by Lucy Gordon;Sarah Morgan;Robyn Donald;Lucy Monroe;Lee Wilkinson;Kate Walker
‘I did not bet on the conquest of anyone!’
Vincenzo’s voice hadn’t lifted above conversational level, but there was a vicious savagery in his tone, a violence only barely controlled that made his response more frightening than if he had actually yelled at her.
But Amy was past caring.
‘No, you had more confidence in your own seduction technique than that. You knew you wouldn’t have to conquer anyone—just turn on the famed Ravenelli charm and the poor gullible fool would fall flat at your feet. But I’ll bet the one thing you hadn’t bargained on was that I would hold out for marriage. That must have given you pause, made you think. Was it worth it, Cenzo?’
Deliberately she used the old affectionate term, lacing it with burning acid, and she felt a glow of triumph as she saw his proud head go back sharply and knew that her barb had hit its mark.
‘You said you’d give the world—do anything you could to get it back. But was it worth tying yourself in marriage to a woman you didn’t love, a woman who hates you, in order to regain your precious ruby ring?’
‘If you want to know the truth, then no, it wasn’t,’ he stated flatly.
Well, she’d asked for it. So she had no right to complain if his words were like a stab of ice in her heart, tearing at the already wounded tissues.
‘But I’m forced to wonder,’ Vincenzo continued savagely, ‘whether you’d recognise the truth if you heard it.’
‘You once told me…’
‘That I never lie,’ he finished for her when she couldn’t complete the sentence. ‘And I never have.’
‘You…’
But her voice failed her once again. She couldn’t accuse him of lying to her by declaring that he loved her, because she had to admit that he had never, ever, claimed such a thing. Even when he had asked her to marry him, he had only said that he wanted her more than any other woman, that he hungered for her physically, and that was something she had always known, and still knew to be the truth.
It was Amy herself who, blinded by her own feeling, had taken that declaration to mean something else. She had believed that by ‘wanting’ he had meant loving, and so her whole world had collapsed in on her when she had found out just how wrong she had been.
‘Can your beloved David say as much?’ Vincenzo questioned softly, a deadly menace in his tone making her skin crawl with nerves. ‘Or can you?’
Amy had had enough.
‘Oh, leave me alone! Go away and leave me in peace, can’t you?’
She made a move to shut the door, only to have it forestalled by Vincenzo’s quick response, the way his hand came out to block the action, one elegantly booted foot being planted firmly in the doorway, keeping it open.
‘Oh, no, you don’t, carissima!’ he declared. ‘You slammed a door in my face once. I do not intend to let you repeat the insult. Besides, if you run now, you will miss out on hearing the good news I have for you.’
That stopped Amy’s impetus towards angry reaction, stilling her hand on the door and leaving her standing staring in amazement.
‘Good news?’ she stammered in disbelief. ‘What good news?’
Had something happened overnight? Something she was unaware of? Could Vincenzo possibly have changed his mind?
No, she couldn’t let herself think that. She didn’t dare even to hope for it. When Vincenzo made up his mind it usually stayed made up. And he had been so determined to make her suffer last night.
‘I’ve been thinking.’
Nothing in Vincenzo’s face gave any indication of the way this was leading, so that Amy felt as if she was groping desperately in the dark.
‘And?’ she prompted nervously when his pause dragged on, stretching her nerves to screaming pitch.
‘And I have reconsidered slightly.’
Reconsidered. Amy’s heart leapt in sudden excitement. Could it be that after all he was prepared to co-operate?
‘You’ll agree to a divorce?’
‘I’m not saying that.’
Releasing his hold on the door, he straightened up slowly, flexing his shoulders before waving an autocratic hand to take in her belongings scattered around the blue and cream bedroom.
‘Get packed. You’re going home.’
‘Home?’ Amy echoed, shocked by his dismissive tone and totally at a loss as to where this conversation was going. ‘But…’
‘Go home,’ Vincenzo repeated, ‘and I will follow you in a few days time. I will meet your darling David…’
‘No!’ Amy protested wildly, her heart quailing inside her just at the thought of her subterfuge being blown wide open. ‘You can’t do that! You mustn’t!’
Vincenzo shrugged off her interjection, strolling into the room and throwing himself into a chair, leaning back in it, long legs crossed at the ankles, bronze-skinned hands steepled underneath his firm jaw.
‘I want to see this David for myself. Learn more about him. Where did you first encounter him, for example?’
‘I—I work for him, as his secretary.’ She gave the information reluctantly. ‘He runs a building firm in Charnham.’
‘I see.’
It was like watching a computer at work, taking in the facts, sorting through them, filing them away for future reference. And it made the nerves in her stomach twist painfully, wondering just what use he might put them to.
‘Vincenzo…’
She forced herself to walk towards him, keeping a tight grip on herself to ensure that her legs were steady, her face expressionless.
‘Why, exactly, do you want to see David?’
‘Isn’t it obvious? I want to see what he can offer you; how he feels about you. If he is the right man for you, if he can really give you more than I can, then I will stand aside. I will sign the papers, give you a divorce.’
‘You will!’ Amy couldn’t believe what she was hearing. ‘Do you mean this? Really mean it?’
A slight inclination of his dark head indicated agreement, Vincenzo’s black eyes hooded and inscrutable.
‘But only if he is the right man.’
For the first time, an edge of unease crept into Amy’s newfound delight.
‘And if he’s not?’
A cutting gesture of one elegant hand made it only too plain what was in Vincenzo’s mind.
‘No divorce. Ever.’
‘But…’ Amy began, but Vincenzo got to his feet again, indicating that in his opinion, the conversation was at an end.
‘Pack your things,’ he commanded. ‘Go home. I will come to you.’
‘But what if David finds out who you are? What will I tell him?’
Polished jet eyes bored into her face with the fierce power of a laser beam, seeming to reach right into her soul and read what was on it.
‘You have already told him I am someone you met in Venice. It would probably be best to stick to that. You can leave the rest to me. Our true relationship will be our own little secret, one that no one need find out about unless I decide otherwise.’
Chapter Nine
ANOTHER day and still no message from Vincenzo.
Amy sighed as she pushed a sheaf of papers into a folder in the filing cabinet and then slammed the drawer shut with a resounding clang.
The waiting was the worst. Surely even having Vincenzo here, in person, watching everything she did couldn’t be as bad as this not knowing. At least then she would understand exactly what she was dealing with, while this…
The next sigh was deeper, her blue eyes clouded, hands pushed into the pockets of her tailored navy dress, as she stared out of the window at the hills and streets of the small northern English town, so different from the sunlit elegance of Venice. This felt unnervingly like waiting for the executioner’s axe to fall, never quite knowing when the blow would come.
It was two weeks since she had last seen Vincenzo. Two weeks in which she hadn’t heard a thing. Not a phone call, an e-mail, not even a postcard. He might as well have vanished into the ether for all the communication
she had had with him. If this went on much longer, she was going to have to break her self-imposed rule of not contacting him herself. Her nerves were shot to ribbons as it was. Any further delay and she felt she would crack altogether.
The sound of footsteps coming down the corridor, a familiar voice, sent Amy hurrying to her desk. It wouldn’t do for David to find her daydreaming like this. He had already noted her increasingly abstracted moods ever since her return from Italy. Any more and she was sure he was going to start asking questions she would find it extremely difficult to answer.
‘I think we’ll find her in here,’ she heard David saying as she hastily brought up a file at random on her computer screen. ‘She won’t be expecting to see you.’
Expecting to see who? She was sure that the office diary was empty, and she had made no personal appointments for this afternoon. Work time was for work, and she always kept scrupulously to that.
‘Ah, there you are!’
David’s greeting brought her eyes to him just as he came through the door, a broad smile on his narrow face under the slightly thinning fair hair.
‘I have a surprise for you.’
‘Surprise?’
Amy had just time to form the question, a faint frown drawing her brows together, before he moved completely into the room and his place in the doorway was taken by another man.
A taller, darker, broader man. A man whose steel grey suit and immaculate white shirt shrieked—no, murmured—of perfect designer elegance and the money to buy it. A man whose coal-black hair and eyes had haunted her dreams by night and her thoughts by day until she was thoroughly distracted and limp as an over-washed dishcloth. A man whose appearance she had both longed for and dreaded fearfully over the past fourteen days.
‘Buon giorno, Amy.’
‘S-signor Ravenelli…’
It took an effort to make her voice work, and even when she managed to get the greeting out she still sounded like someone whose voice was rusty as a result of a bad cold and a very sore throat indeed.
Who did he think he was, strolling in here as if he owned the place? In the frankly uninspired beige and brown surroundings of her office, his height and colouring, the sleek styling of his clothes, looked both sophisticated and exotic. Too showy, too expensive, Amy told herself. Just too damn much, altogether.
‘I wasn’t expecting to see you…’ she continued inanely, earning herself a small, wicked grin and a black eyebrow lifted just a fraction in mocking acknowledgement of her obvious consternation.
She could only be thankful that Vincenzo was still standing slightly behind David so that the other man could see nothing of his expression or the taunting gleam in the deep, onyx eyes.
‘You didn’t tell me that Signor Ravenelli was planning on investing in premises in Britain.’
David’s reproof was mild, but it was a reproach all the same. And Amy thought she could guess why. Given his admiration of Vincenzo’s business acumen and success, an admiration that he had expressed on more than one occasion since her return, she knew that he would have been delighted to think that he would have an opportunity to meet the Italian. And he would have much preferred to have had an opportunity to prepare for it.
As she would have done, Amy reflected with a fulminating glare slanted in Vincenzo’s direction.
A glare that he deflected with an easy smile, seeming to direct its force right back at her as he murmured smoothly, ‘I didn’t tell Amy anything about it. In fact, I didn’t make up my mind until a couple of days ago. But when I did, it seemed logical that I should get in touch with her again. She’d told me that she worked for a building firm, and naturally I shall need to employ someone to adapt the premises I acquire to fit my requirements.’
‘Naturally.’
Amy heard David’s smiling agreement with an uneasy mixture of relief and horror. Clever, clever Vincenzo! He had somehow sussed out the fact that David’s business was central to his life. To suggest using that company, adding to its profits, was guaranteed to win his approval, his co-operation in any matter he chose to raise.
‘We didn’t actually arrange any exact date, did we, Amy? It was simply an understanding that when I was next in England I would call and say hello if I had the time.’
‘It—it was a very fluid arrangement,’ Amy managed, regaining some control over thoughts that Vincenzo’s unexpected appearance had thrown into total chaos. ‘Nothing definite. Just if he happened to be passing.’
That devilish grin grew wider, quirking the beautiful mouth up at one corner as, realising her own mistake, Amy bit down hard on her own lower lip, silently cursing her foolishness. The likelihood of anyone ‘just passing’ Charnham, one of the smallest towns in this part of West Yorkshire, was so far-fetched as to be downright farcical. No one made a detour here unless they had a particular reason to do so.
‘Would you like coffee?’ she managed, wincing at the sound of her own voice, the brittle gaiety she projected that was so obviously artificial and forced.
‘That would be good.’ Thankfully she heard Vincenzo follow her lead. ‘It’s been quite a drive from the airport.’
Amy was relieved to escape from the room to fetch water for the filter machine. It gave her the opportunity to draw in several deep, much-needed, calming breaths of air and run her wrists under the cold tap in an effort to control her racing pulse.
No wonder Vincenzo had delayed his arrival for the past fortnight. He must have had to hunt around to find the address of David’s office in the first place. She was sure she’d never given him anything more than the minimum of basic information when she was in Italy. She was lucky that David’s inbuilt admiration for anyone who made a fortune in business as Vincenzo had, would probably keep his conversation to the matter of work and contracts or investment. That way, hopefully they would avoid any awkward questions.
But even so she didn’t dare to leave them alone together for too long. Vincenzo’s declaration that, ‘I never, ever lie,’ now seemed like a warning that, if challenged, he would reveal everything to David and to hell with the consequences.
Heart thudding frantically, her mind a whirl of apprehension, Amy hurried back to the office, suddenly fearful of what might have happened in her absence.
Her worst fears were confirmed when she pushed open the door to hear David saying casually, ‘And so where are you staying? Briar Court, I presume—or perhaps that new five-star place out of town?’
‘Neither of those,’ Vincenzo returned easily enough, but something about his tone, a bubbling undercurrent of dark amusement gave a hint of warning, setting all the tiny hairs on the back of Amy’s neck quivering in tension like the response of a nervous cat. ‘Didn’t Amy tell you?’
The filter jug of water slid awkwardly in Amy’s suddenly nerveless grasp, landing on the hot plate with a distinct crash. With an effort she controlled her instinctive impulse to whirl round in panic and confront him openly.
‘Didn’t I tell him what?’ she managed, staring fixedly at the wall as she struggled to control her breathing.
‘About our arrangement.’
The cruel amusement had definitely intensified now, though Amy was sure that it was only her own senses, already on overdrive where Vincenzo was concerned, that picked it up. David seemed stolidly unaware of any undercurrents, only curious to know about the subject under discussion.
‘And what arrangement is that?’ he asked now.
‘Shall I explain, Amy, or will you?’ Vincenzo’s question had just the right degree of courtesy, of apparent consideration for her feelings.
Somehow managing to find the control to delay until she had flicked the switch to start the coffee bubbling, Amy turned slowly to face Vincenzo again, her chin coming up, her eyes widening as she silently defied him to do his worst. She didn’t know what was in that coolly calculating mind, but she was pretty sure she was about to find out.
‘Why don’t you tell him?’ she murmured with a sweetness so blatantly false that sh
e was surprised to find that drops of acid didn’t fall onto the carpet and eat it away at her feet. ‘Since you can obviously explain it more clearly than I could.’
A tiny flicker of a smile, the faintest inclination of his glossy dark head acknowledged admiration for her unspoken challenge. But that did nothing to ease the uncomfortably ragged beat of her pulse, the sudden dryness of her mouth as she waited for him to elaborate on just what he had in mind.
‘It’s like this…’
Vincenzo turned his attention to David, his tone altering, sliding into an affable, relaxed, man-to-man tone, his smile calculated to convince the other man that he had nothing underhand in mind.
‘When I told Amy that I was coming to England for a couple of months, I also told her how much I detest living in hotels. Even the very best of them have an institutional nature, an impersonal approach that means I can’t fully relax at the end of a long working day. Then there’s the fact that, staying in an hotel, you get no chance to learn how the people in the country you’re visiting really live. What their homes are like, their lives, their interests…’
Their homes. As the words sank in ominously, Amy shifted nervously from one foot to another, biting down hard on her lower lip in a frantic attempt to hold back the cry of protest that almost escaped her. She had the disturbing feeling that she knew exactly where this conversation was going, and she didn’t like it one bit. But to object now, with Vincenzo fully launched on his wickedly plausible explanation, would only make matters worse, adding fuel to the fire of David’s suspicions just when she wanted to extinguish them.
‘So when we discovered that by a remarkable coincidence my business in England would probably bring me here, to Charnham, to Amy’s home town, she offered me the perfect solution.’
Remarkable coincidence, indeed! Amy thought privately, hating the gleam in Vincenzo’s eyes.
‘As you know, my flat has a spare room standing empty…’ she broke in sharply, taking control of the conversation herself.
Vincenzo might have the upper hand at the moment, but that didn’t mean she had to let him have everything his own way. At least if she took the initiative she would prove that she wasn’t just some sort of a carpet that he could trample all over, wiping the soles of his polished, handmade boots on her whenever he felt like it.
