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His Convenient Wife
Diana Hamilton


Cat is furious when her grandfather insists she consider a marriage of convenience to wealthy Italian businessman Aldo Patrucco. But then it's love at first sight for Cat and lust at first sight for Aldo–so the wedding is on!Once in Italy, Cat plans for her new husband to fall in love with her–only it seems he's returned to his mistress! Proudly announcing she's leaving him, Cat discovers that, mistress or not, Aldo certainly has no intention of relinquishing his convenient wife….









“Caterina—” Aldo emerged from the shadows.


“What is it?” Cat asked thinly. “What do you want?”

“To be alone with my wife.” A small smile lingered on his incredibly sexy mouth.

Cat drew in a ragged breath. “So you finally remembered my existence. It took you long enough—two months by my reckoning.”

“Cara—I admit my absence was regrettable, but it really was necessary if—”

“I’m sure it was,” she said, cutting him off. “Business, was it?”

He pulled her hard against him and she gasped as she tried to pull in enough air to enable her to tell him to stop this pretense, but all that emerged was a tiny despairing groan.

“Don’t be sad, cara,” he said, obviously mistaking that distressed sound for something else entirely.

And as he murmured soft words of comfort in Italian, he sounded so sincere that she could almost believe he cared.




His Convenient Wife

Diana Hamilton










www.millsandboon.co.uk (http://www.millsandboon.co.uk)




CONTENTS


PROLOGUE

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

EPILOGUE




PROLOGUE


�YOU can’t be serious! Are you actually suggesting I marry this Aldo Patrucco character?’ Cat’s green eyes flashed withering scorn in her grandfather’s direction. She pulled herself up to her full five feet nine inches, towering above him, her patrician nostrils pinched with a mix of disbelief and outrage.

Gramps looked oddly shrunken, his clothes suddenly seeming too big for his frail bones as he sat in his favourite armchair. She felt sorry for him, of course she did, very sorry, and she loved him dearly, but no way would she fall in with the insane suggestion he’d just thrown at her.

�Listen to yourself, won’t you?’ she pushed out through her teeth. �You’re asking me to sell myself—it’s positively medieval!’

�And you are overreacting as usual, Caterina,’ Domenico Patrucco objected flatly, his black eyes immediately softening in his lined face as he went on to ask gently, �Why don’t you pour the tea and then we can sit and have a civilised discussion? Without shouting.’

Cat let out a long, pent-up breath. It would cost her nothing to humour him, would it? Poor old Gramps had had a tough time recently. He had lost both his sister Silvana and his beloved wife Alice in the space of three months. She and Gramps were still grieving for Alice, so she knew how he felt. She’d never met her Italian great-aunt Silvana, of course, but she knew how much Gramps had looked forward to those long, gossipy letters which had told him of the doings of the Italian side of the family he had split from all those long years ago.

He was all alone now apart from Bonnie, who had been housekeeper here from the year dot. It had been Bonnie who had waddled over to the converted barn in what had once been the stack yard, where Cat had her workshop beneath her living quarters, to announce that her grandfather wished her to join him for afternoon tea.

As she dealt with the tea things Cat wondered if she should offer to move back into the farmhouse to keep the old man company. To stop him brooding and being too lonely. The farmland had been sold off years ago, when he’d retired, and the poor old guy had nothing to do with his time but come up with manic suggestions.

She owed him big time. He and Gran had brought her up since his only child, her mother, had been killed with Cat’s father in a road accident when she had been little more than a baby. Their love and care had been unstinting.

Two years ago when she’d left college with a degree in jewellery and silversmithing her grandparents had offered her the use of the barn as a workshop and had reluctantly agreed to her plan to move out of the main house and convert the barn’s upper storey into a self-contained flat. She’d been twenty-one and eager to have her own space where she could work or relax, entertain her friends, as the mood took her, be independent.

Keeping him company, keeping an eye on him for a few months, just until he was more himself, wouldn’t hurt her. It was, she supposed, the least she could do after all he and Gran had done for her.

The tea poured, she handed him a delicate china cup and saucer and flopped down on the opposite side of the hearth to where he was sitting, her long jeans-clad legs stretched out in front of her, and offered brightly, �Why don’t I move back in here for a month or two? We could spend time together.’

She could sub-let her booth in the craft centre for three months and put her work on hold, she mentally sacrificed, and because that was not the best idea in the world as far as her career was concerned she flashed him a brilliant, Gramps-deluding smile. �We could take days out together; I’ll drive you wherever you want to go—’

�And give me a heart attack!’ he interrupted drily. �The way you drive is as flamboyant and erratic as the way you dress!’ And, seeing the way her vivid, animated and lovely features went blank, her wide mouth compressing, he amended gently, �I thank you for your concern, but I assure you I am not in need of such a sacrifice. What you can do to make me a happy man is give serious consideration to my suggestion.’

So they were back to that, were they? Cat ground her teeth together. Her diversionary tactics hadn’t worked, so the only way to handle this was to get it all out in the open, force him to see that his intention to marry her off to his great-nephew was a complete non-starter.

�If your suggestion had been remotely sane I might have done that,’ she came back carefully, tenaciously holding on to her patience. �But I’m willing to listen while you try to say something sensible on the subject; that’s all I can promise.’

Leaning back in her chair, she pushed her untameable mane of chestnut hair away from her face. The room was unbearably warm. It was only mid-September but a huge log fire was burning in the hearth. Her grandfather had lived in cool, misty England for many years but his Italian blood still craved warmth.

His heavily hooded eyes held hers but he said nothing for long moments. Trying to find a form of words that would make something crazy sound completely sensible, she guessed. Well, it wouldn’t work, however he dressed it up.

�Family,’ he said at last. �It all comes down to family. Forget the shares for the moment; they are important but not as important as closing the circle.’

Cat could have asked him what he meant by that but didn’t bother. And as for the shares she would happily forget them. Forever.

Growing up she’d heard the story so many times it bored her socks off. How her grandfather had been incensed, hurt in his pride, as he put it, when his older married brother had inherited seventy per cent of the shares in the Patrucco family business while he had received a mere miserable thirty. Marcantonio had had the upper hand, made all the decisions, told him what to do. Had control. So the younger and disgruntled Domenico had just upped and left. America first stop, where, hot-headed and determined to show Marcantonio that he didn’t need him or the olive plantations and the vineyards, he got into trouble over something to do with a parcel of land.

England next, to seek his fortune. What he had found was love. His Alice.

The only child of farming parents, Alice Mayhew had fallen head over heels with her handsome Italian suitor and after their marriage he’d helped out on the Shropshire farm; the income from the shares that had caused his permanent split from his brother had purchased more land, updated equipment and renovated the down-at-heel farmhouse.

However much he had despised the insulting smallness of his holding in the Italian business he had never sold those shares. And now, according to the healthy state of his bank balance, they were paying huge dividends.

�You didn’t think family was important when you upped and left Italy and broke off all contact,’ Cat reminded him gently when she guessed by his continuing silence he had run out of things to say.

�That was pride. The pride of a man is stiff, unyielding.’ He lifted his shoulders in a fatalistic shrug, but defended, �I kept contact through our sister Silvana. She told me of Marcantonio’s success in expanding the business, of the birth of his son, my nephew Astorre. Of my brother’s death ten years after Astorre’s marriage into a super-wealthy Roman family and the arrival of my great-nephew Aldo. Through her I know that Astorre has retired to Amalfi with his grand Roman wife and that Aldo now holds the business reins and has expanded into luxury holiday villas and apartments.’

Cat could almost feel sorry for him. A seventy-nine-year-old man indulging in pipedreams. She saw the relevance of that �closing the circle’ bit now. Sweep past resentments and quarrels aside, marry his granddaughter to his great-nephew and make everything right and whole again.

In his dreams!

�And through the photographs Silvana sent me—’ a slow pause, a smile that might, if she were to be uncharitable, be described as sly �—I know that Aldo is a fine figure of Italian manhood—at thirty years of age he has a truly astute business brain and is the owner of a villa in Tuscany, a town house in Florence and an apartment in Portofino—che bello! You could do far worse! That I know all that is important to know about my lost family I explained to Aldo when I spoke to him on the phone a fortnight ago and suggested that a marriage between you two young things might be arranged to reunite the family.’

A beat of appalled silence. Cat felt her face colour hotly. �You did what? I do not believe this!’ Then the cool and welcome slide of common sense effectively stopped her exploding with outrage. �And he quite rightly told you where to put your interfering “suggestion”. Right?’

�Far from it. He accepted my invitation to come and meet you. To discuss the matter further. As I said, he has an astute brain. Which brings us to my shares.’ He held out his cup and saucer. �Would you?’

Rising, Cat poured his second cup of tea, her hands shaking. She would not let her temper rip. Her grandfather was seventy-nine years old; he was grieving for his Alice. His sister was also, sadly, gone. He couldn’t make his peace with his older brother—he had died many years ago. He wanted to heal the family rift through his granddaughter and his great-nephew. She had to keep reminding herself of the facts to stop herself throttling him!

So she wouldn’t storm out of here as every instinct urged her to. She really didn’t want to upset him. Besides, no one on this earth could make her marry a man she didn’t know, quite possibly wouldn’t even like and certainly wouldn’t love.

Reassured, she handed him his tea and asked, �So when does this paragon arrive?’

�Any time now. I didn’t tell you what I had in mind earlier. You would have suddenly expressed the wish to take a walking holiday in Scotland or go climbing in the Andes!’

Cat dipped her head, acknowledging his correct reading of her character. She recalled a note appended to one of her end-of-term reports. �Caterina is stubborn and headstrong. She won’t be led and she won’t be pushed.’

Bolshie, in other words.

She preferred to think of herself as strong-minded. She knew what she wanted and that wasn’t having to endure being looked over by some Italian big shot like a heifer at market!

�Why aren’t you shouting at me, Caterina?’

The thread of amusement in his voice brought her attention back to her grandfather. She gave a slight, dismissive shrug and walked to the window to look out at the tail end of the afternoon. The days were shortening and the turning leaves of the damson tree mimicked the promise of hazy sunshine breaking through the warm and heavy early-autumn mist.

�The timing of Aldo’s arrival is irrelevant. He is wasting his time coming here at all.’ She turned back to face him, the russet colour of the heavy-duty smock she usually wore when she was working emphasising the burnished glow of her chestnut hair, making her skin look paler, her eyes a deeper emerald. She spread her long-fingered artist’s hands expressively. �I can’t understand why he’s bothering. The guy’s obviously loaded and unless he looks like a cross between Quasimodo and a pot-bellied pig he could take his own pick of women.’

�As no doubt he has,’ Domenico remarked drily. �But when it comes to taking a wife there is much to be considered. Family honour demands that a man marries wisely and well and not merely because he has lustful desires for a particular pretty woman.’

�Your shares in his business,’ Cat deduced in a flat voice. This Aldo creep was obviously the pits. Popular culture marked the Italian male as being passionate, hot-blooded and fiery but this distant relative of hers had to be anything but if he could contemplate, even for one moment, marrying a woman he had yet to meet for the sake of clawing back a parcel of shares.

Verifying that conclusion, Domenico dipped his head. �My thirty-per-cent holding in his business, plus everything that is mine will one day come to you.’ He stirred his tea reflectively. �You are young, you are beautiful and when I am gone you will be all alone. If you were safely married to a man such as Aldo your future would be secure. You would be part of a family, cared for and pampered. I do not make this suggestion because I am crazy but because I love you and worry about your future.’

�There’s no need,’ Cat said gruffly, her throat thickening. On the one hand she wanted to give him a verbal lashing. He was like something out of the ark! In his outdated opinion women couldn’t stand on their own feet; they needed a member of that superior race—a man—to look after them. And when he was no longer around to perform that duty he wanted to pass her over to someone he thought he could trust! He was living back in the nineteenth century—and, what was worse, an Italian nineteenth century!

On the other hand, she knew he loved her, cared about her, and that made her want to fling her arms around him and tell him she loved him, too.

She did neither. She said, relatively calmly, �I’m a big girl; I can look after myself. And if we really must have to anticipate events—which is not what I want to do—then I have a business of my own, remember. I could sell those shares to invest in it,’ she pointed out. �I could buy more and better equipment, hire staff, open a proper high-street shop instead of trading from a craft centre. I have no intention of tying myself to a cold-fish business brain for the sake of a life of idle luxury!’ She turned to the door, telling him, �You’d better start thinking of how to apologise to the guy for bringing him over here on a wild-goose chase.’

�Wait.’ Domenico’s voice was smooth as cream. �Marriage is by no means certain. Though I know Aldo wouldn’t have agreed to this meeting if he hadn’t thought the idea viable. And I warn you, if he does propose and you turn him down for no good reason but pigheadedness—going against my wishes and your own best interests—then the shares, everything I have, will go to him.’

For several long seconds Cat couldn’t move. A heavy ache balled in her chest and her eyes flooded with tears. Gramps had said he loved her but he was quite happy to blackmail her. It hurt more than he would ever know.

The loss of her inheritance paled into insignificance. It would be tough, but she’d manage. When the time came she would have to find new living and working premises to rent, work all hours in order to keep her tiny business viable, and maybe not make it.

But that was nothing beside the knowledge that he was prepared to disinherit her if she didn’t toe the line. He couldn’t care for her at all, or not as much as he cared for what he called family honour.

When she could get her feet to move she walked out of the room and exactly one hour later she saw Aldo Patrucco arrive from the vantage point of her kitchen window above the cobbled stack yard.

He exited from the back of a dark saloon. He was tall, wearing a beautiful dark grey overcoat and a white silk scarf, and that was all she could see because the mist that had been hanging around all day had thickened in the autumn evening.

The uniformed chauffeur took a single leather suitcase from the boot and moments later drove away. So the big shot must have hired the package, Cat deduced as the main door was opened by Bonnie to admit the Italian.

Cat shuddered, her mouth clamped decisively shut. Only ten minutes ago Bonnie had called from the bottom of the stairs that led up from her work-room, telling her that her grandfather expected her to take dinner with him and his guest. Eight o’clock sharp.

She could refuse to put in an appearance. Or she could turn up in her shabbiest work clothes, display disgraceful table manners and vile personal habits, and put the guy off the idea of having anything at all to do with her.

The latter idea was tempting but she had too much pride to let herself act with such immaturity. She would go. She would be dignified. Not speak until spoken to. And spend her time trying to calculate if the amount in her bank balance would fund the renting of new premises if her grandfather threw her out as soon as Aldo Patrucco had left England, his proposal of marriage—if he made it—rejected with the scorn it deserved.




CHAPTER ONE


MARRYING Aldo Patrucco had been the biggest mistake of her life, Cat told herself for the millionth time as she stood in front of the tall window at the top of the villa, staring out at the rolling Tuscan hills shimmering in the haze of afternoon heat.

The panoramic view might once have entranced her. But the gentle purple hills, silver olive groves and scattered ochre-coloured farmhouses, the ubiquitous punctuation marks of the cypress trees merely emphasised her isolation, her frustration and misery.

The villa—every luxury provided…well, that went without saying in a Patrucco residence—reputedly built for the Medici family way back in the middle ages, had been her prison for two long months, since shortly after her miscarriage back in June.

Apart from his twice-weekly dutiful phone calls she’d had no contact with Aldo; he’d used his excuse of �Rest and Recuperation’ to get her away from the house in Florence, out of his sight, masking his disappointment in her failure to carry his heir to full term with an unconvincing display of polite concern for her well-being.

Leaving him free to be with his mistress.

He was cold. Heartless. Unreachable. Except…

Except she’d once been so sure he hadn’t been like that at all, that she could somehow reach his heart.

But he hadn’t got a heart, had he? Just an efficient machine, like a calculator.

As it too often did, her mind slid back with humiliating ease to that fatal night when she’d first met him. Only eleven months ago but it seemed like a lifetime now.

Dinner at eight. True to her intention to grit her teeth and make an appearance, to present a dignified front, she’d dressed in the soberest garment she owned. A peacock-green crêpe shift that skimmed her generously curved body and left her arms bare. Her make-up discreet, her unmanageable hair somehow tamed, drawn back from her face and painstakingly secured with a black velvet bow at her nape.

�Caterina—’ There’d been such a note of pride in her grandfather’s voice as he’d risen from a leather club chair in the study as she’d walked into the room with her head high, but his introduction was lost on her as Aldo Patrucco got to his feet.

Over six feet of superbly dressed Italian male, a strong, harshly handsome face, his features shimmering out of focus because it was the look in those bitter-chocolate eyes that entrapped her.

She’d seen that look in men’s eyes before and had uninterestedly ignored it. Her one and only short-lived affair with Josh, a fellow student, in her final year at college had fizzled out with no regret on either side, and since then she hadn’t been remotely tempted.

But this hot, sultry branding held her as she’d never been held before, and her lips parted on a breathless gasp as his hard mouth curved in a slight, lazy smile just before he greeted her with easy Italian panache, his hands resting lightly on her shoulders, a light kiss on her forehead, another just above the corner of her mouth.

Just the softest brush of his lips against her skin, but it was enough to make her shake, make her breathless, disorientated.

�Ciao, Caterina.’ His voice slid over her like warm dark honey. She mumbled something and turned away to hide the heat that suddenly flared over her face. She preferred to be called Cat—it sounded sharper, definite, more like the self she knew herself to be—but Caterina, on his lips, sounded like magic.

Charm, she told herself, making no attempt to join in the ensuing conversation, which was being conducted in part Italian, part English. He could turn charm on like a tap. Obviously. So why was she feeling hot and bothered, overpowered, when she had to know that the way he had looked at her, as if he wanted to bed her right here and now, was just the stock-in-trade of a man who knew what he wanted and how to get it? A man who was fully aware of his power over other people and used it.

The physical presence of the man filled the book-lined room with a dangerous sexual threat. A combination of a lean, powerful six-foot frame clothed in sheer Italian elegance, and that closely cropped black hair framing hard tanned features, that tough jawline and a mouth that could soften into a wicked, explicit promise whenever he looked her way made a tense, fluttery excitement curl in the pit of her stomach.

Cat rose with a sense of relief when Bonnie poked her head round the door to announce that dinner was ready, a relief that quickly turned into deep trepidation when Aldo rose to escort her, the palm of his long, lean hand hot against the small of her back, burning her. Burning her up with a sheet of wildfire that sizzled through her veins and made her feel light-headed.

No other man had ever affected her this way. She’d sort of fallen into her brief affair with Josh because he fancied her, was easy on the eye, and had been amusing company. And it had seemed to her that she was the only girl in her peer group not in a relationship. But this feeling was entirely different. It was immediate, insistent. Shattering.

Seated opposite him, Cat didn’t know where to put herself, and Bonnie’s meal, beautifully cooked and presented as usual, was untouched on her plate. But the champagne Gramps had insisted on eventually loosened her tongue and Aldo’s dark eyes locked on to her soft mouth as he murmured, �You speak fluent Italian.’

�I was brought up on it—my grandparents insisted.’ She drained her glass, feeling reckless, feeling more like herself. The situation was weird, like something out of an old and rather silly novel, but undoubtedly exciting. What woman wouldn’t be feeling as if she were permanently plugged into a conduit for live electricity when face to face with such a breathtakingly sexy, brain-blowingly gorgeous male who was here with the express intent of looking her over, deciding whether she was suitable wife material?

�Caterina has always been made aware of her heritage,’ Domenico put in with an undertow of satisfaction, like a breeder demonstrating the finer points of his bloodstock to a possible purchaser.

Far from experiencing all that earlier outrage, Cat giggled softly as she watched the bubbles rise in the crystal flute as Aldo helped her to yet more champagne. �I have far more English blood in my veins than Italian,’ she argued softly, feeling those bitter-chocolate eyes on her and secretly wallowing in the sensation of feeling more truly alive than she had ever done before.

Aldo leaned back in his chair, his eyes hooded now as they roamed from the crown of her glossy chestnut head, over her milky white skin and down to the lushly rounded breasts beneath the soft covering of fine fabric, the explicit shafts of golden light in the veiled depths making her blush as he murmured, �With your colouring, your grace, you could be Veneziana, and I hear from Zio Domenico that your temperament is fiery, pure Italiana, with nothing of the phlegmatic English.’

�And could you cope with that, signor?’ she dared, green eyes sparkling through a thick sweep of dark lashes as she thrust the agenda out into the open, wondering if such exposure would wrong-foot this supremely self-assured male, unprepared for and wantonly excited by his softly drawled comeback, the slow and decidedly rakish grin that made her pulse flutter.

�I am quite sure I could. With much pleasure.’

His purring, silken response filled her head with X-rated images. Married to him, enjoying him. His mouth on hers, giving her the heaven it had so far only promised, his hard, honed naked body covering hers, demanding, taking, possessing… It would be criminally easy to give him exactly what his eyes told her he wanted and then ask him for more!

She couldn’t tear her eyes away from his; he mesmerised her, turned her blood to fire, filled her with aching need. And her breathing was going haywire, her pulse throbbing as Domenico rose to his feet, satisfaction in his voice after following their exchange as he announced softly, �You must excuse me. I am an old man and retire early. Caterina, why don’t you show Aldo where you work and give him coffee?’

Which was what she needed, yet didn’t need at all. She wanted to be alone with him and yet the prospect scared her witless. She didn’t trust herself around this man, she didn’t trust herself at all and yet the prospect was heady, electrifying, disturbingly exciting.

Aldo stood and turned to speak to her grandfather, his voice low-pitched. Cat wasn’t listening and she didn’t look at him either. It wasn’t safe.

Looking at him, drowning in that warm, honeyed voice short-circuited her brain. She needed to come down out of fantasy land and plant her feet firmly on the ground, put her brain in gear and tell him she knew exactly why he was here.

Tell him he didn’t need to waste any more of his doubtlessly precious time looking her over because the idea of their marriage was a non-starter.

And yet…

Angrily, she squashed the treacherous beginnings of a mental veer in the opposite direction, the shafting thought that it would be much too easy to fall helplessly in love with this man, that marriage to him would be a challenge, exciting, endlessly rewarding.

Indulging in wild fantasies was alien to her, alien, unwanted and unnecessary. It was time she did something about it, put a stop to all this nonsense. Laying down her napkin, she, too, got to her feet and said stiltedly, �Bonnie will bring coffee, signor; I’ll ask her on my way out. So I’ll say goodnight, too, Grandfather. I’m sure your guest has no desire to see a workshop.’

�I have every desire, Caterina.’ The silken stroke of his voice made every muscle in her body tighten. His stress on that word �desire’ left her in no doubt that he wasn’t referring to her work benches and tools. And the gleam in his eyes as he let them drift lazily over her taut body terrified her. Already she had a violently insane need to get closer, to loop her arms around those wide, immaculately clad shoulders and submit the soft, melting femininity of her body to his hard domination.

She had to be losing her mind! Resisting the impulse to cover her burning face with her shaking hands, Cat made a strenuous mental effort to pull herself together.

She was free, she was independent, she had her work and she loved it. She was passionate about everything she had, and had no intention of accepting a hand-picked husband, selected and presented in cold blood.

It was her misfortune that the man in question was sexier than any man had a right to be. What she was experiencing was lust, she reminded herself tartly. Just lust. All the more shattering because she’d been celibate for a long time, ever since she and Josh had broken up before the end of their final year at college.

Having been left with no other option, Cat led the way over the cobbled yard, picking her way carefully on the uneven surface. The security lights were on but she was used to striding around in flat shoes and jeans or flowing, colourful skirts, and the skirt of the dress she was wearing was narrow and tight and her heels, although restrainedly elegant, were too high.

She more than half expected him to slide an intimate hand around her waist on the pretext of steadying her slow and tottery progress but he did nothing of the sort. She didn’t know whether to feel glad about that or strangely deprived. Whatever, her heart was beating so violently she was sure it would burst out of her chest.

As always, the double doors opened easily at her touch and as she depressed the light switch Aldo remarked coolly, �You don’t lock your premises?’

Cat shrugged slim shoulders. �Sometimes. If I’m out for any length of time. Does it matter?’ Which was her way of saying, Is it any of your business?

�It shows carelessness.’

Wow! His mood had changed quicker than she could bat an eyelash! Watching the lean grace of his beautifully clad body as he ignored her and walked further into the studio, the way his long hands slid carefully over the thin sheets of silver laid out on one of the work benches, she felt sick with disappointment.

Oh, grow up! she snapped at herself. She couldn’t really want to fight a losing battle with him if he had brought that earlier covert seduction out into the open. Of course not. She should be deeply relieved that, away from her grandfather’s watchful eyes, he had reverted to what he truly was—cold and calculating.

He held up the garnet ear droppers she had been working on earlier, switching on the desk lamp and turning them to the light, examining the moulded silver settings before laying them carefully down again and going to stand in front of the open sketch book displaying her designs for future projects.

�You have a certain talent.’ He turned to her, his hands on the narrow span of his hips. And then he lifted his impressive shoulders in a dismissive shrug. �Your grandfather tells me you sell your creations from a stall in a draughty, redundant church. You barely scrape a living.’

�Don’t knock it!’ Cat’s eyes narrowed. How dared he dish out such a put-down? Her fingers curled into the palms of her hands, biting into the tender skin. Earlier she had wanted to kiss him; now she wanted to kill him! The effort of holding her temper in check made her words come out bitingly fast. �Everyone has to start somewhere. We’re not all lucky enough to be handed a ready-made thriving business empire at birth. One day I’ll have my own shop premises, a hand-picked team of craftsmen and women—’

�When you get your hands on your inheritance?’ he slid in with insulting silkiness.

Cat’s face closed up. Had Gramps told him about her recklessly defensive message about selling those precious family shares to fund her own small business, thoughtlessly tossed out to stop him boring on about his wretched idea for an arranged marriage? Or had it been an astute guess?

Whatever, she had no intention of defending herself to this patronising monster. She didn’t want to get her hands on her inheritance, as he had callously put it, because it would mean that her beloved Gramps was no longer around and she couldn’t bear the thought of that.

Her green eyes glittering with emotion, she spiked out, �Please leave. Now!’

�So soon?’ The indolent tilt of one dark brow, his aura of sophisticated and total command, was probably meant to intimidate her. It might have done, had she let it. She didn’t.

�Can’t be soon enough! You know where the door is.’

Unnervingly, his dark eyes gleamed with amusement. �I also know I’m not leaving until we’ve thoroughly discussed your grandfather’s wishes. He is an old man, far from the country of his birth, estranged from his family. The least we can do is discuss the pros and cons of his suggestion. Even if we think it’s mad. Over coffee. This way?’

His dark head dipped towards the steep flight of wooden stairs that led to her living quarters. Cat ignored him. She bit her tongue to stop herself hurling verbal abuse at him as he mounted the stairs, arrogant self-confidence in every movement of his strong, supple body, then launched after him, kicking off her shoes and hiking her narrow, restrictive skirt above her knees.

Did he, too, think her grandfather’s scheme was crazy? Had he come all this way to humour a distant relative he had never met out of respect? Italians went a bundle on respect, didn’t they?

But the question flew out of her head as he reached the apartment well ahead of her, despite her best efforts in the scampering department. The door opened directly into her living room. She had left a table lamp burning and the room just looked like comfortable chaos. But when he found the main light switch and depressed it the room looked like a squalid hovel.

And Aldo, standing in the middle of the muddle, was so beautifully groomed and immaculate. The contrast made her cheeks flame with embarrassment. The velvet bow that had held her hair in check fell off. She heard it hit the floor behind her just before the riotous chestnut tangle tumbled around her shoulders. And she was still holding her skirt above her knees. She dropped the hem immediately and said starkly, �Coffee?’ and picked her barefoot way through to the tiny kitchen, avoiding the piles of trade magazines and glossies, the pile of curtains she’d laundered but hadn’t got around to re-hanging and the heap of work clothes she’d got out of before going through to shower and change earlier this evening.

When she was working, deeply engrossed in a new project, she forgot to be tidy, forgot everything. But no way would she explain or make excuses to this so obviously superior being, who probably had an army of servants to keep everything around him picture perfect plus one in reserve just to iron his shoelaces.

Thankfully, he didn’t follow her to the kitchen to sneer at the empty baked-bean tin with the spoon still in it. There’d been nothing else for breakfast because she’d forgotten to shop and the Belfast sink was over-flowing with unwashed dishes, but at least she did have decent coffee.

When she carried the tray through he had his back to her. He was studying the framed prints that broke the severity of the white-painted walls. Nudging aside a bowl of wilting roses, she set the tray down on the low table that fronted the burnt-orange-upholstered small sofa then stood very straight, dragging in a deep breath.

Time to get the show on the road. Throw Gramps’s stupid idea straight out of play and get on with the rest of her life. The old man would be deeply disappointed, she knew that, and would probably carry through his threat to disinherit her, but she could handle that.

�So you think my grandfather’s idea of an arranged marriage is mad,’ she stated for starters, carefully keeping her voice level, non-confrontational as she waited for his robust confirmation of what he’d said earlier. And watched him turn, very slowly.

�Not necessarily.’ His lean features betrayed nothing. �It was idle supposition on my part—on your behalf. Do you really think I would have come this far if I’d thought the idea had no merit?’ He strolled with an appallingly fluid grace to where she was standing. �Shall I pour, or will you?’

The question didn’t register. Cat’s mouth ran dry, her lips parted. She gasped for air; she felt she was being suffocated. From his attitude since they’d taken leave of her grandfather she’d drawn the conclusion that he’d been humouring the old man, had as little intention as she did of entering into an arranged marriage. Now it seemed the game was back on. It was a deeply terrifying prospect.

Though why that should be she couldn’t work out. No one could force her to marry anyone!

�Your silence tells me you don’t care either way. About who should pour the coffee.’ A strange satisfaction threaded through his voice and curved his lips. Cat’s eyes went very wide as they locked on to that sinfully sexy mouth. Her own lips felt suddenly desperately needy and she was hot, much too hot; she could spontaneously combust at any moment!

The silence was stinging; it gathered her up and enclosed her with him, very tightly, and there was no escape. Her flurried gasp of relief was completely involuntary when he finally broke the awful tension and turned to pour the coffee.

Taking his own cup, he angled his lean body into one corner of the sofa, long legs stretched out in front of him, the sleek fabric caressing the taut muscles of his thighs like the touch of a lover.

Cat gulped thickly. Her thoughts were so wicked! She had to blank them, and when he glanced at the vacant space beside him and invited softly, �Shall we talk?’ she shied away, wrapping her arms around her trembling body, and had to force herself to say, �There’s nothing to talk about,’ because the temptation to join him, sit intimately close, was enormous.

And very, very dangerous!

�No? No opinions?’ he queried softly, his honeyed tone giving her goose bumps. The look in his eyes as they fastened on her hectically coloured face made her stop breathing. �Then I’ll give you mine, shall I?’

Cat forced herself to move, to give a slight, careless shrug before she picked her way over to a vaguely throne-like chair she’d picked up one Sunday afternoon at a car-boot sale. It’s slightly vulgar ostentation had amused her but it was supremely uncomfortable.

Aldo was watching her, his eyes hooded, looking smoky. Seated, Cat kept her eyes firmly on her bare toes. He could spout opinions all night but that didn’t mean she needed take the slightest notice of them.

But her heart was beating uncomfortably fast as he raised his arms and laced his hands behind his head and told her, �I have nothing against arranged marriages, all things being equal. Up until now I’ve been too busy to consider marrying. I confess to never having been in love, and unlike most of my compatriots,’ he added drily, �I consider the condition to be vastly overrated. It dresses the basic human need to procreate in romantic flummery.’

Cat’s eyes shot up from the anodyne contemplation of her toes to lock with his. �So you don’t believe in love,’ she challenged. Her eyes gleamed. �Bully for you! I bet you a dime to a king’s ransom the right woman could teach you differently!’

Brilliant dark eyes sparked with pinpricks of golden light at her husky outburst but his voice was cool when he continued as if she hadn’t spoken, �As far as I’m concerned, marriage is a serious matter. An heir is necessary. Any wife I choose would have to be intelligent, good to look at, have her feet firmly on the ground—no girlish claims to be madly in love with me because such emotional demands would merely make life difficult. Besides all this, I would need her to bring something of substance to the marriage. Family honour as well as sound financial sense demands that much.’ He brought his hands down, his beautifully cut jacket settling back against his upper body with exquisite, unruffled elegance. �I think you qualify on all counts.’

�Especially Grandfather’s shares,’ she said on a dry snap. �Couldn’t you offer to buy them off him—twist his arm or something? You could save yourself a whole heap of trouble.’ If what he’d been saying was supposed to be a proposal then it was the coldest, most calculating one any woman was ever likely to hear. It deserved her utmost contempt. It showed in the green glitter of her eyes, in the tight downturn of her generous mouth.

Water off a duck’s back as far as Aldo was concerned, apparently. He expanded his argument fluidly. �Perhaps Domenico would agree to sell; perhaps not. But I have no intention of going down that road. Why should I when I can kill three birds with one stone? One,’ he ticked off on his long, tanned fingers, �I secure those possibly rogue shares for the family, where they belong. Two, I get a beautiful and intelligent wife, and three, I get an heir. And as far as you’re concerned, you get a pampered lifestyle, more financial security than you’ve ever dreamed of—’

�I don’t need it!’ Distraught, Cat shot to her feet, her breasts heaving. Listening to this man—this…this sex-on-legs—talking of marriage as if it were a cold business arrangement was the last thing she wanted. �I don’t want your empty wealthy lifestyle—I want my own life, warts and all. I’m a big girl, signor; I can stand on my own feet, or hadn’t you noticed?’

�Oh, I noticed,’ he countered, smooth as cream. He rose to his feet and sauntered towards her and she gritted her teeth. He had too much style. He was too much altogether. And this close she could see those intriguing golden lights deep within his eyes, breathe in the elusive male scent of him, and her mouth fell open on a trembling gasp as he whispered seductively, �You truly are a big girl.’ His eyes slid down and lingered on her breasts, which annoyingly responded to this devastating no-touching slide of seduction. �But only, I assure you, in all the most enticing places.’

�Don’t!’ Cat’s command came out on a tortured whisper. When he turned on the sex, flooded his voice with it, she went to pieces.

He was lethal!

�Why not? It’s a bonus.’ Another movement, a step closer.

His black eyes looked drugged as he lifted them slowly from her shamelessly peaking breasts and fastened them on her softly trembling mouth as she muttered defensively, �I don’t know what you’re talking about!’

�Yes, you do.’

The tension was making her shake, making the fine hairs on the back of her neck stand to attention. The sheer sexual power of the man overwhelmed her. She wanted to fight it but didn’t know how.

�A wife who would excite me in bed would be a bonus. Yes?’ The soft huskiness of his voice was an unbearable intimacy; it made the blood pound in her ears and her whole body burn. He was much too close. She stared at him wildly. She had to put more space between them. At any moment she could find herself grabbing him, pulling his head down to discover if the promise of that so sensual mouth was capable of delivery.

Cat tried to move but her legs were so weak she could only sway. Aldo’s hand slid to her shoulder to steady her and an electric storm fizzled through every cell in her body and her eyelids closed helplessly as his knowing fingers stroked the heated skin of her naked shoulder before it brushed with wicked intimacy over the tingling peaks of her aching breasts.

�And you would be excited, too. We would be dynamite together. I feel it and so do you. Yes?’ His hands curved over her hips as he gently tugged the span of her against the hardness of him and the shattering excitement that flooded her produced a ragged sound, halfway between a gasp and a moan. As he lowered his sleek dark head to stifle the sound at source, her arms snaked around his neck, and her last coherent, triumphant thought as he plundered her avidly responsive mouth was a repetition of what she’d said to him earlier—I bet you a dime to a king’s ransom the right woman could teach you differently!



The sounds of a muted commotion in the courtyard far below brought Cat out of her thoughts of the past. Blinking the film of moisture from her eyes, she peered down. At the sight of Aldo’s silver Ferrari her heart leapt and twisted like a landed fish then dropped with heavy lifelessness to the soles of her bare feet as he exited, and walked round to the passenger side to hand out his mistress.

Three members of staff were milling around in excited welcome at their beloved master’s unexpected arrival. Cat willed him to look up to where she was standing, to appear remotely interested in her whereabouts. But he didn’t glance towards the villa. His attention was all for Iolanda Cardinale, who was clinging to his arm, her sleek, elegantly clothed body leaning possessively into his, her ripe lips parted with sultry promise.

Fighting nausea, Cat forced herself to creep down the spiral staircase to her suite of rooms. She was going to have to act her socks off if she was going to be able to pretend she could accept the situation.

Pride wouldn’t allow her to let either of them see how desperate she was. Love and sexual fidelity hadn’t been part of the bargain on his part, had it?

As her English grandmother would have said, �You’ve made your bed, girl. Now you must lie on it.’




CHAPTER TWO


REACHING her rooms and closing the bedroom door behind her, Cat leaned back weakly against the carved wood. She was going to have to face him. Them.

Why had he chosen to arrive unannounced? Why had he brought Iolanda Cardinale with him?

Because he was cruel.

Or simply because this sort of thing went on in the elevated circles in which he moved and he didn’t consider it to be even slightly unusual?

And how long were they staying? Overnight? Would he share this room with her?

Grimly, she thought not. He hadn’t bothered to visit during her exile and he hadn’t so much as touched her since she’d told him—dewy-eyed and stupid with love for him—of the confirmation of her pregnancy.

Besides, he wouldn’t even think about sharing her bed when he had his mistress draped all over him!

On that draining thought she levered herself tiredly away from the door and walked further into the lovely room. Apart from the gilded four-poster bed the furnishings and decorations were a dreamy medley of white and creams, gauzy drapes fluttering at the tall windows that looked out over the sun-drenched landscape, over the silver olive groves and purple hills.

She would have to prepare herself, put on the camouflage of warpaint and chic designer armour, and as if on cue Rosa came bouncing in after a decidedly hysterical rap on the door.

�Il padrone has arrived! So unexpected—everyone’s running round in circles! Did you know? Why didn’t you tell us to make ready? Come, I will help you dress, make yourself beautiful for him!’

Cat forced a thin smile. Rosa, assigned as her personal maid on her arrival here two months ago, had become her dresser, her nanny, her arbiter of correct behaviour and her friend. Unlike the other members of staff Rosa wasn’t painfully deferential and she didn’t whisper behind her hands when she thought she was out of earshot. And no, Aldo hadn’t said anything about finally deigning to visit her the last time he’d phoned her.

�You have already bathed?’ Rosa didn’t wait for an answer, bustling towards the huge hanging cupboard that almost filled one wall, tutting disapprovingly as her eyes fell on the untouched breakfast tray. �You must eat, signora. You lose too much weight already.’ She pulled out one of the fitted drawers and handed Cat her selection of underwear, filmy, lacy pale cream briefs and bra, her kind eyes softening. �I understand how you feel about losing your baby; it was a terrible thing to happen, but an accident of nature and nothing to blame yourself for. There will be other babies for you.’

Nothing to blame herself for? She knew differently. Removing her wrap and dressing in the understated chic of the smoky-grey sleeveless shirt-shift Rosa had put out for her, Cat shivered as the cool silk whispered against her body. She’d been assured at the private clinic where she’d been taken on that dreadful night that the early miscarriage had been nature’s way of coping when everything was not as it should be.

She had said nothing to oppose the well-meaning platitudes but she’d known that if she hadn’t been so tense and anxious she wouldn’t have lost her baby.

Aldo had politely and coolly distanced himself from her when he’d heard of the coming baby. Overjoyed at the news of her pregnancy, of course, and very solicitous.

Too solicitous, she’d felt smothered. Her eager explorations of the beautiful old city with her husband as her attentive guide had been firmly vetoed and he’d given orders to his staff at their Florence home that she was to rest, take a little gentle exercise in the cool of the day with Beppe, an ancient retainer who could walk no faster than a snail, as her companion.

And Aldo himself had been away more often than he’d been at home, catching up on the business responsibilities he’d neglected since their marriage, or so he’d said, and worst of all moving out to another bedroom.

�You are carrying my child,’ he told her gently when she’d protested. �If I share your bed I will make love to you; I will not be able to help myself. And our loving is fierce, truly passionate. Yes? I will do nothing to harm you or the tiny life you carry.’

In view of the way he’d ordered everyone to treat her as if she were made from the finest of brittle spun glass, she might have believed him. She might have lovingly teased him about being over-protective if Iolanda Cardinale hadn’t dripped all that poison into her ears.

She’d refused to believe a word of what the hateful woman had said but the change in Aldo’s attitude towards her when he’d learned of her pregnancy had forced her to acknowledge that Iolanda could have been telling the truth. Her tortured thoughts, her aching anxiety had to be responsible for that miscarriage.

Dutifully seating herself in front of the long mirror in its ornate gilded frame, she watched Rosa working on her hair, brushing it back from her face and securing it neatly in a French pleat.

It had been the first grand dinner party Aldo had thrown on their return from honeymoon, she remembered with a stab of the usual pain. Mainly for the benefit of business associates and friends who hadn’t been able to attend the wedding and be introduced to his new bride at the lavish reception.

Iolanda, as Aldo’s executive PA, had been there, oozing the understated chic Italians were so good at. Her svelte, cool loveliness had made Cat feel gaudy and overdressed in her swirly skirted, bootlace-strapped confection in her favourite shade of vibrant scarlet.

Wandering out onto the terrace to catch a breath of the cool evening air, Iolanda had joined her. As the only unpartnered guest at the gathering Cat had made a point of drawing Iolanda into the conversation around the dinner table so she wouldn’t feel left out. So her smile was wide as she acknowledged the other woman.

�I would like to talk to you,’ Iolanda said.

�That’s nice! It’s getting rather stuffy inside, isn’t it?’ Perhaps, being on her own, the other woman was feeling a bit out of things now that dinner was over and the guests circulating, forming chattering groups. �Shall we find somewhere to sit? There are seats—’

�No.’ The other woman cut across her, a note of impatience in her drawl. �This will only take moments. In view of the situation I thought we ought to be properly introduced.’

�I thought we had been.’ Cat smiled, puzzled, wondering if she’d missed something. Iolanda shook her head slowly, her smooth, raven-dark hair gleaming in the overflow of light from the main salon, her answering smile slight, tight and superior.

�Not really. You are Aldo’s wife. I am Aldo’s mistress. Ordinarily, we would of course know of each other’s existence but we would not meet. Discretion in such matters is important—that is understood. But as Aldo and I work so closely together our occasional meetings cannot be avoided. I thought we should understand our positions. Suspicions and speculations only make life uncomfortable, as I’m sure you would grow to learn when you have done your duty and given him an heir and he begins to spend more time away from you than with you and you wonder why.’

Again that hateful, superior little smile that left Cat speechless with a mixture of rage and disbelief at what she was hearing. �That being said, I would strongly advise you against making a fuss about a situation which a man in Aldo’s position regards as being absolutely normal. An hysterical fuss would only serve to estrange him from you entirely and do you no good at all.’

�There—all done.’ Rosa stepped back, surveying the neat outcome of her ministrations with satisfaction. �I’ll leave you to do your make-up. Be sure you cover up those dark circles round your eyes and put some colour on your cheeks!’

Cat watched her reflection with no enthusiasm at all. She no longer looked like herself. Her exuberant hair had been flattened and tamed, her mouth drooped and her eyes looked haunted.

She’d been stunned, knocked speechless by what Iolanda had said, but she hadn’t believed a word of it. She’d refused to let herself believe it. The woman was obviously a raving idiot! Iolanda wanted Aldo for herself and was out to make mischief.

Having every intention of telling Aldo of his assistant’s crazed lies, she’d changed her mind when as soon as the last guest had departed he’d swept her up in his arms and carried her up the sweeping staircase.

�I don’t know how I’ve managed to keep my hands off you!’ he breathed rawly. �All evening long I’ve wanted to rip your clothes off, bury myself inside you and make endless, endless love to you!’

And he’d done just that, she remembered with a fierce stab of pain. He’d ripped the scarlet dress right from the dipping neckline to the swirly-flirty hem, the wild, fiery passion of his lovemaking making a complete nonsense of Iolanda’s wicked lies. Mentioning what the other woman had said would be a mistake. He would think she was only asking for reassurance, didn’t trust him, and would resent it. Far more sensible to dismiss the distasteful episode from her mind.

But later, listening to the soft sound of his regular breathing, the first uncomfortable pinpricks of doubt had crept in as she’d wondered why the only real closeness they ever achieved was between the sheets, and why he always turned his back on her and immediately fell asleep after making love with her.

Having sex, she tiredly corrected. The only time he’d mentioned the word love had been when he’d confessed that he didn’t believe in the condition. And had he only completely ruined her dress because he’d thought that was all the gaudy thing was fit for? Would he have treated Iolanda’s elegant, wildly expensive black sheath with the same total lack of respect?

Turning on her side, she’d watched the first light of dawn filter through the partly closed window blinds. Perhaps there was a useful lesson she could learn. When in Rome, etc…

And so she’d set about turning herself into the type of woman Aldo would most respect and admire. If she couldn’t have his love she could at least do her best to earn his respect.

Her still vibrant enthusiasm for every new project she took on board had ensured that her clothes were now the last word in unmistakable, understated Italian chic, her unmanageable mane of chestnut hair shortened and skillfully layered, �Molto elegante!’ her horrendously expensive hairdresser had assured her, and she always wore spindly high heels to make sure her free-swinging stride was a thing of the past.

But her rapid transformation hadn’t made a scrap of difference. He’d remained almost painfully polite and considerate, but distant. His eyes never smiled into hers, reminding her of shared intimacies the way lovers did; he never touched her except in bed.

When her pregnancy had been confirmed, her by then rapidly dwindling hope that things could be different between them soared high. That they had changed but not in the way she had wanted was something she hadn’t foreseen, not in her worst nightmares.

Iolanda’s words had come back to haunt her. �You’ll understand when you’ve done your duty and given him an heir and he starts to spend more time away from you than with you.’ She hadn’t given him an heir, she’d lost the precious baby she’d been longing for, but the signs had been there for anyone to see. As soon as he’d known of her pregnancy he’d wanted little more to do with her, his only concern the well-being of the child she was carrying.

Her stomach churning sickeningly at the memories that seemed to confirm everything that venomous woman had told her, Cat stood up from the dressing table, smoothing the silk of her dress over hips which were not as snake-like as Iolanda’s, but getting there. Rosa was right—since she’d been banished after her miscarriage she had lost a lot of weight.

Facing her husband and his mistress with some semblance of dignity was the only thing she must make herself concentrate on right now, she decided with a welcome resurgence of the determination that had been absent for a long time.

But it drained away the moment the bedroom door swung open, revealing Aldo. He had the same unnerving impact on her as he’d had the very first time she’d set eyes on him. He took her breath away.

His dark business suit fitted his lean body to perfection and the crisp white shirt emphasised the bronzed skin of his austerely beautiful features. Cat veiled her eyes quickly. He was so unfairly gorgeous she couldn’t bear to look at him.

�Caterina…’ His voice was harsh; he had never directed that tone towards her before. His politeness had been the hallmark of their relationship.

Her puzzled eyes flickered upwards and met the glittering darkness of his. There were lines of strain on his face. She’d never noticed them before. �You came here to recuperate, to regain your strength,’ he condemned. �What have you been doing to yourself?’

The heavy thumping of her heart quietened, subdued and regulated by an unexpected layer of heavy ice. How dared he criticise her, look at her as if her appearance offended him? She’d spent time and effort turning her exuberant self into what she’d hoped he’d appreciate—a model of Italian chic. And so what if she’d lost weight? Iolanda didn’t exactly billow, did she? Or did fashion decree that Italian mistresses look like stick insects while Italian wives bulge comfortably in all directions?

Glacially, she held his darkly frowning eyes and intoned coldly, �Since you haven’t bothered to come and see what I’ve been “doing to myself”,’ she parodied his condemnatory tone, �I’ll tell you. Grieving,’ she stressed tightly and inwardly flinched as lines of pain bracketed his stern mouth as her lashing remarks hit home.

�For our baby,’ Aldo conceded with a softness that made her heart stand still. He took a step towards her. Cat retreated by a few rapid paces. If he belatedly remembered his abandoned husbandly role and tried to fold her in his arms to comfort her she would, quite simply, go to pieces and embarrass herself, and him, by blurting out all the sources of her present misery.

Turning back to the dressing table, she made a pretence of checking her appearance in the gilded mirror, replying, �What else?’

She could have added, For the death of our marriage, for the loss of all hope that you’ll ever learn to love me, but held her tongue because, to be fair to him, love hadn’t been part of the bargain, just silly wishful thinking on her part.

But a mistress hadn’t been part of the bargain either, she reflected trenchantly, and asked him brittly, �Shall we go down? Had you let me know to expect you I’d have been waiting to greet you and your companion.’ She swung towards the door, aware of his dark eyes boring into her back. �What have you done with her, by the way?’

Aldo caught up with her as she opened the door, a lean, tanned hand snaking out to fasten disconcertingly on her shoulder. Desperately, Cat tried to control her weak body’s electric reaction to his touch, to the effect of those bitter-chocolate eyes scorching into her own.




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