He could turn on the charm the way other people could turn on a light switch, Eden thought grimly as she found that she had no choice but to step into the corridor, the guards moving to stand on either side of her.
As soon as Rafe had pressed the button to close the lift doors she rounded on him. ‘You can call off your bully-boys. It was bad enough that you had me frogmarched out of the Press conference without them dragging me up here.’
Dark eyes flicked from her to the two guards and he spoke to them in voluble Italian that was too quick for her to pick out more than a couple of words. ‘You exaggerate, Eden,’ he said when he turned his attention back to her. ‘Paolo and Romano assure me that they treated you with the utmost respect.’ His tone and the sardonic gleam in his eyes told her it was a respect he believed to be undeserved and she flushed as he opened the door to his suite. He stood aside to usher her inside but Eden stood firm and lifted her chin, her indignation palpable.
‘I won’t come in; I’m not stopping.’
Rafe’s black brows lifted quizzically. ‘Yet you came to the hotel especially to see me?’
No change in his supreme self-confidence, Eden thought darkly, although, to be fair, why should there be? Women had thrown themselves at him for as long as he could remember, but she was determined not to make the same mistake twice. ‘As arrogant as ever, Rafe,’ she remarked coolly, ‘but I’m afraid the only reason I came was that Cliff Harley asked me to attend the Press conference and write an article for my old paper.’
‘I see,’ Rafe murmured dulcetly, and Eden hoped that he didn’t. He had always possessed an uncanny knack of being able to read her mind, but she had been younger then and not as skilled at hiding her emotions. ‘Now that you’re here, at least allow me to offer you a drink. You look,’ he paused, his brows raised in sardonic amusement, ‘hot, and you seem to have spilt something down your trousers.’
Instantly, Eden felt as though she was burning up. She knew her cheeks must be flaming, and a glance at her cream linen trousers revealed a dark stain that ran halfway down her thigh. ‘It’s coffee,’ she muttered, ‘courtesy of the idiot I was sitting next to. If it hadn’t been for him pouring boiling liquid into my lap, you would never have known I was in the conference hall.’
‘I knew you were there,’ Rafe told her shortly as he indicated that she should take a seat on one of the plush leather sofas. ‘What would you like—wine, juice, tea?’ he added, obviously remembering her fondness for a cup of tea.
‘Orange juice will be fine,’ Eden replied hastily. Hot tea would take too long to drink when she was desperate to escape, and she certainly couldn’t handle Rafe and alcohol—she needed to keep a clear head. ‘What do you mean, you knew I was there? How could you possibly have known?’
‘I felt your presence,’ Rafe answered simply. ‘If you hadn’t drawn attention to yourself I would have scoured the room until I found you.’
A heavy silence filled the room and Eden stared at the carpet, studying the intricate gold and beige pattern with apparent fascination while she fought to control the frantic thud of her heart. He was so gorgeous and she had been starved of him for so long. Her eyes kept straying to him, tracing the outline of his strong jaw and the hard planes of his face, hovering for an infinitesimal second on the sensual curve of his mouth.
‘You should check that the coffee didn’t burn your leg,’ he told her as he handed her a glass of blessedly cold juice. ‘There’s a spare robe in the bathroom. You can wear it while I have your trousers laundered.’
‘No, it’s fine, thanks.’ Eden spluttered on her drink at the mere thought of sitting here with Rafe for however long it would take to have her trousers cleaned.
‘But if you don’t act quickly, your trousers may be ruined.’
‘So I’ll buy another pair. Leave it, Rafe,’ she ordered when he opened his mouth to argue. ‘We haven’t met for almost four years, and I’ve no intention of taking my clothes off in the first five minutes.’
‘How long do you need—ten minutes, fifteen? I remember a time when you were only too willing to strip off,’ he added unforgivably, ignoring her gasp of outrage as he leaned back on the sofa opposite her, his arms outstretched along the back, one ankle hooked over the other thigh in a position of indolent ease.
Photographs did not do him justice, nor did her memories of him, and the image she had kept locked in her subconscious for the last four years faded to a shadow before his forceful presence. Nothing had prepared her for his raw, provocative sex appeal, a magnetism that reached across the space between them and trapped her in his spell. His mocking taunts instantly catapulted her back in time, so that she glared at him, pushing away the memories.
‘That was a long time ago when I was young and naive, although you dispensed with my innocence pretty quickly, didn’t you, Rafe?’ One look from those smouldering dark eyes and she’d fallen like a skittle, she remembered despairingly. ‘I didn’t stand a chance against the great Rafael Santini, did I?’ she said bitterly, remembering her humiliating eagerness to fall into his arms and bed.
‘You were an avid pupil,’ Rafe replied coolly, ‘so good that you decided to turn your attentions to my brother.’ The barely leashed savagery in his voice shook her. The poison was still there, festering, and she felt a sudden stinging sensation behind her eyelids at the unfairness of his accusation.
‘That’s a lie…’
‘I saw you with my own eyes.’ Eyes that were now burning like hot coals as he jumped to his feet and glared at her. ‘You and Gianni in each other’s arms. Are you telling me that what I saw by the pool was an illusion?’
Once she had been afraid of his hot temper. Not that she feared he would be violent, never that, but he possessed a cruel tongue and his angry words had flayed her alive.
‘I’m not telling you anything,’ she replied calmly, refusing to be cowed. ‘Why should I waste my breath? You wouldn’t listen to me four years ago and I don’t suppose you’re any more reasonable now.’ Four years ago she had been so unsure of herself, so in awe of him, but not anymore. In the space of five minutes he’d tried her, acted as judge and jury and condemned her and she was damned if she would let him see that she was still serving a life sentence.
‘Reasonable! I caught you half naked in my brother’s arms—did you really expect me to be reasonable?’ His fury was blistering and directed solely at her, black eyes flashing fire, and Eden felt her own temper flare. She didn’t want to be drawn into a slanging match and certainly didn’t want to open up old wounds that were still raw even after all this time.
After piercing her with another furious glare, Rafe paced the room, raking his hand through his thick black hair that had the tendency to curl at the nape despite the fact that he kept it cropped uncompromisingly short. She had loved his hair, loved running her fingers through it, holding his head and drawing his mouth down to hers. The memory was so stark it hurt and she bit back a gasp as she tore her eyes from his broad shoulders. She didn’t want to remember anything and for the sake of her self-preservation, she needed to get out of his room.
‘It was a long time ago,’ she murmured, deliberately lowering her voice in an effort to prevent one of Rafe’s typical Latin outbursts. ‘Time has moved on and so have I.’ Not that it felt like it, she thought dismally. Right now she felt as young and immature as she had done when she had met him for the first time five years ago. That first meeting had also taken place in a hotel, but then, far from wanting to avoid him, she had actually shinned up a drainpipe and had clambered through the window of his suite to land in an ungainly heap at his feet.
Despite everything she felt her lips twitch at the memory and Rafe threw her a questioning look.
‘Something amuses you?’ he queried in his heavily accented English, and Eden swallowed and felt goose-pimples prickle her skin. If anything, his voice was sexier than she remembered, rich and sensuous, licking over her like molten chocolate.
‘I was just remembering the
first time we met,’ she explained huskily. ‘Your room was on the second floor and I climbed up to it by hanging on to a drainpipe and some rather unsafe ivy.’
‘It was the third floor,’ Rafe replied with a slight shudder, ‘and I have never forgotten the mental image I had of you lying smashed and broken on the gravel below, had you fallen.’
Eden blinked back the tears that were still threatening to embarrass her. He didn’t have to sound as if he had cared, dammit, when she had irrefutable proof that he had never had any feelings for her other than desire. ‘I can’t imagine what you thought of me,’ she muttered, shaking her head as memories crowded back. She had fallen in through the window and been helped to her feet by Rafael Santini, Formula 1 World Champion and the man she had been so eager to meet, but one look into his dark, flashing eyes had rendered her speechless and she had stared up at him, unable to disguise her admiration for his stunning good looks.
He had been twenty-eight and at the peak of physical fitness, which had no doubt helped him win the championship for the third successive year. That, and a competitive spirit that bordered on obsessive, his ruthless determination to win awarding him a hero status that others could only aspire to. His life away from the racetrack was as legendary as his driving skill and hardly a week went by without him featuring in a newspaper or glossy magazine, his love life exposed in minute detail. He had been successful, sophisticated and drop-dead gorgeous and she hadn’t stood a chance against his sexy Italian charm.
‘I thought you were beautiful.’ The softness of Rafe’s voice brought her head up and she stared at him, her pulse racing so that she felt breathless and annoyingly disconcerted. ‘You were different from any other woman I had met,’ he continued, ignoring the expression on her face that told him she was aware of just how different she’d been compared to his usual diet of glamour models, who were an intrinsic part of the Formula 1 scene. ‘You were very sweet, very shy and yet utterly determined. You risked your life to climb up to my room, only to inform me that you were not a fan and had only wanted to meet me because of your brother.’
Eden hid her embarrassment with a smile that tilted her wide mouth at the corners, and Rafe’s eyes narrowed as he remembered the touch of that mouth beneath his, the taste of her. ‘Simon was a devoted fan,’ she agreed, ‘and I’d promised him I would try and get your autograph, even if I couldn’t persuade you to come to the open day of the spinal-injury unit.’ Even then, security surrounding the heir to the Santini millions had been tight and the receptionist at the front desk had coldly informed Eden that Signor Santini would see no one, certainly not a junior reporter from the local paper. But the receptionist had been unaware that beneath Eden’s meek exterior lurked a will of iron.
‘But you did persuade me,’ Rafe pointed out and she nodded, recalling her stunned surprise and Simon’s excitement when the world’s most revered sporting hero had turned up at the open day. It hadn’t been a fleeting visit either, Eden remembered. Rafe had stayed all afternoon and spent hours chatting to the children and teenagers who shared a common bond of being confined to a wheelchair. Simon had spoken about Rafe’s visit for weeks after and lined his bedroom walls with yet more posters of his hero, pictures that Eden had found herself staring at whenever she had the opportunity.
At sixteen Simon had spent half his life as a paraplegic after he had fallen out of a tree and broken his spine. He might not have been able to walk but he had made up for that by talking, laughing and bringing such joy to everyone he met that Eden’s eyes burned at the memory.
‘Does Simon still attend the centre?’ Rafe asked. ‘I gave a donation but I didn’t see him at Greenacres.’
‘No.’ Eden swallowed hard. ‘Simon died of heart failure a few months after we…after I…’
‘After you cheated on me with my own brother,’ Rafe finished bluntly, and the bitterness in his voice shook her. ‘It must have been devastating for all of you, particularly your mother; I remember how devoted she was to him.’
Eden nodded. ‘Losing Simon was one of the reasons Dad took up the post of pastor at the missionary church in Africa. He thought that going somewhere where he and my mother were so needed would help her come to terms with Simon’s death.’ She stared at her lap, fighting the rush of tears, and when she looked up she discovered that Rafe was watching her, a curious expression on his face.
‘I know how hard it is,’ he offered quietly. ‘I too have lost a brother.’
Remorse instantly flooded through her at her insensitivity. ‘I was so sorry to hear about Gianni. The accident…it was terrible; I felt so bad for both of you.’
‘So bad that you didn’t even bother to call,’ Rafe taunted, and this time there was no mistaking the anger that darkened his eyes to the colour of jet. ‘Madre de Dio, Eden! You had been close to him, yet you couldn’t even be bothered to send a card.’
‘That’s not fair,’ Eden whispered. ‘I came to the hospital. I flew to Italy as soon as I heard the news about Gianni’s crash.’
The hard stare Rafe gave her spoke plainly of his disbelief. ‘You’re lying. It was in all the papers that Gianni’s injuries were so severe that he would never walk again. You of all people must have realised the hell he was in, especially after you’d lived through it with your own brother. You just didn’t want to get involved once you’d heard that Gianni had been left paralysed.’ The contempt was back, his black eyes cold and hard as he stared at her, and Eden felt sick at the injustice of his accusation.
‘I came to the hospital,’ she insisted forcibly, leaning forwards in her desperation to have him believe her. ‘I met your father and he said…’ She broke off, recalling the unpleasant meeting with Fabrizzio Santini, in which he had made his opinion of her as clear as the fact that she was an unwelcome visitor.
‘It doesn’t matter what he said,’ she muttered, ‘it’s enough to say he persuaded me that my presence at the hospital wouldn’t be welcomed by Gianni and especially not by you.’
‘My father made no mention of a visit,’ Rafe snapped furiously, his tone so disbelieving that she gave up.
‘I don’t know why Fabrizzio didn’t mention my visit, although I imagine he had his own reasons for not doing so.’
‘Meaning what?’ Rafe growled.
‘Meaning that I’m not a liar! I did go to the hospital. I hoped to see you as well as Gianni. I thought you might need someone to talk to,’ she added thickly, remembering the fevered media accusations that Rafe had caused the accident that had left his brother paralysed.
‘Did you really think I would talk to you after everything that had happened?’ Rafe bit out, his face a taut mask, his olive skin stretched over prominent cheekbones. ‘Dio! Apart from anything else, you’re a journalist!’ From his tone of voice she might as well have been a mass murderer, but the media had snatched on the rumour that he had caused his brother’s accident and had written such scurrilous lies about him that she supposed he had good reason to loathe all members of the Press.
‘I went to Italy as a friend, not in my professional capacity,’ Eden replied steadily, ignoring the pain around her heart. ‘But obviously I was mistaken and you didn’t need me at all.’
Silence fell, a silence that thrummed with tension, and Eden set down her glass.
It was time to leave. She stood and picked up her handbag, her body stiffening as a door at the far end of the room opened and a woman strolled into the lounge.
‘Rafe, darling, I thought I heard you. Are you going to be much longer? I’ve been waiting for you all morning.’
The pout was pure drama, but the woman was stunning, Eden acknowledged bleakly, and then derided herself for caring. Rafe had always had his pick of the world’s most beautiful girls and he picked with a regularity that reinforced his reputation as a stud. Through the doorway she could see an enormous unmade bed, the tangled sheets and the opened champagne bottle standing in the ice bucket indubitable proof that Rafe still didn’t need much sleep.
Memories she believed she had ruthlessly erased forced their way into her mind, memories of another time, of endless hotels where she would spend the days sitting around the pool vainly trying to evoke interest in yet another paperback while she waited for Rafe. The nights had been a different matter, Rafe was a skilled and energetic lover and when she had been in his arms, lost in the exquisite pleasure he wrung from her body, she had almost convinced herself that the lonely days and her loss of self-respect were worthwhile.
‘Rafe!’ The woman’s voice had an edge of petulance, her accent unmistakably Scandinavian, and Rafe threw her an impatient glare.
‘I’m busy, Misa; leave us, please.’
With a toss of ash-blonde hair, the woman flounced into the bedroom, slamming the door behind her to emphasise her displeasure.
‘Don’t ask her to go on my account,’ Eden murmured coolly. ‘I have another appointment. I take it she’s your latest Press officer,’ she couldn’t resist adding, recalling the job description Rafe had once used as a lure for her to join the Santini team. The glorified title had been nothing more than a smokescreen for her real position as his mistress, and evidently nothing had changed.
Briskly, she walked towards the door but as she reached for the handle she found that Rafe had beaten her to it and the brief contact with his hand sent a jolt of electricity through her so that she instantly dropped her arm.
‘Have lunch with me?’ The invitation seemed to have been dragged from his soul, his expression thunderous, and she wondered why he had asked when they patently had nothing to say to one another. This close, she was aware of the subtle musk of his aftershave. Heat emanated from his body and curled around her, stirring her senses, and her heart thudded painfully in her chest, so loud she was sure he could hear it. His gaze was focused on her mouth, his eyes hooded so that she couldn’t read his expression, but she knew with sudden, blinding realisation that he wanted to kiss her.
His Private Mistress Page 2
