His heart stilled.
His father had not been a critical or judgemental man, but he remembered once as a child they had been in Palermo, and a stocky man with a sneering smile had got out of a car and Alessandro’s eyes had narrowed.
Sensing his son’s curiosity, his father had told him he was a man ‘without honour’. He had never forgotten the man’s name or his father’s words. Coming from his mild, gentle father, they had shocked him.
Now they choked him.
Cesare Buscetta had hounded and humbled Alessandro to death. He needed to pay for his crimes, and it was Vicenzu’s job—his duty—to make that happen.
‘Excuse me, Imma...’
It was Ciro, a small apologetic smile playing around his mouth. His eyes met momentarily with his brother’s.
‘It’s time for Claudia to go and change, and apparently you said you would help her—’
Imma was frowning, and she seemed dazed—almost as though she’d been woken from a dream. ‘I’m so sorry...of course I did. Would you mind?’
‘Vicè?’ His brother frowned too. ‘Imma’s talking to you.’
‘Yeah, I heard, bro.’ Feeling Ciro’s gaze on his face, he softened his voice and stared down at Imma until he saw a flush colour her cheeks. ‘I mind tremendously, but I’ll forgive you as long as you come right back.’
As she lifted her face and looked up at him his chest tightened painfully. He’d sworn an oath with Ciro and he was going to keep it—but it would be so much easier if she had eyes of a different colour.
Watching her walk away, he gritted his teeth.
It wasn’t fair. Why did her eyes have to be green? And not just green but the exact lush green of the Nocellara olives that grew so abundantly on his family’s estate. Olives he had helped pick as a child. Olives his father had nurtured and loved almost as much as he had nurtured and loved his family.
It was one of his earliest memories—that first time he’d been allowed to join his father and the other estate workers for the harvest.
He had been so proud when he’d shown his father his haul, and Alessandro had not so much as hinted that the fruit he’d picked was too small and not ripe enough.
It had been that way for his entire life—his father covering up his mistakes, never holding him accountable, always giving him another chance. He couldn’t even pinpoint when it had first started.
Had it been at school? When he’d got into trouble for trading tips on how to kiss girls in exchange for getting his homework done? Or when he’d got drunk and driven a tractor around the olive groves? He’d written off the tractor, and some of the estate’s oldest trees—but, just like on all the other occasions when he’d messed up, Alessandro had simply sighed and shaken his head.
Something bitter rose in his throat—the burning anger that had been swirling inside his chest since his mother’s distraught phone call.
If only his father had told him the truth about Buscetta he would have been able to help. It could have been his chance to make amends. It wasn’t as if he was still a child. He didn’t need protecting from the truth.
And then, just like that, he felt his anger drain away swiftly, like water spiralling down a plughole.
To his father he had still needed protecting.
That was why Alessandro had kept both his financial and his health worries to himself. Vicenzu glanced over at his brother. And that was why Ciro was so insistent that they seek revenge on Buscetta.
Unlike him, his brother had always been independently successful on a scale that far surpassed their father, and the idea that Alessandro hadn’t thought Ciro man enough to take on his father’s problems had incensed his younger brother.
The truth was actually the opposite, he thought numbly. His father had known that he’d be able to rely on Ciro, but he hadn’t wanted to confide in one son and not the other, so he’d sacrificed himself so that he, Vicenzu, wouldn’t feel inadequate.
It was yet another reason for him to feel guilty.
‘How’s it going?’
Glancing up at his brother, he shrugged. ‘It’s going fine, I think.’ He leaned forward and picked up a confetti from a nearby table. It was a traditional gift for the wedding guests. His mother still had hers from her own wedding. Five pastel-coloured sugared almonds—a reminder that married life was both sweet and bitter—and five wishes for the new husband and wife.
Health, wealth, happiness, children and a long life.
His shoulders tensed. Now, thanks to Buscetta, his parents’ wishes had withered like olives exposed to a hard frost.
He sensed Ciro’s impatience even before he heard it in his voice. ‘You think? What does that mean?’
He felt a flicker of irritation—and envy. Ever since he could remember people had wanted to make his life easy. Not just his parents, but his friends and pretty much every woman he met. Ciro too. Until now. Now his brother was so on edge, so picky and demanding all the time.
But Claudia had always been the easier sister to seduce. She was younger, naive in the extreme, and had clearly been groomed for marriage. All Ciro had had to do was get past her monstrous father. Okay, that had sounded tough on paper, but in reality Cesare had laid out the red carpet for him.
Obviously.
His brother ticked all the boxes, whereas Vicenzu just owned a hotel. It might be the most celebrated hotel in the Western hemisphere—part sanctuary, part crash pad for its hard-partying, glamorous A-list clientele—but still...
And, of course, there was his reputation—
‘Vicè!’ His brother’s voice tugged him back into the present. ‘I thought seduction was supposed to be your area of expertise?’
‘It is.’ He turned towards his brother, his hands itching to both hit him and hug him. As usual, he went down the path of least resistance. ‘Scialla—just chill, Ciro, okay?’ Grabbing his brother by the shoulders, he pulled him into an embrace. ‘Festina lente, bro.’
‘There’s no time for chilling, bro,’ his brother said irritably. ‘And quoting Latin at me doesn’t change the facts. We agreed—you agreed—’
‘Yeah, and I’m doing it.’
‘Do it faster.’ They were facing each other and their eyes met. ‘I don’t want to be stuck in this marriage for any longer than I have to be.’
‘I know.’
Ciro held his gaze. ‘Look, ever since I was a teenager I’ve watched women climb over each other to get to you. Immacolata Buscetta will be exactly the same. So just do this for Mamma, and for Papà, and then everything will go back to how it was before.’
Except it wouldn’t.
They would have avenged their father, but nothing could bring him back to life. They would have the business and their home, but their mother still wouldn’t have her husband.
He glanced over to where Audenzia was sitting, sipping coffee. His parents had been so devoted to each other they had never spent a night apart during their forty years of marriage. He’d always feared falling short of their ideal, and now he was having to seduce a woman he hated into marrying him.
‘I can’t help feeling that Papà wouldn’t like this,’ he said quietly.
Ciro stared at him. ‘Maybe not—but he’s not here to ask, is he? And if you’re having second thoughts, maybe you should ask yourself why that’s the case.’
The pain was sharp and humbling. And just what Vicenzu needed to clear the confusion from his mind.
He had made and broken enough promises in his life.
This time he would do whatever it took to keep one.
* * *
It was dark when Ciro and Claudia finally left.
‘He will take care of her, won’t he?’
Vicè was standing next to Imma at the edge of the marquee. Having waved off the happy couple, most of the guests had already gone back inside, but she had wanted to
wait until the car had disappeared.
He felt a rush of anticipation—like that moment on a rollercoaster ride just before the track dropped down. Now that it was close, he just wanted to make it happen.
‘Yes, of course,’ he lied.
She nodded. ‘You don’t have to wait with me,’ she said, glancing back at the distant car, her green eyes tracking its progress. ‘I know it’s silly, but it’s the first time she’s gone away without me.’
‘I want to wait.’ He hesitated. ‘And there’s nowhere I’d rather be than here.’ Taking her hand, he gently pulled her closer. ‘With you.’
Her eyes lifted to his face, and there was a faint frown on her brow as she tugged her pashmina closer to her body. He felt his blood start to hum. He’d bet his last sugared almond that she was trying to hide how aroused she was by his words.
‘I don’t think we know each other well enough for you to say that,’ she said quietly.
‘So let’s get to know each other better.’ He took a deep breath. ‘Let’s go somewhere more private.’
She looked up at him, her green eyes wide with confusion and a curiosity that made his groin turn to stone.
He nodded. ‘I know it’s sudden, and I’m guessing you think I do this kind of thing all the time. But I don’t. Usually I’m just looking for fun—but not today. Not with you.’
She bit her lip, and for a moment he thought he’d gone too far, too fast.
‘Look, forget it,’ he said quickly. ‘I must be crazy, suggesting something like that—’
She nodded slowly. ‘Yes, you are.’
He felt her fingers tighten around his.
‘But maybe it’s about time I did something crazy too.’
His heart gave a leap, and he felt shock mingling with confusion. He couldn’t believe she was agreeing with him.
‘I should say goodbye to Papà first—’
‘No.’ He squeezed her hand. ‘Don’t go back in—please.’ There was no way he was going to let her talk to Buscetta before she left. ‘My driver’s out front. We can call your father on our way to the airport.’
She stared at him for a moment, and then she smiled. ‘Or we could go completely crazy and take my father’s helicopter...’
* * *
Leaning back into the cream leather upholstery, Vicè breathed out slowly. The Buscetta helicopter was rising up into the dark sky, its rotor blades whipping up the discarded coriandoli so that for a moment he felt as if he were in a snow globe—a sensation exacerbated by the feeling of his world being turned upside down and shaken vigorously.
He could hardly believe it.
That Imma had agreed to his impulsive suggestion that they get to know one another seemed fantastical enough, but for her to more or less commandeer her father’s helicopter in order to make their escape seemed too preposterous to be true.
And yet that was exactly what was happening.
At that moment Imma turned and smiled at him, her eyes bright with eagerness and pleasure at her part in the adventure, and he felt his heart jump, his body responding to her sudden and thrilling abandonment of the normal expected preliminaries.
Well, perhaps not all of them.
Remembering that this was supposed to be a seduction, he lifted her hand to his mouth, feeling her pulse dart under the skin like a minnow in a pond.
‘Will this thing make it to the mainland?’ he asked softly.
‘The mainland?’ she repeated.
He held her gaze, his eyebrow curving upward at the question in her voice.
He and Ciro had accepted that Buscetta would never countenance Vicenzu courting Imma. Plus, the second brother falling in love with his other daughter was so implausible it would almost certainly hint at some kind of plot, so they’d decided that it would be better to present him with a fait accompli.
His shoulders stiffened. Of course before he’d even thought about how he was going to make that happen Ciro, being Ciro, had already proposed to Claudia and started the process of arranging the paperwork for their marriage.
But seducing a woman was not something Vicè consciously did—normally it just happened. He had no idea how to cold-bloodedly reproduce that organic process, so he’d left it to the last minute—like he did everything else in his life.
Not that he’d told his uber-efficient brother that.
Arriving at the wedding, he’d decided to seduce Imma and then use his reputation as leverage for their marriage. It would be a delicate balancing act. She’d know he wouldn’t be Cesare’s choice for her husband. But nor would her father want her to be viewed as just another notch on Vicenzu’s bedpost. And obviously his plan wouldn’t work if they kept their liaison private, which was why he needed it to play out in public.
And where better to find maximum publicity than at his celebrity-studded hotel with its inbuilt entourage of photographers?
‘I thought I was taking you back to mine,’ he said.
‘To the Dolce Vita?’ She looked confused. ‘I thought you wanted to go somewhere private.’
Good point, he thought, his shoulders tensing.
It was a rookie error—except he wasn’t a rookie. As Ciro had so pointedly remarked earlier, this was supposed to be his area of expertise.
Glancing out of the window, he felt his pulse slow as he realised he’d made another error in assuming he was calling the shots. Imma might not be planning to go back to his hotel, but they were clearly not just flying in circles so...
‘I do,’ he said. He let his gaze linger on her face. ‘And I should have realised that totally rules out my hotel. But ever since you walked into that church behind your sister I haven’t been able to think straight.’
Watching her chew at her lip, he felt his heart kick against his ribs.
‘I’m guessing you have somewhere in mind,’ he said softly.
He felt her fingers move against his and, glancing down, was almost shocked to see her hand entwined with his. Holding hands was not his thing, but his parents had always done it and his ribs tightened as he pictured his mother sitting alone at the wedding. That was another crime to chalk up to Cesare Buscetta’s relentless greed.
But as he felt the ever-present trickle of anger start to rise and swell he pushed the memory away. His anger would wait. Right now he needed to focus on the task in hand.
Closing his grip around her fingers, he gently pulled her closer. ‘So where are you taking me?’
No doubt Imma had some favourite boutique hotel in mind—somewhere quiet, intimate—and actually that might work for him. They could lie low until he had her eating out of his hand, and then he could discreetly tip off the paparazzi.
He felt her gaze on his face.
‘Papà has a villa on Pantelleria...’
Pantelleria. Unlike most people in the world, he’d heard of the island—but, like most of the population, he’d never set foot on it. Why would he? It was basically a black volcanic speck in the Mediterranean between Sicily and Tunisia.
‘Right...’ He nodded, holding his easy smile in place. ‘Your father isn’t going to have a problem with that?’
She hesitated, her face tensing a little as though she was weighing up what to say next.
‘He bought it as a kind of hideaway, somewhere to get away from work—only he’s not very good about handing over the reins, so he never really goes there. But Claudia and I love it. It’s just so beautiful—and very private.’
Her eyes seemed to grow even more opaque.
‘But if you’ve changed your mind I can get Marco to—’
She was close enough that he could feel her small, firm breasts through the thin fabric of his shirt, and the tiny shivers of anticipation scampering over her skin. Seducing Imma at a hideaway on a remote island owned by Buscetta himself was about as far away from ideal as it could get, but he didn�
�t want to jeopardise this mood of intimacy between them.
The time for talking was over.
He looked down at the pulse beating erratically at the base of her beautiful throat, feeling his body harden to stone for the second time in as many minutes. Reaching up, he caught her chin with his hand, tilting her face to his. ‘Nothing’s changed.’
He could make it work—he would make it work.
Needing to defuse any indecision she might still be feeling, he did the first thing that came into his head. Lowering his mouth to hers, he kissed her.
Whatever he’d been expecting when his lips touched hers, it wasn’t what actually happened. For a brief second or two she stilled against him, her mouth softening beneath his, lips parting on an intake of breath, and then her hand slid over his neck, fingers pressing lightly against his skin as though she was reading Braille.
Barely breathing, he moved his lips over hers, teasing her with the whispering heat of his mouth, the firm tip of his tongue, stirring her senses, tasting her, all the while telling himself that he hated this woman, that she was guilty by association.
But then she moaned softly, shifting against him. Her fingers curled through his hair to grasp his skull, her tongue pushing between his lips, and hunger, hot and powerful, punched him in the gut.
Her scent enveloped him and, breathing in sharply, he made a rough, incoherent sound against her mouth, trying and failing to still the blood pounding through his veins, almost idiotically stupefied by the strength of his desire and hers.
He was hard—very hard—and, framing her face with his hands, he kissed her fiercely, pulling her closer so that she pressed against him, wanting more of her, needing more of her—
‘Miss Buscetta?’
Imma jerked back and they stared at one another dazedly as the pilot’s voice filled the cabin.
‘We’ll be coming in to land in about five minutes. There might be a few crosswinds, but nothing to worry about.’
With a hand that trembled slightly, Imma pressed the intercom. ‘Thank you, Marco.’
Vicenzu breathed out unsteadily, blindsided by her response, and utterly floored by his own.
The Terms of the Sicilian's Marriage Page 3
