Pride (In Wilde Country Book 1) (8 page)

That kiss had sent a river of fire racing through her blood.

His erection, pressing into her belly.

His arms, hard around her.

He’d almost carried her to that motel room and once they were alone, when she’d unzipped his fly, he’d sprung into her hands, his flesh hot, swollen, eager.

“Stop it,” she whispered.

She was turning herself on, just remembering.

Why had the sex with Luca Bellini been so thrilling?

He was gorgeous, yes. He had a wonderful voice, that little accent thing. She’d liked that he was big and lean and hard-bodied, that he was taller than she was, even in those silly cowboy boots she’d worn—worn deliberately, because she’d expected to spend a couple of hours with Travis Wilde and she’d met Travis so she knew he’d tower over her and she didn’t like that, the feeling she got when she had to tilt her head back to look at a man’s face, that sense of giving a man some kind of power over her, and how come instead of not liking that she had to do that to look at Luca’s face she’d—she’d found it a turn-on?

Was it that he’d stood up to her? Men never did. They were always as eager as puppies to please her. To impress her.

Bellini hadn’t tried to impress her at all.

In fact, she was pretty sure he hadn’t liked her any more than she’d liked him.

All he’d wanted was to get inside her panties.

Which was what she’d wanted, too.

Okay. So those things made him a little different, but they didn’t explain why the sex had been so hot.

A possibility nibbled at the edges of her mind, one she didn’t like, but one of the things she’d always believed in was honesty. With herself, anyway.

Cheyenne let the water wash away the last vestiges of shampoo.

She’d had the feeling that he’d held back. That he’d wanted to take her instead of letting himself be taken. Well, nothing unusual in that. There was almost always that to contend with, a man who’d let her do her thing and then try to take over, but she never let it happen and they were cool with it.

Bellini hadn’t been cool with it.

She’d sensed that need in him. The hunger to reverse their positions, to pin her beneath him and ride her as a stallion rode a mare.

But she wasn’t into me-Tarzan-you-Jane sex.

That was why she’d sneaked out of the room while he slept, because she’d known that things would be different once he woke, that he would not tolerate having control wrested from him again, and the amazing thing was that the thought had not so much frightened her as it had…

As it had excited her.

“Crazy,” she said, as she shut off the shower. Totally, completely crazy.

Why would a woman want to be taken? Want to give herself up to a man’s touch, his body, his control? Why would a woman want to bend to a man’s domination? To anyone’s domination?

Been there, done that, thank you very much—and what was the point in reliving what had happened hours ago with a stranger in a cheap motel room?

Dr. Will was right about one thing.

What mattered was getting on with your life.

And she was doing exactly that.

The ranch in Texas. That was getting on with your life, wasn’t it? Maybe she wasn’t in such demand as a model anymore. So what? She’d made a fortune, a veritable fortune starting when she was seventeen, and she’d had the brains to invest it wisely. She was twenty-nine now, and she had one huge pile of dough.

Cheyenne wrapped herself in an oversized bath towel and stepped onto the heated bathroom floor. She dried off briskly, hung the towel on the rack and reached for her hairbrush.

She had not spent her money on drugs or clothes or bling. No fancy cars. No Manhattan townhouse.

Instead, she’d turned it over to the smartest broker she knew and she’d watched it grow.

The result was that she owned this condo as well as a small house on a lake in upstate New York where she kept her beloved pair of Thoroughbred horses.

She’d purchased them on a whim—amazing, because she wasn’t given to whims, but she’d been on a shoot at a horse farm in Kentucky and a stable hand had spoken casually about a pair of horses kept in a small barn by themselves. He’d said that they didn’t win races, that one had some kind of hoof problem and the other was off its feed.

“Bad investments,” the guy had said, and shrugged.

“So what happens to them?” Cheyenne had asked, because, right away, she’d had a bad feeling.

“The owner will cut his losses.”

“How?”

“Best of all worlds? Sell ’em to a riding academy. Otherwise, who knows? Dog food factory. Or maybe, you know, they’re insured for a lot of money.” He’d given her a sideways glance. “Sometimes, horses like them just, you know, they just get real sick…”

“Would the owner actually…”

The guy had looked at her as if she were an idiot. And she had to be, to ask the question. The answer was, he would. Of course, he would. She knew that better than anyone. There’d been a horse in her childhood, a sad, broken-down creature, her best friend, her only friend…

An hour later, she’d been the owner of a pair of horses. She’d shipped them to her place in upstate New York.

And fallen in love with them both.

She’d gotten them excellent veterinary care, hired a boy who loved horses to look after them. She’d spent every possible weekend with the animals, nursing them back to good health, winning their trust and, in turn, trusting them in ways you could never trust people. The horses calmed her, it was as simple as that, and when she’d stumbled across an article in a magazine about equine therapy, even though she’d discarded as pure BS all the mumbo jumbo shrinks proposed for dealing with emotional trauma or childhood disorders or whatever you wanted to call simply not sucking it up and getting on with life, the idea that working with horses could help troubled kids made sense.

Having Baby in her life when she was a kid had helped her. Not for long, but for a while.

Cheyenne switched on her hair dryer, bent at the waist, brushed and dried her hair until it was a fall of shiny black. Then she stood straight, pushed the slightly damp locks away from her face, and stared at her reflection in the mirrored wall.

Her appraisal was dispassionate, that of a pro for the product she sold.

A long, lean body. Up-tilted breasts. Curved hips. Long legs.

Her hair was straight and glossy, her cheekbones razor-sharp. She had thick, sooty lashes, a nose that was, as one photographer had gushed, more interesting than perfect, and a wide mouth above a determined chin.

The body was Mama’s: a small-town beauty queen who ended up with a pocket full of failed dreams.

The rest was her father’s: a reservation Romeo with failed dreams of his own.

Not that she’d ever seen her father, but in her sober moments, that was how Mama had described him. Black hair. Thick lashes. Proud nose. Full mouth.

“Fell for him while I was workin’ in a diner near Fort Laramie,” she’d said in her whiskey-rough voice. “Easy on the eyes. Looked like Cochise musta looked in his day.”

Cheyenne had heard the Cochise comparison endless times and when she was ten or eleven, she’d foolishly pointed out that Cochise had been an Apache and her father, according to Mama, had been Cheyenne.

Mama, drunk as usual, had backhanded her.

“Smart ass kid,” she’d said.

“Oh, sweetie,” she’d sobbed the next day when she saw Cheyenne’s black eye, “I’m so sorry,” but by then Cheyenne had learned apologies were meaningless whether they were for beatings or for being warned to make Mama’s latest boyfriend happy…

“What in hell are you doing?” Cheyenne demanded of her reflection.

That was all history.

She had escaped Wyoming, escaped Mama, escaped the life she’d been born to and created her own life, one that she, alone, controlled.

And she was wasting time.

The
Horse Sense
fundraiser started in less than an hour. The timing was bad—she’d stayed in Wilde’s Crossing a day too long—but until almost the last minute, she’d toyed with the idea of baling on the fundraiser and then she’d realized no, she couldn’t do that. The
Horse Sense
board was counting on her to greet guests and convince them to open their wallets and give generously to the foundation.

She knew she wasn’t a real supermodel anymore, but nobody outside the business did.

She had to get dressed, look glamorous, and get into the mood to be Cheyenne McKenna, whose face had graced magazine covers.

Plus, she wanted to see the expressions of the people on the
Horse Sense
board when she told them she was giving them a ranch and she’d foot the cost of reconstruction.

Just thinking about it made her smile.

She took a dress from its hanger, a long fall of silk in shades that ranged from the palest blue to the deepest sapphire, and let it slither down over her head.

No thong. No bra. No panty hose. Not with a dress like this. No accessories except a pair of deep blue Manolos with icepick heels, and a rhinestone clip to hold her hair back from one side of her face. Add a flick of black-as-midnight mascara. A dusting of blusher on her cheeks. A slick of bright red lip gloss.

Cheyenne looked in the mirror and smiled.

She looked the way she was supposed to look. Like a million bucks. Like a magazine ad. Like everyman’s dream come to life.

Would she bring in lots of donations?

She hoped so.

And then, just as the doorman phoned to tell her the limo that had been sent for her was waiting at the curb, she had one last, unexpected thought.

What would Luca Bellini say if he saw her like this?

Would he lift her in his arms, carry her away, strip the dress from her and do all the things men wanted to do to women? Those things that gave men power and made women helpless. Touch her breasts. Put his hand between her thighs. Clasp her wrists, push her against a wall, force her to accept his domination?

She waited for the rush of nausea that always accompanied such images…

And felt, instead, breathlessness, a melting of her bones, a sensation of heat low in her belly.

Cheyenne gave herself a mental shake.

Then she grabbed a small silk purse, tucked two hundred bucks, a comb, her keys, her iPhone and her lip gloss inside, and set off to face the world.

CHAPTER FOUR

W
hy had he
ever agreed to host a table tonight?

It was the last thing in the world Luca felt like doing.

Of course, when he’d made the commitment he hadn’t known he’d be flying back from Texas that same day after confronting what had turned out to be his father’s second family—or his first, depending on your point of view.

Most of the time, when he was approached to donate to an event that involved the rich and powerful dressing up to impress the rich and powerful, he’d explain—politely—that he’d be unable to attend, but he’d be happy to write a check or sponsor a table, meaning he’d pay the fees for whatever number of guests could be seated at it.

That always made everybody happy.

Somehow, he’d forgotten to make those plans clear to the person chairing tonight’s event.

Not a problem, he told himself as his driver pulled the black Mercedes to the curb.

He would put in an appearance, say all the right things, shake all the right hands and after a couple of hours, he’d say goodnight and go home.

Luca checked his watch, then leaned forward.

“Two hours, Aldo—unless I can get away sooner.”

“I’m as near as your cell phone, sir.”

Luca nodded. Aldo had been with him for years, long enough to know that his boss didn’t like formal functions any more than he liked having doors opened and closed for him, so he sat quietly behind the wheel until Luca stepped from the car and walked briskly to the hotel through the small crowd that had gathered to gawk at possible celebrity sightings.

Tourists, the lot of them, Luca thought with mild disdain.

No true New Yorker would gawk at a celebrity, much less acknowledge the presence of one. Luca might have been born in Italy, but he held dual American and Italian citizenship; he had attended Columbia University; he’d lived in the city, first in student housing, then in rented apartments on and off for years before buying his condo. He considered himself a native son to the marrow of his bones, which was one of the reasons he was not impressed by events like this.

The doorman smiled politely, the door swung open and Luca stepped into the marble and gold lobby.

It was handsome, though not something he would choose to be associated with professionally—it was too fussy for his tastes, but he could appreciate the care and expertise that had gone into its design and creation.

Ahead, at the foot of three wide marble steps, a discreet sign listed the evening’s events.

The
Horse Sense
ball and banquet was in the Skytop Room, on the hotel’s sixtieth floor. It was a spectacular room with a spectacular view. He had been to events there many times before, and he knew the space was big enough to accommodate several hundred people.

He bit back a groan as he stepped into an elevator that would whisk him directly there.

There would be endless hands to shake, endless small talk to be made, endless business contacts to make and renew, and,
Dio
, he knew all too well how many women would end up in his path.

He was an eligible bachelor in a city of too few eligible bachelors.

He should have brought a date to run interference.

Cheyenne McKenna, for instance.

One look at her beside him and the competition would have known enough to stay away, and wasn’t that a foolish thought? He had not taken her address or phone number. She hadn’t given him the chance to do so.

And why in hell was he back to that?

The elevator doors opened. He stepped from the car and straight into a wall of noise. Loud voices, coming from the expensively dressed crowd. Loud music, coming from a band on a stage at one end of the huge room.

His belly knotted.

He’d told Aldo he’d stay for two hours, but that had been a mistake. He was not in the mood for this. He’d put in a long day. A difficult day. There was still time to turn around, get right back in the elevator and…

A hand clasped his shoulder.

“Luca! Great to see you.”

Another hand reached for his.

“Bellini. How’ve you been? We need to do lunch this week, talk about a new project I’m considering in Tribeca.”

Too late. He’d just have to get through the evening, or at least a piece of it.

He smiled, nodded, shook hands, was all but smothered by drifts of perfume competing for attention as Manhattan’s most elegantly-dressed women rose on their toes to press their cheeks to his.

And, as he’d known they would, the not-terribly-subtle attempts at matchmaking started almost instantly.

“Luca? Have you met my…”

Daughter. Niece. Sister. He had met them all at one time or another. Or perhaps he hadn’t. Either way, he said the right things, smiled the right smiles…and kept moving, his destination the bar at the opposite end of the room.

He’d almost made it when he heard a feminine shriek and a bejeweled hand grasped his arm.

“Luca!”

The hand and shriek belonged to Alene Beresford, wife of the CEO of a small, elite hotel chain—and, he now remembered, the Chair of tonight’s fundraiser.

Alene was a born do-gooder, always looking for a new cause that would get her name in the
Times’
Sunday Styles
section. True to form, she had a photographer in tow and before Luca could object, Alene plastered herself against his side and beamed for the camera. She was dressed to kill in what was surely a couturier gown in a pink so bright the color hurt Luca’s eyes. Her hair was a shade of red that would never appear in nature, and the skin of her face was so taut that he had an almost overpowering urge to try and bounce a coin off it.

An image of Cheyenne McKenna, exquisite in her jeans and T-shirt, her face bare of makeup, her hair drawn back in its no-nonsense braid, swam into his head.

What would she have worn for an evening like this? Something simple, he was sure of it. Something silky, long and diaphanous. Something that would complement her natural beauty…

“Luca, darling,” Alene said, “I was starting to think you weren’t going to show up!”

“Alene,” he said, smiling politely. “I said I’d be here, didn’t I?”

“Yes, darling, you did.” She lifted her eyebrows. At least, she made the attempt, but whatever had frozen her face in its awful parody of eternal youth wouldn’t permit much more than a quiver. “And I must say, I was delighted! We all know that having you put in an appearance is quite a coup!”

Luca smiled again. By the end of the evening, the muscles of his face would surely ache hurt from an endless succession of phony smiles.

“Well, here I am.” Someone jostled him from the rear; someone else stepped on his toes. “Although,” he heard himself say, “I’m afraid I can’t stay for the entire evening.”

“Oh, you’ll change your mind when you see the marvelous people I’ve seated at your table.”

“I’m sure they’re interesting, but I have an early morning appointment.”

“Luca. Darling boy, tomorrow is Saturday.”

Okay. The smile was already starting to become painful.

“I know, Alene, but—”

“Everyone deserves a day off, even you!” Alene batted her lashes and leaned in. “Besides, I’m counting on you to keep tonight’s honored guest happy.” Her voice dropped to a dramatic low. “I’m not supposed to tell anyone yet, but we just learned that she’s not only going to be our poster child for
Horse Sense
, she’s going to give us an incredible gift!”

“How generous,” Luca said politely.

“Indeed it is! She’s giving us a horse ranch so we can expand our work. Isn’t that wonderful?”

Wonderful indeed, Luca thought grimly. Had he been transported into a universe in which people gave away ranches the way circus clowns gave away balloons?

“In Texas.”

“What about Texas?”

“The ranch, silly man! It’s in Texas. It needs some work, of course.”

Luca narrowed his eyes. A ranch? In Texas? No. That was impossible.

“And, naturally, we’ll need your professional advice. Luca? Are you listening to me? We’ll want your advice.”

“Where is this ranch located?”

Alene rolled her eyes.

“You’re not paying attention! I just said. In Texas.”

“Where in Texas?”

“Oh, for goodness sakes, how do I know that? It’s just in Texas, Luca. You can ask Ms. McKenna for the specific—”

“Who?”

“The donor’s name is McKenna. Cheyenne McKenna. Our new spokeswoman…or is it spokesperson? I’m never sure which is PC, though I doubt if Cheyenne would—”

“Cheyenne?” he said. “Cheyenne McKenna?”

“Yes. The model. Do you know her? I’m sure you know her face. Her picture is everywhere. Well, almost everywhere.” Alene looked around, then leaned close again. “Not as much lately, it would seem. There’ve been rumors. About her career. That it’s on the skids, but it doesn’t matter to us. Not too much, anyway. She’s still famous. And that’s what matters.”

Luca wasn’t listening. He was thinking back to what Matteo had said, something about one of their sisters suggesting that Cheyenne seemed familiar.

“…the perfect face to publicize our cause. Well, you can see for yourself. Not from here, though. This crowd…” Alene clasped Luca’s arm and drew him across the room. “There. See? That wall, darling. That’s Cheyenne McKenna.”

Luca stared at the display of photos, all done in stark black and white.

All magnificent, thanks to the subject matter.

Thanks to Cheyenne.

In one, she stood beside a white horse, her hand resting on the animal’s arched neck. In another, she held the reins of a black stallion as she led him down a hillside. There were half a dozen other photos of her with what seemed to be the same pair of horses, riding them bareback, feeding them from the palm of her hand, stroking their muzzles as the animals closed their eyes in ecstasy.

He understood that ecstasy.

He had felt it this morning as Cheyenne had ridden him to a mind-blowing orgasm.

“Well? What do you think?” Alene said. “Will she help get us noticed? Will Cheyenne McKenna do what we need?”

What Cheyenne McKenna was doing was certainly not what he needed in a public place, turning him inside out, firing a hunger so raw, so savage that he could feel his cock turning to stone.

The lies he’d told himself rose like bile in his throat. Telling himself that he was over her, that he didn’t want her… Every nerve ending in his body mocked him. What they’d done had not been anywhere near enough. He wanted her again, his way, not hers, wanted her begging for him, pleading for his possession, a willing slave to his every need, every demand, every desire…

“Luca? What do you think?”

Say something, he told himself fiercely, but how could a man say something intelligent when his body had taken control of his brain

“That face. That body. Add in the ranch she’s giving us and we’ll be off to a tremendous start. I mean, we’re such a new charity…” Alene giggled. “Just look at you! You’re speechless. Well, I can’t blame you. This is just superb news, isn’t it?”

Luca cleared his throat.

“Superb,” he said.

“And I’ve put her at your table, you lucky man, so you can ask her about the ranch. She hasn’t told us much. Well, we really haven’t had time to talk. She was away, you see, but now that she’s back—”

“Alene,” Luca said quickly, “this—this thing about a ranch… It’s not what I do. I’ll be happy to recommend someone, but—”

“Good evening.”

A male voice boomed through the ballroom. Conversation ebbed, then died; people turned toward the stage and applauded the white-haired man, microphone in hand, who beamed down at them.

“Thank you for that warm welcome, and let me
extend an equally warm welcome to you and to what we hope will become an annual tradition, a celebration of horses, kids, and the wonders that can happen when you mix the two together. For those of you who don’t know me…”

Polite laughter greeted that statement.

“I’m your host, Jonathan Beresford. My lovely wife, Alene, is the genius who planned this amazing evening. Alene? Darling, where are you? Come up here and help me thank all these good people. I’m afraid our guest of honor is a bit late, but she’s phoned to assure us that she’s on her way. Until she arrives, Alene will tell you all about our wonderful new project.”

“I have to go,” Alene hissed as she pressed her lips to the air beside Luca’s cheek. “See you later, darling. And remember—we’re counting on you to help us get this project off the ground.”

“No. Alene, wait—”

Too late.

Alene Beresford had slipped through the crowd.

* * *

Luca did the same.

There was no reason to stay, no matter what Alene said.

He had paid thirty-five thousand dollars to sponsor a table. That was his act of charity for the night. He could leave now and no one would question it. People understood that the Luca Bellinis of this world had full schedules and were often called away on a moment’s notice.