The Innocent and the Playboy

by Sophie Weston

  He lobbed the tie away from him.

  Rachel said, ‘You’re not serious.’

  The jacket followed the tie. Neither Rachel nor Riccardo broke eye contact to see where the garments fell.

  ‘I’m always serious when I play games.’

  Rachel shook her head. She felt dazed. He did not mean it. He could not. She looked at his expression and realised she was wrong. He meant it.

  Riccardo di Stefano cancelled the distance between them and reached for her in one smooth movement.

  ‘Oh, Lord,’ she said as her feet left the ground. She clung onto him purely for balance.

  He held her against his chest, looking down at her for a moment. His eyes were assessing. ‘Ah, the innocent,’ he remarked. ‘Interesting.’

  He strode over to the bed and dropped her unceremoniously in the middle. The front of the sarong came undone at the rough treatment. Neither broke eye contact to take any notice of that either.

  He sat on the side of the bed. Rachel struggled up onto one elbow. ‘I don’t know what you think you’re doing—’ she began indignantly.

  His expression silenced her. To her intense astonishment Rachel felt her bones begin to melt.

  ‘Yes, you do,’ he said softly. ‘You know exactly. We’re going to do something about those instincts of yours.’

  His fingers drifted up the side of her bare arm. Something inside Rachel contracted with longing. Her eyes screwed tight shut with the intensity of it.

  ‘Some of them are in working order, then,’ said that amused voice in her ear.

  She felt his lips on the side of her neck, her collar-bone, brushing aside the tangled sarong. His touch was insistent. He was gentle but utterly determined. And when he reached her quickening breasts she did not even want him to be gentle any more.

  She twisted restlessly, her hand tangling wildly in his hair. He lifted his head. Reluctantly, Rachel opened her eyes. He was looking down at her, his chest rising and falling as if he were running a race. She could not bear it. Her head tossed on the pillow, tumbling her hair into crazy disarray. The hibiscus fell away unnoticed.

  Slowly, slowly, he raised his head, searching her face. Her gaze was wild. Riccardo met it. He looked implacable. Her lips parted in silent yearning. His eyes flamed.

  She felt his breath on her flesh, the beat of his blood. She felt his naked skin, warm as she had never imagined. She trembled, shaken. She knew his need was as harsh and urgent as her own.

  Yet, in spite of that, Riccardo was holding back. Rachel felt it, in disbelief. Her fingers clenched like a vice on his upper arms. A groan burst out of her. There was a precipice that she needed to reach, she had to reach.

  Riccardo seemed to know. He said her name, almost as if he were in pain. And then, and then...

  In the end it was not the knowledgeable, dominating man of the world who drove them both over that compulsive edge. It was Rachel herself.

  Afterwards he rolled over on his back and stared at the ceiling. Rachel’s heartbeat steadied slowly. She felt bewildered. And lonelier than she had ever done in her life.

  She thought she would give anything if Riccardo would only take her hand. But his open eyes were fixed on the ceiling fan. He seemed very far away. She realised, with a flash of perception beyond her years, that to be unable to reach the person you were lying beside was one of the cruellest exiles. She did not think she was going to forget that one again.

  And there was something else she realised. Judy had said she did not understand. Well, now she did. If Riccardo wanted her there was nothing—nothing—she would not do for him. If he wanted her. The silence was like a prison sentence.

  Rachel folded her lips together and got off the bed. Riccardo turned his head to watch her. She bent her head, rubbing the back of her neck to ease the tension. He shut his eyes briefly.

  ‘Rachel, I didn’t mean—’

  But she was not to find out what Riccardo had not meant. Because that was when the door of the cabin banged back on its hinges and Judy stormed in.

  Nine years later in London Rachel shut her eyes, remembering. Even over the distance of years, her whole body convulsed in an agony of shame.

  Later she’d discovered that Judy had just tried to persuade Anders to marry her if she got a divorce. Anders had laughed. Rejected, Judy had been hurt and spitting mad. She’d gone to Rachel’s cabin looking for a fight. She’d found it.

  For a moment Judy stood in the doorway, frozen. Then pure venom took over. Rachel blinked and shrank.

  At once Riccardo stood up. ‘Enough,’ he said.

  Such was his authority that Judy stopped, in mid-vituperation. He strolled forward, magnificently unconscious of his nakedness. Rachel groped round for the rags of her sarong. She was appalled.

  ‘This,’ he said to Judy, ‘is none of your business. Out.’

  And, to Rachel’s amazement, her stepmother turned and went. Riccardo turned back to her.

  ‘I seem to owe you an apology,’ he said formally.

  He was as remote as the moon. The man who had called out her name in something like agony might never have existed. Rachel shrank even more. She did not know what to say. She could not bear to look at him. She was afraid of what she would see in his face: indifference, embarrassment or, worse, regret. She wished he could not see her either.

  But he could, and seemed to have no trouble in reading her reactions. He sighed.

  ‘Don’t look like that. It’s not the end of the world.’

  Rachel found herself wishing passionately that it was. She did not say so. She did not say anything.

  He hesitated. ‘I take full responsibility but—’

  Rachel flinched. She could not help it. He was going to say that they had both been carried away and she was not to make too much of it. She almost hated him for that.

  But she was still in love with him and it was total desolation. She put out an instinctive hand to ward off whatever he was going to say.

  He said quietly, ‘I never meant to hurt you. I didn’t think.’

  Rachel nodded jerkily, not meeting his eyes. ‘I know. Nor did I.’

  ‘Well, then-’

  ‘These things happen all the time,’ Rachel said, before he could.

  But she had read him wrongly.

  ‘No, they don’t.’ Riccardo was not remote any more, or unreadable. He was furious. ‘Not to me.’

  She shrugged. ‘Then chalk it up to new experience.’ She thought she would die of the pain. But she sounded flippant. In fact she could almost convince herself that she was utterly cool and in control. It was some consolation.

  He took an impatient step forward, then curbed himself.

  ‘You’re beat,’ he said curtly. ‘We’ll talk in the morning.’

  But in the morning she was on her way to the airport in Anders’ limousine, with her stepmother as escort.

  In contrast with her venom of last night, Judy was oddly triumphant.

  ‘You always were a slyboots. A cold, self-righteous, stupid slyboots.’

  Rachel had not slept. After Riccardo had left she had packed. Then she’d gathered the sarong around her like a shawl and sat in the window, waiting for dawn. She was now too tired to reply to Judy’s taunts.

  ‘Sneering at Anders and the rest of us like that. Going off with your books and pretending to be so holy. The crazy thing is, you convinced me. You convinced everyone. We thought you didn’t even know what you were passing up.’

  Rachel leaned her head back against the cushioned headrest and tried to ignore the shrill voice.

  ‘You won’t be so smug now, will you? You’re down here with the rest of us now.’ .

  Rachel said wearily, ‘I can’t argue with that.’

  Judy laughed. ‘And of all the men in the world! The moment Riccardo di Stefano walked in.’

  ‘No,’ said Rachel loudly.

  Judy laughed again. ‘Oh, yes. We all saw it. You’re an open book, you stupid child.’

  Rachel ke
pt her eyes very wide and refused to cry. Her ordeal was nearly over. The limousine was pulling up outside the shack that was the small island’s airport.

  Judy gave vent to one final flurry of malice. ‘We’ll see what your father says about his idolised little girl now.’

  Nine years later Rachel remembered exactly what her father had had to say and shuddered. He’d met her at the airport and delivered it in one comprehensive speech. After that, he’d driven her to a friend’s house and never seen her again.

  For weeks Rachel was numb. Even Judy, when she returned to London, was taken aback. She arranged to meet Rachel and gave her some money to tide her over.

  In fact, Rachel thought afterwards, it was, perhaps, just as well that the practical problems were so enormous. In facing them, she began also to face her own feelings. There was no question of going to university without her father’s financial support. So she had to find a job. Although she did not admit it to herself, she was half waiting for Riccardo di Stefano to arrive in London and save her from her predicament. He never did.

  In the end she found Brian Gray and his family. She began to go to night school. She passed crucial examinations. Eventually she stopped waiting for Riccardo. Eventually the only thing she wanted was never to see him again. She began to think she would manage that.

  Until today. Rachel rubbed her hands over her tired eyes. It was all back, as clearly as if she had only just got off that plane. She bit back a cry of shame. For, whatever she’d thought, then or later, about Riccardo di Stefano’s seduction, there was one thing she could not disguise from herself. He was older, more experienced and infinitely more cynical than she, but in one thing they had been equals: she had wanted him quite as much as he’d wanted her.

  The fact had been so difficult to live with that she had wiped it out of her memory. Or she had thought she had, until today. That must be why she had been so hard on Alexandra, she realised suddenly. Riccardo di Stefano was not forgotten and poor Alexandra had been picking up the punishment for a younger Rachel’s mistakes.

  She bit her lip, remorseful. What had happened at the Villa Azul was history. It had nothing to do with Alexandra, or with the person Rachel herself was these days. She straightened her shoulders. Anything she might have to say in the future to Riccardo di Stefano was going to be professional and nothing but professional, she vowed.

  But that small room, the tangled sheet, the wide shoulders, slick and warm under her hands...

  ‘Forget it,’ she said to herself, clenching her fists in concentration. ‘Forget it, forget it, forget it.’

  She banished it. There was a job to be done. She was the one to do it and she knew it. She could not allow herself to be deflected. Rachel had to meet her team for discussion and then it was back into the boardroom.

  At first she thought no one was there. That did not surprise her, or worry her. Normally she liked to be early, to set up her presentation. On this occasion she’d thought she would probably have to do it all under the impatient eyes of her intended audience. So it was with a sigh of relief that she registered the empty chairs. Clearly the board lunch was running on.

  She began to set up the slide projector and checked that her notes and the slides were m corresponding order. Her notes were on small cards which she could hold in one hand. It was an orderly task and she relished it. She was even humming to herself before an unexpected voice spoke.

  ‘I see you like to be prepared.’

  Rachel jumped. She stopped humming. After those vivid memories, the sound of that voice made her feel a little sick. She turned round very carefully.

  Riccardo di Stefano raised his eyebrows. He strolled forward.

  ‘I seem to have shocked you. Sorry.’

  He did not sound the least bit sorry, Rachel thought. Nor did he look sorry. But he did look curious. Her shock must be showing.

  That was dangerous. She pulled herself together.

  She said with as much calm as she could command, ‘I didn’t realise anyone was here.’

  His eyebrows rose higher. They were strongly marked. Why hadn’t she remembered that? He was not a friendly pirate any more. Today he was looking satanic. Those eyebrows gave him the air of a devil, and what was more, a devil with a special line in mockery.

  Had he always been like that? She remembered cynicism and anger and, in the end, a passion that had seared her to the soul. She did not remember mockery.

  Stop that, she told herself, shaken. Long forgotten, right?

  Of course, he was older, and even more successful these days. He would not be the same person she remembered, any more than she was after all these years. She became conscious that he was watching her narrowly.

  The mockery intensified. ‘Do I disturb you?’

  ‘Of course not,’ Rachel said sharply.

  She bent her head and riffled blindly through the memo cards she had just put into order. She could feel him watching that too.

  He said in a thoughtful tone, ‘You know, I have the oddest feeling about you, Mrs Gray.’

  Rachel’s mouth went dry. ‘Oh?’ she said, trying to sound indifferent.

  ‘Yes. Increasing by the minute.’

  Rachel concentrated on her task. She knew he wanted her to ask what sort of feeling. She was not going to give him that satisfaction, she promised herself. So she shrugged, not looking up.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Don’t you look at people who are talking to you?’ he demanded. There was a distinct edge to his voice.

  It was a challenge she could hardly avoid. It made her furious but there was nothing she could do about it. Rachel gave an elaborate sigh and straightened.

  She still did not quite dare to meet his eyes. But by dint of looking just to the left of his ear she gave a very fair impression of looking at him directly. Riccardo di Stefano’s expression was frankly speculative.

  ‘You’re quite sure we haven’t met before?’

  She did not know what to say. There was a pause. His mouth tilted.

  ‘Because, you know, I have the strangest feeling that we know each other. Very well indeed.’

  CHAPTER SIX

  RACHEL’S fingers tightened involuntarily. Her hands were sweating. She could feel the stiff little cards getting slippery.

  ‘I told you, I was away—’

  ‘The last time I came by,’ he finished. ‘Yeah, yeah. But the world is not bounded by Bentley’s boardroom. Maybe we bumped into each other some other place? Another time?’

  The cards shot out of her hands, fanning out across the carpet in total confusion. Rachel gave an exclamation of dismay and fell to her knees, gathering up the cards clumsily. She had difficulty in getting hold of them. Her hands were shaking.

  ‘Allow me.’

  Riccardo di Stefano bent and gathered the cards in one hand, like a gambler. He straightened. Rachel had to get up as well, perforce. He was a lot closer now. He put the cards on the lectern and considered her thoughtfully.

  ‘Thank you,’ she said. Her throat hurt.

  He ignored that. He was smiling and his eyes were bright green. ‘You know, I’ve heard a lot about you, Mrs Gray. A lot of good things from a lot of people. None of them said you were as jumpy as a cat on a hot spot.’

  Rachel was tempted to ask the identity of his informants. For a moment she almost did. Then it occurred to her that it would only prolong the conversation.

  She said carefully, ‘I think your bombshell this morning was enough to make anybody jumpy.’

  He looked amused. ‘Yes, that they did mention.’

  ‘Mention?’ Rachel was confused. ‘What?’

  ‘You think on your feet.’

  She could feel the guilty colour in her cheeks.

  ‘Now are you going to tell me why I scare the hell out of you? Or are you going to let me have fun working it out?’

  There was no answer to that. Rachel looked down, picking up the cards pointedly. She could feel him looking at the top of her head, feel his annoy
ance. He was balked and he knew it.

  Let him stay balked, she prayed.

  He gave a quick, annoyed laugh. ‘OK, I get the message. You want to get your presentation in order.’

  ‘That was why I came to the boardroom early.’

  ‘And there was me thinking you were stalking me,’ he said silkily.

  For a moment she did not realise it was a joke. Her eyes flew up to his in pure horror. She had no time to disguise her reaction. His brows twitched together in surprise. His lips parted as if he was going to demand an immediate explanation.

  Rachel leaped in to forestall him.

  ‘Please—I haven’t got much time.’ She gestured at the lectern, the slide projector.

  There was a frozen second when she thought he was going to insist on his explanation there and then, no matter what her excuse. Rachel’s head went back and, behind her back, she crossed her fingers in a gesture that was pure childhood superstition.

  Then at last di Stefano drew back. Reluctantly, it seemed.

  ‘And I’ve interrupted you.’ His voice was heavy with irony. ‘Sure. You’ve made your point, Mrs Gray. But we still have to get together and sort out where we’ve met before.’

  Rachel suppressed her shiver at that. Instead, she gave him one of her best unfocused smiles and said, ‘I look forward to it.’

  For a moment his frustration was undisguised. Then he shrugged. ‘See you later, then.’

  He sauntered out. Rachel collapsed in the nearest chair.

  She could not stay there, of course. She had work to do. And work, as she had good cause to remember, was a great therapy. Thank God for work, she thought.

  By the time the meeting reconvened, she was in reasonably good shape. Her work was in order again, her speech ready. Philip ushered the men into their seats. Rachel took a deep breath, avoided looking at Riccardo di Stefano, and began.

  She had learned that the secret of selling her ideas to the board was to keep her presentations short and let them ask questions. That way they got to think they had thought of some of the ideas themselves. That made them better disposed to accept them. No one had ever noticed this technique before.