‘It’s nothing to do with gardens,’ he rapped impatiently. ‘I have a charity event I host each year.’
‘I see,’ she murmured, frowning. She didn’t see at all. In fact, her mind was a blank canvas on which he could paint pretty much anything.
‘It’s a dinner,’ he explained, as if she should know all about it. ‘And I need a plus one, or there will be an empty space next to me.’
And that would be unthinkable, she silently supplied.
‘The organiser of the charity was supposed to be my dinner partner,’ he elaborated with an impatient gesture, ‘but a family emergency has prevented that.’
‘So, you’ll have an empty seat next to you,’ she said, frowning as if such things were a mystery to her.
‘No. I won’t,’ Marco assured her, ‘because you will be sitting in it.’
‘Me?’ Horror filled her. This was everything she had spent her adult life avoiding, and she had no intention of going to some glitzy party.
‘I don’t know why you sound so shocked,’ Marco countered. ‘I’m only inviting you to join me at a party.’
What the hell was wrong with her? Other women would be falling over themselves to accept this invitation, but not Cassandra. Oh, no. She was looking at him as if he had suggested some extreme and arcane form of torture—that, or a Roman orgy.
‘A charity event in Rome? A dinner?’ she confirmed, paling as she continued to frown.
‘I don’t know what’s so hard for you to understand. Just say yes. I’ll provide the clothes, the hairdresser, the manicurist. You’ll have beauticians and stylists on tap—whatever you need.’
Her eyes widened, and then, to his astonishment, she said, ‘You are joking?’
‘I’m being perfectly serious.’ Her reaction baffled him. ‘I have just invited you to join me at the event of the year.’
‘Well, I can’t,’ she insisted. ‘I just couldn’t do it. I couldn’t pull it off,’ she insisted, when he stared at her with incredulity. ‘I’d be falling over the hem of my gown, knocking into people—’
‘Hopefully not,’ he said wearily.
‘You are serious,’ she added quietly, as if he had been speaking in a foreign language and she had only just worked it out. ‘You want me at your side, at the top table at a charity event in Rome?’
‘Yes. I do,’ he confirmed. How many more times did he have to say it?
She shook her head. ‘I’m really sorry, Marco, but the idea of me all tricked out in a gown and on my best behaviour is about as likely as you getting down and dirty in the garden.’
‘But I do get down and dirty in the garden,’ he reminded her, all out of patience now. ‘Of course, if you’re not up to this...’
Her heart was hammering in her chest. Marco had to be crazy—or desperate, asking her to do this. ‘Thing is, I function best in a garden,’ she explained firmly. ‘I don’t function at all at a...function.’
‘I’d pay you for your trouble.’
That stopped her. ‘You’d pay me? How much?’ she said faintly, thinking of her godmother now.
Marco named a sum that drained the blood from her cheeks.
As he had expected, the mention of a large sum of money turned the tide. Every woman had her price. But then Cassandra started stuttering something that sounded dangerously like no—and no was not an answer he could accept.
He turned up the pressure to put her back on track.
‘What are you going to do when you leave here and go back to England? Will you work at the supermarket, stacking shelves?’
‘Why not?’ she demanded, showing no reaction to his scorn. ‘It’s honest work, and I’ve made some very good friends at the supermarket.’
‘And you can make some very good friends in Rome,’ he said, seething with frustration. ‘Friends with fabulous gardens that need a lot of care and attention. You can network at the party, if nothing else.’
She blinked and appeared to reconsider. ‘You’d introduce me round?’
He balked at that. ‘Well, my people would. You’d get your money, and you’d get the chance to network. I don’t see much wrong with that.’
And neither did she, from the look on Cassandra’s face. His senses sharpened as she bit down on the full swell of her bottom lip while she considered his suggestion.
‘I suppose—’
‘You’ll do it,’ he said.
‘I suppose if it will help—’
‘It will help.’
‘But I’ve only brought one dress with me—’
‘I’ve told you,’ he said, forcing patience into his tone. ‘I will provide a dress for you to wear.’
‘I’ll pay you back.’
‘The dress and all the other expenses will form part of your payment. You may keep the dress afterwards,’ he added as a generous afterthought.
She hummed and frowned.
‘You’ll have everything you need,’ he promised. ‘I’ll see to that.’
‘And you’re quite serious about this?’
‘Cassandra, I never say anything I don’t mean.’
He sat back, confident that this time she’d say yes.
‘I need more time to think about it.’
‘No,’ he said flatly. ‘You give me your answer now. Yes? Or no?’
* * *
She couldn’t pretend she wasn’t anxious at the thought of making a return to a shallow world of sophistication that had proved so damaging in her youth, but when she weighed that against the fact that the money Marco had offered would help to pay for her godmother’s ticket to Australia. She knew it was a golden opportunity, and one that might never come around again.
She had to remind herself of this as she walked self-consciously into one of the most exclusive hotels in Rome. At the back of her mind she still had this nagging suspicion that Marco had bought her. But at least she could comfort herself with the thought that he had got the raw end of the deal. She was a gardener, not a socialite, and no number of designer gowns would change that.
But it was too late to worry about it now. She was here, with one of Marco’s people shepherding her through the lobby.
She tensed as the hotel manager approached. The memories of her childhood had faded, but she was sure she had stayed in a place like this when she’d been a little girl. She couldn’t remember her mother being around, but there had always been women. Her father had used women like commodities, and according to the press had possessed an animal magnetism that had made him irresistible. Much like Marco. In her father’s case, this had led to serial infidelities that had broken her mother’s heart.
She had vowed to stay away from this world, and yet here she was.
Cass swallowed convulsively as the manager bowed over her hand and smiled. She had to remind herself that this was all in a good cause, and that it would enable her to buy the ticket to Australia for her godmother.
‘I hope you will be very happy here, signorina,’ the hotel manager said with practised charm.
‘I’m sure I will be,’ she lied, for his sake. This was his hotel, and it was very beautiful. Located on one of the main streets in Rome, it was as discreetly labelled as the dress size of a couture gown. She knew quite a lot about couture gowns now, since her first stop of the day had been to the atelier of a designer who specialised in ‘the style of gown Signor di Fivizzano favoured’, according to Marco’s people, who had arrived in a squad to take her in hand.
Atelier was a posh word for a workshop with a rather uncomfortable sitting room attached, she had discovered, as the designer measured every inch of her so he could prepare a toile, or pattern, from which any number of visions, as he called a frock, could be created.
Signor di Fivizzano might favour a particular style of gown, but she had made it clear f
rom the off that if she didn’t feel comfortable she wouldn’t play the game. Plunging necklines and sausage skins were out. She didn’t care how exclusive the fabric might be, the shape had to be right for her. The designer had shuddered at her mention of sausages, but he had promised to supply her with a rail full of his visions to choose from. That had taken up a great deal of time and the event was closing in. There was no time to lose, and so she made the best of things, pinning a smile to her face as the hotel manager led her forward.
‘I’ll leave you now,’ Marco’s man said briskly, according her a small bow. ‘You’ll have half an hour to settle in, and then your assistants will arrive.’
‘My assistants?’
Too late! Having nodded briskly to the manager, Marco’s man was on his way.
The manager’s face was now a professional mask, devoid of all expression, but she had to wonder what he made of her in her one shabby dress—a sale rail number that had seemed a good idea at the time but which now, she realised, having just caught sight of herself in one of the mirrors in the lobby, made her look like a galleon in full sail. And as for the hideous pattern—
‘Signorina?’ he prompted with an almost balletic gesture. ‘No expense has been spared,’ he added approvingly as they waited for the elevator. ‘Three hairdressers will attend you in our best suite—on the top floor.’
Three hairdressers? Was she a three-headed hydra?
Snake charmers this way, she thought dryly as the steel doors slid open.
They exited the elevator into a lobby discreetly decorated in tones of cream, taupe and ivory, with just a hint of Caligula in the crumbling Roman busts that lined the walls on marble plinths. She didn’t need any more encouragement to shudder with a sense of impending doom.
‘Your people will be with you shortly,’ the manager announced, opening the door onto the suite with a flourish.
The suite was at least twice as big as her godmother’s house. Picture windows overlooked Rome—towering antiquity existing happily alongside modernity—and it was a stunning view, but her mind was full of Marco. She only had to look at herself in the mirror to know how out of place she would be at his function, and how quickly he would realise his mistake. It would take more than a team of beauticians to put this right—she’d need a miracle.
And there was another thing—what man would spend this sort of money on a woman without expecting more than small talk? Fantasies were fine, but reality was something else with a man so potent and virile he made Genghis Khan look like a drooping weed. And she had far more sense than to get hot and heavy with her boss. She wanted to keep this job—
She jumped at a knock on the door. Swinging it wide, she stood back as her team filed in.
‘Where is she?’ a man with a lavender quiff demanded, staring about.
She pressed back against the door, quailing beneath his scrutiny. She could only imagine the many faults he would find with her.
Narrowing his mascaraed eyes, lavender quiff stared at her. ‘Are you Signorina Rich?’ He couldn’t have sounded more horrified.
‘I’m afraid so.’ She smiled and jumped to attention.
Lavender quiff did not smile. Finely plucked brows rose at an improbable angle as he leaned in to examine her more closely. He almost, but not quite, managed not to groan.
‘Well. We’d better get started,’ he said, pursing his lips. ‘I can see that I’ve got a lot to do.’
‘What exactly are your instructions?’ she asked, glancing around nervously as beauty professionals laid out what might be instruments of torture, for all she knew, along with an improbable quantity of make-up and scent.
Lavender quiff consulted his phone. ‘Do what you can with her,’ he intoned.
Marco clearly didn’t expect too much of her. No pressure, then, Cass concluded wryly as she resigned herself to her fate.
CHAPTER FIVE
‘AND THE GRAND REVEAL! Come on, sweetie, do try and put a good face on it,’ lavender quiff, whom Cass now knew was called Quentin, pleaded as he heaved a theatrical sigh. ‘The livelihoods of all these people depend upon you making a good impression at the party. And, believe me, they have definitely earned their money tonight.’
Cass laughed as Quentin took hold of her hands. He had relaxed her—and he had surprised her by turning out to be the best fun. Every time she had worried that she couldn’t pull this off, Quentin had shaken her out of it. He was just the best at bolstering her confidence. With a purse of his lips, or a tweak of her hair, he’d made everything seem that it might be all right. This was one occasion when first impressions were most definitely wrong. Quentin had turned out to be a real fairy godmother.
‘You look beautiful,’ he said.
‘Why don’t I believe you?’ She pulled a face.
‘I have no idea,’ he protested. ‘Nigel? Mirror, please...’
The room felt silent and she was stunned.
‘Well? Say something, sweetie,’ Quentin prompted.
She couldn’t. She was too full of emotion. She was normally so down to earth, and yet after years of trying to blank out the past she was seeing not herself, looking spruced up and almost passable in the mirror, but her mother instead. Had her mother felt like this—like a chicken being prepared for the feast? She could remember enough to know that her mother had tried so desperately hard to keep the interest of Cass’s father, and that to do that she had been forced to compete with much younger groupies. How helpless she must have felt...
‘Sweetie?’ Quentin prompted anxiously. ‘Are you okay?’
‘I’m fine,’ she said, lifting her chin and adding a smile. Quentin and his team had worked so hard that she owed it to them to put a good face on this. ‘I can’t thank you enough,’ she said to him and to everyone else.
To her embarrassment and amazement people started clapping, until the whole room was ringing with applause.
‘Well, I can’t pretend it’s been easy,’ Quentin admitted with a sigh. ‘But I suppose it’s a mark of my genius that you’ve turned out as well as you have.’
* * *
Where the hell was she? He had waited long enough. He glanced at his watch and then at the door. The event was being catered at his penthouse in the centre of Rome. One hundred carefully selected sponsors were attending. They would be raising a lot of money for the charity tonight, and everything had to be perfect. Cassandra could not be late. They’d be sitting down to dinner soon, and it was unthinkable that he would have an empty place next to him.
His internal rant ended abruptly when Cassandra entered the room. Everyone stopped talking and turned to look at her. His mind blanked completely. She looked stunning. Where had that poise come from—that enchanting smile that lit up the room? He was more used to seeing her up to her elbows in mud, leaning on a pitchfork handle.
She saw him at once and smiled, but her eyes were wary as she darted a glance around the room. This was not her comfort zone, though she was a good actress and stepped forward with apparent confidence. Only he had seen the momentary falter in her step; everyone else was riveted by the sight of her. But why was she alone? Where were his people?
He felt protective suddenly, and held his breath as she walked towards him. It was then he realised that Cassandra didn’t need anyone to escort her, and that she could hold everyone’s attention without any effort at all.
‘So you got here eventually,’ he said curtly as she halted in front of him.
‘Good evening to you too,’ she murmured, extending her hand. ‘I wasn’t in a position to speed things up.’ Lifting her chin, she held his stare steadily. ‘I think I presented the beauticians with more problems than they had anticipated.’
He ground his jaw, admiring her even more for her honesty. ‘I doubt that.’
‘I’m sorry if I’ve kept you waiting,’ she adde
d. ‘This sort of transformation takes a lot of time. Do you approve?’
Her concern on this point at least was genuine. Did he approve? So much he wanted to tell everyone to leave.
‘You’ll do,’ he offered coolly. She looked magnificent. She looked like a queen—like a goddess, a fact that hadn’t been lost on any man in the room.
‘Do I look good enough?’ she prompted, with real concern in her voice.
‘Of course you do,’ he said shortly. ‘Can you really imagine Quentin setting you free unless he was completely satisfied?’
At last she laughed. ‘I suppose not,’ she confessed, smoothing her hands down her dress.
The gown was composed of some floating sky-blue fabric, cunningly cut to mould her ripe figure. He would give the designer a bonus on top of his extortionate fee for designing a dress so perfect for Cassandra. The shade of blue brought out the colour in her eyes, and while the neckline was higher than he would have preferred, maybe he was wrong in thinking it should be lower. As it was now, it hinted at the treasures underneath without revealing them. He found this more provocative than putting everything she had in such lush abundance on show.
The gown was sculpted so precisely it made him wonder if she had room for underwear beneath. His best guess was no.
And her hair— Dio! Her hair! Flowing free to her waist, it shimmered like a golden cape as it flowed in thick, glossy waves down her back—a back that was naked, he noticed as she turned around. The gown had been cut high at the front, yet it dipped practically to the swell of her buttocks at the back.
‘Shall we sit down?’ he suggested, feeling the need to get out of range of all the hungry male glances.
‘Why not?’
Why not? Because he wanted to take her straight to bed.
Bound to the Tuscan Billionaire Page 5
