‘Thank you.’
‘Don’t mention it,’ he said gravely, and then smiled. ‘You want to stay here, or do you want to go out and eat?’
‘It’s too late, surely?’ she protested.
‘They eat very late in Spain. Didn’t you know?’
‘I don’t know if I can be bothered to get dressed.’ She yawned, unwilling to leave this room, to shatter the curious air of intimacy which had somehow evolved between them.
‘Then I can ring down for Room Service?’
‘Mmm. That sounds better.’
She feasted her eyes on him as he walked naked across the room to the telephone, and heard him issue a number of requests in what sounded—to her untutored ears—like fluent Spanish.
When he turned around he saw her watching him, her eyes alive and on fire, and then saw her face close, as if she was keeping something secret from him. For a man brought up in a culture where secrecy was second nature, it was oddly disconcerting.
‘You’re happy?’ he asked suddenly.
‘Of course.’ She drew in a deep breath and looked at him. She had to know. ‘Did you…did you…see Anna?’
He turned away, but not before she had seen the dark look of regret which haunted his eyes, and it stabbed straight through her heart.
‘Isn’t this a rather strange time to ask me a question like that?’ he returned in a harsh, cruel voice.
She had to know where she stood. She had to. ‘Did you?’ she persisted.
‘Yes. Yes, of course I did.’ There had been two tense, fraught meetings before Anna had realised that the clock could not be put back. He had told her sincerely that he wanted her to find happiness with someone who deserved her quiet devotion. She had told him to go to hell and somehow that had made him feel better.
‘How is she?’
He turned back again. ‘Do you really care?’ he demanded.
‘Of course I care! Do you think I feel good about what happened?’
‘I feel a lot worse about it than you do, cara, let me assure you.’ He gave a short laugh. ‘The last I heard, she had cut her hair and was flying to stay with her sister in Rome, who is promising to give her the time of her life.’
Still, there was something else she needed to know. ‘So there is no chance of a reconciliation?’
‘Kate,’ he said dangerously, ‘if this was troubling you then should you not have asked me before you agreed to come out here?’
‘I suppose so—’
‘But you didn’t?’
‘No.’ She bit her lip as she recognised the truth, that she had wanted to see him to the exclusion of all else—of pride…even of common decency.
He shook his head as if in quiet disbelief. ‘Did you really imagine that I would betray her for a second time with you?’
‘Is that all I am to you?’ she said bitterly. ‘A betrayal?’
In a sense, yes, she was, but she was more than that. His reaction to her had illuminated the fact that he did not have the steely control he had once thought defined his character. She was his weakness, too.
‘Would you be here tonight if I thought that?’ he grated.
‘It might have been easier if you had found yourself a different bed-partner,’ she said stiffly. ‘Someone who didn’t have such tainted associations as I clearly do.’
‘But I didn’t want another bed-partner. I wanted you.’ His eyes were luminously blue as he came to sit on the edge of the bed, his finger ruefully tracing the tremble of her mouth. ‘I wanted to see you again,’ he said starkly. ‘I had to see you again.’
But she thought that he made her sound like an addiction he couldn’t wait to be rid of. ‘Can I have a drink now, please?’ she asked him as a diversion.
‘You can have anything you want,’ he smiled.
Except his heart.
‘Magara mia,’ he whispered.
‘What’s that?’ she whispered back.
There was more regret in his face as he shrugged. ‘My witch.’
But witches could work magic, and there was no spell she could put on Giovanni to make him love her as she loved him. Lucy had been right all along, Kate realised. Because from unconventional beginnings had grown a feeling which now consumed her.
He gave her a robe to wear, and put one on himself, and then opened champagne just as the food arrived—tiny little tapas which he laid out on a table overlooking the glittering city.
Kate forced herself to forget her useless longings, to enjoy the view and the food and the man who sat before her, enchanting her with little looks of longing as he fed her morsels of delicious food with his fingers.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
KATE had rarely felt so nervous as she dressed for dinner the following evening—and her nerves were compounded when she emerged in her towelling robe from the shower to have Giovanni casually drop a large, flat beribboned box onto the still-rumpled bed.
‘What’s that?’ she asked him.
His eyes glittered. ‘Why not open it, and see?’
Beneath the layers of tissue paper lay the most beautiful lingerie she had ever seen—silver silk-satin and filigree lace. Bra. Camiknickers—and a wisp of a garter belt. Kate swallowed as she pulled each delicate item out of the box. ‘It’s…’
He heard the strained quality in her voice, and frowned. ‘You don’t like it?’
‘How could I not like it?’ she questioned shakily. ‘It’s utterly beautiful.’
But her reaction had not been the delight he had anticipated. ‘Will you wear it tonight, cara?’ he instructed silkily. ‘For me?’
She slid the garments onto her still-damp skin, aware that his eyes were devouring every trembling movement she made. The silk felt unbelievably light and delicious as it clung fluidly to every curve, but she couldn’t rid herself of an unreasonable sensation of disappointment.
Because as he himself had pointed out the fripperies were such a typical gift of a man to his mistress that she felt almost as if she was being stereotyped by the man who had once accused her of the same thing. And now she was being cast into a one-dimensional role from which there could be no escape.
She forced herself to smile as she turned slowly for her captive audience. ‘How’s that?’
A pulse beat deep within his groin, and he wished that he could cancel the dinner. ‘Exquisite,’ he murmured throatily. ‘It seems a pity that you have to cover them up.’
‘You mean that you’d like other men to see me like this?’ she demanded wildly.
Jealousy—hot and dark and potent—flooded over his skin. ‘They are for my eyes only,’ he told her dangerously, but something in the reproachful tremble of her lips made him adjust his tone. ‘Just the image of you wearing them will sustain me through dinner, and I will imagine myself removing them later,’ he promised.
She wore one of her new dresses—a deceptively simple robe, cut on the bias, which skimmed the floor. Its plain, almost stark cream colour provided the perfect foil to the living fire of her hair, which she clipped back at the sides and let tumble to her waist.
He murmured his approval as she stood in front of him.
And Giovanni looked exquisite, too—in the beautifully cut black dinner suit and a snowy silk shirt. Formality suited him, she thought, but then, in a way, he was almost old-fashionedly formal in his outlook.
His behaviour towards her, as his mistress, was exemplary. He had flown her to a beautiful city and bought her fine underwear. He was the most skilled and considerate lover, and now he was taking her out to a fancy restaurant to meet business colleagues of his.
If only there could have been a little more warmth in his attitude towards her—but warmth implied emotion, didn’t it, and there was precious little where he was concerned? Which made it imperative that she keep her own feelings hidden.
The restaurant was crowded and had the lively buzz of success about it. The others were already seated and Giovanni introduced her to Xavier and Juan, and Juan’s wife, Rosa.
&n
bsp; Very Spanish, with their dark, flashing-eyed looks, Kate thought that both men were attractive, but Xavier especially so. His eyes narrowed appreciatively as she walked in at Giovanni’s side, and he made a great play of bending to kiss her fingertips in an impossibly chivalrous manner.
‘Giovanni did not tell me that you would be quite so beautiful,’ he murmured in perfect English.
Giovanni took Kate’s hand to his lips and let it linger there in an action which was decidedly possessive. ‘And I did not tell Kate that you were quite so presumptuous! Be careful, cara—Xavier has quite a reputation with women!’
Kate laughed, enjoying his territorial display. ‘I’ll heed your warning,’ she told him.
Rosa was not so forthcoming, and her polite smile at Kate was undoubtedly iced with frost, though Kate doubted whether any of the men had noticed.
They drank expensive wine and ordered food, and Rosa subjected her to a gentle little grilling, which to the outside world must have sounded like genuine interest. But the look in her brown eyes told a different story.
‘You have known Giovanni long, Kate?’ she asked quietly.
How to answer this? She had known him for about three and a half months, but the reality boiled down to about fifteen hot and steamy days. Kate turned her eyes desperately to Giovanni for assistance.
‘We met at my godmother’s house, back in July,’ he said smoothly.
‘Oh!’ Rosa’s plucked eyebrows shot upwards in two delicate arcs. ‘You are a friend of Giovanni’s godmother?’
Don’t let her intimidate you, thought Kate. ‘Our relationship is a working one,’ she said staunchly. ‘You work for her?’ quizzed Rosa.
She was making her sound like Lady St John’s cleaner, thought Kate indignantly. ‘In a sense. I decorate her homes for her.’ She smiled, with an effort.
‘Oh!’ said Rosa again, and curved her lips into a smug, little smile.
The fish course was brought, and Kate felt as if she were ploughing through sawdust, but she finished most of it, washed down with the occasional mouthful of white Rioja.
Across the table, Giovanni watched her. Outwardly, she was completely at ease in the luxurious surroundings, and her table-manners were a delight to observe, and yet she seemed unaccountably nervous, and he wondered why.
Surely the sight of Xavier looking as though he would like to devour her for courses one, two, three and four was not making her look almost self-conscious—a quality he had never associated with Kate. He sent Xavier a searing look, and this was interpreted with a rueful shrug.
Before the dessert, Kate got up to use the powder room, and Rosa got to her feet at the same time.
‘Let’s go together,’ she said prettily. ‘And then the men can talk about us while we’re away!’
‘We’ll be talking football, I can assure you,’ said Giovanni mockingly.
In the powder room, all pretence slid away as Rosa turned to Kate, an undisguised look of hostility on her face.
‘So,’ she observed slowly, ‘you are the woman responsible for the breaking up of Anna and Giovanni’s engagement.’
The mention of Anna’s name made Kate’s cheeks flush hot and she thought that it must look like an admission of guilt. ‘You know Anna, do you?’
‘But of course.’ Rosa shrugged. ‘She and Giovanni were together for such a long time—’
‘How long?’ asked Kate, without thinking about the folly of asking such a question.
‘You don’t know?’ The smile grew superior. ‘No, I suppose you wouldn’t. Well, my dear, they were together for eight years.’
Kate felt all the blood drain from her face and had to grip onto the handbasin to stop herself swaying. Eight years! That long!
‘You do look guilty,’ observed Rosa, her soft tone unable to disguise the barb in her voice. ‘I expect that I would feel exactly the same—but then I can never imagine doing what you have done to another woman.’
Kate wanted to cry out and defend herself. To tell this woman that she had not known of Anna’s existence. That Giovanni had not told her. But something stopped her—and she wasn’t sure whether it was loyalty to Giovanni, or a sinking worry about whether she would have behaved differently even if she had known about Anna.
Instead, she fixed a bland smile onto her lips. ‘I think we’d better get back now, don’t you—or the men will wonder where we are?’
Somehow she got through the rest of the meal without letting her smile slip, aware that Giovanni was watching her closely.
And once they were back in the car he didn’t start the engine, just turned to look at her. ‘What is the matter with you?’ he demanded. ‘You’ve been acting strangely all evening!’
She wasn’t going to blab. She pretended to search in her handbag for a tissue she didn’t really want. ‘Nothing.’
‘Yes, there is something,’ he contradicted. ‘Look at me! Something was wrong tonight, Kate, and I demand to know what it is!’
She looked up and glared at him. ‘You lay no claim on me! You cannot demand anything of me, Giovanni!’ she told him proudly. ‘Nothing!’
He almost smiled at her defiance, but he remained resolute. ‘Was something said?’
Kate sighed, recognising a persistence and a determination about his character which was very similar to her own. Giovanni would push and push and push until she gave him the answers he required. Better, she supposed, to give in gracefully now, rather than ruin the rest of their last precious night together.
She stared out at the night. ‘Rosa spoke of Anna—’
An abrasive word was torn from his lips. ‘She had no right! It is not her business!’ he snarled, and then his voice grew softer. ‘What did she say?’
Kate shifted uncomfortably in her car-seat. ‘It doesn’t matter.’
‘Kate,’ he said, on a dark note of warning, and she stared unhappily into his glittering eyes. ‘It matters.’
‘I had no idea that you had been together for so long!’ she said despairingly. ‘Eight years! That somehow makes it all the worse!’
Her pain affected him more than it had any right to. ‘It is the custom in Sicily,’ he told her gently, ‘for engagements to be long ones.’ His face altered into a grim mask. ‘I will speak to Rosa,’ he said in a voice of deadly venom.
‘No, Giovanni! You mustn’t!’
‘Mustn’t?’ he repeated imperiously, as if he had never been forbidden to do something by a woman in his life. ‘Don’t forget, you lay no claim on me either, Kate.’
‘But what point is there in saying anything—it’ll only cause trouble?’ she asked him urgently. ‘You’ve known Rosa and her husband for years and years—you can’t fall out, just because of me!’
‘Thank you for your consideration, Kate,’ he said implacably. ‘But I will say a few quiet words. Don’t worry, cara mia,’ he tilted her face upwards and coaxed a smile, ‘we will not fall out.’ He wasn’t going to tell Kate that Rosa was probably jealous of her, and that the wife of one of his oldest associates had been giving him the come-on for the past year. Giovanni’s mouth hardened. It was time he warned her off.
‘Kate?’
‘What?’
He bent his head forward and planted a soft kiss on her lips, smiling as he watched her eyes flutter helplessly to a close. ‘Let’s make the most of our last few hours in Barcelona,’ he whispered urgently. And he wasn’t talking sightseeing.
He drove as if demons were at his heels, and, back in the hotel room, he stripped her clothes from her body with such slow, sensuous care that she wanted to beg him to hurry up.
But the waiting and the anticipation more than compensated for her mounting need for him, and only when she was lying in the beautiful silver undergarments on the bed did he remove his own clothes and come to lie on top of her.
She saw the look of dark hunger on his face and gestured to the camiknickers she still wore, a question in her eyes.
‘I want to leave them on,’ he whispered. ‘I want to do
this.’ And he pushed aside the panel which shielded the very core of her femininity, his finger coming away coated with the syrup of her longing and he groaned and positioned himself and thrust into her long and slow and deep.
The sensation of the silk still against her skin, and then the silk of him inside her skin was almost too much too bear, and frantically she clung to him as he kissed her, and rocked her with the oldest rhythm of all.
And then it was too late, it was happening all over again, and this time she had to concentrate very hard to keep her emotions in check.
Because this time she was determined not to cry.
Kate felt subdued as she stood close to the departure lounge, but she hoped that she achieved the right kind of grown-up expression. The kind of look which would tell him that she had enjoyed herself—though she guessed he must have known that. A look which would tell him she had no expectations about the future.
She wondered what he would say. Just a goodbye, and then a brief, poignant kiss, maybe?
Giovanni looked down into eyes as green as the cypress trees which dotted the hills around the place of his birth, and touched his mouth to hers.
‘So did you enjoy your visit to Barcelona, Kate?’ he murmured.
To be honest, they could have been in any city in the world, for all the sightseeing they had done, but then sightseeing hadn’t been number one on their agenda. She knew that and he knew that.
She nodded, and smiled, her smile masking the thought that this might be the last time she would ever see him. ‘You know I did.’
‘Mmm. I thought so, magara mia!’
‘I am not your witch!’
His eyes narrowed. ‘Your Sicilian is improving by the day!’
Her flight announcement was called for the second time, and he swore softly beneath his breath. Had two days really passed with such indecent speed?
‘Giovanni, I really must go—’
He halted her with a forefinger placed softly over her lips. ‘Listen, I’m going to Roma in a few weeks’ time. Would you like to come and join me there?’
Her heart leapt, even while she registered how casually he broached the question. She pretended to give the question careful consideration, determined not to seem too eager.
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