild. And free. And listen to my instincts instead of my insecurities. Because my body was telling me—no, screaming at me—that however dangerous this man was, this could be the most exciting night of my life.
‘Okay, then, I’d like to accept your invitation,’ I said.
