When Da Silva Breaks the Rules Read online

  Now Cesar was angry. He took her arms in his hands, gripping her. ‘Don’t you dare put words in my mouth. I don’t think any such thing. And you are not damaged. You’re perfect.’

  Lexie’s anger drained away, leaving her feeling shaky. ‘I’m sorry. I just...I shouldn’t have told you.’

  ‘I’m glad you told me. It’s just a lot to take in.’

  He let go of her arms and stepped back, raking a hand through his hair. Lexie felt bereft.

  ‘Look,’ she offered, ‘I’m fine—really. I always suspected this scene would be difficult. But it’s one of the reasons I took the job in the first place. Initially I wanted to say no, but I knew I couldn’t let it stop me. I dealt with what happened a long time ago, Cesar. But something like this would be difficult even under the best of circumstances.’

  Cesar shook his head lightly. He came close again, touched Lexie’s jaw.

  ‘You shouldn’t have had to face it alone.’

  Lexie felt emotion building inside her. Terrified of it, she said simply, ‘I’ve always been alone.’

  Cesar looked at her with a burning intensity. Desire, pure and hot, sparked to life within her, mixing with the emotion to produce something volatile. She brought her hand up to cover his and saw his eyes widen slightly.

  ‘Please...’

  One word. She could see that he understood, and she trembled inwardly in case he might balk. He could never know the depth of how badly she needed him right now—for myriad reasons.

  His voice was gruff. ‘Lexie...are you sure? The other night...’

  She nodded. ‘I’m sure. The other night...it wasn’t about you. It was about me.’

  ‘I don’t want to hurt you.’

  ‘You won’t...’

  He didn’t move, though. Frustration welled inside her. Maybe Cesar couldn’t deal with the ugly truth of what had happened to her. She took her hand down, stepped back, dislodging his hand. She’d just exposed herself spectacularly.

  ‘It’s okay... If you don’t want me any more because of—’

  His hand shot out, caught her. She looked at him.

  ‘Of course I want you.’ He sounded fierce. ‘I just have to look at you to want you.’

  He came closer. Held her face with both hands. ‘You’re in my blood. I need you.’

  Lexie’s own blood sang. She needed him too. Her whole being came alive as he drew her close and lowered his mouth to hers. The kiss was so tender and gentle that she almost emitted a sob of emotion, but held it back.

  When he drew back he took her by the hand and led her into his bedroom. There was no sense of hesitation within Lexie. No sense of that same panic that had gripped her the other evening. She knew now that that had been largely because of her apprehension of acting out being raped. And it was over.

  Cesar stopped by the bed and she faced him. He said, ‘If you want to stop...’

  Something melted inside her. She shook her head, her hands going to the buttons on his shirt, her voice husky with need. ‘I won’t want to stop.’

  Her hands were clumsy on his buttons and he gently took them away to undo them himself. Lexie sucked in a breath to see his chest revealed. She opened the knot on her robe.

  Cesar looked down and she saw a dark flush slash across his cheekbones. He slid his hands under the shoulders of her robe and pushed it till it fell to the floor.

  Lexie ran her hands over his pectorals, her nails grazing his nipples, making them stand up into hard little points. She reached forward and put her mouth there, swirling her tongue around one hard tip, feeling her core moisten with desire.

  As she lavished kisses on his chest and nipples her hands were on his jeans, flipping open the buttons, feeling the hard ridge of his arousal brushing her fingers. She drew back and pushed his jeans down, taking his underwear with them, her breath disappearing when his erection was freed.

  She wrapped a hand around him, awed by his sheer size and strength and the knowledge that he would never use it to hurt her. Cesar was kicking his feet free of his clothes and then he put his hands on Lexie’s arms.

  She looked up.

  He sounded rough. ‘I need you. I need to taste you.’

  Her hand stalled on the thick column of flesh and gently Cesar removed it, pushing her down onto the bed. He came down beside her and his mouth was on hers, and Lexie moaned as she tasted him hungrily, sucked him deep. Wrapped her legs and arms around him as if she could bind him to her for ever.

  Gently Cesar unbound her, spreading her arms out, his mouth leaving hers to explore over her jaw and neck. Over the tops of her heaving breasts. Taking each tight bud of her nipples into his mouth, making her moan even louder and her hips writhe against him.

  But he kept moving down, over her belly. An arm came under her back, arching her into him, his other hand pushed her legs apart.

  She felt dizzy. ‘Cesar...’

  His green gaze was blistering. ‘Trust me.’

  Trust me. Lexie sank back. She did trust him. She always had—from the moment she’d met him and let him kiss her. Her—with her history. The knowledge rushed through her. Wiping aside any trepidation or lingering hurt.

  His mouth was moving down, kissing the top of her thigh. Moving in. A big hand was splayed under her buttocks, tipping her towards his face. Lexie’s breaths were coming so hard and fast she had to consciously slow down for fear of passing out.

  And then his tongue touched her there. He licked her with explicit skill. All the way up the seam of her body, his tongue delving into her secret folds, opening her up to him, baring every part of her.

  Lexie’s hands gripped the sheet. Legs bent, back arched. Cesar licked and sucked and drove her more and more mindless. His tongue swirled with maddening strokes against her clitoris before leaving it to lavish attention elsewhere and then returning just when those cells were screaming for release.

  When it came it was so huge...so all-encompassing...that Lexie thought she’d passed out. Because the next thing she was aware of was Cesar sliding into her, so deeply and thoroughly, and with such a fierce look of concentration on his face that it was all she could do to wrap her legs around him as far as they’d go and tilt her hips to take him even deeper.

  They were locked in a dance that was as old as time and as profound. Lexie couldn’t look away from Cesar even though she felt as though her soul was being turned inside out and he’d see it as clear as day. She loved him. And it went deeper than just loving him because he was the first man she’d allowed herself to be intimate with. He was the only man she could imagine being intimate with. The only man she wanted to be intimate with.

  That revelation came just as bliss split her body in two, throwing her high into the air, where she seemed to hang suspended on the crest of a huge wave until it finally dropped her again. Cesar caught her in his arms and rolled them both so that she went limp across his heaving chest, their hearts thundering in unison, their skin slick with perspiration.

  * * *

  In the aftermath of her shattering climax and revelation Lexie felt as wobbly and vulnerable as a new foal trying to stand on spindly legs. So much had happened, and in the past couple of days since leaving Cesar’s apartment she’d deliberately cut herself off from the people around her, dreading the upcoming rape scene.

  It had reminded her of when she’d arrived in London for the first time, when she’d been completely alone and unsupported.

  Cesar shifted now and she winced minutely as the connection between their bodies was broken.

  He asked with obvious concern, ‘Are you okay?’

  Lexie nodded and looked at him. He was on one elbow, some hair flopping into his forehead, his face dark, eyes glowing like dark green gems. She loved him.

  But even as she knew that she also knew, with a feeling of desolatio
n, that he didn’t feel anything for her other than desire...and maybe worst of all pity.

  Cutting into her thoughts, Cesar asked, ‘What happened to him?’

  Lexie went cold inside. ‘My uncle?’

  Cesar nodded.

  She braced herself for the pain that inevitably came whenever he was mentioned or she thought about him, but it wasn’t as sharp. Lexie’s mouth became bitter. ‘Nothing. My parents didn’t want to know when I told them. They were very religious—pillars of the community. My father was a salesman; he travelled a lot. The thought of the scandal was too much for them.’

  Cesar was incredulous. ‘You mean he just got away with it?’

  She pulled the sheet around her and sat up against the pillows. ‘He died in a car crash about a year after it happened. But, no, he never got prosecuted or punished.’

  ‘How could they have done that to you? Just ignored it?’

  Lexie glanced away from Cesar. There was an even darker stain on her soul than he could imagine. She suddenly felt jaded and weary. Knowing that she loved him, but that it would end when she left the castillo for London at the end of that week, she felt reckless. As if she had nothing more to lose.

  ‘That wasn’t all,’ she said now in a quiet voice.

  ‘What do you mean?’ Cesar moved, sitting up too.

  She looked at him. ‘The rape resulted in me becoming pregnant.’

  He frowned. ‘Pregnant? You had a baby?’

  Lexie nodded, suppressing the inevitable spasm of emotion. ‘A baby boy. I named him Connor.’

  Cesar shook his head, clearly finding this hard to digest. ‘But...you don’t... Where is he now?’

  ‘I had just turned fifteen when I had him. My family sent me away to a distant relative down the country for the duration of the pregnancy, where I was pretty much kept a prisoner for nine months. He was adopted two days after the birth, and is growing up somewhere in the greater Dublin area—that’s all I know. And that they kept Connor as his middle name.’

  Lexie watched as Cesar, looking slightly stunned, blindly pushed back the covers and got out of the bed. A sinking feeling gripped her. This was it. Her ugly truth bared. She’d known on some deep level that it would be too much to take in. This relationship was about a flirty affair while they were filming—not about dark secrets.

  She knew with a sick feeling that she had just ended it.

  CHAPTER TEN

  CESAR PULLED ON his jeans and then he faced Lexie again. She looked impossibly young against the sheets, eyes huge. He was literally speechless. Didn’t know what to say. The knowledge of what she’d been through was...enormous. And it was making all of his own dark demons rear their ugly heads.

  He felt tight inside. As if a hand was closing around his chest and heart and squeezing with remorseless pressure. He thought of her reaction when he’d first presented her with the option of staying in the castillo for the duration of the shoot. No wonder she’d looked panicked.

  Lexie was a mother. She’d had to give up her baby. He knew rationally that she’d had no choice, but it impacted on him in a deeply raw place. He couldn’t breathe.

  ‘Why did you tell me this?’

  Lexie’s eyes widened. Her face paled. And then something in her features hardened, as if in response to Cesar’s stoniness.

  ‘I told you because I felt I could... But I can see I shouldn’t have.’

  Cesar watched as if slightly removed from his own body as Lexie reached for her robe and pulled it on, getting out of bed too. Belting the robe tightly around her.

  So many different emotions were impacting on him that it was almost overwhelming. Among them was anger—which he knew was directed at himself, for his less than coherent response, and at Lexie for bringing him face to face with things he didn’t want to look at in himself.

  ‘I don’t know what you want me to say.’

  Lexie stared at him, her hair tumbled around her shoulders. Right then she seemed like a tiny warrior queen. Majestic.

  ‘You don’t have to say anything, Cesar. I’m not looking for therapy. I had years of that. I told you...’

  She stopped for a second and that tightening sensation in Cesar’s chest grew stronger. He almost put a hand there, as if that could alleviate the pain.

  ‘I told you because I’ve never been with another man.’

  Cesar stepped back. Stunned. ‘Since you were...?’

  Lexie snapped. ‘Since I was raped, yes. You were my first lover.’

  Faintly, Cesar said, ‘Why me?’

  She crossed her arms. ‘You were the first man I desired.’

  * * *

  Lexie had never regretted anything more than opening her mouth to Cesar. Self-disgust ripped her insides to shreds. She’d truly learnt nothing. For a long time she’d felt ashamed, dirty. That she was some kind of damaged goods. And then therapy had helped her make sense of what had happened and she’d begun the long process of healing and forgiving herself.

  Healing. The physical process of that, which had started with Cesar’s incendiary kiss in the stable, mocked her now. She’d confused physical intimacy with something deeper. Clearly it had never been about anything else for him.

  Her own family had shunned her a long time ago, and she was damned if she was going to let that happen again.

  Lexie stalked around the bed and into the bathroom, aware of Cesar’s eyes on her. The fact that he was so silent, not making any attempt to touch her, said it all. She closed the door and with shaking hands that told her of the heightened emotion she was barely reining in, she took off the robe and put on the costume nightshirt she’d been wearing for the rape scene.

  When she emerged Cesar had put on a top. He looked serious.

  Lexie hated that even now she was acutely aware of her sensitised naked body under the voluminous robe.

  She was brisk. ‘I shouldn’t have said anything.’ From somewhere, Lexie even managed to force a smile—as if this hadn’t just cost her everything.

  ‘Lexie—’

  She cut him off, dreading hearing some platitude, and a spurt of anger made her say, ‘Cesar, we’re wrapping here on Friday. It’s not as if this was ever going to go further. The papers have already lost interest in us—we’ve done what we set out to do in the first place.’

  ‘We have.’ His voice was flat.

  ‘Yes,’ Lexie insisted, forcing herself to look at him even though it was hard. ‘I wanted to salvage my reputation and avoid being dragged through the tabloids again as some kind of victim. You wanted to avoid unnecessary scrutiny into your family. It was a mutually beneficial affair—isn’t that what you called it?’

  Everything within Cesar rejected Lexie’s terse words but something was holding him back. The feeling that the very walls around him were about to start crumbling—as if some sort of invisible earthquake was happening below ground.

  Right at that moment the full impact of just how different Lexie was from any other lover he’d had hit him with the force of a blunt object. She’d turned him upside down and inside out.

  ‘Yes,’ he agreed, ‘it was.’

  Just then there was a knock on the main door of Cesar’s apartment. He cursed even as a very weak part of him welcomed the interruption. He strode through the main living space to get to the door, and opened it to see one of the film’s PAs.

  ‘Sorry to disturb you, Mr Da Silva, but the director is looking for Lexie.’

  Cesar knew Lexie was behind him without turning around. His skin prickled. He felt disorientated, dizzy. Even now he had to battle an absurd urge to protect her and snarl at the young guy to leave.

  Lexie was oblivious to the messy tumult in Cesar’s gut. She stepped around him, didn’t look at him, and spoke to the PA. ‘Tell Richard I’ll just change before I come to him.�
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  The PA hurried off, clearly relieved to have delivered his message. Cesar watched Lexie. She was avoiding his eye. He wanted to tip her chin up, force her to meet his gaze, but at the same time he didn’t want to see what was in those blue depths.

  ‘I should go and talk to Richard.’ Lexie’s voice was husky, her almost belligerent stance of moments ago less evident.

  She looked at him then and Cesar tensed, but her eyes were clear. Unreadable. It irritated him—which irritated him even more.

  ‘The next few days are heavily scheduled so that we get out of here on time. I think it’s best if we just...let this be finished now.’

  Cesar felt slightly numb. This was a novel situation: a woman who was ready to walk away before he was ready to let her go.

  Humiliation scored at his insides. Lexie was right—this had only ever been about the short term. The thought of anything beyond this place was not an option. He did not chase women around the world. Whatever desire he felt would dissipate. He could not want her so badly that he was unable to let her go.

  He was tight-lipped as he reached for the door and held it open. ‘Goodbye, Lexie.’

  Something flared in her eyes for a second, and then it disappeared. She didn’t speak again, just turned and walked out, and as Cesar watched her go he thought numbly that she could be a ghost in the long white gown and in her bare feet.

  He closed the door on her, on that evocative image, and pushed down the chilling sensation that she would haunt him for ever. Everything he’d been holding in since she’d told him about the rape, and then the baby, surged up in a tangled black mess of emotion.

  He went to his drinks cabinet and took out a glass, poured himself a drink. Taking a swift gulp, he felt the liquid jolt him back to life. His hand tightened on the glass as he stared unseeingly at the wall in front of him.

  His own mother had abandoned him and left him at the mercy of his grandparents. Lexie had given up her own son. For a moment pure unadulterated rage rose up within Cesar as he acknowledged what she’d done —but it was an old, reflexive anger that had more to do with his mother than with Lexie.