Читать книгу: «Marriage In Peril», страница 2

‘Men don’t talk about things like that, woman. But it’s as obvious as the nose on my face.’

Sophia sighed. ‘I’ve no doubt he does love Brooke, in a fashion. She’s a very beautiful girl. And incredibly sweet. But he was in love with Francesca. I will never forget the way he looked at her on the night of their engagement party, with such hunger in his eyes. To find her in bed that same night with his brother must have nearly killed him.’

On the balcony above Brooke was reeling from shock after shock. Leo…her Leo, in love with Francesca? Her husband, once engaged to his brother’s wife? Francesca choosing Lorenzo over Leo?

‘Unfortunately,’ Sophia went on with another sigh, ‘Leonardo handled Francesca the wrong way back then, playing the gentleman with her. He thought respecting her virginity was the right thing to do. But he was wrong. Lorenzo, to my eternal dismay, had no respect for anything, or anyone. He simply took what he wanted, and silly, shy, naive Francesca was swept away by his decadent wickedness.’

‘You’re talking nonsense, woman! Lorenzo was not wicked, just weak in matters of the flesh. If he was truly wicked, he would not have married the girl. Yes, they did wrong, but they couldn’t help themselves. They fell madly in love at first sight. Lorenzo told me so himself. He was very sorry he hurt Leonardo, but Francesca obviously didn’t really love the boy. Lorenzo said she was only marrying his brother because he was kind, and she was so lonely after her father’s recent death. As soon as Leonardo understood that, any feelings he had for the girl died a natural death.’

‘If he no longer cared for Francesca,’ Sophia scorned, ‘then why did he run off to Australia? And why didn’t he return for his brother’s wedding?’

‘He didn’t run off to Australia. I sent him there! As for not returning for the wedding, give the man some leeway, woman. He has his pride. He did right to stay away.’

‘Perhaps so. But I don’t think he’s staying away now. With Lorenzo dead, Leonardo finally has the opportunity to have what he foolishly denied himself back then. Francesca, in his bed.’

‘I don’t believe a son of mine would dishonour the family name in this way.’

‘Why not?’ Sophia said, her voice becoming hard. ‘Your other son did. Often.’

‘Lorenzo may have strayed once or twice. But he was a handsome man, and women threw themselves at him in a shameless fashion. It’s unfortunate Francesca never had children. Children keep a man at home, and loyal. But let us talk of Lorenzo no more. The boy is dead. It is not right to speak badly of the dead. And you are wrong about Leonardo. Now, I want to hear no more about this matter.’

‘Turning a blind eye will not solve this situation, husband mine,’ Sophia said sternly.

‘If what you say is true, then turning a blind eye is the only answer,’ Giuseppe refuted. ‘If Leo is fool enough to be having an affair with Francesca, he’ll soon get her out of his system and realise there’s just as good to be had at home. If I’m any judge, I’d say better! Leonardo and his family fly back to Sydney in two more days. Be patient and say nothing. The problem will pass.’

‘Maybe you’re right. But two days can be a long time…’

CHAPTER TWO

SOMEHOW Brooke made her way back into the bedroom without alerting the couple on the terrace below, there to collapse onto the gold silk quilt. Both her hands lifted to cover her eyes, as though by blocking out the light she could somehow block out the horror of what she’d just heard.

Leo, in love with Francesca! Leo, once engaged to his brother’s widow! Leo, not at the office, but spending time with his lost love…

It seemed unbelievable, and yet it explained so much. The fact Leo had never actually said he loved her. Not ever! He’d used other endearments, other phrases. Adoration. Desire. Need. But never love.

And then there was his oddly cold behaviour around Francesca. Not dislike or indifference, as she’d imagined. But the other side of love.

Oh, God…

The pain wasn’t just emotional. It was brutally physical. A vice clamped around her heart, pressing down till she simply couldn’t breathe!

Gasping for air, Brooke struggled off the bed and into the bathroom, where she splashed some cold water over her face, then sucked in great gulps of oxygen before straightening. The distressed face staring back at her in the vanity mirror was hardly recognisable. Chalk-white, with huge, hurt blue eyes and an uncontrollably quivering chin. When tears blurred her vision her eyes dropped and her shoulders sagged. She had to clutch at the marble vanity-top to stop herself from sinking to the floor.

Dear Lord, what was she going to do?

Suddenly, and perversely, she wanted her mother.

Yet her mother was the last person she could tell any of this to. She would just say, I told you so! in that scoffing, scornful way of hers.

Brooke could not help thinking that it was almost five years since her mother had prophesied Leo would make her miserable. Next week was their fifth wedding anniversary. And she’d been right!

Or had she?

What if Giuseppe was right and Sophia was wrong? What if Leo wasn’t still in love with Francesca, let alone spending today—or any other day—with her? What if he didn’t give a damn about his brother’s wife, and hadn’t since she’d betrayed his love with his brother?

Brooke’s heart clung to this desperate hope.

It was possible, wasn’t it? Okay, so Leo hadn’t proclaimed his undying love for her. But in the five years she’d known him he’d never given a hint that he was unhappy, or pining for another woman. He’d always seemed very happy to come home to her every night, and very satisfied with their life together, especially their sex life.

Till this last three weeks, that was, she conceded, with a sickening twist in her stomach. Leo hadn’t been himself in that department since coming home for Lorenzo’s funeral.

She’d thought his unusual lack of desire was due to grief and exhaustion. Now, another more awful reason invaded her mind…

Brooke groaned in despair.

Francesca’s abrupt move back to Milan suddenly took on a more sinister meaning, as did Leo’s wholehearted approval of his sister-in-law’s decision. He’d wanted the opportunity to be alone with the woman he still loved and wanted, away from the prying eyes of his family, and well away from her, his wife.

Francesca’s tears that day might not have been grief, but guilt.

She was the type of female to feel guilty, Brooke thought bitterly, but not enough to say no to a determined man. If Leonardo declared his undying love for her, passionately insisting she give him what she’d once withheld, silly, wishy-washy Francesca would probably become as putty in his hands.

Now Brooke’s eyes snapped up, and they were no longer quite so haunted-looking. They were angry. No, not just angry. Livid.

Giuseppe might be able to turn a blind eye to his son’s adultery, but she could not! She would go and confront the pair of them. Right now! This very moment! Borrow Sophia’s car and drive into Milan to Francesca’s place.

She knew the way. Leo had often taken her into Milan to shop during previous visits, as well as to his brother’s fancy apartment for those dinner parties. She herself had driven home on these occasions, forced to concentrate on the roads involved in a way you didn’t when you were a passenger.

Leo liked to have a bottle of wine over dinner, and always gave her the keys at the end of such evenings. It was the only time he allowed her to drive when he was in the car, something which rankled Brooke but which she tolerated. As she’d tolerated Leo’s edict shortly after their marriage that he didn’t like her to drink much. He’d said it made her aggressive.

‘Like your mother,’ he’d added, when she’d been about to object.

That thought had stopped the automatic protest bubbling up in her throat, after which she’d curtailed her drinking, restricting herself to just one glass or two. Not once during the last five years of their relationship had she ever told Leo it was his turn not to drink that evening, that she wanted to relax over a bottle of wine for once.

‘Silly, weak cow!’ she sneered at herself in the bathroom mirror. ‘No wonder he thinks he can get away with cheating on you.’

Well, he was in for a shock, wasn’t he? In about an hour she would be arriving at Francesca’s door, and there would be hell to pay!

If by some remote possibility Giuseppe was right, and Leo wasn’t with Francesca, if it proved his car was parked safely in the Milan head office car park, and not where she suspected it would be, then she would simply turn round and drive home.

But some inner female instinct told her Leo wasn’t going to be at the office, just as his mother knew. Women knew about such things, provided they opened their stupid eyes and saw the signs.

‘Well, my eyes are well and truly open now, Leo,’ Brooke seethed aloud. ‘And God help you!’

With cold fury in her heart, Brooke set about brushing her hair and applying some lipstick before going downstairs in search of Leo’s mother.

She found her in one of the large sitting rooms, ostensibly reading a magazine. But her grey head was bowed in a weary fashion, her normally proud shoulders slumped in an attitude of great sadness.

Brooke’s heart squeezed tight. She liked her mother-in-law a lot. Sophia was a warm, generous-hearted woman who’d welcomed her into her home and her heart without question. How wretched she must be feeling, with one son dead and the other involved in a potentially disastrous affair.

Protecting Sophia from unnecessary distress became an instant priority with Brooke, her inner fury temporarily pushed to one side. She was still determined to go and find Leo, but whatever happened after that would be between them and them alone. Sophia was not to be told a thing.

Her mind made up, Brooke moved into the room. Sophia’s head jerked up at the sound of footsteps on the tiled floor.

‘Brooke!’ she exclaimed. ‘I…I thought you were sleeping.’

Brooke adopted what she hoped was a suitably wan expression. ‘I tried. But I have this dreadful headache.’

‘Oh, my dear. What a shame. Can I get you something? A tablet? A drink?’

‘No. I’m afraid they won’t help. It’s a PMT thing. My period’s due tomorrow.’ Which it was, she realised. Being on the pill, such things were very predictable. ‘Happens every month. Sometimes, when I get this back home, I go for a walk or a drive. For some reason that unwinds me and the headache goes away. Would you mind if I borrowed your car, Sophia? I promise to be careful and not to speed.’

‘Of course you can, dear. But where will you drive to?’

‘Oh…just around.’

‘Do you want me to go with you?’

‘No, no. I prefer to be by myself. Would you mind the children for me if they wake up before I return?’

‘Certainly.’

Five minutes later, Brooke was carefully negotiating the tight corners of the curving road which hugged the lake, only the prospect of leaving her children motherless stopping her from speeding.

She couldn’t get to Milan fast enough. She wanted to see the evidence of Leo’s betrayal for herself; wanted to see his car outside Francesca’s apartment block; wanted to storm inside and find them together.

In her mind’s eyes she saw herself tearing strips off Leo, shouting and screaming and doing all those hysterical things she hadn’t done during her last five lily-livered years!

The drive took well over an hour, with traffic building the closer she got to Milan. Brooke got a bit lost before finally turning into the wide, tree-lined street which housed Francesca’s apartment block.

Brooke had thought she was ready for the sight of Leo’s car parked in one of the visitors’ bays by the side of the building.

But she’d been wrong.

Her stomach cramped when her eyes landed on its distinctive make and colour, then heaved when the number-plate confirmed there was no mistake. She only just opened her own car door in time for her lunch to land in the gutter and not her lap. As it was, her dress became a little stained.

At last, she sank back against the leather seat, shaken and still shaking. All she could think of was that the man she loved… her husband…her Leo…was inside that building, inside Francesca’s apartment, in her bedroom, in her bed.

No use pretending he wasn’t. If his presence there was perfectly innocent, why lie about what he was doing today?

He’d probably been lying all week, Brooke accepted, nausea swirling again. He’d probably never been in the office at all. Or only minimally. That was why he’d left his mobile phone number with her, and not the office number.

Perversely, now that she had proof of his lies, her courage failed her. Suddenly she was afraid of what would happen if she did go inside and confront them both.

Because there would be no going back then: no pretending it was just a passing problem—or a passing passion; no turning that blind eye Giuseppe had perhaps wisely said was the only solution.

If she confronted them, her marriage would be over. Even if Leo didn’t want that—and Brooke believed that Leo would not want to hurt or lose his children—then pride would come into it.

Her pride.

It was one thing to go on living with a man you knew didn’t love you. Quite another to go on living with a man who knew you knew he didn’t love you. That would be beyond the pale. Totally unendurable.

But she could drive away now, go back to the villa and pretend she knew nothing. Then, if Leo took them back to Australia this Friday—confirming he’d made the decision to give up Francesca for the sake of his family—they might be able to go on as before. Because that would mean he did love her, in a way.

Who knew? Maybe his being with Francesca today was just a sex thing, a hangover from the past, an old, unrequited passion which he hadn’t been able to let go. Maybe he was doing exactly what his father said, getting the woman out of his system.

Much as it killed Brooke to think of Leo in the arms of another woman, it was better he take the creature to bed a few times then ask for a divorce.

The truth was she simply could not bear it if Leo divorced her. Brooke knew she would never love another man as she loved him. On top of that he was the father of her children. They adored him. Heavens, even her mother had grown to like him.

Better she swallow her pride and turn that blind eye. Better she ignore the pain, hide the overwhelming feelings of humiliation and pretend nothing had changed.

But oh, dear Lord, it was going to be hard…

Brooke swallowed, reached forward, and turned on the engine. Slowly, wretchedly, she turned the car and made her way back to Lake Como.

‘My dear, you look terrible!’ was Sophia’s first remark on her return. ‘And what’s that on your dress?’

‘I…I was sick,’ Brooke mumbled, feeling wretched and utterly exhausted. ‘Must be a migraine, not PMT.’

‘You poor thing. I know how terrible they are. I’ve suffered from migraines for years. You simply must go back to bed. And draw the curtains. I’ll bring you up some very good tablets the doctor prescribed for me. They’ll make you sleep, but that’s for the best. Now, don’t you worry about the children. Giuseppe has taken them out for a boat ride on the lake. Nina’s gone with them, so they’ll be quite safe.’

Brooke was having a battle not to cry. ‘You’re very kind,’ she choked out.

‘Not at all. Leonardo rang again. I didn’t tell him you were out driving. I said you had a headache and were having a sleep. I hope I did the right thing.’

Brooke met the woman’s worried eyes and wondered why they were both protecting Leo.

For the sake of the children, she supposed.

‘Yes, Sophia, you did the right thing,’ she said in a flat, dead voice.

‘Good. Now, upstairs with you and into a nice refreshing shower. I’ll put the tablets by your bed, along with a drink and something light for you to eat. It’s not good to take these tablets on an empty stomach. And don’t worry about anything. If you’re still asleep when Leo comes home, I’ll tell him not to disturb you.’

Now the tears came, and Sophia looked alarmed. ‘Are you sure it’s just a headache, Brooke? There’s nothing else wrong, is there?’

Brooke refused to add to the woman’s worry. She’d had enough on her plate lately. This was her problem and she would deal with it.

‘I think I’m a bit homesick,’ she said, not untruthfully.

Sophia nodded. ‘It’s time Leo took you home.’

Brooke just smiled sadly and turned to go upstairs. Her legs felt like lead, each step a mammoth effort. By the time she came out of the shower, two rather big white pills were sitting on the near bedside table, along with a glass of water. A small and very elegantly set out tray rested on the other table, with two tempting-looking sandwiches and a tall glass of iced milk.

Her mother-in-law’s sweet thoughtfulness brought another rush of tears. Brooke knew Sophia would be devastated if she and Leo broke up. So would Giuseppe. Brooke could not do it to them, or to her children, or to herself. She loved Leo. She would always love him, no matter what. Life without him was unimaginable!

Brooke fell asleep with tears still wet on her cheeks. But they had long dried when she woke many hours later to the sounds of someone in the en suite bathroom, in the shower.

Her errant husband, it seemed, had finally deigned to come home.

CHAPTER THREE

ODDLY, Brooke’s first reaction was fury, not distress.

The room was dark, she noted angrily. Leo must have turned the bedside lamp off when he came in.

She rolled over to check the luminous numbers on the bedside clock and saw it was twenty minutes past eleven. Not too late, so a wife wouldn’t be suspicious. Certainly not one as stupidly doting and one-eyed as herself!

With a bitter resentment in her heart, she rolled back onto her side, facing the far wall, curling her body up in a foetal position, glad she was wearing one of her more modest nighties.

Leo had a thing for short, slinky black satin night-wear which barely covered her bottom. This particular nightie was much longer, reaching her knees. It was particularly low-cut up top, however, and had only the thinnest shoulder straps keeping it in place. Still, with her back to him, its length was the most important factor.

I’ll pretend to be asleep, she vowed savagely as she lay there. That way I won’t say anything I might regret in the morning.

Maybe if Leo hadn’t stayed in the shower so darned long Brooke might have been able to keep to that vow. But fifteen minutes went by and the water was still running, evoking all sorts of darkly jealous thoughts.

He was trying to wash the smell of her off his body. He probably reeked of her, and that heavy, musky perfume she always wore.

By the time the taps were turned off, five minutes later, Brooke had rolled back over and was glaring in the direction of the bathroom, watching and waiting for him to come out.

She was still glowering at the door when it finally opened.

Leo emerged, obviously trying not to make a sound, turning off the bathroom light before carefully closing the door behind him.

But not before Brooke got a good long look at him, framed in the brightly lit doorway.

There was no doubting Leo was an impressive man naked. Brooke had never seen better.

He had it all. Broad shoulders. Deep chest. Flat stomach. Slim hips. Gorgeous olive skin. Not too much body hair. Strong arms and lovely muscular thighs…with more than adequate equipment in between.

Brooke had been overawed by him from the first time he’d stripped for her. She was still overawed by him. Even now, when she wanted to hate him.

Her heart began to pound as his darkened silhouette crossed the room, lifted the sheet and slid, still naked, into the bed. Not an unusual occurrence. Leo often slept in the nude.

But the cool, casual arrogance of the man infuriated her. When he rolled over and put his back to her, she wanted to kill him.

Brooke lay there, scowling up at the ceiling, thinking of the cruellest most uncivilised way of putting him to death for his crimes against her and their marriage. The guillotine was too quick and too kind. The same applied to a firing squad. She wanted him to suffer as she was suffering, to endure…in agony.

Hanging, drawing and quartering would do just fine, she decided. Like in past times. But only after a few years’ solitary confinement in one of those cold, old prisons, where his only companions would be cockroaches and rats!

Unfortunately, there was no real solace or satisfaction in such thinking, and Brooke’s jealous fury was soon sidelined by an equally savage determination to know for sure just how great Leo’s crimes against her were: how far things had progressed, how many times he’d been unfaithful to her that day.

The state of his body, she resolved with a wild recklessness, would be much more telling than the sight of his car in that car park this afternoon.

He flinched when her hand landed on the indent of his waist, then stiffened when it began to slide around further. Abruptly he rolled onto his back, his head twisting on the pillow to face her.

By this time the palm of Brooke’s hand was resting provocatively on his stomach, and her heart was racing. With fear of what she’d find, she wondered? Or fear of what he’d do if she dared touch him down there?

‘I thought you were asleep,’ he said, his voice as cool as his skin.

‘I was.’ She could just make out his face. The moon was out and the curtains which covered the bedroom windows were light and filmy, letting in enough light to see by once your eyes had adjusted.

Leo was looking at her rather oddly, his eyes narrowed and wary.

‘I tried to be quiet,’ he said, a measure of defensiveness in his voice.

‘Why?’

‘Mamma told me you’d had a bad migraine all day. She said she’d given you some pills.’

‘Yes. She did. She’s very kind, your mum.’

‘True.’

There was a moment’s awkward silence when Leo said nothing further and Brooke’s courage began to fail her. Her hand lay still on his stomach while her heart thudded away.

‘You’re very late, Leo…’

‘Yes. I know. I’m sorry, but Lorenzo’s left a damned awful mess behind him. I’m trying to have everything sorted out before we leave on Friday. I haven’t finished yet, either. I wasn’t as productive today as I would have liked to be. Too many interruptions. So I might have to work late tomorrow night as well.’

‘I see,’ Brooke said, and another awkward silence fell between them.

‘It’s not like you to have a migraine, Brooke,’ Leo said at last. ‘I wonder what brought it on?’

Thinking of you in love with Francesca all these years, she wanted to throw at him. Thinking of you in bed with her all afternoon and half the night.

Such thoughts renewed her bitter resolve to see the lie of the land, once and for all.

‘I feel much better now,’ she murmured, and slid her hand back and forth across his stomach.

He sucked in sharply.

‘So I see,’ he bit out.

When he made no move to stop her, Brooke’s hand changed direction. A little shakily, it began to travel downwards, till it encountered then encircled her intended target.

Shock held her fingers still for a few moments. For never had Leo felt so limp, or less interested in her touch!

As Brooke had already found out this afternoon, it was one thing to think something, another to find hard evidence of its truth, even when that evidence wasn’t hard, but soft. Crushingly, cruelly soft!

Waves of emotion swept through her. Dismay. Devastation. Despair! How could he betray her this way? Deceive her? Destroy her!

And how could Francesca? The bitch! And so soon after her husband’s death!

Eventually, surprisingly, the wish to kill them both was sublimated by the mad desire to make Leo respond, to show him that she—his wife—knew him better than any other woman, knew what he liked, could give him pleasure unequalled elsewhere. Francesca couldn’t possibly do for him what Brooke knew she could.

Finally, her frozen fingers began to move once more.

His groan sounded like a protest, but she stubbornly ignored it, using her acquired knowledge of his body to arouse him. After all, hadn’t Leo tutored her personally in what he liked during the first few weeks of their relationship, spending long evenings and even longer nights in extending her sexual education, showing her at the same time that her previous lovers had been total ignoramuses?

All they’d wanted were quickies.

But his flesh was depressingly slow to respond, its lack-lustre performance very telling. Her normally responsive and very virile husband must have been making love all day to be like this!

Brooke refused to give up. He would respond, she vowed with an icy resolve, her heart hardening against any distracting or distressing emotions.

‘This isn’t like you, Leo,’ she murmured, all the while caressing him intimately.

‘I thought you were asleep,’ he muttered through obviously gritted teeth. ‘I’ve just had a very long, very cold shower.’

In truth, his skin was cold. But she didn’t believe his lengthy shower had anything to do with consideration for her.

‘Then maybe you need a little extra help,’ she said, and, sliding down his body, boldly took the evidence of his recent betrayal between her lips.

This wasn’t something Brooke ever did off her own bat. Only at Leo’s behest. Even then, it wasn’t something he asked for much nowadays. In fact she couldn’t remember the last time. Probably last summer, here, in this very room. But in the past it had unfailingly aroused him, no matter how many times he’d already made love to her.

It aroused him now, his flesh swelling quickly. Brooke was merciless, her only aim to make him so excited that he would lose control. She wanted to seduce him so totally that he would forget everything else…and everyone else. Especially Francesca.

At the back of her mind Brooke knew she was acting out of sheer desperation, but she couldn’t stop for the life of her. One part of her was almost horrified by what she was doing. Another part remained coldly detached, driving her on to do everything she could think of. And more. Her hands joined her lips in the fray, finding all sorts of erotic areas to torment and tantalise. She was more adventurous than she’d ever been before.

Dimly, she heard him moan, felt his own fingers splay shakily into her hair. When they tightened, she thought for one awful moment he was going to drag her away, make her stop.

But he didn’t.

He muttered something in Italian at one stage, his voice low and shaking.

She stopped momentarily to glance up at him. His handsome face was etched clearly in the moonlight, his hooded eyes almost shut, his mouth grimacing.

‘Do you want me to stop?’ she purred.

When a violent shudder shook his head from side to side, she smiled an amazingly cool smile, dipped her head, and continued.

His breath began coming in raw, panting gasps. He was erect now, all right. More than he’d ever been, his flesh almost cruelly stretched. And straining.

A wave of dark triumph flooded Brooke, bringing its own brand of excitement and satisfaction. For at that moment Leo was hers, totally. He had no will of his own. No ability to think, let alone stop her.

Or so she’d thought.

Brooke was so caught up in her own dizzying sense of power that she didn’t notice Leo’s hands abandon her hair. When they slid under her arms and pulled her up off him, her cry of shock and frustration was very real.

Ignoring her protest, Leo pushed the satin nightie up to her waist, grasped her buttocks in an iron grip and lifted her till she was kneeling high above him. Before she knew it, his titanic erection was between her thighs and she was being forcibly drawn downwards onto it.

Her lips gasped wide at the swiftness of this turnaround, plus the stunning pleasure as her husband slid, hard and huge, into her. She hadn’t realised till that moment how turned on she was.

So much for being removed from the experience!

So much for being the one in control!

Suddenly, all she wanted was to move, to feel him filling and refilling her. But he was holding her too tightly for the riding motion she craved. In desperation, she swayed back and forth, wriggling her hips and squeezing her insides to create some friction, to ease the craven need which was suddenly driving her wild.

‘Be still!’ Leo commanded, his thumbs and fingertips digging into her flesh.

‘But I don’t want to be still,’ she choked out.

‘I can see that,’ he growled, then smiled the wickedest smile up at her. ‘But I need a little time to compose myself before we continue. Still…maybe I can help you out in the meantime.’

His black eyes glittered in the moonlight as he reached up to brush her tangled hair back off her flushed face, pushing it right back off her shoulders before slowly sliding the thin straps off her shoulders, peeling the nightie downwards till her breasts were totally exposed.

Brooke knew, without looking at them, that they were cruelly swollen, and her nipples as hard as rocks. She had nice breasts. Big, without being too big. Breastfeeding had made them drop only a little, and her nipples were much larger than before.

‘I should neglect you in the bedroom more often,’ Leo muttered thickly, ‘if this is the result.’ Reaching up, he took both nipples between his thumbs and forefingers, and gave them both a sharp tug.

Shock—and something else—quivered down Brooke’s spine. Leo had never done anything remotely like that to her nipples before. He was usually so gentle and tender with her breasts, using his mouth and tongue more than his hands.