‘I have nothing to apologise for. Now that I have got on top of work, I will have far more time to spend with Theo and you after the wedding,’ Gio told her stubbornly, watching her curls bounce round her animated features, the passion flaring in her green eyes, while noting how luminous the pearls were set against her creamy skin and the firm, sweet swell of her breasts. Hunger stormed through his tautening length in an uncontrollable wave, leaving him painfully aroused. ‘I refuse to go through a wedding with you behaving like this. This is why I needed to see you.’

Billie was silenced. Suddenly she was the one at fault for straining their relationship beyond tolerance. Wide-eyed she stared back at him, the atmosphere dense and sending a curious little quiver through her belly. ‘So...we...er call it off now and go our separate ways?’ she whispered shakily.

Gio stared at her in rampant disbelief, his dark eyes golden-bronze spearheads of intimidation at the mere thought of her pulling a disappearing act again. ‘You’re not going anywhere without me.’

Billie didn’t understand because that sudden shock of fear had destroyed her ability to think straight. Her heart was jumping up and down inside her ribcage like a rubber ball being bounced and making it very hard for her to breathe.

‘Ever again,’ Gio growled in menacing completion as he scooped her up in his arms and brought her down on the bed.

‘What are you doing?’ Billie gasped. ‘Gio...my dress!’

Gio came down on top of her, almost squashing her flat. ‘Stop struggling...you’re more likely to rip something.’

Billie looked up at him with huge disconcerted eyes. ‘Gio...we can’t...this isn’t the answer to anything.’

Gio rubbed his mouth sexily across hers with a sensual groan. ‘It’s the only answer for me.’

‘You’re wrecking my make-up,’ she framed unevenly, fingertips dancing shyly through his cropped black hair, slowly dropping to frame his amazing cheekbones.

‘You don’t need make-up,’ Gio told her thickly.

‘Every bride needs make-up,’ Billie argued, trying to slide unobtrusively out from beneath his weight without shredding her dress.

He lowered his head and devoured her mouth with a hungry driving urgency that made her every sense shift into superdrive with piercingly sweet longing. The taste and scent of him infiltrated her like a dangerous drug, blowing her control out of the water. ‘I won’t wreck the dress,’ he promised, lifting his hips to tip the bundled skirt of her gown up to her waist.

‘Gio...’ Billie whispered pleadingly even as her back arched and her pelvis rocked up to his without her volition.

‘Diavelos, Billie...I hurt,’ he ground out, his breath fanning her cheek while he shifted revealingly against her, grinding the thrust of his erection into the cradle of her thighs.

And low down in her pelvis, deep in her feminine core a surge of moisture dampened her most tender flesh and she started to melt. ‘We can’t...we haven’t got the time.’

‘We’ll make time,’ he husked, yanking out his phone as it buzzed, clamping it to his ear and talking in fast Greek to a male voice that sounded both loud and agitated. ‘Our day, nobody else’s,’ he spelled out fiercely.

Long fingers glided up her inner thigh, leaving tingles of humming energy in their wake. Her eyes closing, her head fell back on the pillows, her neck extending as her spine arched. Her heart was racing thump-thump-thump at the foot of her throat. He stroked the taut triangle of satin between her thighs and the only thing in the world for her at that moment was the stupendous high of excitement and anticipation holding her fast. With a yank, Gio dislodged her bodice sufficiently to expose a creamy breast topped by a pale pink nipple. He closed his mouth urgently to that swollen peak and a stifled gasp escaped her, eyes squeezing tight shut.

‘I need to know you’re mine,’ Gio growled against her throat.

He eased a finger below her lace-edged knickers and stroked along the petal-soft folds. Her thighs opened wider in helpless invitation and when he rubbed the little bud where she was most sensitive she moaned and shifted her hips, urging him on, helpless in the grip of the savage need he could induce. He thrust a long finger into her tight, wet sheath and she jerked, on the edge of crying out until he clamped his mouth to hers to silence the sounds she was making. The rhythmic play of his fingers over her tender flesh sent ripples of throbbing excitement through her. As the tension in her pelvis rose to an all-consuming ache that was unbearable, her every muscle clenched tight and she soared to a breathless shattering peak of ecstasy while biting the shoulder of his jacket to mute the sob of release building up inside her.