The Italian's Wife

by Lynne Graham

  Wrapped in a towel, she peered round the edge of the door. It was Ezio

  Farretti and he had a large cotton sack in his arms.

  'Where are the radiators?' she queried.

  'There aren't any. The heating is under the floor.'

  'Oh...'

  'This bag is full of clothes left behind by other guests,' Ezio

  continued. 'There might be something which will fit you or Timmie.'

  'I can't wear someone else's things...they'd be furious-'

  'These are very rich people. They don't miss what they overlook; they

  just buy more,' the older man told her gently. 'I'll leave the bag

  outside the door.'

  There was a horrid thickness in her throat. 'Thanks, Ezio.'

  'No problem.' He cleared his throat. 'But, if you don't mind a spot of

  advice, give the boss a wide berth. Off the

  record, he's just not himself right now and you don't want to get your

  feelings hurt.'

  Not just himself? Her feelings hurt? What on earth was that supposed to

  mean? Holly's face burned up scarlet. Oh, my goodness, had Ezio noticed

  her blushing and getting on like a teenybopper with a bad crush around

  Rio Lombardi? Was he warning her off? What else could he possibly be doing?

  41

  'Holly's doing...what?' Rio ground out with rampant incredulity.

  'Almost finished cleaning the kitchen floor, boss,' Ezio repeated with

  reluctance. 'She's been dusting and scrubbing and polishing all day and,

  short of physically restraining her, there was nothing I could do about

  it. She's got a lot of grit but she's on the brink of a collapse-'

  'The kitchen floor...' Rio seethed, striding through the door that led

  down to the basement where all the household utilities were situated.

  His mood was not improved when he went through the wrong door on the

  lower floor and found himself in some sort of boiler room because it had

  been a very long time since he had visited the kitchen quarters.

  When he finally located his own kitchen, the first sight that met his

  eyes was Timmie strapped into a high chair, slumped over fast asleep,

  curly dark head down on the tray, a feeding cup dangling from one tiny

  hand. He looked rather like a miniature drunken sailor, his little legs

  and feet clad in white...tights'} And what was that frilly thing round

  his almost non-existent neck? Dio mio, Timmie was wearing a little

  girl's woollen dress with a lace collar! Rio was truly appalled by that

  discovery.

  He strode round the protruding unit to gaze down the length of a kitchen

  that stretched more than forty feet in depth. He settled his outraged

  gaze on the female behind weaving from side to side as Holly knelt on

  the floor with her

  Bucket and scrubbed like a Victorian housemaid. He stilled, attention

  entrapped by the wholly feminine fullness of that derriere, every line

  defined by the fine fabric shaping its delicious curves.

  Without warning, an attack of such powerful lust assailed Rio that his

  every muscle clenched in shaken resistance. Four weeks without sex and

  he was turning into an animal, ready to jump anything female, he decided

  in even darker fury. His lean hands clenched into fists as he willed the

  throb of his aching sex to dwindle to manageable proportions.

  'Get the hell up off that floor!' Rio launched with wrathful bite.

  Dredged from her concentrated efforts to deny her exhaustion until she

  had completed her work, Holly swivelled round on her knees in fright,

  collided with the bucket and tipped it noisily over. Her soft mouth

  opening in dismay, she gasped strickenly, 'Now look what you've made me do!'

  'How dare you come here and start cleaning my floors?' Rio demanded with

  savage censure.

  Very slowly, Holly picked herself up, the over-large green dress with

  its wide neckline lurching off one bare white shoulder. But that shade

  was incredible against that fair skin of hers, Rio noted before he

  registered that she was swaying and literally grey with pallor.

  Holly focused on him, butterflies breaking loose in her tummy. Snatching

  in a stark breath, she met his stunning golden eyes and felt the burn of

  reaction deep down in her pelvis, an enervating sensation that made her

  weld her slender thighs together in fierce embarrassment. 'I'm sorry, I

  thought-'

  Rio strode through the grimy flood that had spilled from the bucket and

  lifted her off her feet before she fainted in

  42

  front of him. 'How could you be so foolish? Do you think I invited you

  here to slave for me?'

  'I only wanted to make myself useful...' Holly drank in the scent of him

  that clung to the jacket beneath her cheekbone, her nostrils flaring

  with helpless eagerness on that fresh familiarity.

  Holding her that close was doing nothing for Rio's rampant arousal. He

  was furious with himself, furious with her. Lack of control was not a

  sensation he was accustomed to suffering around a woman. But he was

  hugely tempted to tell her that if she wanted to make herself useful he

  had a whole catalogue of undomestic distractions to offer, not one of

  which, he was ashamed to admit, would have been thwarted by a wet floor,

  a child within hearing distance or even a fire alarm. He had seen her

  susceptibility in her eyes, in the way she held her slender, shapely

  body and in the mood he was in, a don't-give-a-damn-about-anything mood

  of intense bitterness, that awareness inflamed his libido even more.

  Ezio was positioned by Timmie's sleeping form when Rio strode for the

  kitchen exit. 'Bring Timmie upstairs and get him out of that stupid

  dress,' he instructed the older man.

  'I only put it on him to keep him warm until his own clothes dried. He

  doesn't know it's a dress,' Holly protested. 'It was all that was

  available-'

  'You could be damaging his sexual identity for life!' Rio condemned

  fiercely.

  'Do you think so?' she questioned, aghast, as Rio carried her into a

  lift that she had not known existed until that moment.

  He set her down and hit the buttons, choosing not to wait for Ezio. The

  door buzzed shut. She slumped back against

  the cool wall. 'The floor's in a real mess now,' she lamented. 'I can't

  leave it like that.'

  'Shut up.' Rio closed his eyes and breathed in deep and slow. He had had

  one hell of a day, barring calls from Christabel, putting his social

  secretary in charge of cancelling the elaborate wedding arrangements,

  watching the slow ripple of awareness pass round his personal staff one

  by one, recognising the amazed speculation in the eyes of those too

  stupid to hide their curiosity. Rio Lombardi and Christabel Kent, the

  golden couple, had broken up. All his life he had been a private

  individual, who hated others to breach his reserve. Now he was a mass of

  raw emotion and seething bitterness and, to crown his intense sense of

  raging humiliation at being put in such a position, all he could think

  about was the wild, savage oblivion of sex!

  Holly shut up while the silence charged up. Rio opened eyes as bright as

  golden sunlight and dazzled her. The atmosphere was fraught, full of

 
; vibrations that skimmed along her nerve-endings, filling her with the

  strangest excitement in spite of her weary bewilderment. He was

  smouldering like a powder keg, she registered. She had no idea why but

  she had never been so aware of the potent magnetism of powerful masculinity.

  In fact, she finally admitted, she was so hopelessly attracted to Rio

  Lombardi she could barely think straight, and that was a major shock to

  her system and her knowledge of herself. Jeff had never made her tremble

  just by looking at her. Jeff had never made her crave his touch. So,

  doubtless her ex-boyfriend had had good reason to call her a 'lousy

  lay'. That humiliating recollection from the past steadied her and

  cooled her as nothing else could have done and made her drop her eyes

  from Rio Lombardi's lean, strong face in shame.

  44

  'I'm sorry I spoke to you like that,' Rio murmured curtly as he stood

  back for her to precede him out of the lift.

  She nodded with a bowed head.

  'Go to bed and rest,' Rio advised harshly, stopping dead on the

  threshold of her bedroom but going not one step further. 'I'll have a

  supper tray sent up.'

  'I'm not hungry,' Holly whispered shakily, no longer able to look at

  him. She listened to him walk away, feeling the loss of his vibrant

  energy and despising herself for that sensitised awareness.

  A bloke like Rio Lombard would never look twice at her, which was just

  as well, she conceded dully. She was useless in bed. Frigid as a corpse.

  She stilled a shiver of revulsion at that unforgettable description of

  her less than adequate performance: Jeff had spelt out exactly why he

  had lost interest in her. She might not have enjoyed that single session

  of physical intimacy that had none-the-less resulted in Timmie's

  conception, but Jeff had made it clear that he had enjoyed it even less.

  How could she have actually believed his drunken assertion that she was

  the girl he wanted to marry? That had just been a standard line to get

  her between the sheets.

  'Why the hell didn't you get an abortion, you stupid cow?' Jeff had

  railed at her before he'd hit her smack in the face with his fist. He'd

  knocked her right off her feet in his rage almost five months back and

  had terrified her with his violence. 'If you think I'm forking out my

  hard-earned cash to keep you and your little bastard, you'd better think

  again! If you try to hang rum round my neck, I'll make you sorry you

  were ever born...'

  She was sorriest of all that she had been so unforgivably stupid as not

  to see through Jeff's superficial charm to the user and abuser of women

  that he was. He had slept with

  those girls he'd dumped her for twice over. He had lied about that, and

  in her heart of hearts she had always suspected that truth but had

  blindly refused to face the fact that a man who treated her that way

  could have no caring feelings for her. Jeff was the kind of creep whose

  ego could not bear female rejection. The instant he had taken her

  virginity, he had begun losing interest.

  So she had got her punishment for being a silly, credulous doormat,

  dreaming of white dresses and the 'Bridal March'. What she could not

  stand was that her parents, and now Timmie, seemed to be sharing that

  ongoing punishment with her. For of course her parents would be missing

  her, but she could never go home as long as she had her son and no ring

  on her finger. Farming communities were not liberal. An unwed daughter

  and fatherless grandchild would shame and mortify her parents.

  As Holly slumped down on the bed, slight shoulders sagging, Ezio

  appeared in the doorway, clutching Timmie. 'I got his clothes out of the

  drier but I'm afraid you'll have to change him.'

  'Thanks...' she said chokily, getting up to reclaim her son.

  Ezio hovered on the threshold. 'The boss is on a pretty short fuse at

  present. I did try to warn you.'

  She was just no good at listening. Her stubborn pride had offended Rio

  Lombardi. She had slighted the one person who had tried to be kind to

  her in countless months of indifference. A rich, good-looking guy of

  Rio's calibre could not have any ulterior motive in helping her and she

  was ashamed of the reality that she wished that he had, ashamed that she

  reacted as she did around him.

  The phone ringing by the bed woke her the next morning.

  It was Rio. 'I'm taking you shopping and I don't want

  46

  to hear any arguments. The sight of you running round dressed like a bag

  lady embarrasses me.'

  Holly was poleaxed. 'But-'

  'I've hired a nanny to take care of Timmie. You got to sleep in because

  she's already here. He's now getting his morning constitutional in the

  garden. As soon as you've had breakfast, I want you downstairs.'

  Click went the phone as Rio cut the connection. Even as Holly replaced

  the receiver in sleepy, shell-shocked bewilderment, a manservant was

  knocking on the door and entering with the promised breakfast. A nanny

  had been hired just to take care of her Timmie? For goodness' sake, had

  Rio Lombardi gone mad? She could not possibly allow him to buy her

  clothes! It was out of the question.

  However, hunger made her succumb first to the tempting dishes on the

  beautifully arranged bed tray. She explored the bruising at the base of

  her skull. The spot was still tender but she felt fine after a really

  good night of sleep. As soon as she had eaten she had a quick shower.

  Dressing in her clean jeans and shirt, she pulled on the man's sweater

  that she had found at the very foot of the pretty-much useless bag of

  clothing which Ezio had brought to her.

  Her bronze ringlets fanning wildly round her narrow shoulders after a

  too vigorous and impatient brushing, she hurried down the stairs. Rio

  was pacing the hall floor and her first glimpse of him just took her

  breath away. His superb tailored suit in palest grey set off his exotic

  darkness and bronzed skin to perfection. His black hair gleamed in the

  light coming through the windows and was so temptingly touchable to her

  dilated gaze that her fingertips actually tingled.

  'I can't let you take me shopping,' she told him unevenly.

  A curious expression tensed Rio's darkly handsome features and his

  strong jawline hardened, his gorgeous dark golden eyes almost bleak. 'I

  need a distraction today. You're it. You'll be doing me a favour.'

  So disconcerted was Holly by the roughened sincerity patent in that

  unexpected response that she was halfway into the limo before she

  recalled that she had not yet seen her son. 'Just two minutes, Rio.' She

  said his name for the first time and then reddened with self-consciousness.

  The nanny was a really nice young woman and she even wore a uniform. She

  looked like the sort of nanny that might be hired by royalty and Timmie,

  propped up in an incredibly impractical but imposing coachbuilt pram,

  might even have aspired to being a little prince, had it not been for

  his shabby clothing.

  'Satisfied, cara?' Rio asked as Holly got into the limo.

  'Timmie seems happy
enough-'

  'You should ditch the Timmie and call him Timothy.' Rio informed her

  just as she glimpsed Ezio's unusually grim expression before the older

  man turned away to swing into the front passenger seat.

  'Why?'

  'He's timid. Give him a name he can grow into, not one that makes him

  sound like a pet pooch.'

  Holly flushed but she said nothing. She was overwhelmed by the sensation

  that she was being carried away by a very forceful personality on a trip

  she did not understand. 'Is...is there something wrong today? I mean,'

  she muttered awkwardly, 'that you feel you need a distraction?'

  His lean, powerful face tautened, brilliant eyes veiling. He had the

  most extraordinary long, inky dark lashes, Holly noted, studying his

  classic profile with helpless fascination.

  'Everything's right. Everything is as it ought to be,' Rio

  48

  stated in a cold tone that contrived to chill her to the marrow.

  The uneasy silence dragged.

  Holly made a frantic effort to redress the apparent damage she had

  caused. 'So you're not working today?'

  'No.'

  'And you taking me out shopping is just a whim...the sort of thing rich

  people do when they're bored?'

  The taut line of his sensual mouth eased and he flashed her a glittering

  glance that sent her heart racing like an express train. 'You could put