Cinderella In The Sicilian's World (HQR Presents)

by Sharon Kendrick

  His eyes grew hard, and bright. She saw in them understanding, and fear. But the fear would fade in time. Love would make sure of that. It would soothe and smooth everything in its path. It would comfort and reassure. And it would also provoke—in ways which were emotional as well as physical.

  She shivered as he stroked his thumb over one peaking nipple.

  ‘I think it’s time for bed,’ he said, a little unsteadily. ‘Don’t you?’

  EPILOGUE

  ‘READY?’ QUESTIONED SALVATORE.

  Lina looked up into the glitter of her husband’s beloved blue eyes and nodded. ‘Ready,’ she said.

  The limousine was waiting outside to take them to the airfield. Soon they would be high over the skies of California, en route to Caltarina—their first trip since they’d married there, last year.

  It had been the most gorgeous wedding Lina could have imagined—an unfussy ceremony, the tiny church bursting to the rafters with a mix of villagers and many of Salvatore’s jet-setting friends. Siena had been there, eying up some Greek tycoon, and Lina had insisted on Henry, Shirley and Salvatore’s chef, Ric, being present. There had been huge excitement when Sheikh Kadir Al Marara had flown in for the reception, and Lina’s mother had been in her element, boasting to anyone who would listen that her beloved daughter was marrying one of the richest and best connected men in the world. But Lina didn’t let that bother her—to be honest, she was so happy that nothing could bother her.

  Reconciled soon after the announcement of her engagement, and determined to forget the harsh words of the past, Lina had asked her mother to make her wedding dress, and throughout those fittings they had talked in a way they’d never done before. Each stitch sewed into the delicate organza seemed to have helped heal their fractured relationship. She had learnt of her mother’s desperate loneliness after the death of her husband and her realisation that she had transferred all that pain onto her daughter. Yet Lina’s departure for the United States had forced her mother to re-evaluate her life, and to forge a new way of living, which was bringing her an unexpected kind of contentment.

  The wedding dress had turned out to be a triumph of simplicity and Lina had worn her hair loose—of course. A single photograph of the happy couple had been sold to news outlets around the world, with all the profits going into Salvatore’s charitable foundation.

  A foundation for which Lina now worked, alongside her husband, because she’d decided that dispossessed children were closer to her heart than accessories for the rich and privileged. But she hadn’t given up completely on her unique designs. Her handbags were now made by a dedicated team of out-workers and there was huge competition for these jobs, because the rates of pay were so favourable. There had already been talk of diversification. Of shawls and evening shoes, with the looping Lina signature embroidered on every product. There was also a simple Lina scent—an evocative lemon fragrance meant to evoke images of sunny Sicilian days.

  She was happy about her success and the fact that all profits went into the foundation. But most of all Lina was happy because Salvatore loved her with all his heart. He told her so every day, and every day she echoed that sentiment.

  But...

  She looked up to find him watching her, his eyes narrowed with interest. He was so intuitive, she thought happily.

  But...

  Her heart was beating very fast and she knew she couldn’t put it off any longer. ‘How...how would you feel about us having children?’

  Salvatore didn’t answer straight away, but then, he was pretty sure she didn’t expect him to, because this was way too important not to give it his full consideration. But he didn’t have to think about it for very long.

  ‘I want to have a baby with you,’ he answered simply.

  Tears sprang to her eyes. ‘You’re sure?’

  He nodded. ‘As sure as when I knew I wanted to spend the rest of my life with you. But this isn’t an academic discussion we’re having here, is it, Lina?’

  ‘I don’t know how it happened!’ she burst out.

  He was smiling. ‘You don’t?’

  ‘That’s not what I mean. I don’t want you to think that I—’

  ‘Shh.’ He pulled her into his arms and he could feel the pounding of her heart against the race of his own as he buried his lips in her hair. ‘Contraception hasn’t been my number one focus lately. It just seemed less important. I’ve probably been careless.’ He smiled against her thick black curls. ‘Or just too damned relaxed.’

  She drew back and searched his face, dazzled by the blaze of his blue, blue eyes. ‘You’re saying...?’

  ‘I’m saying that it feels right,’ he said huskily. ‘Just like you feel right. You always did.’

  ‘And you think... You think we’ll be okay parents? You’re not scared?’

  ‘Of course I’m scared,’ he admitted slowly, in a way he would never have done to anyone else. But Lina had made him realise that it was okay to express your doubts and fears, and that being strong didn’t mean you couldn’t also be vulnerable. He cleared his throat. ‘But we know what we do want for our baby,’ he husked. ‘And, more importantly, what we don’t want. And we’ve got each other, Lina. We can help each other along the way.’

  ‘I love you, Salvatore di Luca. Do you know that? I love you so very much.’

  Her face was wet as they kissed and when he drew back and wiped her tears away, he shot a calculating glance at his watch. ‘I think we could allow the car to wait a little longer.’ His hands on her shoulders, he looked deep into her eyes. ‘Don’t you?’

  ‘That depends,’ she said, a little breathlessly. ‘On what you had in mind.’

  ‘You know exactly what I have in mind. I want you. And I want you right now.’ The words came out ragged. Emotional and deliberate. It was a statement he’d made many times before but with Lina it meant something different. It meant way more than sex.

  It was all about love.

  * * *

  Lost in the magic of Cinderella in the Sicilian’s World? Discover more stories by Sharon Kendrick!

  The Sheikh’s Secret Baby

  Bought Bride for the Argentinian

  The Argentinian’s Baby of Scandal

  His Contract Christmas Bride

  Available now!

  Keep reading for an excerpt from Proof of Their Forbidden Night by Chantelle Shaw.

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  Proof of Their Forbidden Night

  by Chantelle Shaw

  CHAPTER ONE

  ‘WHAT DO YOU think of the news that Papa is engaged to the Ice Queen? Isla has hooked her claws into him, make no mistake.’

  Andreas Karelis came to an abrupt halt a few feet away from the helicopter which had brought him to his family’s privately owned island, Louloudi, and stared at his sister, who had run across the garden to meet him. Nefeli’s shrilly furious voice had risen above the whomp-whomp of the slowing rotor blades.

  From the air the island, partially covered with a cedar forest and olive groves, resembled an emerald set amid the azure Aegean Sea. Andreas’s happiest boyhood memories were of running free on Louloudi, away from his parents’ expectations of the Karelis heir. He owned houses in California and the French Riviera and a penthouse apartment in Athens, but Louloudi was the only place he thought of as home.

  ‘I have heard nothing from Stelios,’ he said curtly and his sister’s eyes widened. Usually Andreas kept a tight control over his feelings and no one, not even Nefeli, who was the only person he was at all close to, knew what he was thinking. But he disliked surprises, good
or bad, and this was definitely the latter.

  ‘I thought Papa might have phoned you. He dropped the bombshell when I arrived.’ Nefeli tossed her dark curls over her shoulders. She was petite with a volatile temperament—the opposite of Andreas, who owed his tall, athletic build to his Californian maternal grandmother and had learned early in his childhood to suppress his emotions. It was a lesson he had mastered with astonishing success.

  ‘A press statement will be released tomorrow to formally announce Papa’s engagement to Isla, but he wanted to share the news with his family first. God!’ Nefeli’s voice went up another octave. ‘She’s his housekeeper, and young enough to be his daughter. What is Papa thinking?’

  Andreas gave a careless shrug to hide his violent dislike of his father’s matrimonial plans. The strength of his reaction surprised him, and he reminded himself that Stelios was free to do as he pleased. There was no fool like an old fool, especially a widowed, elderly billionaire in thrall to a beautiful young woman, he thought sardonically.

  A restlessness gripped him as he visualised the woman who was now apparently Stelios’s fiancée. Isla Stanford was undeniably beautiful. An English rose with her spun-gold hair and creamy skin. But she had an untouchable air that Andreas would usually find off-putting. He preferred women who were sexually confident, which was why he had found his intense awareness of Isla on the few occasions that he had met her so puzzling.

  ‘Papa has brought her to Louloudi and she is to attend my birthday party at the weekend,’ Nefeli said sulkily. She slipped her hand through her brother’s arm as they walked towards the villa. ‘You will have to do something, Andreas.’

  ‘What do you suggest?’ His trademark lazy drawl with its blend of cynical amusement disguised his thoughts but his restless feeling intensified when Nefeli spoke again.

  ‘Why don’t you seduce her? I’m sure you could quite easily. Women always fall at your feet, and when Papa realises that the Ice Queen had only pretended to be interested in him for his money, he’ll get rid of her and everything will return to normal.’

  By normal Nefeli presumably meant that Stelios would revert to behaving like a man in his late sixties who should be preparing for his retirement instead of lusting after a blonde bimbo who saw cash signs when she looked at him. Except that Isla was not your average bimbo. It would make life a lot easier if she was, Andreas brooded.

  ‘I don’t want to risk getting frostbite,’ he quipped. He swore silently. It wasn’t that he had any objection to his father taking another wife. Just not her. Not Isla. Why couldn’t the old man marry a woman of a similar age to him? A comfortably plump widow who would share Stelios’s twilight years, rather than an ice-cool blonde with intelligent grey eyes and a Mona Lisa smile that drove Andreas to distraction.

  His thoughts flew back to eighteen months ago when he had been summoned to the house in Kensington which his father had purchased shortly after his wife’s death, some six months earlier. Stelios’s decision to move to London had been a surprise, and after Andreas had handed his rain-spattered jacket to the butler and been shown into the drawing room, he’d intended to ask why his father had chosen to live in a country with such an infernal climate.

  But his mind went blank and his gaze was riveted on the woman sitting close to Stelios on the sofa. Too damned close, had been Andreas’s first thought, followed by a strong urge to snatch her away from his father’s side. She rose to her feet, as graceful and supple as a ballerina, and slipped her hand beneath Stelios’s arm when he stood up. Her solicitousness as she hovered protectively next to his father had irked Andreas.

  ‘Andreas, finally you have found the time to pay me a visit.’

  Stelios’s greeting held a note of criticism which Andreas had come to expect, and he gritted his teeth as he stepped forwards to kiss his father’s cheek. ‘It is good to see you looking well, Papa.’

  In fact his father looked tired, but Andreas barely noticed and his attention was on the woman. Who was she? Stelios’s personal assistant perhaps? Her appearance gave no clue to her role in Stelios’s life. She was wearing a white dress with three-quarter-length sleeves and a softly flared skirt that fell to just below her knees. A narrow black belt around her slender waist and black patent stiletto-heeled shoes were elegant accessories. Her hair was the colour of pale honey, drawn back from her face and tied in a ponytail that reached halfway down her back. She looked as demure as a nun, but the curve of her full lips and her high, firm breasts suggested an understated sensuality.

  Andreas couldn’t take his eyes off her and he gave a jolt when his father said drily, ‘Allow me to introduce my housekeeper, Miss Stanford. Isla, this is my son, Andreas.’

  ‘I’m pleased to meet you,’ she murmured.

  Her voice made Andreas think of a cool mountain stream and at that precise moment he would have gladly jumped into an ice bath to put out the fire raging inside him.

  ‘The pleasure is mine, Miss Stanford.’ He had intended to sound sardonic, but the word pleasure hovered in the air, infusing his greeting with sensual heat and something that sounded to his own ears like a challenge. He noticed the faint flush of rose pink that stained her cheeks like the sweep of an artist’s brush over a white canvas. Her eyes widened a fraction and Andreas glimpsed his confusion mirrored in those grey depths.

  There was another emotion too. He recognised a flash of awareness, before her long eyelashes that were a few shades darker than her hair swept down and shut him out. Time juddered to a standstill. In the silence Andreas heard the harsh rasp of his breath and the unevenness of hers, but when she met his gaze again her expression was unreadable.

  She turned to Stelios. ‘I’ll go and make tea.’

  ‘Thank you, my dear.’ A look passed between the old man and his housekeeper that Andreas could not decipher. Irritation swept through him. When the hell had his father, a lifelong coffee addict, started drinking tea?

  ‘I prefer coffee,’ he said abruptly, earning a frown from Stelios.

  ‘Of course.’ Isla Stanford gave a perfunctory smile that made Andreas long to ruffle her composure. He wanted, badly, to discover if there was heat beneath her ice and if her lips would fit the shape of his as perfectly as he imagined.

  She stepped past him and her elusive perfume teased his senses. He watched the sway of her hips as she walked across the room and heard himself blurt out, ‘Would you like some help?’

  ‘I can manage, thank you.’ She sounded amused. Pausing in the doorway, she glanced back at him and her brows arched as she gave him a speculative look that made him feel like a wet-behind-the-ears schoolboy. ‘Or don’t you trust that I can make Greek coffee, Andreas?’

  The way she spoke his name in her soft English accent had made him want to growl like a predatory beast. Andreas hadn’t trusted her, and every time he had met Isla on subsequent visits to his father in London his instincts warned him that she was trouble. Now the news of Stelios’s engagement to the woman his sister had christened the Ice Queen proved that those instincts had been right.

  He followed Nefeli into the house, where the marble-lined entrance hall was blessedly cool after the heat outside. Andreas had left California sixteen hours ago. Admittedly, travelling by private jet was not arduous but he was looking forward to a leisurely shower and a drink. He was about to ask the butler Dinos to bring a whisky and soda to his room when his sister turned to him.

  ‘You had better hurry up and get changed. You’re later than expected. Papa has arranged a formal dinner party this evening to celebrate his engagement to Isla.’ She grimaced. ‘I can’t believe he is planning to marry her. He’s making a fool of himself. Can’t you think of anything that might make Papa see sense?’

  Nefeli’s plea stayed in Andreas’s mind when he entered his private suite of rooms and quickly showered, before he donned black suit trousers, a snowy white shirt and a black dinner jacket. He would have preferred
to pull on a pair of old denim shorts and a T-shirt and stroll down to the beach, but instead he had to sit through a dinner party to mark his father’s betrothal. Theos! He glowered at his reflection in the mirror and raked his fingers through his unruly dark hair that moments ago he’d attempted to tame with a comb.

  He could in fact think of something that might make his father question his relationship with his erstwhile housekeeper who was now his fiancée. What if he were to reveal how Isla had come apart in his arms when he’d kissed her in London a month ago? Would Stelios be so keen to marry her?

  Andreas’s jaw clenched at the memory of Isla’s wild response to him—the way she had opened her mouth beneath his and made a husky moan when he’d thrust his tongue between her lips. With a frown he acknowledged that he had kissed Isla to satisfy his curiosity, but she had tested his control in a way he hadn’t expected. So much so that he had cut his trip to England short and flown back to California the next day.

  Had Isla set her sights on a bigger prize? Stelios was the head of Karelis Corp—the family-owned business which operated the largest oil refinery in Europe. The company also ran the biggest chain of fuel stations in Greece and had interests in shipping and banking. Andreas was the heir to the Karelis business empire but he was in no rush to take over from his father. He had carved out a career as a champion rider in the World Superbike league until a serious accident had forced him to retire from motorbike racing.

  Forcing his thoughts back to the present, Andreas muttered a curse and strode out of his suite. He paused in the corridor outside his father’s private apartment and knocked on the door. If he could have a conversation with Stelios and his new fiancée before dinner, he might have a clearer understanding of the reason for their surprise engagement. There was no reply, and after waiting for a few seconds he opened the door and glanced around the sitting room. The door leading to the bedroom was closed and the idea that Stelios was in there with Isla evoked a corrosive feeling in the pit of Andreas’s stomach.