The Flaw in Raffaele's Revenge (Harlequin Presents)

by Annie West

  So that was the deal. A partnership.

  Raffaele hadn’t mentioned that. He didn’t have partners. He delegated day-to-day management of individual enterprises but he was always the final authority.

  Could he change to accommodate a partner?

  More to the point, why would he? The resort was charming. But what made it so attractive he’d change the habit of a career and take a partner to get it?

  ‘Well? Is he here to make a deal?’ Olga’s eagerness was obvious. Maybe she really cared for Bradshaw.

  ‘Raffaele doesn’t inform me of his plans.’

  ‘That one keeps everything close to the chest.’ Olga’s mouth tightened and Lily was consumed with a need to know exactly what had been between Raffaele and the Russian woman. ‘But you must have some idea?’

  Did that wide-eyed look work with men? ‘That’s not something I can discuss. One of my conditions of employment is complete confidentiality.’

  The other woman leaned back, surveying Lily speculatively.

  ‘That’s why you won’t talk. You’re in love with him, aren’t you?’

  ‘Sorry?’ Lily gaped, horrified.

  The blonde looked knowing. ‘You’re so protective, like a mother hen guarding her chick.’ She laughed, the sound grating. ‘As if that one needs your protection.’

  Lily plonked her glass down, every muscle and sinew twanging with shock.

  In love with Raffaele.

  Olga had put into words the fear, the dreadful yearning hope that haunted Lily. She’d told herself it couldn’t be true, but in her heart of hearts she hadn’t been able to deny it.

  ‘You have an excellent imagination to read that from the fact I won’t discuss his business.’ Lily was proud of her even tone.

  ‘It’s not just that. There’s the way your eyes follow him when he’s not looking. You eat him up.’

  Denial stuck in Lily’s throat. Had she made her feelings obvious? Sickening fear rose that maybe Raffaele had seen her stare at him like that. Except Olga had specified ‘when he’s not looking.’

  Lily shrugged. ‘He’s the most attractive man I’ve ever seen. Why wouldn’t I look? But, as for anything else? He’s not my type.’

  ‘Let’s be frank. He’s every woman’s type. You’d have to be blind not to be attracted. And even if you were blind, he knows his way around women. He’s had plenty of practice using those skills to get exactly what he wants.’

  It was on the tip of Lily’s tongue to say Olga wasn’t in any position to throw stones, but she snapped her mouth shut. It was no secret Raffaele’s life was littered with women.

  Lily told herself she was grateful for all that experience. She had no one to compare him with but if she was destined to have just one lover, she’d lucked out with Raffaele. The way he made her feel...

  That was when she realised what it was she read in Olga’s sharp gaze. Jealousy.

  * * *

  ‘Raffaele rejected you, did he?’

  Lily’s words halted Raffa in the doorway.

  He’d left Bradshaw ringing his lawyer since Raffa had given tomorrow as the deadline to agree to his terms. He’d cut the meeting short, not wanting to leave Lily with Olga Antakova. Unease had been a low thrum in his belly all through the meeting.

  What he hadn’t expected was to hear Lily take the Russian head-on.

  ‘Reject me?’ Olga’s tone dripped ice. ‘As if I’d give him the chance. I have more taste than to fall for a man like that.’

  Raffa’s lips twitched. No, Olga hadn’t fallen for him, but she had tried to catch him the best way she could. And been furious when he’d spurned her. She represented everything he despised in the high gloss, low sincerity world he inhabited. Sex, affection, even friendship were tools to get what you wanted. Commodities. The woman was a million light years from Lily.

  ‘A man like what? Raffaele is incredibly attractive.’

  Call him shallow, but hearing Lily’s words felt good. They kept him where he was, just out of sight.

  Raffa was used to the hyperbole of the media, those ‘sexiest man’ tags, and to fawning women. Yet hearing Lily admit her attraction in her trademark husky voice had a surprisingly powerful effect. Despite their passionate affair she’d never verbalised it, except when she gasped his name in ecstasy.

  ‘I prefer a man with more class.’ Olga was giving her best aristocratic impersonation, as if born to diamonds and caviar.

  Raffa took a step forward, ready to make his presence known, but Lily’s words stopped him again.

  ‘Class? If Raffaele doesn’t have that, I don’t know who does. He’s savvy and successful but he’s decent too. And kind. Not every successful businessman can say that.’

  Decent? Kind?

  Raffa had been called many things but never, to his knowledge, either of those. Formidable, driven, impatient—that was his current reputation, if you discounted the usual flummery about his looks. And before that? No, neither word fitted the younger him.

  ‘You’re attracted by his rough around the edges past?’ Olga’s voice was frosty. ‘I prefer a gentleman.’

  ‘By gentleman I assume you mean someone who never had to work for what he’s got?’ Lily’s voice was even but the precise clip to her words gave her away. ‘I’m more impressed by someone who’s worked hard for what he has. I find that admirable.’

  Her words shouldn’t matter. Words had long ago lost any power over him. But Raffa felt his heart bash his rib cage in a double-time rhythm that snared his breath.

  He’d never had anyone defend him.

  Not since Gabriella.

  It made him feel... He couldn’t describe the hot turmoil rising from his belly, clogging his chest and squeezing his throat. Emotion clawed his vitals.

  ‘Oh, Raffa had to work. But not in the way you think.’ Olga’s tone was snide. ‘I met someone who’s sure she came across him when he was young, in Italy. You’d be surprised at—’

  ‘Reminiscing, are you, ladies?’ He strolled onto the veranda, watching Olga start.

  He raised an eyebrow, but she said nothing. She dealt in poison, but wasn’t brave enough for a frontal attack. Particularly since she hoped he would pour money in her lover’s greedy hands.

  He looked at Lily, reading anger in her gleaming eyes and taut frame. Raffa put his hand on her slender shoulder, enjoying the way she instantly eased closer.

  ‘Olga says she knew someone who knew you in Italy.’

  ‘Really?’ He held the Russian’s eyes. ‘What was their name?’

  She snapped her gaze away. ‘No one important. She wasn’t even sure it was you.’

  Raffa said nothing. He’d be surprised if her acquaintance would come out publicly with her memories. Nor would it bother him if she did. He’d done what he had to escape poverty.

  Yet he tasted bile.

  He’d had enough of this place. Dealing with Bradshaw, staying his hand instead of grabbing the man and demanding he admit what he’d done to Gabriella was hard enough. Walking back to find Olga baiting Lily was even worse.

  ‘Ready to go?’ His hand tightened on her shoulder and she lifted her gaze to his.

  ‘Absolutely.’ She turned to the other woman. ‘Goodbye, Olga.’

  He slid his hand from Lily’s shoulder and threaded his fingers through hers as they stepped onto the path.

  She stiffened. ‘You want them to know we’re not just colleagues?’ Lily’s whisper was for his ears alone.

  ‘Does it matter? I’m not ashamed of you, Lily. Or of us.’ Though the thought surfaced that she’d be ashamed of him if she knew his past.

  Lily squeezed his fingers and warmth filled him. She was passionate but outside the bedroom she never touched him.

  Because she preferred privacy?

  Or because she thought he wanted their liaison kept quiet? As if she were some shameful secret.

  It was people like himself and Olga and Bradshaw who should be ashamed! Lily ought to be nothing but proud of herself.
>
  Raffa disengaged his hand from Lily’s and looped his arm around her shoulder, pulling her hard against his side. Her curves slid against him as they walked and once more that sense of rightness as he held her stifled other thoughts.

  A swift turn of her head revealed stunning eyes, brown with an inner glow of amber. A hint of a smile tugged her lips and something in his chest rolled over, as if his heart belly-flopped against his lungs, squeezing the air out.

  Raffa stopped, turning to face her.

  She lifted her chin, eyebrows rising in question as she planted her hands on his chest.

  Deliberately, aware they were in full view of the house, he lowered his head and touched his lips to Lily’s. Her mouth opened, inviting him into a realm of sweet pleasure. Instantly any thought of the outside world, of proving a point, disappeared.

  Only the knowledge there were better places to kiss her made him eventually pull back. Her eyes shone and her husky laugh urged him on as he clasped her hand and turned towards the resort.

  By the time they’d followed the path through the gardens to his bungalow, Lily was breathless and his pulse strummed a quickened beat. Usually he enjoyed the view of the crescent beach and clear waters. Today it didn’t register.

  Digging for his key card, he tugged her to the door. Palm to wood, he pushed the door open and kept moving.

  It was shadowy in the foyer but he read the gleam in Lily’s eyes. Her breasts thrust out with each snatched breath.

  ‘So, you find me incredibly attractive, do you?’ Raffa strove for light-hearted but his voice emerged rough and urgent.

  ‘You know I do.’ Lily stared back. ‘That’s not news. You’ve known that for ages.’

  Not ages. She’d concealed her feelings well behind her prickly exterior. His piccola istrice.

  ‘What are you smiling at?’ Her palms flattened on his chest, reigniting that slow-burning fire.

  ‘Me.’ He covered her hands with his, his smile fading. ‘I can’t believe how much I need you.’ And not just sexually.

  Her words earlier had affected him. Her praise of his character had echoed inside with every step they took back to the villa. Each word swelled inside him, taking up all the available space, clotting his brain, filling him with a pleasure as unfamiliar as it was intoxicating.

  Raffa couldn’t explain it. Didn’t want to. All he wanted was an outlet for this...fullness, this feeling he was about to burst out of his skin. It had to be sexual. There was no other explanation.

  One step and he backed her against the wall. Another and he was between her legs, his thigh pressing up. He watched the convulsive movement of her pale throat as she swallowed.

  Releasing her hands, he cupped her breasts, revelling in the way they fitted his palms. Seconds later she was groaning, her head lolling against the wall as he rolled her nipples between his fingers.

  Raffa bent to scrape his teeth along her bare flesh where her shoulder curved up to that delectable slender neck. Another groan and she slumped into him, hands on his shoulders for support.

  Teeth gritted in a feral smile, Raffa tugged at her dress, lifting it, yanking at her panties till they ripped and fell, leaving him in possession of downy softness. His fingers probed, finding liquid heat as her thighs clamped tight around him.

  Urgent now, his need a compulsion he hadn’t a hope of taming, he reefed at his trousers, wrenching them open, shoving fabric away till he was unencumbered, fully aroused and sliding against slick, delicate folds.

  There. He grabbed her thigh and hooked it over his hip. Just...there and—

  ‘Condom.’

  At first Raffa didn’t register the wisp of sound. Not till she said it again, a hoarse gasp that made him shudder into stillness just as he began a long, slow thrust into Paradise.

  Heat surrounded him. Lush softness. Their laboured breathing. And within him that urgency, unlike anything he’d known, to possess, to claim, to brand Lily as his.

  Air sawed from his burning lungs then in again as he managed shallow gasps.

  He fought for control. His brain ordered him to withdraw, take the precautions he always did, protect them both. But his body was in full-scale mutiny. It wanted completion, now. Not just completion but to claim Lily rough and hard and completely.

  Raffa winced as, finally, he withdrew. The sense of loss was so keen it knifed like a blade through his belly.

  Dragging in oxygen, he bent and fumbled for his trousers. His hand met Lily’s, already in his pocket.

  ‘Here.’ She pressed the packet into his hand.

  Her eyes were like gems, he realised. Faceted, gleaming gems, with shards of honey-brown fire.

  ‘Quickly.’

  He didn’t need encouragement, was already ripping it open with his teeth, extracting the condom and rolling it on.

  Lily sighed as he grabbed her hips and plunged inside. Heat met heat and desire coiled tight. He tried to give himself time by focusing on her, watching her eyes flicker half closed and her ripe lips part. She keened his name in that raw, beautiful voice he knew he was the only man ever to hear and that was all it took to drag him over the edge. Raffa thrust hard and shuddered, desperate to capture that pinnacle and take her with him.

  Or perhaps she took him, the waves of her climax breaking around him with the force of an ocean surge.

  How long they stayed there, sagging against the wall, Raffa didn’t know. It seemed hours before he had the strength to carry her to bed, collapsing with her in a tangle of slick, spent bodies.

  Never had release been so cataclysmic.

  Never once had he come near to forgetting protection.

  Lily Nolan affected him as no woman ever had. Raffa realised that for the first time a woman had real power over him. Albeit a power she didn’t realise she wielded.

  He wanted to spurn the idea, tell himself it was impossible. Yet as sleep claimed him he gathered her close, revelling in the way she clung to him, and smiled.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  HOW HAD HE ever thought Lily ordinary? Her eyes glowed and the late-afternoon light turned her sun-kissed hair to bronze. They lay side by side on the sand, spent from sex and swimming. The small beach he’d discovered beyond the resort was deserted and they’d made it theirs.

  It was hard to believe just a few hours ago they’d been at Bradshaw’s house. This felt a world away from his polluted presence.

  ‘Olga called you Raffa. Were you close?’ The sharpness in Lily’s question took him by surprise. As did the realisation Lily had never once called him by the diminutive. Yet the way she said his name felt uniquely intimate.

  ‘No. Never.’ He covered her hand, hating the idea of Lily believing he’d been with the Russian. ‘I met her on a photo shoot. Later she invited herself into my limo and tried to seduce me.’

  Lily gaped and he had to repress a smile. ‘You’re not joking, are you?’

  He shook his head.

  ‘I suppose women throw themselves at you all the time.’ What was she thinking? Even now sometimes, he found her hard to read.

  ‘It’s not always about me. Most of them want the lifestyle. Olga wanted money, not me.’

  Lily nodded as she stroked a line from his damp collarbone down his chest. Her lips turned up in a smile that loosened something inside him. ‘At least I’m upfront. You know I want your body.’

  ‘Then we’re equal,’ he growled, drawing his hand over her breast, feeling that tug of satisfaction as her breath caught and her eyes dilated. She looked like a sea nymph, temptation for any man.

  Desire stirred. But it didn’t diminish that other sensation, the one he’d felt when they came back from Bradshaw’s house. That strange fullness, as if just looking at Lily created feelings that crammed him to the brim.

  Sex hadn’t shifted it. Instead it had settled deep inside him, bone-deep. Raffa frowned, moving his hand down to clasp the curve of her waist.

  ‘What’s wrong?’ She cupped his jaw, her brow crinkling with concern. Unlike ot
her women, Lily really cared about him. It was distracting, disturbing. And it felt frighteningly good.

  No one had cared about him since Gabriella. He found it hard to accept. He and Gabriella had been close as blood could make them. They’d clung to each other after their mother died, fighting the odds to stay together.

  ‘Nothing.’

  Wide eyes surveyed him. He could almost hear that analytical brain of hers whirring into gear. ‘Was it something Olga said? About the work you used to do?’

  If only it were that simple. ‘Raffaele?’ Lily leaned close and he inhaled the scent of sweet pears, saltwater and warm woman. The combination went to his head, the look in her eyes exacerbating that sensation of fullness, as if a king tide rose within him. ‘What work did you do in Italy?’

  Raffa hesitated, torn between a lifetime of keeping secrets and the compulsion to trust someone as he hadn’t trusted since he was twelve. He’d felt unsettled, not himself, ever since taking Lily to visit Bradshaw.

  Finally she dropped her gaze, and her hand. ‘It’s probably time we went back—’

  ‘I had sex with women for money.’

  The words throbbed into echoing silence, broken only by the soft shush of a wave and the squawk of a seabird.

  Lily’s head jerked up. ‘No wonder you’re so good at it.’ She stopped, eyes widening as if shocked at her words rather than his. ‘You must have made a fortune.’

  Lily’s response was so unexpected he almost laughed. Except memories of those days were too bitter. ‘Hardly a fortune. But enough to feed and clothe me and get me out of the slums.’ He had to push out each word. This was something he’d never spoken of.

  ‘I can’t imagine real poverty.’

  Raffa swallowed what he was going to say, that poverty could make you do terrible things, things you regretted.

  ‘You don’t mind?’ He couldn’t read her thoughts but nor could he see revulsion in her features. Then he realised what he’d asked. Was he seeking Lily’s approval? His brow knotted.

  ‘It’s in the past. I have no right to mind.’

  Yet Raffa found himself wanting—what? Absolution? Understanding? It didn’t make sense.