The Italian's Revenge

by Michelle Reid

  ‘Now he is trying to use his charm on me to get him out of trouble,’ Luisa confided to a smiling Catherine. ‘It was always the same, even when he was as small as Santino.’

  But she did look beautiful. A beautiful person dressed in shimmering gold satin who, two hours later, was wearing the soft flush of pleasure from the wealth of compliments that had flooded her way about her looking not a day over forty.

  ‘She’s enjoying this,’ Catherine murmured to Vito as she caught sight of no less than three gentlemen gallantly vying for his mother’s hand for the next dance.

  ‘More than you are, I think,’ he replied quietly.

  But then, she’d had to outface a lot of curiosity from people she’d used to know three years ago. Not that any of them had been allowed to quench their curiosity about the present state of her marriage, because Vito had remained steadfastly at her side throughout the whole evening, as if to act as a shield to that kind of intrusion.

  And with a hand lightly resting on the curve of her hip, so his thumb could make the occasional caressing stroke across the skin left exposed at the base of her spine, if she moved he moved with her; if she was invited to dance he politely refused for her. It was all very possessive, and deliciously seductive.

  So the evening wore on, the champagne flowed freely, and the hired eight-piece orchestra played while some people danced and others went to help themselves to the buffet. And the only thing that seemed to be missing was—Marietta.

  ‘Where is she?’ she asked Vito.

  ‘Delayed, so I believe,’ he answered briefly.

  ‘But your mother will be disappointed if she isn’t here to toast her birthday.’

  ‘Oh, don’t worry,’ he said dryly. ‘I would say that you can virtually count on her being here at some point or other.’

  Catherine frowned, not liking the abrasion she had caught in his tone when he’d said that. In fact, when she thought about it, Vito’s tone had been distinctly abrasive whenever Marietta’s name had come up since their trip to Paris.

  Had they had a row? she wondered. Then felt something disturbingly like hope curl her stomach. Had Vito actually come to accept that if he wanted his marriage to succeed this time then it had to be without Marietta in its shadows, and had he already called the parting of the ways he had promised?

  Hope was a seed that could bloom all too quickly when its host was so eager to feed it. And Catherine was more than ready to do that tonight, with her man behaving so very possessively and with his diamond heart lying against the warm skin just above her breasts.

  Good or bad timing on his part that he sent that intrusive thumbpad of his skating across the triangle of flesh exposed by the V of her gown? Whatever, she quivered, and she quivered violently enough to make Vito utter a soft curse beneath his breath.

  ‘Let’s dance,’ he determined huskily.

  It was an excuse to hold her closer. Catherine knew that as she let him guide her out onto the dance floor. His palm flattened against the silk-smooth skin of her back as his other hand closed around her fingers, and as she rested her free hand against his lapel he set them moving to one of those soulful melodies that had a nasty habit of touching the heartstrings. The usual vibrations that erupted between the two of them the moment their bodies were in touch with each other began to pulse all around them.

  It was dangerously seductive, wholly mesmerising. They didn’t attempt to talk, and the silence itself added fuel to their growing awareness of each other. When his lips touched her brow it was like being bathed in static. When his thigh brushed her thighs it set the soft curls of hair around her sex stinging in reaction.

  And, in response to it all, she felt Vito’s inner self quicken, felt his heart pick up pace beneath her resting hand and that familiar tension enter his body. Unable to resist the urge, she lifted her chin to look at him at the same moment that his lush, long curling lashes gave a flicker as he lowered his gaze and looked at her.

  Their eyes suddenly locked. And for a short, stunning moment it was as if everything going on around them faded into the ether. It was seduction at its most torturously exquisite. He held her captive with eyes that were saturating her in the liquid gold heat they were pouring into her.

  It was total absorption. Utterly enthralling. Because right there in the middle of a hundred other people she was sure she could feel love come beating down upon her from the one place she had never expected to find it.

  ‘Vito...’ she heard herself whisper, though she didn’t know why.

  ‘Catherine,’ he said tensely. ‘We have to—’

  ‘Luisa. Happy birthday, darling!’ a beautifully rich female voice called out in its warmest Italian and—snap—the link between them was broken.

  Marietta had arrived. Dear Marietta. Even the music came to an abrupt standstill.

  But then, if anyone could make a perfectly timed entrance, it was Marietta, Catherine mused cynically as she turned within Vito’s slackened grasp to view her worst enemy.

  At which point everything alive inside her froze to a complete cessation.

  For there, framed by the open glass doors of the glittering ballroom, stood Marietta, dressed in a silver sequinned creation that was as bold as it was beautiful and did tremendous things for her wonderful figure.

  But it wasn’t what Marietta was wearing that was paralysing Catherine. That achievement was down to the man who was standing at Marietta’s elbow. Tall, dark, extremely attractive in a very British kind of way, he was looking distinctly uncomfortable with his own presence here...

  ‘Marcus,’ she breathed, too shocked to even think of holding the name back.

  So the tensing she felt taking place behind her sent her heart plummeting in a sinking dive to her stomach as she watched Marcus give a tense tug at his shirt collar before offering the hand and a stiff smile to Luisa, who was being formally introduced to him.

  Marietta was smiling serenely while Luisa attempted to put Marcus at his ease, as you would expect from Luisa. But Marcus was beyond being put at his ease. It was so obvious he did not want to be here that Catherine could not understand why he was!

  Confusion began to replace the numbing sense of surprised horror. ‘But what is he doing here?’ she murmured, bewildered.

  ‘You mean you cannot guess?’ Vito taunted grimly.

  ‘It has nothing to do with me, if that’s what you’re thinking!’ she protested.

  ‘No? I would say that his being here has everything to do with you,’ he coolly informed her.

  As if to confirm that, Marcus’s restless eyes suddenly alighted on her standing there, with Vito tall and grim behind her. And colour rushed into the other man’s face. It was awful. Like watching, helplessly from the sidelines, someone slowly drown without being able to do a single thing to help him.

  Then she caught the flash from a pair of malevolent eyes, and suddenly realised that this was all Marietta’s doing. Marietta had somehow managed to find out about Catherine’s more personal association with Marcus and she had brought him here with the single intention of using that information to cause trouble.

  But who could have told her? Her mind quickly tried to assess the situation. Certainly not Marcus himself. Besides his clear discomfort with his present position, he was not the kind of man who told kiss and tell stories.

  And what was even more worrying was how Marietta was no longer attempting to hide her malevolence. It was out of the closet and on show for anyone to see—including Vito, if he wanted to.

  Determined to find out just what was going on, Catherine went to break free from Vito. But his steely grip held her.

  ‘No,’ he refused. ‘This is Marietta’s game. We will let her play it.’

  And he wasn’t shocked. He wasn’t even angry! ‘You knew he was coming,’ she realised shakily.

  ‘It is very rare that anyone enters my home without my prior knowledge,’ Vito replied smoothly.

  Beneath his resting hands her stomach gave a quiver of disma
y as a brand-new suspicion began to form like a monster, and she spun around angrily. ‘This is all your doing,’ she accused him. ‘You told Marietta about Marcus and me. You helped her to arrange this!’

  He didn’t answer, and his expression was so coldly implacable that for Catherine it was an answer in itself.

  Contempt turned her green eyes grey. ‘I despise you,’ she breathed, and turned back to look at the trio by the doorway just in time to see Marcus excuse himself to Luisa so he could come striding purposefully towards them.

  He looked angry, he looked tense, and his eyes were filled with a mute plea for understanding even before he spoke. ‘Catherine...’ he said as he reached them. ‘My sincere apologies, but I had no idea whose party this was until I was introduced to your mother-in-law just now.’

  ‘It is called being set up,’ Vito dryly inserted.

  As Marcus glanced warily at him, Catherine took her moment to break free from his grasp and stepped towards Marcus. ‘Dance with me,’ she said, and before he could protest she had pulled him into the middle of the dance floor and placed herself firmly in his arms.

  ‘I don’t think your husband is pleased that we are doing this,’ Marcus said uneasily.

  Well, I’m not pleased with him, Catherine countered silently. ‘Just smile, for goodness’ sake,’ she told him. ‘And tell me what you are doing here.’

  On a low groan that was packed full of contempt for his own gullibility, he explained about Marietta turning up at his offices that week, asking specifically for him. ‘Having never heard of a Signora Savino before, I had no idea at all about her connection to the Giordani family.’

  ‘She is my mother-in-law’s goddaughter,’ Catherine informed him.

  ‘So I’ve just discovered.’ Marcus nodded. ‘She seems a nice lady, your mother-in-law,’

  ‘She is,’ Catherine confirmed. Shame about the rest of her family.

  ‘But the goddaughter doesn’t seem quite so nice.’

  Catherine’s eyes turned arctic grey. ‘How did she get you here?’ She prompted him to continue.

  ‘With that magical word business,’ he replied. ‘And can we go somewhere less public, do you think?’ he pleaded. ‘Only I am beginning to feel distinctly de trop here...’

  ‘Sure,’ Catherine agreed, and stopped dancing to lead the way out through the open French doors which led into the lantern-lit garden, without even bothering to check out what Vito was doing. She wasn’t interested. In fact, she didn’t care at this moment if she never set eyes on the manipulative, vengeful swine ever again!

  The air out here was warm and silken on the flesh. Catherine breathed in a couple of deep breaths of it, then said, ‘Let’s walk,’ and began strolling down one of the pathways with Marcus pacing grimly beside her. ‘Go on with your story,’ she instructed.

  ‘She lured me to Naples on the information that a well-known investment bank was looking for a new legal firm that specialises in European law,’ he explained. ‘When I asked her the name of the company she said she wasn’t at liberty to give it until she had the go-ahead to make an official approach, but invited me over here this weekend—to meet some people—was the way she baited it. She sounded very plausible,’ he added in his own defence. ‘Extremely knowledgeable about what kind of legal expertise is required in the investment field.’

  ‘She is,’ Catherine confirmed. ‘She owns stock in Giordani’s, has a place on the board, holds some of their most lucrative portfolios.’

  ‘Then she wasn’t lying.’ He frowned thoughtfully.

  ‘About Girodani’s wanting to change lawyers? I don’t know, is the honest answer,’ she replied. ‘All I do know is that Marietta was one of the main causes for my marriage break-up three years ago. And since I came back here I have been expecting her to try the same thing again.’

  ‘She’s in love with your husband,’ Marcus assumed from that.

  Catherine didn’t deny it, though she would probably use the word ‘obsessed’ instead of love. ‘They work very closely together,’ she murmured. ‘Marietta is a natural charmer and Vito is—’

  ‘Renowned for his troubleshooting qualities.’ Marcus nodded. ‘He turned Stamford Amalgamates round from bankruptcy in weeks only last year.’

  ‘I didn’t know that!’ Catherine admitted, impressed without wanting to be, since most people knew that Stamford Amalgamates was about as big as a giant conglomerate could get.

  ‘The fact that they were in trouble was kept secret to save the stock price,’ Marcus explained. ‘It was only after your husband had been in and waved his magic wand that those in the know discovered just how close things had been to collapse. He impresses me,’ he added. ‘Even though I don’t want him to.’

  ‘I know the feeling,’ Catherine said grimly.

  ‘Which means he’s a dangerous man to cross.’

  ‘I know that too.’ She nodded.

  ‘So why is Marietta attempting to cross him?’

  ‘Because she is one of the only people Vito lets get away with it.’ Catherine’s smile was bitter.

  ‘And the reason he does that?’

  ‘Now there is the big question,’ she mocked. ‘I can give you a dozen maybes, Marcus. But no absolute certainties.’

  ‘Okay,’ he said. ‘ So give me the maybes.’

  He was frowning thoughtfully—thinking on his feet just like Vito, Catherine likened wryly.

  Which was probably why she liked him so much, she then realised, and didn’t like the feel of that, since it also probably meant that she had always been looking for Vitotype qualities in every man she had come into contact with over the last three years.

  ‘Because she is his mother’s beloved goddaughter?’ she suggested. ‘Or because she was married to his best friend? Or maybe it could have something to do with the fact they are lovers?’

  ‘Lovers in the past tense or the present?’ Marcus asked sharply.

  Catherine shrugged a slender shoulder. ‘Both,’ she replied.

  ‘Rubbish,’ Marcus denounced. ‘That man has too much nous to play around with another woman when he’s got you to come home to.’

  Turning towards him, Catherine let her eyes soften. ‘That was sweet of you,’ she murmured softly.

  But Marcus gave an impatient shake of his head. ‘I wasn’t being sweet, I was being truthful. I know men, Catherine. I am one myself, after all, so I should do. And I am telling you as a man that your husband is married to the only woman he wants to share his body with.’

  Catherine stopped walking to turn sombre eyes on him. ‘Then you tell me why you think you were brought here tonight?’ she prompted gently.

  He frowned, not understanding the question. ‘It was Signora Savino who brought me here, in her quest to stir up trouble between you and your husband,’ he replied.

  ‘But who gave her the idea to use you as a weapon?’ she posed. ‘Who, in other words, told Marietta that you and I were more intimately involved than mere employer and employee?’ she asked. ‘Was it you who told her?’

  ‘No!’ he denied.

  ‘And it wasn’t me,’ she said. ‘Which leaves only one other person who knew about us.’

  ‘Your husband?’ Marcus stared at her in complete disbelief. ‘You think your husband confided in that bitch about you and me?’

  ‘Vito knew you were coming here tonight.’ Catherine shrugged. ‘He told me himself.’

  ‘Then none of this makes any sense.’ Marcus was frowning again. ‘Because I can’t see what either of them aimed to gain by bringing me face to face with you again. It served no useful purpose except to give us both a couple of embarrassing moments.’

  He was right, and it hadn’t. And they fell into a puzzled silence as their feet set them moving again—only to come to an immediate stop when the angry sounds of a familiar voice suddenly ripped through the air.

  ‘You think you are so very clever, Marietta,’ Vito rasped out. ‘But what the hell do you think you have gained by bringing him here with
you tonight?’

  ‘Vengeance,’ Marietta replied, and Catherine turned in time to see the metallic flash of Marietta’s dress as it caught the light from one of the many hidden halogens. They were standing facing up to each other on the path that ran parallel with the one Catherine and Marcus were walking along. A neat boxed hedge surrounding a bed of pink roses was separating them. But that didn’t mean Catherine couldn’t see the malice in Marietta’s face when she tagged on contemptuously, ‘You have been flaunting Catherine at me since the day you married her—why the hell should I not flaunt her lover at you?’

  ‘They were never lovers,’ Vito denied as, beside Catherine, Marcus released a protesting gasp.

  ‘They were lovers,’ Marietta insisted. ‘The same as we were once lovers! And when she tells you otherwise you know she is lying, Vito,’ she added slyly. ‘In the same way that she knows you lie every time you deny ever making love to me!’

  ‘No,’ Catherine murmured, closing her eyes as she waited tensely for Vito to deny the charge—now—when she could then let herself believe him at last!

  But he didn’t. ‘That was a long time ago,’ he bit out dismissively. ‘Before I ever met Catherine—and therefore has no place in our lives today.’

  Catherine felt Marcus’s arm come around her shoulders when she must have swayed dizzily.

  ‘It does to me!’ Marietta insisted. ‘Because you loved me then, Vito! You were supposed to have married me! Everyone expected it. I expected it! But what did you do?’ she said bitterly. ‘You settled for a short affair with me, then dropped me. And I had to settle for second best and marry Rocco—’

  ‘Rocco was not second best, Marietta,’ Vito denied. ‘And he loved you—genuinely loved you! Which from the sound of it was more than you deserved from him!’

  ‘Is that why you did it?’ she asked curiously. ‘Because Rocco loved me, did you step gallantly to one side and let him have me?’

  ‘No. I stepped gallantly to one side because I didn’t want you.’ Vito stated it brutally.

  ‘Shame you didn’t let Rocco know that,’ Marietta threw back. ‘For he died believing he had come between the two of us.’