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It was a good question.
He was not a man who believed in ordering women around. He’d explain that, explain that he’d only been joking…
“Let your hair loose, Chiara,” he said, and waited.
The seconds crept by. Then, slowly, she put her hands to her hair. The neat bun came undone. Her hair—thick, lustrous, curling—fell down her back.
The fist in his belly tightened again.
“That’s better.”
She nodded. Cleared her throat. Knotted her hands in her lap.
“As I was saying—”
“It’s warm in here.”
She swallowed hard. “I don’t find it—”
“You don’t need that coat.”
She looked down at herself, then at him. “I’m… I’m comfortable.”
“Don’t be silly.” He reached toward her, caught the coat’s lapels in his hands. “Take it off.”
Chiara felt her heart leap. She was alone with this stranger. Completely alone, in a way she had never been alone with a man before. Enzo, yes. Her father. San Giuseppe’s old, halfdemented priest. But this was different.
This man was young. He was strong. He was her husband.
That gave him rights. Privileges. She knew about those things, oh God, she knew.
“The coat.” His voice was harsh. “Take it off.”
Heart pounding, she unbuttoned her coat and shrugged it from her shoulders.
“Listen to me,” she said, and hated the way her voice shook. “Signor Orsini. I do not want to be your wife any more than you want to be my husband.”
“And?”
“And we are trapped. You had no choice but to marry me and—”
His eyes narrowed again. She had already learned enough about him to know that was not a good sign. “Is that what you think?”
“Your father wanted it.” He said nothing and she hurried on. “And my father wanted it. So—”
“So, I did it to please them both?”
“Yes. No. Perhaps not.” She was losing ground; she could sense it. The thing to do was speak more quickly, make him see that she understood why he’d done what he’d done and that he could gain by undoing it. American gangsters could be bought. She had watched enough films to know a great deal about America, and this was one of the things she knew.
“Perhaps my father made promises to you. Perhaps he said he would reward you.”
He sat back. Folded his arms again. Watched her, waited, said nothing, everything about him motionless, his body, his face, nothing moving but that damnable muscle in his cheek.
“Did he offer you a reward, signor? I can make a better offer.”
The corners of his lips curved. “Can you,” he said, very softly.
“As soon as we get to America, we will end the marriage. It is an easy thing to do in your country, yes?”
He shrugged. “And you walk away. From me. From your charming father. From that miserable little town. Everybody lives happily ever after. Right?”
He understood! The relief was enormous. “Yes,” she said, with a quick smile. “And you get—”
“Oh, I know what I get, baby. But I’d get that, anyway.”
Chiara shook her head. “I don’t under—”
“That black thing you’re wearing.”
Confused, she looked down at herself again, then at him.
“The black thing? You mean, my dress?”
“What’s under it?”
She blinked. “Under…?”
“Give me a break, okay? You’re not deaf. Stop repeating what I say and answer the question. What’s under that dress?”
Color heated her face. “My… my undergarments.”
He grinned. She almost made the old-fashioned word sound real. “Silk? Lace? Bra? Panties?” His smile tilted. “Or is it a thong?”
Chiara shot to her feet. “You’re disgusting!”
“You know, it took me a while but I finally figured it out. This get-up. The clothes, the hair, the ‘Don’t touch me’ all but painted on your forehead—it was all for me, wasn’t it?”
She swung away. His hands fell hard on her shoulders and he spun her to him. He wasn’t smiling anymore; his face was hard, his eyes cold.
“The real Chiara Cordiano is the one I kissed in that car.”
“You are pazzo! Crazy! Let go of me. Let go of—”
Rafe bent his head and kissed her. It was a stamp of masculine power and intent, and when she tried to twist away from him, he caught her face between his hands and kissed her even harder, forcing her lips apart, thrusting his tongue into her mouth, taking, demanding, furious with her for the lies, furious with himself for falling for them.
Furious, because he was stupid enough to want to reclaim that one sweet moment when he’d kissed her and she’d responded.
Except, she hadn’t.
That, too, had been a lie just like everything else, including the way she was weeping now, big, perfect tears streaming down her face as he drew back.
If he hadn’t known better, he’d have bought into the act.
“Come on, baby,” he said with vicious cruelty, “what’s the point in prolonging this? Get out of that ridiculous dress. Do what you undoubtedly do best.” His mouth twisted. “Do it really well and I might just give you that divorce you’re after.”
“Please,” she sobbed, “please…”
“Damn it,” Rafe growled. He’d had enough. He reached out with one hand, grabbed the collar of her ugly black dress, tore it open from the neckline to the hem.
And saw white cotton.
Sexless, all but shapeless white cotton. Bra. Panties. The kind of stuff his sisters had worn beneath their school uniforms when they were kids, stuff he and his brothers used to cackle over when they saw those innocent, girlish garments drying on the line in the backyard.
He stood, transfixed, uncertain. Was this, too, part of the act?
“Don’t,” Chiara whispered, “I beg you, don’t, don’t, don’t…”
Her knees buckled. Rafe cursed, caught his wife in his arms and knew, without question, he’d gotten everything wrong.
CHAPTER SIX
THE cabin spun. The floor tilted. And all Chiara could think was, No, I am not going to pass out again!
Once in a lifetime was enough. What she needed to do now was fight, not faint.
The American had scooped her into his arms.
“Stay with me,” he was saying. “Come on, baby, stay with me!”
He wanted her conscious when he forced himself on her. That chilling realization was enough to chase the gray fog from her brain. Chiara summoned up all her strength and began beating her fists against his shoulders. One blow connected with his chin, and he captured her flailing hands in one of his and held them tightly against his chest.
“Hey,” he said, “take it easy!”
Take it easy? Take it easy? Maybe the women in his world gave in, but she would fight to what might well be her last breath because this man was strong. Very strong. No matter what she did, she could not get free.
“Chiara! Listen to me. I’m trying to help you.”
“Liar! Liar, liar, li—”
“Damn it, are you crazy?”
No, Rafe thought, answering the question himself. Not crazy. She was blind with panic and he couldn’t much blame her. What in hell had he done, all but tearing off her clothes like that? For all she knew, what came next would be—
Hell.
He kept one hand clamped around her wrists, used the other to try and pull the edges of the dress together. It was impossible, especially with her fighting him all the way.
Not exactly the way a man hoped to start his honeymoon. A joke, of course, because this was never going to be a honeymoon but still.
Her head jerked back.
She had some dangerous moves. He had to remember that. The way she could get her knee up, for instance, aiming with precision. Getting in close, putting her off balance, would be his only protection. He swept his arms around her, lifted her off her feet and brought her hard against him.
“Chiara! Stop fighting me!”
The lady was a hellcat personified.
And she was soft. Very soft. Her breasts were flush against his chest. Her belly was against his groin. She was still struggling, moving against him, rubbing against him.
Desperate, Rafe sent a searching glance around him. He needed a place to put her down. Crews on private jets were trained to be discreet but if the attendant chose this minute to see if her passengers wanted something, explaining what was going on might be, at the least, embarrassing.
The Orsini plane had a private bedroom and bathroom in the rear of the cabin. Well, there was a door in the back of this one. He had no idea what was behind it. For all he knew, it might be locked but it was worth—
Chiara’s sharp little teeth grazed his throat. Okay. Enough was enough. One bite a day was all she was going to get. Grunting, he upended her, tossed her over his shoulder and strode down the aisle while his crazy wife panted, raged, pounded the hell out of his back. Please, he thought grimly when he reached the door, grasped the knob.
Rafe breathed a sigh of relief.
The door opened. And beyond it was some kind of room. Not a bedroom. A lounge. Maybe an office. He rolled his eyes. Who cared what it was? There was a desk. A chair. A small lavatory visible beyond a partly opened sliding door. And, best of all, a small leather sofa just made for accommodating an out-of-control female, he thought, and shouldered the door shut.
He went straight for the sofa. Dumped Chiara on it and stood up.
Bad idea.
She was on her feet and trying to fly past him in a heartbeat. He grabbed her, wrestled her down onto the sofa again, squatted in front of her and clamped his hands around her forearms.
“Listen to me,” he said. “I am not going to hurt you.”
Chiara bared her teeth. An attack-trained rottweiler might have given him a friendlier response. Rafe shook his head in frustration. He had a mess on his hands and only himself to blame. He’d scared the life out of his bride. A joke to call her that, but that was what she was, at least for the time being.
His fault, sure, but how was he to know she’d go off like a roomful of high explosives if he touched her?
You didn’t just touch her, that sly voice inside him whispered. True. He’d gone at her as if he were out of control, but whose fault was that, if not hers?
A woman couldn’t play hot and cold. That kiss this morning. That one moment of incredible surrender. Was he supposed to forget it had happened?
Had it been real? Had it been a ploy to get him on her side? Who in hell knew? And what about the insults she’d heaped on him, her easy assumption that he was a villain, that she could buy him off? Did none of that count for anything?
Yes, but she’d been through a lot today. So had he, but it wasn’t the same. He hadn’t been threatened with wedded bliss as the wife of her father’s capo.
If even that had been real. If it hadn’t all been an act, meant to make him agree to a marriage a pair of aging dons on both sides of the Atlantic seemed to want.
For the moment he’d go with believing his wife hadn’t been in on the deal—and why in hell think of her as his wife? She was nothing but a temporary impediment in his life. Maybe she’d calm down once she understood that. Hell, she had to. He couldn’t spend the rest of the flight hanging on to her as she struggled to get away.
Rafe took a long breath.
“Look,” he said, “I’m sorry I frightened you. I never—I mean, I had no idea. The thing is, I got angry. And.” And what? None of that excused what he’d done. Truth time, he thought, and drew another breath. “Here’s the deal, okay? I thought you had been stringing me along. And—”
“Hah!”
“Hah?”
“Why would I string you along,” she panted, “when I would like to string you up?”
How could he want to laugh at a time like this? He couldn’t, not without enraging his wildcat even more. Instead he cleared his throat.
“I thought you were part of the plan. You know, to convince me to marry you.” Her face registered incredulity, but they were getting somewhere: she had stopped struggling, at least for the moment. “Okay,” he said carefully, “I’m going to let go of you. Then I’m going to stand up.” His eyes drifted down; he’d all but forgotten her dress was torn in half, showing all that schoolgirl lingerie.
Showing the small but somehow lush breasts, the narrow waist, the flaring hips.
Rafe forced his gaze back to her face. When he spoke, his voice was hoarse.
“I’ll stand up, and then I’ll get your suitcase so you can change clothes. Okay?”
Chiara glared at him. “I was not part of any plan,” she said with icy precision.
“You want something to wear or not?”
He could see her weighing the offer. At last she nodded.
“Good. Fine.” Slowly he took his hands from her. She scrambled back as he rose to his feet. She looked like hell, not just the torn dress, but her face was devoid of color, her eyes huge and dark.
And he was the cause.
He, the idiot who’d said yes to marriage to save her, had done this.
“Be right back,” he said briskly, striding from the lounge as if shredding a woman’s clothes and scaring the life half out of her were just everyday occurrences.
He didn’t see her suitcase. Just as well. It was probably overflowing with black dresses and he’d seen enough of them to last a lifetime. He grabbed his carry-on bag, headed back to the lounge.
And paused.
Chiara was exactly where he’d left her, clutching the torn dress together at her breasts. The only difference was in her posture. She sat with her head down, her hair tumbling around her face. The fight had gone out of her; she looked small and vulnerable. Mostly she looked defeated, just as she had in her father’s house.
It killed him to see it.
She was shaking. With fear? No, Rafe thought, not this time. He dropped the carry-on bag and hurried to her. She was hovering on the brink of shock. Adrenaline spiked, then dropped, and this was the price you paid.
“Chiara,” he said, when he reached her.
She looked up. He could hear her teeth chattering. He cursed softly, went down on his knees and gathered her into his arms.
She balked. He’d expected it and at the first jerk of her muscles, he drew her even closer against him, whispering her name, stroking one big hand gently up and down her back. Gradually he felt her body begin to still.
“That’s it,” he said softly, his mouth against her temple, his hand still soothing her, and at last she gave a shuddering sigh and leaned into him.
Rafe closed his eyes.
Her face was against his throat. Her lips were slightly parted. He could feel the delicate whisper of her breath, the warmth of it on his skin.
His arms tightened around her. He drew her from the sofa onto her knees. He felt her hands against his chest, one palm flat against his heart.
She was so small. So delicate. He could feel the fragility of her bones and he thought of the time a migrating songbird had flown into one of the windows that lined the terrace of his penthouse. It had been a windy day; when he heard the soft thud of something hitting the glass, he’d thought it must be a chair cushion, but when he went outside, he found the bird, smaller than seemed possible, lying on the marble floor, eyes glazed, heart beating so frantically that he could see the rise and fall of its feathered breast.
Helpless, clueless, he’d carefully scooped the tiny creature into his palm. Minutes had crept by and just when he was about to give up hope, the bird made a soft peep, scrambled upright, blinked, spread its wings and took to the sky.
Chiara stirred like that now. Her eyes swept over his face.
“Okay?” he said softly.
She swallowed. “Yes.”
He felt the same rush of pleasure as the day the tiny bird had survived its brush with death. Still, he went on holding her in his arms. He didn’t want to let her go. She might go into shock again, might need him to comfort her.
“Please let go of me, Signor Orsini.”
So much for needing his comfort.
Rafe got to his feet and retrieved the carry-on bag. She was seated on the sofa again, a portrait of composure except for the gaping dress. He cleared his throat, dropped the bag on the floor and jerked his chin at it.
“Nothing in there will really fit you, of course,” he said briskly.
“I have my own things. In my suitcase.”
“Yeah, well, I grabbed the first bag I saw. Anyway, there’s some stuff that might work. Jeans, sweats, a couple of T-shirts.” He was babbling. She could figure things out for herself, once he gave her some privacy. “I’ll, ah, I’ll wait outside. Let me know when you’re done and then… and then, we’ll talk. Okay?”
Chiara nodded. Her face gave nothing away, but all things considered, he figured he was doing pretty well. He nodded back, stepped from the room, shut the door, folded his arms…
And waited.
He waited for what seemed a very long time. Just when he’d finally decided she was going to pretend he didn’t exist, the door swung open.
His throat constricted.
She was wearing one of his T-shirts over a pair of his workout shorts. The shirt hung to her knees; the shorts fell to midcalf. Her feet were bare. Her hair was a soft cloud of dark chocolate silk: he figured she must have found his brush and used it.
She should have looked comical. At least foolish.
She didn’t.
She looked beautiful.
It made him smile. Big mistake. Her chin rose and he knew she was about to give him hell.
“Thank you for the clothes, signor.”
“It’s Rafe.”
“Thank you, Signor Orsini,” she repeated, and took a deep breath. It made the thin cotton T-shirt fabric lift in a way that drew his gaze to her breasts. “And for this,” she said, in a voice that stopped him thinking about the shirt and what was under it. Looking up, he saw the unmistakable glint of steel in her hand. “Touch me again, and I will kill you!”
Well, hell. His brush wasn’t the only thing she’d found. She’d found his nail scissors, too.
“Chiara,” he said calmly, “put that down.”
“Not until we reach New York and you set me free.”
“You are free.” His mouth twisted. “I married you. I didn’t buy you.”
“I told you. I want an annulment. A divorce. Whatever is legally necessary.”
He could feel his temper rising. She was hardly in the position to make demands.
“I have money.”
His eyebrows rose. “What?”
“I have my mother’s jewels. I told you about them. Obviously, you were not listening.” Her eyes met his. “They are very valuable. I will give them to you in exchange for my freedom.”
The woman had a wonderful opinion of him. It annoyed him and he told himself to stay calm.
“Do you think this is a bazaar? That you can haggle with me to get what you want?”
Her face colored. “No. I did not mean—” She took a deep breath. “I see what you are trying to do, signor. You think, if you direct this conversation elsewhere, you will dissuade me.”
He lifted one dark eyebrow. “Dissuade?”
“Sì. It means—”
“I know what it means. Someone taught you some fancy English in that hole-in-the wall town of yours.”
“San Giuseppe is not ‘my’ town,” she said coldly. “And yes, Miss Ellis taught me, as you say, some fancy English.”
“One of your father’s girlfriends?”
She laughed. Miss Ellis had been seventy. Tall, thin, about as approachable as a nun—but the best teacher in the world, until her father had decided she was filling Chiara’s head with too much worldly nonsense. It still hurt to remember the day he’d dismissed her.
“One of my tutors,” Chiara said, and lifted her chin. “Thanks to her, you will not be able to dissuade me in English or in several other languages.”
“Am I supposed to be impressed?”
“You are supposed to be warned, Signor Orsini. I am not prepared to take what has been forced upon me by you and my father standing up.”
Rafe grinned. He couldn’t help it. For all he knew, she spoke a dozen languages but there was a difference between speaking English like a native and speaking it like a scholar, especially when the words came from the mouth of a woman who looked like an armed street urchin.
“You find this amusing, signor? I promise, I will defend myself if you approach me again.”
He thought about going straight at her and snatching the scissors away. He wouldn’t get hurt—it would be like taking candy from a baby—but what the hell, this was just getting interesting.
“So, you want out of our marriage.”
“It is not a marriage, it is an alliance between my father and yours.”
“Whatever,” he said, as if he didn’t know damned well she was probably right. He made a show of shaking his head. “I guess modern women just don’t believe in keeping their vows anymore.”
Chiara clucked her tongue. “Such nonsense! Neither of us wants this marriage and you know it.”
For some reason her certainty irked him. “And you know this about me because…?”
Her eyes narrowed. The tip of her tongue came out and touched her top lip, then swept back inside, to be replaced by a delicate show of small—and, he knew—sharp white teeth that sank, with great delicacy, into her bottom lip.
His gut knotted. His entire body tensed. Ridiculous, but then, the entire day had been ridiculous. Why should things become normal now?
“I mean,” he said, sounding like the voice of reason, “I’m Italian. What if I don’t believe in divorce?”
What if the sun went nova? He wasn’t Italian, except by heritage. He was American. That was how he thought of himself. And while he didn’t believe people should bounce in and out of matrimony, he did believe in divorce when no other solution made sense.
Like now, when they’d both been forced into a union neither wanted… which was exactly what she’d said.
Yes, but why make this easy for her?
He’d been suckered into this. Even if she hadn’t been party to the plan, she hadn’t protested it, either. Now she wanted out. Fine. So did he. But first he wanted some answers. And this woman—his wife—was the only one who could provide them.
“I’m waiting, baby. Why should I agree to a divorce? After all, I flew across the ocean to marry you.”
Chiara blinked. “But you told my father—”
“I know what I told him. I said I had no wish to marry you.” Rafe shrugged. “Any good businessman knows better than to accept the first offer when he’s negotiating a deal.”
“A deal?” She stared at him in disbelief. “You mean—you mean, you intended to go through with it all the time? You only let my father think he could hand me off to that… that animal?”
“I didn’t say that.”
“You implied it.”
First, dissuade. Now, implied. Tricky words, even for native English speakers, which Chiara was not. What she was, his scissors-wielding bride, was a font of surprises.
“I married you,” he said calmly. “Never mind my reasons. As for you… I didn’t see Daddy holding a shotgun on you during the ceremony.”
“I do not understand what that means.”
“It means you married me without a word of argument.”
“I would have married a… a donkey if it meant I didn’t have to marry Giglio!”
“You’re no prize package either, baby.”
Color rushed into her cheeks. “You know what I mean. And do not call me ‘baby.’ I am a grown woman.”
Yes. She was. A beautiful grown woman, but there was much more to her than that.
Her face wasn’t just lovely, it was animated. Her eyes weren’t just a color that reminded him of violets, they were bright with intelligence. He’d seen enough of her body to know it was feminine and lush, but it was the proud way she held herself that impressed him, something in her stance that said she would fight to the end for what she believed.
She was, as she said, a grown woman.
His woman.
His wife.
Rafe felt his body stir. They were alone, still a few hours from landing. He’d scared the hell out of her by coming at her with all the subtlety of a hormone-crazed bull, but then, he’d misjudged her.