The Fiancée Caper

by Maureen Child

  “So,” he said when she didn’t speak for several long minutes. “I heard you say you were nervous.”

  “You shouldn’t eavesdrop.”

  “You shouldn’t talk to yourself, so we should both be ashamed,” he said. “But back to your case of nerves.”

  “I’ll be fine.”

  “Are you sure?” He moved in closer and she half wondered if she could just sink into the side of the building.

  “Of course I’m sure. I was a little concerned about pretending for your family. But...” She forced a smile. “How hard can it be?”

  “Pretending to be my lover?” He winked. “I promise to be very attentive. To do all I can to help you.”

  That’s what she was afraid of. Over the last few days, they’d been together nearly nonstop—and all of his “attentiveness” had pushed her to the ragged edge. It shouldn’t have been like this. Shouldn’t have been so hard to keep her mind on the job and her body from whimpering every time he got too close.

  Like now.

  The wind sighed past her just then and she realized it was cooler now. The last few days had been oddly warm for summer in England, but it seemed things were about to change. And the sudden shift in temperature was a good excuse to run.

  “I’m cold,” she said, congratulating herself on the lie, since with Gianni looking at her as he was, cold just wasn’t an option.

  “Bravo.”

  “What?”

  “The lie,” he told her. “Said with a straight face. Almost believable.”

  “Almost?” She lifted her chin, determined to brave it out.

  “You’re not shivering,” he pointed out, “and the gleam in your eye speaks of heat, not a chill.”

  “Let it go, Gianni,” she whispered and took a step forward, hoping he would move back and out of the way.

  He didn’t.

  Instead, he dropped both hands onto her shoulders and held her in place. She was forced to lift her chin to meet his eyes and so her mouth was only a breath away from his.

  “I think we should get something out of the way before we leave tomorrow.”

  Her mouth was dry, her heart hammering in her chest as she forced herself to ask, “What’s that?”

  “A kiss,” he said. His voice dropped into a rumble that seemed to reach out for her and bounce around her chest like some crazed ping-pong ball.

  Oh, boy, she really wanted to. Which meant she probably shouldn’t. Her gaze briefly dropped to his mouth and his lips curved slightly as if he knew exactly what she was thinking. Dragging her eyes back up to meet his, Marie said softly, “This wasn’t part of our bargain.”

  “Bargains can be renegotiated,” he mused, his gaze moving over her face like a caress.

  “Into what?” she asked, shaking her head. “This is temporary and we both know it.”

  “Doesn’t mean we can’t enjoy ourselves,” he countered. “Live in the moment, Marie. You might like it.”

  She had never lived in the moment. She was all about plans and strategies and worrying about the future. Even when she was a kid, she’d had goals. Marie had focused on those goals, those plans, to the exclusion of everything else. Dating hadn’t really been a big part of her life because frankly, she’d never seen the point. Her world was big and full and busy and trying to shoehorn a man into it didn’t seem worth the trouble. Especially since she’d never met a man who had even come close to making her want to throw her plans out the window.

  Until now, of course.

  Gianni had her thinking things so unlike her she hardly recognized the thoughts flying through her own brain. And wouldn’t you just know that the first man who made her body sing would be exactly the wrong man?

  His thumbs moved over her shoulders, and even through the fabric of her night shirt she felt the heat of his touch. He eased her closer and she instinctively leaned forward. Mistake, she told herself. Big mistake.

  “You can’t pretend intimacy,” he said and his breath drifted across her mouth, tempting her to part her lips. “My family will be with us. They will see if we’re uncomfortable with each other. They will wonder and we don’t want that, do we?”

  “I guess not,” she said, because she could see his point. They had to look the part or why bother pretending in the first place?

  He slid one hand up from her shoulder to thread his fingers up into her hair, cupping the back of her head in his palm. “We should know the taste of each other, Marie. And now is the time.”

  She didn’t speak. Didn’t have to. Probably couldn’t have, even if she’d wanted to. Her brain wasn’t in charge anymore. Her body had the reins and was running with the power. Marie had always believed that being with the wrong man was worse than being alone. She’d had her hormones, her needs, on lockdown for so long, everything inside her was breaking free at once.

  Rationally, she knew that Gianni Coretti was the wrong man. But right now, at this moment, he was the only man that mattered. She would probably worry about that thought at some point soon. But not now. Now wasn’t the time for thinking. Now was all about the taste she wanted so badly.

  He bent his head and took her mouth with his, and Marie’s breath slid from her lungs on a sigh. That soft exhalation fired something in Gianni, because he dropped his hands to her waist and pulled her in so tightly, there was absolutely no doubt that he wanted her as much as she wanted him.

  Need fired need and their tongues tangled in a frenzied dance of sensation. She slid her hands up the length of all that warm, golden skin until she was clutching at his shoulders. Heat seemed to radiate from his body and seep into hers. He tangled one hand in her hair, holding her head still while he plundered her mouth, stealing her breath, her resolve, her will.

  The taste he gave her was a promise of more and that enticed her. Splintered images crashed through her mind. The two of them, in that huge white bed of his, twisted up in the sheets, skin to skin, hands exploring, bodies melding. Her brain short-circuited, but then she didn’t need to think. She only needed to feel. Marie gave herself up to the mesmerizing sensations pouring through her because she’d never known anything like it before. They stood locked together at what felt like the top of the world.

  He held her tighter, wrapping his arms around her with the strength of a vise, pressing her closer and closer still until she wouldn’t have been able to say where his body ended and hers began. He claimed more and gave more. His kiss deepened further, and he groaned as her tongue met his, stroke for stroke. Their breath mingled, their heartbeats thundered in time to a staggering rhythm.

  It could have been minutes, or hours. Marie’s mind was fuzzed out and her body was burning. The night surrounded them, wrapping them in a cocoon of stars and moon and the cool touch of the wind. The entire world seemed to shrink around them until all that existed was that terrace and the two people on it. It was a moment out of time, and Marie knew that things between she and Gianni would never be the same.

  When her head was spinning and her knees were weak, he finally broke the kiss and left Marie swaying slightly until she fell against his chest breathlessly. Her only comfort being that judging from the racing of his heartbeat he was handling this no better than she was.

  “That was,” he said finally, “a revelation.”

  She laughed and shook her head against his chest. “A revelation?”

  “Yes.” He tipped her chin up so that he could peer into her eyes as if searching for something. Then he quipped, “I’ve never kissed a cop before. I believe I may have been cheating myself all these years.”

  “Well,” she admitted, going for the same falsely lighthearted tone that he’d adopted, “I’ve never kissed a thief before, either, and I’ve got to say, it was pretty good.”

  “Pretty good?” he repeated, laughter in his eyes. “There’s putting me in my p
lace.”

  Smiling up at him, Marie answered, “Who knows? With practice you might get better.”

  He smoothed her hair back from her face, then trailed his fingertips down her jaw and cupped her cheek. The smile was still in his dark brown eyes when he assured her, “I’m a devil for practice, cara. Why settle for pretty good when, with a little hard work, you can have perfection?”

  Oh, boy.

  * * *

  The plane ride to St. Thomas felt like it took days.

  Gianni was tangled up in knots and he knew it was Marie’s fault. There she sat, in her new, designer clothes, and all he could picture was her in that ridiculous giraffe nightshirt. The one that covered her only to the tops of her thighs. The one he’d held pressed so tightly to him he could feel the pebbled hardness of her nipples against his chest.

  Her hair was smooth and tangle-free, her makeup was perfect and yet, his mind held the image of windblown curls, sleepy eyes and a kiss-swollen mouth. Deliberately then, he wiped that image from his mind. He couldn’t allow himself to get caught up in this little theatrical production they had going on.

  What he had to remember was that this woman was only here because she had threatened his father’s freedom. She was blackmailing him and that was hardly the basis for the kind of relationship he’d like to have with her. Sleeping with a woman who had a separate agenda was a dangerous thing.

  So he’d keep his distance. Get through this week with his family, then recover her necklace and get the evidence she held against his father. Then he’d walk away—or she would. That’s why he was here, after all. To keep his family safe, he would risk everything. Even a week in the same room as Marie O’Hara.

  By the time they arrived on Tesoro a couple hours later, Gianni was back in control. He’d used the familiarity of the flight to St. Thomas, and the private boat launch taking them to the island, to smooth out his thoughts again. The trip had become second nature to him in the year that his sister had been living here. The Corettis were a close family and took every chance they had to get together, plus Gianni enjoyed seeing Teresa happy in her new life.

  If there were a small thread of trepidation inside him at the idea of bringing Marie into the heart of his family on the strength of a lie, he ignored it.

  “It’s beautiful.”

  Gianni turned to face Marie, who was sitting on the sapphire-blue bench seat opposite him. Sunlight poured down on her and lit the dark fire of her hair. The wind tossed that hair into the wild curls he preferred and there was a shine in her eyes as she stared ahead at the island.

  It was just the two of them on the launch and yet they hadn’t spoken since leaving St. Thomas. There was tension between them now, humming since the night before. His own damn fault, of course. It had been a whim. More of a game than anything else, he told himself. One kiss. To unsettle her. Keep her off balance. But it had become so much more.

  He’d never known a single kiss to be so explosive. With that one taste of her, he’d craved more. Like a man dying of thirst and being offered only a swallow of cool water, he’d wanted to gorge himself. He’d almost let himself forget who she was and why she was there. Almost put aside his natural sense of caution to indulge in something that might have ended up endangering the very family he was trying to protect.

  It hadn’t been easy to deny what was there between them. Pulling away from her had cost him. He’d spent the next several hours in exquisite pain from the ache of denying himself.

  So he had no one to blame but himself for what he was feeling now. And damned if he’d let her know that he was still suffering.

  “Tesoro is beautiful,” he agreed, watching her features rather than the island. He knew what she was seeing. Miles of white beaches, palm trees staggered along the coastline, interspersed with other trees throwing shade across narrow roads and homes with terra-cotta tile roofs jutting out along the cliff lines. He knew the dock would be busy, crowded with local fishing boats and other tourist launches.

  “It’s like a rainbow on the ground,” she said, lifting her voice over the roar of the boat engine. She turned a smile on him that lit up her face and shone in her eyes.

  A hard woman to ignore, he acknowledged, as a jolt of desire rocked him momentarily. Beautiful, he thought, but more than that, she had a mind and a fierce will that really appealed to him on many levels. Too damn bad, really.

  “It’s a nice place,” he said, forcing himself to keep his thoughts on the conversation and to stop taking off on wild tangents that led absolutely nowhere. “Teresa loves it here.”

  “And you don’t?”

  “Clever to pick up on that, aren’t you?” He nodded and shifted his gaze to the fast-approaching dock. “As a brief holiday, Tesoro is perfect. Wait until you go into the village,” he said. “Flowers everywhere, cobbled street, brightly colored shops crowded together.”

  “Sounds wonderful.”

  “Oh, it is. But after a week or so, I become restless.” He looked at her. “I need the city I think. The bustle. The noise. The sense of life being pursued relentlessly—while here, most are content to allow life to meander along on its own terms.”

  She nodded thoughtfully. “I’ve always loved a big city, too. People say they’re impersonal, but they’re really not. It’s just that life is so busy people are too rushed to get involved in each other’s lives.” Tipping her face up into the sun and the salt spray on the wind, she closed her eyes and added, “Still, friends can be counted on and when you do get the chance to slow down, there’s so much to see and feel and experience in a city.”

  Damn it. She really was close to perfect. But for the whole blackmail issue. And that had to remain at the top of his consciousness. She had come to him with a threat to imprison his father. Their “relationship” was nothing more than a play.

  And Gianni found himself regretting that fact a bit more every day.

  Seven

  “It looks as though we have a welcoming committee,” Gianni said when he turned his head to stare at the dock. “That’s my sister and her husband, Rico, waiting for us.”

  “Darn it,” she muttered. “Those nerves are back again.”

  He knew what she meant. Lying as a thief was one thing. Lying to his family was something else again. But what choice did he have, really? If he were to keep his father out of jail, this was necessary. And once it was all over and Marie had gone home to New York, he would explain it all to the Corettis and they’d understand. He hoped.

  “It will be fine.”

  “Easy for you to say,” she told him, her gaze still locked on the dock and the two people waiting for them. “You already know them.”

  “And you know me,” he said.

  “Do I?” Her startling green gaze shifted to his.

  One eyebrow lifted and a smirk curved his mouth briefly. “Really? Is now the time to get into a deep, existential conversation when we are moments from docking?”

  “No,” she said shortly, and straightened, squaring her shoulders and lifting her chin as if she were preparing to climb the steps of a gallows.

  Damned if she weren’t the strangest combination of fierce determination and quiet vulnerability. It was all he could do to keep from scooping her up, wrapping his arms around her and just holding on to her until she lost that guarded look in her eyes. Which officially made him stolto—foolish. Or worse.

  “Good. Because here we are.” The boat eased into the slip at dockside and Teresa was shouting.

  “Gianni! I’m so glad to see you!” Her black hair was pulled back into a ponytail that somehow made her seem far too young to be a wife and mother. She wore white linen shorts, a red cotton blouse and sandals on her feet.

  He jumped out of the boat, clambering onto the dock just in time to catch his baby sister as she threw herself at him. He caught her up and s
queezed her hard before setting her onto her feet again.

  “Motherhood looks good on you.”

  “You always know just the right thing to say.”

  “It’s a gift,” he said with a wink.

  Rico stepped up then and held out one hand. “Good to have you back,” he said. “Teresa has been missing her family.”

  Gianni noticed that even living on a tropical island hadn’t altered Rico’s wardrobe. He still wore all black, and here on this tropical island he stood out like a funeral director at a wedding.

  “You should come to London and visit me. Leave the island once in a while.”

  “Leave all this?” Teresa laughed and shook her head. “No thank you.”

  Gianni turned back to the boat, caught Marie’s wary gaze and reached out one hand to help her onto the deck. While he did, he noticed that his sister’s voice had died away, leaving behind surprised silence. Now the only sounds he heard were from the seagulls flying and screeching overhead, the slap of water against the hull of the launch boat and, from a nearby fishing boat, the muffled sound of someone’s radio.

  Marie met his gaze and he willed her to relax. His family would expect a certain degree of nervousness, sure. But too much and they might guess that something was up. As if she had understood his concerns, she nodded, took a breath and forced a smile that was good enough to fool Teresa—but not Gianni. He knew her too well. After only a few days, he had learned her expressions, her moods, and he was fascinated by all of her.

  “Gianni?” Teresa’s voice brought him back from his thoughts and reminded him of where they were and what they were doing.

  He gave Marie’s fingers a squeeze, then pulled her in close to his side and dropped one arm around her shoulders as he turned to face his family.

  “Teresa,” he said, “I want you to meet Marie O’Hara.”

  His sister’s eyes shone with confusion, then lit up with excitement when he added, “My fiancée.”