The Italian's Demand

by Sara Wood

  ‘I worked it out earlier this evening.’

  His hand rested on her knee, his thumb rhythmically stroking. He seemed a little tense but perfectly in control of himself, as if he was able to turn his passion on and off without effort. She bristled, annoyed. No man had promised her ecstasy before, let her taste it—and then calmly accepted her rejection.

  She tried to be indifferent too. ‘Worked out what?’

  ‘The solution. Let’s establish one or two things. First, you agree that Lio should know his father, yes?’

  ‘Ye-e-es.’ She took a deep breath. ‘Yes, of course. I’ve never denied that.’

  She looked wary. What was he up to? Why had he abandoned the idea of seducing her when he must know that she had almost surrendered? Why wasn’t he kissing her, demanding…oh, God! she groaned silently. She felt so empty. And hated him and herself for being ruled by basic instincts.

  ‘Good.’ His thumb travelled a little further up her thigh. She clamped her hand on his, pushing it away. He made no protest and she found herself watching his fingers, wondering, wishing… ‘Now,’ he said, making her jump with his brusque efficiency. ‘The situation is this. I need to return to Italy to deal with my business. There’s only so much I can do by telephone and e-mail.’

  ‘Oh.’

  He smiled and she hoped he hadn’t detected the note of disappointment in her response. Of course she wanted him to go. Probably. Except…

  Annoyed with her stupid vacillating, she whipped her brain sternly into order. ‘You go, then,’ she said smartly.

  Or at least, she’d intended to sound brisk. Her voice had been more rasping, as if, she thought gloomily, she’d smoked forty a day for the past twenty years. And he was smiling a knowing smile, the kind of smug, ‘I’ve got you where I want you’ kind of smile. She really must try harder, she scowled.

  ‘One problem. I won’t leave without Lio,’ he stated. ‘And he won’t go anywhere without you.’

  ‘No,’ she agreed, trying not to drown in his wide, chocolate-dark eyes. ‘Stalemate,’ she pronounced. ‘Something has to give. I think it’ll have to be you.’

  ‘I don’t think so.’

  He looked horribly self-satisfied and she sat up in her chair, suddenly alert. Her worst fears had come true!

  ‘I won’t leave him!’ she declared furiously. ‘You can’t part us—!’

  ‘You won’t have to,’ Vittore soothed.

  ‘But…how—?’

  ‘It’s simple. You will both come with me. We go tonight, while he’s asleep to minimise his distress—’

  ‘Whaaat? But—!’

  ‘I have arranged everything. It’s settled. We’ll fling his clothes and favourite toys into cases,’ he forged on inexorably. ‘A chauffeured car will pick us up in an hour and we’ll be on my private jet and in Naples airport before you know it.’ His eyes gleamed, his voice purred with pleasure. ‘You see, Verity, this is the perfect solution to all our needs!’

  All? Did he mean…? Her mouth fell open in astonishment. Then snapped shut again, this time in anger.

  ‘Oh, I see! So that’s what you were doing just now!’ she hurled shakily. ‘Softening me up! Organising dinner by candlelight, plenty of wine, taking advantage of my exhaustion to half-seduce me so I’d eagerly fall in with your plans!’

  ‘Verity, I—’

  ‘And then, presumably, you thought I’d not only be willing to look after Lio, but I’d be a useful little bedmate tucked away in your house, whenever you wanted a bit of slap and tickle! Oh, yes, your needs would be well catered for! A substitute mother by day and a whore at night! How dare you?’ she raged, incensed that he could be so cold-blooded as to coax her in such a way—when she’d stupidly imagined he’d made a pass because he’d been unable to resist her! No wonder he’d been able to switch off. He’d been working to a hidden agenda!

  ‘Verity,’ he assured her gravely, ‘slap and tickle is not my style. It was not my intention to half-seduce you.’ His mouth curved wickedly, shooting her nerves into spasm. ‘It is not my habit to do anything by halves,’ he growled sexily.

  ‘That makes it worse!’ she cried heatedly. ‘You would have made love to me—’

  ‘Oh, yes,’ he murmured with alarming enthusiasm.

  ‘And then,’ she began shakily, trembling from a thousand spears of sheer lust, ‘I—I suppose you thought I’d be so grateful, so stunned by your expertise, that I’d lie adoring at your feet and be pliant to your every demand!’

  He smiled, amused. ‘That has a certain appeal, I admit,’ he admitted.

  ‘You’re impossible!’ she yelled, leaping to her feet.

  ‘Honest,’ he corrected. ‘Verity, can you think about this rationally for a moment? The car will be here in an hour as I said, and—’

  ‘An hour! You didn’t give yourself long! What did you estimate for your seduction time?’ she cried indignantly. ‘Ten minutes for sex and ten more to spring your surprise on me? Would you have checked your watch and told me to hurry up and climax because the car was almost due?’

  He laughed out loud, his teeth white, his smile infuriatingly compelling.

  ‘To be truthful, I was taken by surprise at what happened. Originally, I was just going to put the idea to you. Then I found myself touching you and…’ His hands expressed helplessness.

  ‘Oh, sure. You couldn’t help what happened!’ she finished for him. ‘What rubbish! You’re a grown man, in charge of your actions—’

  ‘Not entirely. Since meeting you I have been swept along by fate,’ he confessed with a wry and charming smile.

  She knew what he meant. Maybe he gave in to his urges too often and too easily, but she hadn’t been in control of herself, either.

  Several times in the past week they’d accidentally touched, or had brushed past one another. Or had found their gazes locked together.

  And on those occasions she’d found herself incapable of sensible thought, her mind and body weak as they received the full force of his devastating appeal.

  She and goodness knew how many others, she reminded herself tartly. All now forgotten, just a blur of bodies and pleasure. Huh!

  ‘I wish you had let it sweep you somewhere else,’ she muttered.

  ‘Well, it didn’t. I made a pass and you responded with more enthusiasm than I expected,’ he replied baldly.

  Flames of shame roared over her skin. So she’d been eager. But he wasn’t much of a gentleman to point that out to her!

  ‘Sorry if my eagerness almost ruined your tightly worked-out schedule!’ she snapped, as tart as a lemon.

  ‘I wasn’t exactly thinking of it at the time. I couldn’t have stopped what happened any more than you could,’ he murmured.

  Another insult. ‘That’s where you’re wrong. I did stop!’ she stormed.

  ‘Mmm.’ He studied her thoughtfully. ‘I’m still not absolutely sure why.’

  ‘I told you. Suddenly I came to my senses!’ she raged. ‘I realised you disgust me!’

  ‘Really.’

  ‘Yes, really! Maybe it’s hard for you to believe,’ she spat, ‘but I don’t like to play around with pleasure-seeking Italian men who wouldn’t know a moral if it leapt up and savaged their ankles to rags!’

  Infuriatingly, he grinned, as if vastly amused by her unusual turn of phrase.

  ‘I made a mistake then,’ he conceded gravely. ‘I misread the signs you were giving out.’

  She scowled, knowing full well that he’d read them with plumbline accuracy.

  ‘You caught me at a weak moment,’ she defended. ‘I was tired. Lulled by the meal and the warmth of the wine. I don’t like you, Vittore. I loathe shallow men who use women purely for their own needs and then discard them like…like…used light bulbs!’ she cried, failing to find a suitable example in her fury.

  ‘Light bulbs?’ He was openly laughing at her now.

  Verity flushed crossly and hoisted up a wayward shoulder strap, stubbornly searching for a means to defend her ch
oice of words.

  ‘Yes! They get switched on and off whenever you want and then when they’re used up, you dump them!’

  ‘Ah. Were you switched on, then?’ he teased, his eyes hot and burning.

  She had to look away or be desperate for him all over again. How could she deny how she’d felt? She could have lit up a football field all on her own and had enough left over for a small town.

  ‘You’re ridiculously vain!’ she scorned, ducking the reply. ‘And you can forget your so-called solution—’

  ‘Because you think badly of me,’ he said soberly, his hands eloquent with regret.

  ‘Understatement,’ she clipped.

  ‘But all your information has come from Linda. None of it is from first-hand knowledge.’

  ‘I know that you tried to seduce me—’

  ‘Yes. Why not? You are beautiful and fascinating and wonderful to be with. We have lived intimately for a week and I’m not made of stone. But it doesn’t mean I seduce every woman I meet and treat sex casually, or that I was unfaithful during my marriage.’

  ‘But you were unfaithful. Linda said so!’ she cried.

  ‘Hmm. Don’t you think that she might have lied about my fidelity?’ he persisted. ‘Think about her for a minute. The kind of person she was. You tell me. Did she ever tell lies when you were children together?’

  Verity frowned. All the time, was the answer.

  ‘She might have,’ she mumbled grudgingly.

  That didn’t seem to surprise him at all. And he swept on, ‘Would you say she was basically kind, or spiteful? Balanced or hot-tempered?’

  He was driving her into a corner. ‘I refuse to say anything bad about her. She’s dead,’ Verity said frostily.

  ‘I admire your sense of honour. But I think, if you’re honest, you will have doubts now. Remember that she deliberately spirited my son away and kept me from him. Remember that she lied when she told you that I was dead. If she lied about that, isn’t it possible that she told other lies, too? Maybe I am a womaniser, maybe not. You only have the word of a habitual liar for that. And do you honestly think I was a bad father?’

  ‘You have a demanding business. It must take you away from home a lot,’ she muttered, the doubts crowding in on her.

  ‘But you can’t be sure. I could be innocent. The injured party. I might have cherished my son and spent every free second with him. Why don’t you give me the chance to prove she was wrong, and that I can care for Lio?’

  ‘Because I can’t take risks with his sanity!’ she cried hotly. ‘How do I know what you’ll do if I go to Italy with you? You could ban me from seeing him, use Italian law to turn me out of your house—’

  ‘Then I’d never gain Lio’s love, would I?’ he broke in, his tone quiet and measured. ‘I’m not such a fool, Verity. I know you are the key to his happiness at the moment. Come with us. Discover what kind of man I am—’

  ‘No!’ She shrank back, all too afraid of the man he was—and that she’d discovered far too much already. His presence was overwhelming, his sexual power all too easily capturing her and making her an unwilling victim. ‘I can’t leave England!’ she cried frantically, clinging on to safety. ‘It’s my home! All my friends are here. And this is where I work, where my contacts are—’

  ‘I’ll speak to your employer—’ he began evenly.

  ‘I don’t have one! I’m self-employed!’

  ‘Then there’s no problem,’ he reasoned.

  ‘There is,’ she scowled, fast running out of objections. ‘I’ll lose all the goodwill I’ve built up. I’m staying here.’

  ‘But Lio,’ he said softly, ‘will be in Italy.’

  ‘Over my dead body!’ she cried hotly.

  ‘I don’t think I’d have to go that far. Just far enough to get what I want.’

  She blanched. Took a step back. He’d meant what he’d said. He wouldn’t let her stand in his way. She began to tremble.

  Vittore stood up and tucked in his shirt, his mocking eyes observing her horror when she realised that she’d ripped it from his waistband, that she had run her hands over his gloriously muscular chest and had been more intimate with him than any man on earth.

  ‘Don’t do this!’ she whispered, her mouth dry, her lips so parched they could barely form the words.

  ‘I refuse to continue to go on as we are in this house. If you won’t pack Lio’s things, then I will,’ he announced grimly.

  ‘You won’t know what to pack, what he needs!’

  ‘Then help me!’

  She stared at him helplessly. ‘I’m his guardian! I decide what happens to him! If you try to take him, I’ll call the police!’ she said shakily.

  He gave one of his characteristic shrugs. ‘Do that. I have Lio’s birth certificate, Linda’s death certificate which you kindly handed over to me, and my ID card. I also have Lio’s passport. I don’t think the police will stop me, as his legal parent, do you? He is morally mine. And if you make a fuss, then I’ll get the Press involved. How does this sound? “Spinster aunt denies grieving father his son.” Your life would be hell, Verity. As mine has been.’

  ‘You wouldn’t!’ she breathed.

  ‘I’d do anything,’ he said, frighteningly quiet, spine-chilling in his determination.

  ‘You are a barbarian!’ she gasped.

  ‘No.’ His black eyes gleamed. ‘I am inviting you to come with me. It’s you who are thinking of breaking Lio’s heart by refusing to accompany him. Choose, Verity. Stay here alone—and have the house sold from under your feet—or come to Italy with me and Lio. Think of it as an all-expenses-paid holiday in a luxury home. To form a relationship with my son I must have you around. I will buy your time. I need you. He needs me. He needs a man in his life as well as a woman.’ He smiled. ‘How are your football skills?’

  ‘Try me!’ she muttered, hoping he wouldn’t ask her about the off-side rule.

  He gave a lazy smile. ‘I will, when we are in Italy.’ There was a long and significant pause during which her heart bumped jerkily against her ribs and she wondered just what he meant to try. ‘And once Lio and I are totally at ease with one another,’ he said with breathtaking simplicity, ‘you can return to your friends and the country of your birth.’

  Her throat dried again. Quite cold-bloodedly, he was intending to amuse himself with her while she was in Italy and then stick her on a plane when she’d fulfilled her purpose! She couldn’t believe his nerve.

  ‘What do I get out of this?’ she enquired, her eyes hostile.

  ‘Time with Lio. A pampered existence. Perhaps…me.’

  ‘I knew there was a catch,’ she muttered.

  Vittore grinned. ‘In any case, you will take back with you enough money to set yourself up in business.’ He started to walk away. ‘Your choice entirely.’ He threw her a wicked, mocking glance. ‘I’m putting no pressure on you to say “yes”.’

  ‘Pressure?’ she yelled, striding forwards to confront him. ‘I have no choice! You know that! You evil, devious brute, you’re making me leave everything I love—’

  ‘Apart from Lio,’ he pointed out infuriatingly. ‘And it would be only temporary. You’ll return alone in a couple of months or so to your beloved England.’

  Her mouth pruned in. He was wrong. As he’d find out. Lio would never settle. And her nephew would have been dragged away from everything he knew for no benefit at all. The poor kiddie would be in an even worse emotional mess than he was at present. Utterly frustrated, she jammed her fists into her hips as she let off steam.

  ‘It’s a terrible risk, uprooting him! And Lio will need me for some time to come! He needs my love—’

  ‘And mine. Can you deny me that, Verity? Can you deny him?’

  She chewed at her lip. ‘No,’ she mumbled. ‘But would he get it? You have that business of yours to run. What then? You’d win his confidence and then promptly swan off to your business meetings. Do you think he’ll be happy to transfer his affection to a nanny when you leave eac
h day? And can you guarantee that a nanny will love him as I would, and that she’d stay with him till he was old enough not to need her any longer?’

  ‘No,’ he said shortly, his face taut with sudden anxiety.

  ‘Now you see the responsibility you’re taking on!’ she declared heatedly. ‘This is a disturbed child we’re talking about, Vittore! If you’re going to be an absentee father then you might as well leave him here with me! With you, he’d have no stability. You travel the world, I imagine?’

  ‘Yes,’ he clipped.

  ‘So there’d be long periods without you at all. Just him and some frequently changing, substitute mother-figure—’

  ‘I’d take him with me!’

  ‘Around the world? To meetings? I don’t think so. And if you did, you’d end up employing a nanny or use some hotel baby-sitting service. Or get your current mistress to oblige. In any case, you’d disrupt his routine even more. Lio needs routine. He needs security! Your solution is not good enough!’ she declared fiercely.

  ‘Then I’ll stay home. Rearrange my affairs—’

  ‘You’d soon get bored. I won’t let you do this to Lio! It might give you a kick to be a father, but you’re not going to sell the family firm to stay at home with your son, are you? I can’t see you abandoning your career for him!’

  He frowned, his elegant black brows meeting fiercely together. ‘All I know is that he needs to get away from here. I am convinced that this house is half the problem. He watches open doorways anxiously. Jumps when there’s an unexplained noise—’

  ‘Then I’ll move—’

  ‘Yes. To Italy! He needs to be taken away from the memories that he associates with the house. Verity, I’m certain that something happened here. Perhaps he was left alone or felt frightened of someone or something,’ he said firmly. ‘We’ll probably never know. But he’s coming with me tonight and time’s running out and I’m not standing here arguing with you. If you won’t join us, then that’s your decision. I need to move fast if I’m to complete the journey while Lio is asleep.’

  ‘How can you be so stubborn?’ she cried helplessly.