“I would never betray you!” she said with a sob. “I was going to tell you everything! I swore it to myself, when I finally realized you didn’t know about my family. All this time, I thought you did, until the day I first told you I loved you.”
Her voice trembled, but her tears weren’t going to work on him, not this time. “That was weeks ago.” He grabbed her by the shoulders, looking fiercely into her weepy eyes. “All this time, I thought I could trust you. And you were waiting to stab me in the back. What was your goal? How are they going to work against me? Are your father and cousin planning a hostile takeover of my company?”
“You know me better than that!” She hiccupped, and her eyes became huge as she looked up at him. Unchecked tears streaked her rosy cheeks as she whispered, “Don’t you?”
“I wish to God I’d never met you.” Alessandro’s pulse hammered in his ears, and he couldn’t breathe. Couldn’t even think. “There’s just one last thing I need to know.”
“What?”
He gently touched her full bottom lip, the lip he’d once thought could only speak the truth. “How deep do your lies go?”
Her lips parted beneath his touch. His hand slowly traced down her neck, skimming over the breasts and corset to the bright pink-and-purple skirts that covered her swollen belly. “Is the baby mine?”
Her eyes widened as she gasped.
“Tell me the truth, Lilley,” he said in a low, dangerous voice. “Did you sleep with another man?”
A sob came from the back of her throat. As he stared down at Lilley’s beautiful, tortured face, Alessandro suddenly forgot about the crowded ballroom, forgot Caetani Worldwide, forgot Olivia behind him. All he could think was that he’d loved Lilley. That had been the feeling swelling in his heart moments before. That had been what he’d wanted to tell her. He loved her.
But now he knew the woman he’d loved was a lie. Lilley had deceived him from the beginning. He’d asked for a paternity test, and she’d talked him out of it. She’d lured him into loving her, so she could rip out his heart. Just like all the rest.
Unwilling memories rushed through him. Lilley’s teasing smile as she tried to get him to play. Lilley naked in the pool in Sardinia. Lilley defending everyone, even people who didn’t deserve it. Lilley clinging to him for comfort and strength. Lilley’s deep, loving eyes that promised eternity. All a lie.
She stood in front of him now, swaying on her feet, looking as if she might faint. “You really think I would do that?” she whispered. “That I’d sleep with another man, then marry you and spend the rest of my life lying to you? How can you think that? I love you!”
“Nice,” he murmured. Touching her cheek, he tilted her face towards the light of the chandelier. “The tears in your eyes, the catch in your voice.” He dropped his hand and said acidly, “You’d almost have me believe that you cared.”
“I do care!” she choked out. “I love you—”
“Stop saying that,” he said harshly, then set his jaw, glaring at her with hatred. “Fine. Don’t tell me. I wouldn’t believe a word you said anyway.”
Lilley clasped her hands together, looking pale and small in her vivid ball gown, flowers tumbling from her long brown hair. Then she glanced at Olivia behind him.
“She did this, didn’t she? She took my white lie and twisted it into evidence of a black heart.” A tremble filled her voice as she looked back at him. Tears were streaking her face. “And you believed her. You never thought I was good enough to be your wife. You never wanted to love me. And this is your easy way out.”
“I despise you,” he said coldly.
She gave a sob, and Vladimir Xendzov placed a hand on his shoulder. “Enough. You’ve made your point.”
Alessandro twisted out of the man’s grasp, barely restraining himself from punching his face. “Stay out of this.” He suddenly hated Xendzov, Olivia and every other vulture in his colorful, festive ballroom. Setting his jaw, he looked around the ballroom and shouted, “All of you—get the hell out!”
“No,” Lilley said behind him. “Stop it, Alessandro.”
Her voice was harder and colder than he’d ever heard from her lips before. Surprised, he turned back to face her.
Lilley’s eyes were still grief-stricken but her shoulders were straight, her body rigid. “Our guests haven’t done anything to deserve your abuse. And neither have I.” She squared her shoulders and said, “Either tell me, right now, that you know this baby is yours, or I will leave you. And never come back.”
An ultimatum. He stiffened. “I’m just supposed to trust your word, am I?”
Lilley’s face turned pale, almost gray. “I’m not going to stay in a marriage you don’t know how to fight for.” She glanced back at Olivia bitterly. “She’s the one you always wanted. A woman as perfect and heartless as you.”
In a swirl of purple-and-pink skirts, Lilley turned away.
Alessandro grabbed her shoulder. “You can’t leave,” he ground out. “Not without a paternity test.”
She looked at him, and he could have drowned in the deep grief of her brown eyes. “I’m done trying to make you love me,” she whispered. “Done.”
Alessandro couldn’t show weakness. Couldn’t let her know how close she’d come to breaking him entirely. “You’ll stay in Rome,” he said harshly. “Until I allow you to leave.”
Her eyes glittered.
“No,” she said. “I won’t.”
Her face looked strange, her eyes half-wild as she took a deep breath.
“I slept with a different man, just like you said.” Blinking back tears as she looked up at him, she choked out with a sob, “And I loved him.”
Her words were like a serrated blade across Alessandro’s heart. He staggered back, stricken. “And the baby,” he breathed, searching her eyes. “What about the baby?”
Lilley’s brown eyes were dark as a winter storm. Tears streamed down her face like rain. For answer, she pulled her canary-yellow diamond ring off her left hand and wordlessly held it out to him.
Numbly, he reached for it. Lilley turned away, pushing through the crowds, not looking back.
And this time, he didn’t try to stop her. Gripping the ten-carat diamond ring tightly against his palm, Alessandro closed his eyes, leaning his head against his fist as he felt the first spasms of grief course through his body.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
A WEEK later, Alessandro sat in his study staring at divorce papers, feeling numb.
He hadn’t seen Lilley since she’d fled the reception, running out into the streets of Rome with only her passport and wallet, still dressed in the fuchsia ball gown. He had no idea where she was, and didn’t care. Let the lawyers find her.
He looked down wearily at the documents spread across his desk. He didn’t need Lilley, he told himself. He didn’t need their baby.
Except a hard lump rose in his throat every time he passed the room that would have been the nursery. The walls were soft yellow, and Lilley’s painting of baby elephants, monkeys and giraffes was propped against the wall. Alessandro’s car still held the stuffed elephant he’d bought the day before the reception, and it was in his trunk right now, wrapped in festive paper decorated with baby animals, tied with a bright yellow bow.
The ache in his throat increased. Alessandro clenched his jaw. He’d burn the toy, he thought savagely. Then he’d repaint the nursery’s walls with a color that wouldn’t remind him of either Lilley or the baby. No blue. No pink. He couldn’t use brown, either, the color of her eyes. Nor red, the color of her lips. So what was left?
Black. Just black.
He leaned his forehead into his hands. He was better off without them. Better off without Lilley constantly pestering him to jump in the pool or dance or play. Without hearing her soft voice speak dreamily of their future children, of a happy marriage that would last fifty years. Without seeing the sensual, breathless expression in her face as she looked up at him in bed, the moment before he pushed inside her.
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Va bene. He didn’t need them. He’d go back to the life he’d had before, working all day to earn money he didn’t need, having meaningless affairs that were forgotten by morning. Trusting no one. Forever alone. Perfetto.
He covered his face with his hands.
His phone rang. “Buon giorno, darling,” Olivia said cheerfully. “Now you’re rid of your mistake, I want to ask you to lunch. To celebrate.”
“I’m not divorced yet,” he said in a low voice.
“Come to lunch anyway. I don’t mind.”
Her low, smug voice jarred him. Swiveling in his chair, he turned towards the window, towards the view of the city and hazy blue sky. Where was Lilley? Was she with another man? He remembered the way Vladimir Xendzov had looked at her. Remembered Jeremy Wakefield’s awed face when he saw her in the red dress.
Who was the father of her baby?
I slept with a different man, just like you said. And I loved him.
His lips twisted. That meant she’d lied when she’d told Alessandro she loved him. Another lie to add to the pile.
Through the window, he saw a limo park at the gate of his palazzo. A driver got out of the limo, opening the door for a well-dressed, dark-haired man, who went to talk to the security guard. Frowning, Alessandro sat up straight, narrowing his eyes, trying to see the man’s face.
Then he did. And he rose to his feet with a half-strangled curse.
“Darling, what’s wrong?” Olivia asked. “What is it?”
“Someone’s here,” he said curtly. “I have to go.”
“Who could possibly pull you off the phone with me?”
“Théo St. Raphaël.”
“What?” Olivia’s voice was suddenly sharp. “You don’t need to see him. Wait at your house, I’ll pick you up and take you for lunch—”
“Sorry,” he said shortly, and he hung up, tossing his phone on his desk. As he ran down the stairs, his blood was pounding for battle. His hands were clenched into fists, ready for a fight, any fight. Brushing past his bewildered housekeeper, he went into the courtyard.
“Let him in,” Alessandro ordered his guard in Italian. Théo St. Raphaël came through the gate, looking polished and powerful in a suit and yellow tie, holding a leather briefcase. He looked calm, cool and under control, all things Alessandro hadn’t felt for a week. The hot Italian sun shone down on his scrubby T-shirt and jeans as Alessandro stalked through the dusty courtyard to finally meet his rival.
“What the hell do you want?” he demanded. “Come to gloat?”
Théo St. Raphaël stared at him as if he were insane. “Gloat?”
“I bet you and—” he still couldn’t say her name out loud “—your cousin had a good laugh after she helped you steal the Mexico City deal. It was clever for her to lure me into giving information in bed!”
In a swift movement, St. Raphaël leapt five steps across the courtyard in a flutter of dust and punched Alessandro solidly across the jaw.
“That’s for Lilley,” he said, panting as he rubbed his wrist. “Damn you.”
It would have knocked a lesser man to the ground. As it was, Alessandro felt the impact of the blow all the way to his knees.
His own fist flew back on instinct. Then he straightened, rubbing his jaw. “At least you have the decency to attack me to my face, St. Raphaël,” he said. “Rather than stabbing me in the back.”
“Lilley kept one small secret from you. One.”
“Small?” Alessandro said incredulously. “She told you my plans for the Mexico City deal! Convinced me to marry her when she was in love with another man! And worst of all …” He cut himself off, and his voice hardened. “Why are you here? What more could she possibly want?”
The Frenchman glared at him. “In your office.”
Alessandro stiffened, then realized his security guard was watching with interest, as were the paparazzi who’d been parked across the street ever since the scandalous night of their reception. He set his jaw. “Fine.”
Turning on his heel, he led the count silently into the palazzo.
“I’m here to collect Lilley’s things,” St. Raphaël informed him once they reached his study. “Her tools. Her mother’s quilt.”
“And the clothes I bought her?”
“She doesn’t want them.”
Alessandro sank into his office chair, feeling weary. He swiveled towards the window. He’d nearly thrown her most precious belongings away in his rage after she’d disappeared, but he hadn’t been able to do it. The tools and quilt were too much a part of what he’d loved about her. “It’s boxed up by the front door. Help yourself.” He glared at the other man. “I’ll be glad to get it all out of here.”
St. Raphaël stared at him coldly, then set his briefcase on the desk. Opening it, he pulled out a file and held it to Alessandro.
“What’s this?” he asked, not touching it.
“The Mexico City deal,” St. Raphaël said scornfully. “If you still want it.”
Alessandro opened the file. Skimming through it, he realized it was a contract to exchange Joyería for the St. Raphaël vineyard. He looked for a catch. He couldn’t find one.
“I will step away from the Tokyo deal as well.”
Alessandro looked up in bewilderment. “I don’t understand.”
“Lilley’s idea.”
“But why would she arrange this, when she’s the one who betrayed me?”
“Lilley didn’t betray you,” St. Raphaël bit out. “Someone else gave me that information. She said she wanted payback for the way you replaced her with some cheap file-room girl.” He paused. “I had no idea she was talking about Lilley.”
“Olivia?” Alessandro said in a strangled voice. “Olivia Bianchi?”
St. Raphaël’s eyes settled on his. “The two of you deserve each other.”
Was it possible he was telling the truth? Had Olivia betrayed him? Alessandro suddenly remembered all the times he’d done business on the phone in the back of the limo, with Olivia sitting bored beside him. She’d certainly known about his rivalry with St. Raphaël.
She’d had motive, means and opportunity.
The Frenchman leaned forward, his knuckles white against the desk. “But you must promise, in writing, that you will keep the design studio in Mexico City. I gave Rodriguez my word that none of his people would lose their jobs. And, unlike you, I do not wish to be a liar.”
Alessandro’s eyes narrowed. “I didn’t lie. I might have implied—”
“You lied. Worse than Lilley ever did. All she was trying to do was get a job. You were trying to enrich your own pockets at the expense of someone else’s honor. You lied to Rodriguez. Just as you lied to Lilley when you didn’t mention until after you were wed that you wouldn’t allow her to work.”
Alessandro’s cheeks grew hot. Then his chin lifted coldly. “Lilley slept with another man, then tried to pass off her unborn child as mine.”
With a snort, St. Raphaël stared at him, then shook his head. “If you believe that, you’re even more stupid than I thought.” He pulled out one last paper. “Here. Give that to your lawyers.”
I slept with a different man, just like you said. Alessandro remembered Lilley’s wide, stricken eyes as she stood in her pink ballgown amid the holly and ivy. He remembered the strange way her voice had trembled. And I loved him.
Alessandro’s heart gave a sickening lurch.
What if Alessandro was the man she’d loved—before he’d turned on her so brutally, in public, with his ex-mistress egging him on, practically chortling with glee?
He’d vowed to honor and protect his wife. Why hadn’t he cared for her enough to speak with her privately? To ask, to listen, to give her the chance to explain? Instead, he’d turned on her like a rabid dog. He’d attacked her, his beautiful wife who had never done anything but love him with all of her gentle, loyal heart.
“Where is she?” he whispered.
“She left France a few hours ago.” The other man’s lips pr
essed together in a thin line. “She wanted to visit her father, then scout out locations for her jewelry line.”
“She’s doing it?” Alessandro said faintly. “Really doing it?”
St. Raphaël glared at him. “My wife says Lilley’s jewelry is a sure thing. And she should know.” He drummed his fingers on the desk. “You know, I should thank you. For doing the right thing by my cousin.”
Alessandro’s lips lifted humorlessly. “You mean marrying her?”
“Divorcing her,” he replied coldly. “Lilley is the kindest person I know. She doesn’t have a mean bone in her body. She and her baby deserve better than you.” He closed his briefcase with a snap. “But business is business. I have wanted these vineyards back for some time. Have your lawyers review the documents. There is no need for us to meet again. Adieu.”
Without another word, Théo St. Raphaël left. Numbly, Alessandro stared down at the file, and at the divorce papers still spread across his desk beneath. Picking up a page, he tried to read it, but the words seemed to move and jump across the pages. It was as if he were suddenly seeing the world from Lilley’s point of view.
Pushing the papers aside, he rose to his feet. From the window, he saw St. Raphaël carry a large box out through the gate. His limousine soon disappeared back into the streets of Rome.
Alessandro looked up. The bright-blue sky seemed smeared violet. As if the world were going dark.
I love you, Alessandro.
I’m yours. Forever.
He closed his eyes, pressing his hot forehead against the cold glass of the window. But even with his eyes closed, even if he covered his ears with his hands, he could still hear Lilley’s shaking voice, still see the grief in her eyes. I’m done trying to make you love me. Done.
And the truth hit Alessandro like a blow.
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