Indiscretions - Elizabeth Adler [69]
“Thank God.” She sighed. “I was beginning to think we’d come to Dracula’s castle.”
“That would be no place to take a girl like you for a weekend.” Fabrizio wrapped his arms around her, pulling her close. She could smell his familiar cologne and she put up her hand to brush back his wet curling hair.
“Poor girl, you’re frozen,” he murmured in her ear. “We’ll light the fire and drink some brandy, and I’ll have you warm in no time.”
The kindling crackled comfortingly and the well-dried logs caught at once, sending out a rosy glow that, while it wasn’t yet hot, made them feel warmer just by its flickering presence. India threw her bedraggled fox jacket on the floor to dry and accepted the brandy he offered her.
“Heaven,” she murmured, leaning against the mantel, sipping her brandy and toasting her toes over the fire.
“I told you it would be all right.” Fabrizio brought her a huge, fluffy towel from the bathroom. “Here, dry your hair,” he commanded.
India unbraided her hair, shaking and rubbing it vigorously with the towel until it stood up around her face in a spiky bronze halo. Her face was flushed from the brandy and the flames and, thought Fabrizio, she looked adorable.
“Let’s continue where we left off?” he suggested, unbuttoning her checkered country shirt.
“I’d like another drink.”
“Later.” He slid the damp shirt from her shoulders.
“What about dinner?” India thought longingly of tagliatelle steaming under a hot fresh tomato sauce flavored with basil.
Fabrizio unzipped her wet tweed skirt, kneeling to pull it down over her hips, tugging it gently past her thighs. India stepped out of her skirt.
“Tights,” he groaned, “are the enemy of man.”
He slid them off.
“How about a hot bath?” suggested India.
“Good idea,” he murmured, burying his face in the softness between her legs.
India laughed.
“I did, didn’t I?” she murmured.
“Did what?” His tongue sent ripples of pleasure through her.
“Come all this way just to get laid.”
The fire, fueled with fresh logs, cast a flickering glow over their retreat. India sat cross legged in front of the hearth wearing only a huge cashmere sweater she’d found in a drawer, munching on the slices of Parma ham that Fabrizio was carving from the side they’d discovered on their foray to the kitchen. With a crumbly mountain cheese, some biscuits, and a box of dried figs, it made a delicious dinner for two, washed down with a bottle of Amarone Riserva, filched from the wine cellar.
“Perhaps I’ll forgive them after all,” decided Fabrizio, cutting another slice of ham.
“Forgive who?” India leaned back, sipping her wine sleepily.
“The Brandinis—for messing up our arrangements.”
“Definitely,”—she yawned—“as long as tomorrow we can rent a car—or at least find these elusive servants.”
“Consider it done,” he said magnanimously. “Come on, you look tired. Let’s go to bed.”
India climbed into the gilded four-poster, feeling as though she were floating in a golden sea as Fabrizio closed the gauze curtains around them. It was rarely that they managed to spend a night together, and she watched as Fabrizio cast off the toweling robe he was wearing, admiring his muscular tapering body as he slid naked beside her.
“You know, don’t you, Fabrizio,” she murmured as she lay with his arm around her while the firelight flickered on their curtains, “that this is just a golden never-never land.”
There was a shrill buzzing inside her head, and India wished it would go away. It was a familiar sound, like a siren. Why didn’t Fabrizio do something about it? She jolted awake as the bedroom door was flung open and the lights switched on.
“Oh, my God,” she cried as Fabrizio flung his arms about her protectively.
“Polizia!” barked the man framed in the doorway, a hand on his gun. Two