The Italian's Baby Bargain: The Italian's Wedding Ultimatum / The Italian's Forced Bride / The Mancini Marriage Bargain

Chapter Seven

NOW, this she couldn’t let ride.

‘You need your head examined,’ she rebutted huskily. ‘If you assumed that just because I kissed you—’ she gave a mocking laugh and was grateful he had no idea of the images playing in her head ‘—I’m going to sleep with you!’

‘I suggest you wait until you’re asked before you say no.’

The humiliating colour flew to Sam’s cheeks as she turned her head back to the window, cursing her unruly tongue.

‘I’m not saying it won’t happen—’

‘I really couldn’t be that lucky…’ she drawled sarcastically.

Alessandro grinned, but didn’t turn his head. ‘I like to prioritise.’

‘You sweet, spontaneous romantic, you.’

Again he grinned. ‘I had no idea you wanted me to be romantic. I assumed you just wanted me for my body. Seriously.’ He slanted a quick sideways glance at her huddled figure. ‘You urgently need to get into some dry clothes. There’s a place a mile or so down here where I sometimes stay. You can take a hot bath while they dry your things.’

Sam released an incredulous laugh. This high-handed behaviour was clearly par for the course for him. ‘It didn’t occur to you to ask me if I want to go there?’

He looked mildly surprised by the question. ‘Not really.’

‘Do people always do what you tell them?’ she wondered out loud.

‘You would prefer to be wet and uncomfortable?’

Sam, very aware that her saturated clothes were chafing in several places, gritted her teeth. ‘That’s not the point…’

‘On the contrary—it is very much the point. I realise that you would prefer to walk barefoot over hot coals than fall in with any suggestion I make…’

‘It wasn’t a suggestion, it was a fait accompli!’ she snapped.

He angled a dark brow. ‘You noticed?’ He congratulated her. ‘Fait accompli rather makes this conversation pointless, wouldn’t you say? Why don’t you give in gracefully? We can even pretend that it was your idea, if you like.’

Glaring at his smug, patrician profile, Sam lapsed into seething silence as he turned through a pair of big wroughtiron gates. The hotel’s impressive driveway was a mile long, and led through some charming parkland where deer grazed in the fading light.

When Alessandro opened the passenger door Sam, who was staring at the big sprawling half-timbered building they had pulled up in front of, shook her head. ‘You can’t walk into somewhere like this and demand a room for an hour. They’ll think…’

Alessandro gave a sardonic smile. ‘They’ll think what…?’ The malicious amusement glittering in his dark eyes made it impossible for her to maintain eye contact. ‘That we could not contain our mutual lust until we got back to London?’

‘Don’t be disgusting!’ she choked.

‘This display of puritanical outrage might carry more weight with me if you hadn’t tried to rip off my clothes once already today. Perhaps it is me who should be concerned about my reputation?’ he suggested, the gleam in his eyes becoming more pronounced as a fresh wave of mortified colour rushed to her cheeks.

‘Reputation!’ Sam yelled, leaping soggily from the car. Feet crunching on the gravel, she advanced, her small fists clenched. ‘I think your reputation is beyond further blackening,’ she sneered. ‘What has it taken…? Ten years…? Still, I’m sure the effort was worthwhile. I think everyone knows by now that you’re a sleazy, womanising loser! And as for ripping off c…clothes…’ A distracted expression slid into her eyes as the memory of her hands sliding under his shirt and over hard, satiny-smooth skin flashed into her head. It was the wrong time to recall how warm and solid and male…She inhaled and shook her head, reminding him angrily, ‘I’m the one missing two buttons.’

It wasn’t until she saw the direction of his gaze that Sam realised that in pulling open her jacket to reveal the gaping section of her shirt she had also unintentionally revealed a section of smooth, pale midriff. With an indignant squeak she dragged the fabric of her jacket together.

His smouldering eyes locked onto hers, and the simmering silence that stretched between them tore her already traumatised nerves to shreds.

‘Relax—they don’t rent rooms by the hour here. And besides, I keep a suite,’ he revealed casually.

Relax? After what he had just said! Sam almost laughed. ‘You keep a suite…?’ she echoed incredulously. ‘You live in a hotel?’

‘Not live, obviously, but it is useful.’

Sam, who didn’t see how a hotel off the beaten track in rural Cornwall could possibly be useful to a man who spent his time flitting from one European capital to another, looked sceptical. ‘How often do you actually use it?’

‘It varies. Twice…maybe three times…’ He began to look impatient with her interrogation.

‘A month…?’ It seemed shockingly extravagant and wasteful to Sam. But then she wasn’t a millionaire—or was that a billionaire…?

‘A year,’ he corrected, and her jaw dropped.

‘A year!’ She shook her head, unable to disguise her disapproval. ‘That must cost a fortune.’

‘You are lecturing me on fiscal imprudence…?’ His expression suggested the idea amused him.

‘It’s nothing to me how you choose to spend your money. You can burn it for all I care.’

‘If it makes you feel any better, I am joint owner of the hotel…a silent partner.’

Sam looked at his hand, extended in a silent invitation for her to climb the shallow flight of steps that led to the porticoed entrance where a tall figure had emerged from the building. The woman, her grey hair tied back in a smooth knot at the nape of her neck, was wearing a silk shirt and tweed skirt.

‘What are you doing standing there?’ She peered over the top of her half-moon spectacles, subjecting Alessandro to a critical glare. ‘This poor child looks perished.’

To Sam’s astonishment, far from going into one of his haughty freeze-you-with-a-glance routines, Alessandro smiled—the sort of heart-flipping smile that he probably reserved for the select few he genuinely gave a damn about.

The possibility that her own heart was utterly susceptible to the warmth of that smile brought a ferocious scowl to Sam’s face.

She felt a hand in her back, propelling her up the steps, and heard him say, ‘Sorry, Smithie.’

Smithie?

Inside the wood-panelled hallway, which didn’t boast the usual reception desk, it was blissfully warm. The moment she stepped in, even before she had had an opportunity to register that the décor was ‘lived-in country house’, Sam was conscious of the warm, comfortable laid-back atmosphere. Despite the fact that her stress levels were off the scale, she felt some of the tension slip from her shoulders.

While Alessandro warmly embraced the older woman Sam examined her surroundings curiously, conscious as she did so of the loud ticking of a grandfather clock set against the wall and of the distant murmur of conversation interspersed by the occasional laugh somewhere close.

‘You look marvellous, Smithie. Like a fine wine, you improve with age.’

‘One of the advantages of being an ugly young woman is that your face becomes more acceptably interesting as you get older.’ Pushing Alessandro away with a sharp admonition not to drip on the carpet, she turned her attention to Sam. ‘And who is this you have brought to see me?’

Sam, still bemused at seeing Alessandro spoken to as though he were a grubby schoolboy, blinked as the interrogative blue eyes swept over her. The woman personified her mental image of a girls’ school headmistress—the sort that probably didn’t exist outside a film-maker’s imagination. She had the smallest and sharpest eyes she had ever seen. But I bet you don’t miss much, Sam thought as she endured the searching scrutiny.

As Alessandro placed a hand lightly on her shoulder and drew her forward Sam caught sight of the crackling flames of an open fire through the open double doors to the right. ‘This is Miss Samantha Maguire.’

Very conscious of the fingers on her shoulder, Sam nodded and flashing Alessandro a sideways glance, corrected him. ‘Sam.’

‘Well, hello, Sam Maguire. I’m Dorothy Smith—I manage the place.’

‘Smithie is the non-sleeping half of the partnership,’ Alessandro explained.

Considering the amount of energy the older woman exuded, Sam wouldn’t have been surprised to learn she didn’t sleep at all!

‘My mother’s family have lived in this house for centuries. When she died—’ She broke off and sighed, adding, ‘If it hadn’t been for Alessandro’s intervention it would have had to be sold to pay the death duties.’

‘I know a sound investment when I see one.’

The older woman lifted her brows and laughed before turning to Sam. ‘He had to sink a small fortune into it just to stop it from falling down,’ she confided, slanting him a challenging look that dared him to contradict her. ‘On present performance it will be another ten years before our hard-headed business tycoon even breaks even. Sound investment! Huh!’ She snorted.

‘I’m in for the long haul,’ Alessandro said, looking as close to uncomfortable as Sam had ever seen him.

‘Of course you are, dear,’ the older woman agreed. ‘Now, introductions over. What you need is a hot bath and a brandy, Sam,’ Dorothy announced briskly. ‘No, Alessandro,’ she said, accompanying her sharp words with a dismissive wave of her hand as he began to follow them, ‘we don’t need you.’

Now, that was something he couldn’t hear very often, thought Sam, torn between outright shock and amusement as she turned her head to see how he was taking the rejection.

Alessandro inclined his dark head, accepting the prohibition with an uncharacteristic meekness that made Sam’s jaw drop. He intercepted her astonished stare and an ironic glitter entered his eyes.

‘Come along, Sam…’

It amused Sam that the older woman’s words were an order, thinly disguised as a request.

‘I will see you later,’ Alessandro said as she approached the broad sweep of the stairs.

‘Now, there’s something to look forward to.’

Her muttered response drew a quizzical look from the older woman, but she made no comment beyond recommending Sam to watch her step. Deciding to take this ambiguous comment literally, Sam lowered her eyes and clasped the curved banister.

She was eaten up with curiosity as to how this most unlikely of partnerships had come into being, but couldn’t work out a way of asking without coming across as nosy. ‘Are you very busy at the moment?’ she asked, as a couple emerged from a room along the hallway.

Her hostess gave a nod, before asking Sam. ‘Have you known Alessandro long?’

Obviously the other woman did not share her concern about appearing nosy. ‘Not really. Actually, I don’t really know him at all. I’ve been aware of him, of course…’ She stopped, a dark blush spreading over her fair skin. ‘Not aware in that way—just…’ Lowering her eyes from the other woman’s amused, knowing glance, she bit her lip. ‘My car broke down—hence the drowned rat look.’ She laughed. ‘And he picked me up.’ That, she decided, could have been phrased better.

‘Oh, yes—he would,’ the other woman said immediately. ‘Alessandro is very chivalrous.’

Are we talking about the same man? Sam wondered, responding to this affectionate confidence with a non-committal grunt.

‘I have known him since he was a child. I was his nanny.’

‘Oh, that explains it!’ Sam exclaimed without thinking.

‘His mother was still travelling a lot with her work then…’ The sharp little blackcurrant eyes scanned Sam’s face. ‘You did know that she was an opera singer…?’

Sam shook her head. ‘No, I didn’t know that.’ It occurred to her that she didn’t know much at all about Alessandro. But then, she asked herself, why should I? Bottom line was, he was the next best thing to a total stranger.

‘Oh, yes, she had a very successful career. But after little Katerina was born she decided to become a full-time mother, and I was not needed.’

‘That must have been hard for you.’ Sam, who imagined that a nanny would become very attached to her charges, sympathised.

‘Yes,’ admitted Dorothy Smith. ‘It was.’

‘And for the child too…?’

The observation brought a flicker of approval to the older woman’s eyes. ‘It was,’ she admitted. ‘But he always kept in touch. Alessandro was always a punctiliously polite boy, and he wrote me delightful letters. I have kept them all. One day,’ she promised, sending Sam a warm glance, ‘I will let you read them.’

Embarrassed that the other woman persisted in misinterpreting her relationship with Alessandro, Sam bit her lip. Before she had a chance to set matters straight once and for all, the other woman continued.

‘When the accident happened I had retired.’ She shook her head, her expression sombre as she thought about those dark days. ‘Of course I came back to help—though the first task was convincing Alessandro he needed help.’ She stopped outside a door and smiled warmly at Sam. ‘But I’m sure I don’t need to tell you that.’

Sam just smiled. She suspected anything she said was not going to alter the other woman’s determination to see a relationship where there was none. Hopefully, Alessandro would put her right. What was she thinking? Of course he’d put her right. It would do his reputation no good at all for people to think he was sleeping with a ginger-headed frump who wore beige.

‘Alessandro usually uses that one, but the bedrooms are identical and of course they are adjoining,’ Dorothy was saying when Sam tuned back into the conversation.

‘Bedrooms…?’

‘Yes, they’re adjoining—see,’ she said, pushing open a door. She saw Sam’s expression and frowned. ‘You could have a room of your own, of course, but with the Food Festival and the fishing tournament falling in the same week this year we’re totally full.’

‘Goodness, no—I just meant to say, I’m not staying. I’m going back to London tonight.’

‘Really?’ Her barely discernible brows rose. ‘I must have misunderstood. I thought Alessandro said he was staying over.’

‘Maybe he is—he’s a free agent—but I’m not…Staying, that is—not not a free agent. Which I am—’ She broke off, lifted a hand to her head and sighed.

The other woman observed her pale, drawn face and looked remorseful. ‘Look at me, chattering on when what you need is some peace and quiet. I’ll send you up some brandy. Now, off you go and get out of those wet things. The bathrooms here are really marvelous—when I think what the plumbing was like when I was a girl…’ Shaking her head she lifted a hand in farewell and left Sam alone…finally.

Lying in the deep bath, her senses soothed by the decadent oils she had added to the water, Sam’s thoughts turned to the day’s extraordinary events. Her mind, pleasantly blurry from the shot of brandy she ought to have refused—though it would have taken a very strong person to say no to the redoubtable Dorothy—kept returning again and again to that bone-melting kiss.

She had not known that kisses like that one existed! Let alone realised what she had been missing!

Now she knew, and it had been Alessandro who had been the catalyst—the man who had been in the right place at the right time and pressed all the right buttons.

‘It could have been anyone.’ The room was empty, so the only voice of dissent to this defiant statement was in her own head. Are you sure about that…?

She sat upright, her expression mutinous and set. ‘Too right I’m sure. There’s nothing special about Alessandro Di Livio.’

The sheer ludicrousness of this contention drew a pained laugh from her throat as she slid back into the water. Alessandro was a lot of things, but commonplace was not one of them…!

Approaching twenty-four and she had never lost control…now, that was worrying. Even more worrying was the fact that she had not seen the appeal of such a loss until now! A part of her wished that the searing kiss had never happened, that she was still walking around in blissful ignorance, but another part of her was inclined to relive the moment again and again…!

Recalling once more those initial moments of boneless, melting submission made her heart-rate quicken. As Alessandro had plundered her mouth the submission had given way to something equally outside her experience: a frantic, inarticulate need to touch and taste…to fuse with his male heat and hardness. Thinking about the primitive response made her breathing quicken and her pale, translucent skin turn a rosy pink.

Sighing she sank beneath the water. Surfacing moments later, she brushed the fronds of water-darkened hair from her face. She knew she loved Jonny. It had been a given in her life for so long that she just hadn’t questioned it—not until Alessandro had put doubts in her head with his sneers.

‘I do love Jonny!’ she announced defiantly to the steamy bathroom.

Just because you couldn’t imagine yourself having steamy head-banging sex with someone it didn’t mean you didn’t love them! And, by the same token, just because you could imagine it, it didn’t mean you did!

No, the stuff with Alessandro was just about sex. Maybe, she thought, lifting her head as the depressing possibility struck her, you couldn’t have love and sex. You had to settle for one or the other. Now, that was a depressing thought.

Chapter Eight

SHE was belting a big fluffy robe when there was a tap on the interconnecting door. Without waiting for her to respond, the door opened and Alessandro walked in.

‘What—?’ she said, her voice accusing, because his presence sent her hard-won composure straight out of the window.

‘I did knock,’ he observed, dropping the jacket he was carrying on the bed and walking towards her.

‘The idea of knocking is that you wait for someone to invite you in…or tell you go away.’

‘You don’t want me to go away.’

His calm assurance made her want to hit him. Lips pursed, she lowered her eyes. He had changed into a pale cashmere sweater and dark, close-fitting jeans, he smelt of soap and himself, and he looked sexy enough to cause mass hysteria in the female population of a small planet!

‘Believe that if it makes you feel happy.’ Tightening the belt on her robe, she was reminded of the fact she didn’t have a stitch on underneath.

‘I didn’t come here to fight with you,’ he said, sounding weary. ‘I came to ask what you want to do about dinner. Do you want to eat here, or with the other guests? Though I must warn you up-front that a quiet dinner downstairs isn’t an option. Smithie favours dining dinner-party-style.’