Two intense, passionate stories from bestselling authors Emma Darcy and Melanie Milburne!

NOTORIOUS

“Emma Darcy’s Ruthlessly Bedded by the Italian Billionaire is a charming take on the Cinderella love story …” —RT Book Reviews

“Bound by the Marcolini Diamonds by Melanie Milburne: When when the romance burns hot, it melts …” —RT Book Reviews

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Notorious
Ruthlessly Bedded by the Italian Billionaire

Emma Darcy

Bound by the Marcolini Diamonds

Melanie Milburne

www.millsandboon.co.uk

Ruthlessly Bedded
by the Italian
Billionaire

Emma Darcy

About the Author

Initially a French/English teacher, EMMA DARCY changed careers to computer programming before the happy demands of marriage and motherhood. Very much a people person, and always interested in relationships, she finds the world of romance fiction a thrilling one and the challenge of creating her own cast of characters very addictive.

CHAPTER ONE

Sydney, Australia

‘MISS Rossini …’

Another voice calling to her, using Bella’s name.

Jenny struggled to understand. Her mind felt weirdly disconnected, taking in only snatches of what was said. She couldn’t make sense of what she heard. It was as if she was locked inside a fog that almost cleared sometimes but then swallowed her up into a blank nothingness. Was this a nightmare that kept coming and receding? She needed to wake up, get a grip on what was real, but her eyelids were so heavy.

‘Miss Rossini …’

There it was again. Where was Bella? Why did the voices use her friend’s name as though it belonged to her? It was wrong. Her head ached with trying to figure it out. The fog swirled. So much easier to slide back into oblivion where there was no painful confusion. Yet she wanted answers, wanted the torment of this nightmare to end. Which meant focusing all the energy she could summon on opening her eyes.

‘Oh, dear God! She woke up! She’s awake!’

The screech hurt her ears. The sudden glare of light made her want to close her eyes, but she fought the impulse, frightened of losing the strength to open them again. Her blurred vision picked up a flurry of movement.

‘I’ll get the doctor!’

Doctor … white bed … white screens … tubes stuck in her arm. This had to be a hospital. Some kind of sling was on her other arm. She couldn’t see her legs. The blanket on the bed was covering them. She tried to move them but couldn’t manage it. Dead weight. Her mind filled with a galloping fear. Was she paralysed?

A nurse appeared at the foot of her bed, a pretty blond woman with anxious blue eyes. ‘Hi! My name is Alison. I’ve paged Dr Farrell. He’ll be here in a minute, Miss Rossini.’

Jenny tried to say that wasn’t her name but her mouth wouldn’t co-operate. Her lips, her throat were so dry they felt cracked.

‘I’ll get you a cup of ice,’ Alison said, darting away.

When she returned she was accompanied by a man who introduced himself as Dr Farrell. Alison fed her a piece of ice which she rolled around her tongue, working moisture from it, grateful for the lubrication trickling down her throat.

‘Glad to have you with us at last, Miss Rossini,’ the doctor was saying, looking cheerful about it. He was a short stocky man, probably mid-thirties, dark hair given a buzz cut that seemed to defy the receding hairline, certainly no vanity about hiding it. His bright brown eyes twinkled approval of her wakeful state. ‘You’ve been in a coma for the past two weeks.’

Why? What’s wrong with me? Panic churned through her as she tried to telegraph the questions with her eyes.

‘You were in a car accident,’ he said, understanding her need to know. ‘For some reason you were not wearing a seat belt and you were thrown clear of the wreck. However, you suffered a severe concussion, and the bruising of the brain undoubtedly contributed to the coma. You also had three broken ribs, a broken arm, deep lacerations on one leg and you have a cast on the other, fixing up a broken ankle. However, you are mending nicely and it’s only a matter of time before you’ll be on your feet again.’

Relief whooshed through her. She wasn’t paralysed. However, her bruised brain wasn’t working so well. It couldn’t recollect any memory of a car accident. Besides, it didn’t make sense that she hadn’t been wearing a seat belt. She always did. It was an automatic action whenever she got into a car.

‘I see you frowning, Miss Rossini. Are you up to speaking yet?’ the doctor asked kindly.

I’m not Bella. Why didn’t they know that?

She licked her lips and managed to croak, ‘My name …’

‘Good! You know your name.’

No!

She tried again. ‘My friend …’

The doctor sighed, grimaced. His eyes softened with sympathy. ‘I’m sorry to tell you that your friend passed away in the accident. Nothing could be done for her. The car burst into flames before help arrived. If you had not been thrown clear …’

Bella … dead? Burnt? The horror of it brought a gush of tears. The doctor took her hand and patted it, mouthing words of comfort, but Jenny didn’t really hear anything but the tone. All she could think of was that being burned was a terrible way to die and Bella had been so kind to her, taking her in, giving her a place to live, even letting her borrow her name so she could work at the Venetian Forum since everyone employed there had to be Italian. Or of Italian heritage.

Was that how their identities had got mixed up?

The tears kept coming. The doctor left, appointing the nurse to sit at her bedside and talk to her. Jenny couldn’t speak. She was too overwhelmed by the shock of her situation and the dreadful loss of her friend. Her only friend. And Bella had had no one, either. No family. Both of them orphans—a bond that had given them immediate empathy with each other.

Who would bury her? What would happen to her apartment and all her things … the home she’d made, waiting for her to come back … except she never would return to it.

Eventually the exhaustion of grief drew her into sleep.

Another nurse had replacedAlison when she woke up.

‘Hello. My name is Jill,’ she said encouragingly. ‘Can I get you anything, Miss Rossini?’

Not Rossini. Kent. Jenny Kent. But there was no one to care about who or what she was now that Bella was gone.

Fear speared through the dark turmoil in her mind.

Where would she go when they finally released her from this hospital? Social Services would probably find some place for her, as they had throughout her childhood and early teenage years—places she’d hated—and if she was forced back into the welfare system because of her injuries, that sleazy abusive creep might hear of it.

Revulsion cramped her stomach. The officials hadn’t believed her when she had reported their highly experienced social worker for helping down-and-out girls in return for sexual favours. He was too entrenched in the system not to be trusted, and the other girls had been too frightened of his vengeful power to back up her report. She’d been painted as a vindictive liar for not getting what she wanted from him, and no doubt he would revel in victimising her again if he became aware of her present circumstances.

Yet what other choice was viable? Simply to survive she would have to be dependent on welfare until she could stand on her own two feet again and make her way, selling her sketches on the street as she had before meeting Bella. Impossible to stay on at the Venetian Forum without the Rossini name.

The wild thought flashed into her mind—did she have to give it up?

Everyone thought Jenny Kent was dead.

There was no one to care if she was, no one to come forward to claim her. If officialdom believed she was Isabella Rossini … if she found out why they did … would it be too terrible of her to take over her friend’s identity for a while … stay in the apartment … go on working at the Venetian Forum … build up some savings … give herself time to think, to plan out what to do when she felt up to coping on her own?

Wouldn’t her friend have wanted that for her instead of all of it just … ending?

CHAPTER TWO

Rome, Italy

Six Months Later

DANTE Rossini unwound himself from Anya’s voluptuous charms and reached for his cell-phone.

‘Don’t!’ she snapped. ‘You can pick up the message later.’

‘It’s my grandfather,’ he said, ignoring the protest.

‘Oh, fine! He calls and you jump!’

Her burst of petulance annoyed him. He sliced her a quelling look as he flipped open the cell-phone, knowing it could only be his grandfather because no one else had been given this private number—an immediate link between them. He’d bought the phone for this specific use when Nonno had been diagnosed with inoperable cancer, and yes, he was ready to jump whenever it rang. Three months at most, the doctors had forecast, and already a month had gone by. Time was running out for Marco Rossini.

‘Dante here,’ he said quickly, aware of a tight knot of urgency in his chest. ‘What can I do for you, Nonno?’

Frustrated that her jeering words had had no effect on him, Anya flounced off the bed and strutted angrily towards the bathroom. Time was running out on Anya Michaelson, too, he decided. She always expected to be indulged, which he hadn’t minded in the past, given her fantastic body and her talent for erotic games, but her self-centred core was beginning to irritate him.

He heard his grandfather wheezing, gathering breath enough to speak. ‘It’s a family matter, Dante.’

Family? Usually it was a business issue he wanted resolved. ‘What’s the problem?’ he asked.

‘I’ll explain when you get here.’

‘You want me to come now?’

‘Yes. No time to waste.’

‘I’ll be there before lunch,’ he promised.

‘Good boy!’

Boy … Dante smiled ironically as he flicked the cell-phone shut. He was thirty years old, already designated to take over the management of a global business, having met every challenge his grandfather had set for him from his teenage years onward. Only Marco Rossini had the balls to still call him a boy, and Dante excused it as a term of familial affection. He’d just turned six years old when his parents were killed in a speed-boat accident and he’d been his grandfather’s boy ever since.

‘What about me?’ Anya demanded as he rose from the bed.

She’d propped herself provocatively against the bathroom doorjamb, every lush naked curve jutting out at him, her long blond hair arranged in tousled disarray over her shoulders, her full-lipped mouth pouting. The desire she’d stirred earlier was gone. The only feeling she raised now was impatience.

‘I’m sorry. I have to leave.’

‘You promised to take me shopping today.’

‘Shopping is unimportant.’

She was blocking the way into the bathroom. He took hold of her waist to move her aside. She flung her arms around his neck, pressing herself against him, her green eyes sparking anger. ‘It is not unimportant to me, Dante. You promised …’

‘Another time, Anya. I’m needed on Capri. Now, let go.’

His voice was cold. His eyes were cold. She let go, infuriated by his command but obeying it. He stepped past her and walked into the shower stall, not glancing back.

‘I hate the way you switch off!’ she screeched. ‘I hate it!’

‘Then find yourself another man, Anya,’ he said carelessly and turned on the water, drowning out any extraneous noise. The last thing he wanted was to be subjected to a hissy fit, and he didn’t really care if Anya found herself another man. Let someone else buy her clothes and jewellery for the pleasure of her body. There were always other beautiful women, eager to share his bed.

She was gone when he emerged from the bathroom and he didn’t give her another thought. As he plunged into the business of getting ready to leave—calling the helicopter pilot to be on standby for a flight to Capri, dressing, grabbing some breakfast—his mind was sifting through the family positions, trying to work out who was causing his grandfather concern.

Uncle Roberto was currently in London, overseeing the refurbishing of the hotel, happily immersing himself in the kind of creativity he loved. He’d always managed his gay life with discretion and Marco tolerated his son’s homosexuality, with the proviso that it wasn’t paraded under his nose. Had something unacceptable happened?

Aunt Sophia had shed her third money-sucking husband a year ago, at the cost of several million dollars, causing Marco to gnash his teeth over his wayward daughter’s total lack of judgement. She had married in turn an American evangelist, a Parisian playboy and an Argentinian polo player, all of whom apparently exuded enough sexual charisma to woo and win themselves a very wealthy wife. Had she started another unsuitable liaison?

Then there was his cousin, Lucia, Aunt Sophia’s twenty-four-year-old daughter by the Parisian playboy, a sly little minx whom he’d never liked. Even as a child she’d had a habit of spying on people and tattling if she thought it would win her some advantage. But she was always sweetness itself to Marco. Dante couldn’t imagine her giving their grandfather a problem. Lucia would avoid that like the plague, especially when there was a hefty inheritance in sight.

Marco himself had only married once. His wife had died before Dante was born, and Marco had satisfied himself with a string of mistresses over the years. They’d been treated well and paid off handsomely at the end of each ‘arrangement.’ None of them should be causing trouble.

Mulling over the possibilities was probably pointless, though Dante liked to be mentally prepared to carry out any directive his grandfather gave. Marco had drilled into him that knowledge was power. Anyone who was surprised at an important meeting had not done their homework and was instantly at a disadvantage. Dante was rarely surprised these days. Though he had been surprised by his grandfather’s choice to spend his last months at the villa on Capri.

Why not the palazzo in Venice? The worldwide chain of Gondola Hotels, the Venetian Forums built in ‘little Italy’ sections of major cities … all were inspired by the place Marco called home. Of course, the air in Venice was not as sweet as on the island, the view not as clean, the sunshine not so accessible, not for a very sick man. Still, his grandfather had been born in Venice and Dante had expected him to want to die there.

He wondered again about that choice as the helicopter flew him towards Capri. His gaze swept around the high grey cliffs dotted with scrubby trees, the rocky outcrops spearing up from the sea, the predominantly white township sprawling around the top edge of the island, the water below a brilliant turquoise blue. There was nothing even faintly reminiscent of Venice.

The villa had always been a holiday place, mostly used by Aunt Sophia and Uncle Roberto. Dante had spent some of his school vacations there but his grandfather had only ever dropped in on them, not staying for long, certainly not ever demonstrating a fondness for the relaxed lifestyle it offered. He’d always seemed impatient to be gone about his business again.

The helicopter landed on the rear terrace of the villa grounds. It was almost noon and the sun was hot enough for Dante to be glad to reach the flag-stoned walkway, which was well shaded by pine trees and the profusion of bougainvillea spread over the columned pergola. He was not so glad to see Lucia at the other end of it, walking out to meet him.

She favoured her father in looks, more French than Italian, dark-brown hair cut in a very chic bob, her fine-boned face featuring a straight elegant nose, a full-lipped sensual mouth, bright brown eyes that were always keenly observant. She wore a coquettish, little-girl dress that shouted French designer class, geometrically patterned in brown and white and black, the miniskirt showing off her long slim legs.

‘Nonno is in the front courtyard, waiting for you,’ she said, turning to accompany him as he came level with her.

‘Thank you. No need for you to escort me, Lucia.’

She stuck to his side. ‘I want to know what’s going on.’

‘He called me, not you.’

She flashed him a resentful look. ‘I’m just as much family as you, Dante.’

She’d eavesdropped on the call. He kept walking, saying nothing for her to get her teeth into. They entered the villa, moving towards the atrium, a central gathering place that connected the wings spreading out from it and led to the front courtyard.

Frustrated by his silence, Lucia offered information to tempt some speculation. ‘A man came yesterday afternoon. He didn’t give a name. He brought a briefcase with him and had a private meeting with Nonno. It left Nonno looking even more ill. I’m worried about him.’

‘I’m sure you’re doing your best to brighten him up, Lucia,’ he said blandly.

‘If I know what the problem is …’

‘I have no idea.’

‘Don’t play dumb with me, Dante. You always have an idea.’ The bite in her voice softened to a sweet wheedle. ‘I just want to help. Whatever Nonno heard from that man yesterday has knocked the life out of him. It’s awful seeing him so sunk into himself.’

Bad news, Dante thought, steeling himself to deal with the fallout as best he could. ‘I’m sorry to hear it,’ he said, ‘but I can’t tell you what I don’t know, Lucia. You’ll have to wait until Nonno chooses to reveal what’s on his mind.’

‘You’ll tell me after you’ve talked with him?’ she pressed.

He shrugged. ‘Depends on whether it’s confidential or not.’

‘I’m the one here looking after him. I need to know.’

His grandfather had a private nurse and a whole body of servants looking after him. He shot his cousin a mocking look. ‘You’re here looking after your own interests, Lucia. Let’s not pretend otherwise.’

‘Oh, you … you …’ Her mouth clamped down on whatever epithet she would have liked to fling at him.

It was clear to Dante she hated him for seeing through her artifices, always had, but open enmity was not her game.

‘I love Nonno and he loves me,’ she stated tightly. ‘You might do well to remember that, Dante.’

An empty threat, but it probably gave her some satisfaction to leave him with it. They’d reached the atrium and she sheered off to the right, probably heading for the main entertainment room from where she could view what went on in the courtyard, though she wouldn’t be able to hear what was said.

Dante continued on, only pausing when he stepped outside, taking in the scene before announcing his arrival. His grandfather was resting in a well-cushioned chaise lounge, his face shaded by an umbrella, the rest of his brutally wasted body soaking up the natural warmth of the sun.

He wore navy silk pyjamas, their looseness emphasising rather than hiding the loss of his once powerful physique. His eyes were closed. Sunken cheeks made his cheekbones too prominent, his proud Roman nose too big, but there was still an indomitable air about his jutting chin. His skin had tanned, probably from many mornings spent like this. It made his thick, wavy hair look shockingly whiter.

The nurse sat on a chair beside him, ready to attend to his every need. She was reading a book. A pitcher of fruit juice and a set of glasses stood on a table within easy reach. Tubs of flowers provided pleasing cascades of colour, and the brilliant blue vista of sea and sky generated a peaceful ambience. But Dante knew the sense of peace had to be a lie. Something was wrong and he had to fix it.

His footsteps on the terrace flagstones as he moved forward alerted the nurse to his presence, and his grandfather’s eyelids snapped open. The nurse rose to her feet. His grandfather directed a dismissive wave at her and gestured for Dante to take the chair she had vacated. He didn’t speak until she had gone and his grandson was settled close to him. Greetings were unnecessary and any inquiry about his health was unwelcome, so Dante waited in silence to hear what he’d been summoned to hear.

‘I have kept many things from you, Dante. Private things, Personal things. Painful things.’ A rueful grimace expressed his grandfather’s reluctance to confide them. ‘Now is the time to tell you.’

‘As you wish, Nonno,’ Dante said quietly, not liking the all too evident distress.

The usually bright dark eyes were clouded as his grandfather bluntly stated, ‘Your grandmother, the only woman I ever really loved, my beautiful Isabella, died in this villa.’

His voice faltered, choked with emotion. Dante waited for him to recover, feeling oddly embarrassed by so much feeling, never openly expressed before. The only knowledge he’d had of his grandmother was the occasional reference in newspapers of Marco’s one and only wife having died of a drug overdose. It had happened before he was born, and when he’d queried the story, his grandfather had vehemently forbidden any further mention of it.

Dante had privately assumed he had felt some guilt over his wife’s untimely and scandalous death, but given she was the only woman he had ever really loved, perhaps there had been a deep and abiding grief that he couldn’t bear to touch upon. It did answer why Marco had chosen to die here, too.

A deep sigh ended in another grimace. ‘We had a third son.’

The missing Rossini ‘wild child’—another sensational story occasionally popping up in newspapers, full of lurid speculation about the rebellious black sheep who’d obviously refused to knuckle under to what Marco wanted of him, dropping completely out of his father’s world—speculation that was never answered by the Rossinis—a family skeleton kept so firmly in the cupboard, Dante’s curiosity about the uncle he’d never known had always been frustrated. His jerk of surprise at the totally unexpected opening of this door evoked a sharply dismissive gesture from his grandfather, demanding forebearance.

‘Just listen.’ The command held no patience for questions. ‘I banished Antonio from our lives. No one in the family was to even speak his name. Because of him, my Isabella died. He killed his mother, not deliberately, but he gave her the designer drug that led to her death. It was his fault and I couldn’t forgive him.’

Dante’s mind reeled with shock. It took him several moments to attach some current significance to the revelations of this traumatic family history. Had his exiled uncle resurfaced? Was this the problem?

‘He was the youngest of our four children. Your father, Alessandro—’ his grandfather sighed, shaking his head, still grieved by the loss of his eldest son ‘—he was my boy in every way. As you are, Dante.’

Yes, Dante thought. Even in looks, both he and his father had inherited Marco’s thick wavy hair, his deeply set dark-chocolate eyes, strong Roman nose, and the slight cleft centring their squarish chins.

‘Roberto … he was softer,’ his grandfather went on in a tone of rueful reminiscence. ‘It was obvious from early on he would not be a competitor like Alessandro, but he does well enough with his artistic talent. And Sophia, our first girl … we spoilt her, gave her too much, indulged her every whim. I cannot really blame her for the behaviour I now have to pay for. Then came Antonio …’

His eyes closed, as though the memory of his youngest son was still cloaked in darkness. It took a visible effort to speak of him. ‘He was a very bright child, mischievous, merry, given to creating amusing mayhem. He made us laugh. Isabella adored him. Of our four children, he looked most like her. He was … her joy.’

Dante heard the pain in every word and knew that Marco had shared his wife’s joy in the boy.

‘School was too easy for him. He wasn’t challenged enough. He looked for other excitement, adventures, parties, physical thrills, experimenting with drugs. I didn’t know about the drugs, but Isabella did. She kept it from me. When she died, Antonio confessed that she had been trying to make him stop and he had urged her to try the drug, to see for herself how marvellous it would make her feel and how completely harmless it was.’

His eyes opened and black derision flashed from them as he bitterly repeated, ‘Harmless …’

‘Tragic,’ Dante murmured, imagining the horror of discovering how his wife’s death had occurred, and the double grief his grandfather had suffered.

‘Antonio should have died, not my Isabella. So I made him dead as far as my world was concerned.’

Dante nodded sympathetic understanding. None of this had touched his life and he still felt somewhat stunned that so much had been kept totally suppressed by the family. No doubt it was a measure of his grandfather’s dominating and singularly ruthless power that not one word of the mother/son drug connection had leaked out, not privately nor publicly.

A mirthless little laugh gravelled from his grandfather’s throat. His eyes seemed to mock himself as he said, ‘I thought I might make peace with him. It’s bad enough for any man to have one son die before him. Losing Alessandro was … but at least I had you, my son’s son, filling that gap. Antonio was completely lost. And is completely lost. There can be no making peace with him.’

Dante frowned. ‘Do you mean …?’

‘I hired a firm of private investigators to find him, bring me news of the life he’d made for himself, information that would tell me if it was viable to set up a meeting between us. The owner of the firm called on me yesterday. Antonio and his wife died in a plane crash two years ago—a small private plane he was flying himself. Bad weather, pilot error …’

‘I’m sorry, Nonno.’

‘Too late for making peace,’ he muttered. ‘But he did leave a daughter, Dante. A daughter whom he named Isabella, after his mother, and I want you to fly to Australia and bring her here to me.’ His eyes suddenly blazed with a concentration of life. ‘I want you to do it, Dante, because I know you’ll do everything in your power to make her come with you. And there is so little time …’

‘Of course I’ll do it for you, Nonno. Do you know where she is?’

‘Sydney.’ His mouth twisted with irony. ‘She even works in the Venetian Forum we built there. You will have no trouble finding her.’ He leaned over, picked up a manila folder which was lying on the low table beside his chaise. ‘All the information you need is in here.’

He held it out and Dante took it.

‘Isabella Rossini …’ The name rolled off his grandfather’s tongue in a tone of deep longing. ‘Bring Antonio’s daughter home to me, Dante. My Isabella would have wished it. Bring our grand-daughter home….’

CHAPTER THREE

SATURDAY was always the best day for Jenny at the Venetian Forum. It had a carnival atmosphere with weekend crowds flocking to the morning markets set up on either side of the canal, staying on for lunch at the many restaurants bordering the main square. In their stroll around the stalls, people invariably paused to watch her drawing her charcoal portraits, many tempted to get one done of themselves or their children. She made enough money on Saturday to live on the entire week.

It was even better when it was sunny like today. Although it was only the beginning of September—the start of spring—it almost felt like summer, no clouds in the brilliant blue sky, no chilly wind, just lovely mild warmth that everyone could bask in while they looked at the marvellous array of Venetian masks, original jewellery, hand-painted scarves, individually blown-glass works of art—so many beautiful things to buy. The photographer was busy, too, taking shots of people on the Bridge of Sighs, or on their gondola rides. He wasn’t in competition with her. Hand-drawn portraits were different.

She finished one of a little boy, pocketed her fee from the pleased parents, then set herself up for the next subject in line, a giggly teenage girl who was pushed onto the posing chair by a couple of equally giggly girlfriends.

A really striking man stood to one side of them. Was he waiting his turn in the chair? Jenny hoped so. He had such a handsome face, framed by a luxuriant head of hair, many shades of brown—from caramel to dark chocolate—running through its gleaming thickness, and perfectly cut to show off its natural waves. It was a pity she couldn’t capture the colours in a charcoal portrait, but his face alone presented a fascinating challenge; the sharply angled arch of his eyebrows, the deeply set eyes, the strong lines of his nose and jaw with the intriguing contrast of rather full, sensual lips and a soft dimple centred at the base of his chin.

She kept sneaking glances at him as she sketched the girl’s portrait. He didn’t move away, apparently content to linger and observe her working. A very masculine man, she thought, taller than most and with a physique that seemed to radiate power.

He was dressed in expensive clothes, a good quality white shirt with a thin fawn stripe and well-cut fawn slacks. The fawn leather loafers on his feet looked like Italian designer shoes. A brown suede jacket was casually slung over one shoulder. She guessed his age at about thirty, mature enough to have made his mark in some successful business, and carrying the confidence of being able to achieve anything he wanted.

Definitely a class act, Jenny decided, and wondered if he was idling away some time before a luncheon date, probably at the most expensive restaurant in the forum. It was almost noon. She half-expected some beautiful woman to appear and pluck him away. Which would be disappointing, but people like him weren’t usually interested in posing for a street artist.

Gradually it sank in that he was studying her, not how she worked. It was weird, being made to feel an object of personal interest to this man. She caught his gaze roving around the chaotic volume of her dark curly hair, assessing the features of her face, which to her mind were totally unremarkable, skating down her loose black tunic and slacks to the shabby but comfortable black walking shoes she’d been wearing since breaking her ankle.

Hardly a bundle of style, she thought, wishing he’d stop making her self-conscious. She tried to block him out, concentrating on finishing the portrait of the teenager. Despite keeping her focus on her subject, her awareness of him did not go away. He remained a dominating presence on the periphery of her vision, moving purposefully to centre stage and taking the chair vacated by the teenager as the sale of the completed portrait was being transacted.

Jenny took a deep breath before resuming her own seat. Her nerves had gone all edgy, which was ridiculous. She’d wanted to draw this man, he was giving her the opportunity. Yet her hand was slightly tremulous as she picked up a fresh stick of charcoal, and the blank page on the easel suddenly seemed daunting. She had to steel herself to look directly at him. He smiled at her and her heart actually fluttered. The smile made him breathtakingly handsome.

‘Do you work here every day?’ he asked.

She shook her head. ‘Wednesday to Sunday.’

‘Not enough people here on Monday and Tuesday?’

‘Those days are usually slow.’

He tilted his head, eyeing her curiously. ‘Do you like this kind of chancy existence?’

She instantly bridled at this personal probe. It smacked of a much superior existence, which he had probably enjoyed all his life. ‘Yes, I do. I don’t have to answer to anyone,’ she said pointedly.

‘You prefer to be independent.’

She frowned at his persistence. ‘Would you mind keeping still while I sketch?’

In short, shut up and stop disturbing me.

But he wasn’t about to take direction from her. He probably didn’t take direction from anyone.

‘I don’t want a still-life portrait,’ he said, smiling the heart-fluttering smile again. ‘Just capture what you can of me while we chat.’

Why did he want to chat?

He couldn’t be attracted to her. It made no sense that a man like him would take an interest in a woman so obviously beneath his status. Jenny forced herself to draw the outline of his head. Getting his hair right might help her with the more challenging task of capturing his face.

‘Have you always wanted to be an artist?’ he asked.

‘It’s the one thing I’m good at,’ she answered, feeling herself tense up at being subjected to more curiosity.

‘Do you do landscapes as well as portraits?’

‘Some.’

‘Do they sell?’

‘Some.’

‘Where might I buy one?’

‘At Circular Quay on Mondays and Tuesdays.’ She flashed him an ironic look. ‘I’m a street vendor and it’s tourist stuff—the harbour, the bridge, the opera house. I doubt you’d be interested in buying.’

‘Why do you say that?’

‘I think a name artist would be more your style.’

He didn’t rise to the note of derision in her voice, affably remarking, ‘You might make a name for yourself one day.’

‘And you want the pleasure of discovering me?’ she mocked, not believing it for a moment and feeling more and more uneasy about why he was engaging in this banter with her.

‘I’m here on a journey of discovery.’

The whimsical statement teased her into asking, ‘Where are you from?’

‘Italy.’

She studied his face; smooth olive skin, definitely a Roman nose, and that sensual mouth seemed to have Latin lover written all over it. His being Italian was not surprising. As she started sketching his features, she commented, ‘If you wanted a taste of Venice, surely it would have been much easier to go there.’

‘I know Venice very well. My mission is of a more personal nature.’

‘You want to find yourself?’ she tossed at him flippantly.

He laughed. It gave his striking face even more charismatic appeal. Jenny privately bet he was a devil with women and wished she could inject that appeal into his portrait, but the vibrant expression was gone before she could even begin to play with it on paper. The sparkle in his eyes gave way to a look of serious intent—a look that bored into her as though determined on penetrating any defensive layer she could put between them.

‘I came for you, Isabella.’

His soft and certain use of her friend’s name shocked her into staring at him. How could he know it? She signed her portraits Bella, not Isabella. Her mind reeled back over this whole strange encounter with him; the fact that he didn’t fit her kind of clientele, his too-acute observation of her, his curiosity about her work, the personal questions. A sense of danger clanged along her nerves. Was she about to be unmasked as a fraud?

No!

He thought she was Bella. Which meant he hadn’t known her friend. He must have got the name from one of the stall-holders who knew her as Isabella Rossini. Was he playing some supposedly seductive pick-up game with her? But why would he?

‘I beg your pardon!’ she said with as much indignation as she could muster, hating the idea of him digging for information about her, and thinking he could get some stupid advantage from it.

He gestured an apology. ‘Forgive me for not being more direct in my approach. The estrangement in our family makes for a difficult meeting and I hoped to ease into it. My name is Dante Rossini. I’m one of your cousins and I’m here to invite you back to Italy for a reunion with all your other relatives.’

Jenny was totally stricken by this news. Bella had told her she had no family. There’d been no talk of any connections in Italy. But if there had been an estrangement, perhaps she’d never heard of them, believing herself truly orphaned by the plane crash which had killed her parents. On the other hand, was this man telling the truth? Even if he was, how would Bella have responded to it? No one from Italy had cared about her all these years. Why bother now?

Fear fed the burst of adrenaline that drove her to her feet. Fear chose the words that sprang off her tongue. ‘Go away!’

That jerked him out of his air of relaxed confidence.

Jenny didn’t wait for a response to her vehement command. She slammed down the stick of charcoal, ripped the half-done portrait off the easel, crumpled the sheet of paper up in her hands and threw it in the waste-bin to punctuate an emphatic end to this encounter.

‘I don’t know what you want but I want no part of it. Just go away!’ she repeated, her eyes stabbing him with fierce rejection as he rose from the chair, suddenly taking on the appearance of a formidable antagonist.

‘That I cannot do,’ he stated quietly.

‘Oh, yes you can!’ Her mind wildly seized on reinforcements. ‘If you don’t I’ll go to the forum management, tell them you’re harassing me.’

He shook his head. ‘They won’t act against me, Isabella.’

‘Yes, they will. They’re very tight with security.’

He frowned at her. ‘I thought you knew the Rossini family owns all the Venetian Forums. That you chose to buy one of our apartments here in Sydney because of the family connection.’

Her mind completely boggled. Had Bella known this? She had never mentioned it. And what did he mean … all the Venetian Forums? Was there a worldwide network of them? If so, the Rossini family had to be mega-wealthy and no one was going to take her side against this man. She was trapped on his territory.

‘I’ve already spoken to the management here about you,’ he went on. ‘If you need them to identify me, assure yourself that I am who I say I am, I’m happy to accompany you to the admin office …’

‘No! I’m not accompanying you anywhere!’ she almost shouted at him in panic.

Her raised voice attracted the attention of passers-by, including Luigi, the photographer, who dropped his hustling for clients to stroll over and ask, ‘Having trouble here, Bella?’

She couldn’t rope him in to help her, not against the man who had the management in his pocket. Luigi depended on his job here. The two men were eyeing each other over—both macho Italian males—and the bristling tension told her neither one of them was about to back down.

‘It’s okay, Luigi. Just a family fight,’ she said quickly. He would understand that. Her experience of working in the forum had taught her that all Italian families got noisy over a dispute and were best left to themselves to sort out the problem.

‘Well, tone it down,’ he advised. ‘You’ll be scaring customers away.’

‘Sorry,’ she muttered.

He shrugged and moved off, tossing an airy wave at Dante. ‘Make him take you to lunch. He looks as though he can afford it. A bit of vino…’

‘Excellent idea!’ her nemesis agreed. ‘I’ll help you pack up, Isabella.’

He turned and collected the folding chair he’d been sitting on before Jenny could say a word. She felt totally undermined by his arrogant confidence, helpless to fight the situation, yet desperate to escape it. He wasn’t family to her, and what had seemed a harmless deception—a temporary lifeline that would help her and not hurt anyone—was turning into a murky mess that she didn’t know how to negotiate.

‘Why turn up now? Why?’ she demanded of him as he carried the chair over to where she stood beside the easel.

‘Circumstances change.’ He flashed that smile again. At close quarters it probably made every woman go weak at the knees and Jenny was no exception. Dante Rossini had megawatt sex appeal. ‘Let me explain over lunch,’ he added, his dark-chocolate eyes warm enough to melt resistance, his voice a persuasive purr.

Her spine tingled. Her heart pounded in her ears. Her mind screamed danger. No way could she give in to the charm of the man. If she didn’t somehow extricate herself from this situation, it would lead to terrible trouble.

‘You’re too late,’ she blurted out. It was the truth. Bella was dead. But she couldn’t reveal that. ‘I don’t need you in my life. I don’t want you,’ she threw at him, wildly hoping he would accept that his mission was futile.

‘Then why set yourself up in the Venetian Forum?’ he shot at her, his eyes hardening with disbelief at her hysterical claims.

Bella had set her up. Confusion roared through Jenny. Had there been some artful plan behind her friend’s kindness in inviting her to share the apartment, getting her employed here by using the Rossini name? Had Bella imagined it might catch the attention of the forum management enough to mention it to the Rossini family?

Was I bait?

Her first meeting with Bella … the offer that had seemed too good to be true … wanting to believe luck had smiled on her for once. Jenny shook her head. It was all irrelevant now. She shouldn’t have stayed on, using Bella’s name, getting herself in this awful tangle.

‘Think what you like,’ she snapped at the cousin who’d come too late. ‘I’m out of here.’

She instantly busied herself, packing up the easel, her inner agitation making her hurry so much she fumbled and dropped the box of charcoal sticks. He swooped and picked it up, holding it out to her, making it impossible to completely ignore him. He was still holding her fold-up chair, as well.

‘Thanks,’ she muttered, snatching the box from him, stowing it in the carry-case.

‘I’m not about to go away, Isabella,’ he warned.

Her nerves quivered, sensing the relentless force of the man. With all that wealth and power behind him, he was undoubtedly used to people falling in with him. Being rebuffed and rejected would sting his ego, make him more persistent. It was imperative now to plan a disappearing act, get back to the apartment, pack only essentials, catch a bus, a train, a plane … anything that took her away. He wouldn’t look for Jenny Kent. She was of no interest to him.

The carry-case was ready to go. She folded up the stool she used when sketching, tucked it under one arm, then steeled herself to face Dante Rossini and put an end to this danger-laden meeting. It took all her willpower to lift her gaze to his and hold it steady as she spoke to him, pouring a tone of flat finality into her voice.

‘Don’t waste any more of your time. Isabella Rossini has not occupied any place in your family all these years and that isn’t about to change because you suddenly want it to.’ She held out her hand. ‘Just give me the chair and let me go.’

He shook his head, unable to come to grips with her stance, not about to accept it, either.

Jenny panicked at the thought of having to endure more argument from him. ‘Keep it then,’ she cried, her hand jerking in a wave of dismissal as she turned away and forced her trembling legs to march across the forum, heading for the elevator that would shut him out and take her up to the apartment he couldn’t enter.

The chair didn’t matter.

It would have to be left behind anyway.

The only way to disappear was to travel lightly, go fast and far, leaving no trace for anyone to pick up.

CHAPTER FOUR

DANTE had never failed to deliver what his grandfather asked of him. Failure in this instance was unthinkable. He had to get Isabella Rossini to Capri.

He followed her determined walk away from him, staying a few steps behind, not attempting to catch up with her. He needed time to process her reaction, make some sense of it before tackling her unreasonable negativity again. He had anticipated a pleased response. The fact that she’d chosen to live and work at the Sydney forum after losing her parents had suggested a wish for contact with the family. He now had to get his head into gear to deal with something entirely different.

Angry pride?

A fierce independence, grown out of being left to fend for herself for so long?

There’d been fear in her eyes just before she’d turned her back on him. Fear of what? Change? The unknown?

Beautiful eyes. Even without any artful makeup they were stand-out eyes, their amber colour quite fascinating, shaded by long, thick curly lashes. He liked her wide, generous mouth, too, another stand-out feature in her rather angular face. Her hair was an unruly mop, but take her to a good stylist, get it shaped right, hand her over to a beautician to polish up the raw material, put her in some designer clothes—her figure was thin enough under that shapeless black gear to wear them well—and Lucia would be as jealous as sin over her newly discovered cousin.

And spitting chips over another grand-daughter to inherit some of Marco’s estate.

The money …

He could use that as a bargaining tool. Isabella’s parents had left her enough to buy the apartment but little more than that. She wouldn’t have to work another day in her life if she pleased Marco. She could live like Lucia, being pampered in the lap of luxury. No woman in the world would knock that back. He just had to lay it on thickly enough for Isabella to take the bait.

Confidence renewed, Dante quickened his pace. She was heading into the passageway where the elevator to the south bank of apartments was housed. He glanced up, smiling at the colourful concoction the architect had designed—pink, lemon, green, red, blue, orange, purple—reminiscent of the brightly painted houses on the islands of Murano and Burano, a short ferry ride from Venice. Isabella’s apartment was the purple one on the third floor. She had pots of pink geraniums on her balcony, a nice homely touch.

I don’t need you in my life.

Dante’s chest tightened as he remembered those vehement words. Maybe she didn’t, but she could give up two months of it for Marco. Especially when the reward would be substantial. He’d pay her himself—upfront—if she doubted there was a pot of gold at the end of this trip. He’d spent thousands on Anya Michaelson to keep her sweet while he wanted her. He didn’t care how much it cost him to give his grandfather the solace of making some peace with the past before he died.

Her finger jabbed the elevator button—an action of haste and anxiety. In her fast flight across the square, she hadn’t once glanced back to check on what he was doing. Nor did she acknowledge his presence when he stood beside her, waiting for the elevator doors to open. She stared rigidly ahead as though he didn’t exist.

Dante was not accustomed to being ignored. As much as he told himself not to be piqued by her behaviour—it would change soon enough with the lure of wealth—it took a considerable effort not to reveal any vexation when he spoke.

‘I’m sorry I’ve upset you, Isabella. That wasn’t my intention,’ he assured her quietly.

No reply. Her jaw tightened. Dante imagined her clenching her teeth, denying the possible spilling of any more words to him. The stubborn stance irked him further. She was throwing out a challenge he’d take great satisfaction in winning, if only to see that rude rigidity wilt.

‘I’d appreciate it if you’d listen to a proposition which is very much to your advantage,’ he said, wondering if the blank wall she was holding was actually a negotiation tactic. Resistance virtually guaranteed being offered more.

The elevator doors opened. Her head jerked towards him. Her eyes slashed him with a cut-throat look. ‘I’m not interested!’

Having punched out those decisive words, she stepped into the small compartment and hit the button for her floor.

Dante stepped in after her.

She glared at him, clearly seething with frustration. ‘I told you …’

‘I’m carrying your chair up for you,’ he said blandly. ‘You are rather loaded down with the rest of your working gear.’

She rolled her eyes away. The doors closed and she pointedly watched for the floor numbers to flash up, once again set on ignoring him. He noted that every line of her body was tense, fighting the pressure of his presence. She might be ignoring him but she was acutely aware of him.

A pity she was his cousin. He’d like nothing better than to have her at his mercy on a bed, begging him to do whatever he wanted with her. Now that would be very satisfying—seeing her stiff body quivering, surrendering to his will! But a bit too incestuous, given the close blood link. His grandfather wouldn’t approve of that tactic.

The sexual scenario raised the possibility that her love life might be a barrier. ‘Is Luigi your boyfriend?’

The question startled her from her fixation on the upward journey of the elevator. ‘No.’ Worry carved a line between her brows. ‘So don’t pester him on my behalf. He’s just a fellow worker. And don’t go looking for other boyfriends, either, because there isn’t one.’

‘Good! No one to object to your coming to Italy with me.’

‘Will you get it through your head I’m not going anywhere with you!’ she cried in exasperation.

‘Why not? There’s nothing that can’t be put on hold here. Why not satisfy a natural curiosity about the family you’ve never met?’

A frantic, cornered look in her eyes.

Was it a daunting prospect for her? Did she see herself being critically examined by a bunch of strangers?

‘My grandfather … your grandfather … wants you with him, Isabella,’ he pressed, then played his trump card. ‘Marco is a very wealthy man. If you grant his wish, he will shower riches on you, give you access to more money than you’ve ever dreamed of. Financially your future—’

‘I don’t want his money!’

Horror on her face. Her whole body shuddered in recoil from the idea. Dante was so stunned by her reaction, he was totally at a loss to know what line of persuasion to try next. This woman was impossible. It was utter madness to be repulsed by the promise of financial security for the rest of her life.

The elevator came to a halt. She rushed out of it the moment the doors were open enough to make an exit, pelting along the corridor to her apartment as though the hounds of hell were snapping at her heels. Dante followed, grimly determined to get to the bottom of this crazy conundrum.

She shoved the key in the lock, was pushing against the door even before it opened. Dante knew she’d whirl inside and shut him out, given half a chance. He barged straight in after her before she could do it, not caring how outraged she’d be by the action. He’d run out of patience with trying to reason with her. If he had to tie her up and gag her, he would force her to listen to him long enough to be convinced that a trip to Capri was the best course for her to take.

‘This is home invasion!’ she yelled at him, her chest heaving in agitation. Nice breasts, Dante couldn’t help noting.

‘No reasonable person would think so. You didn’t object to my carrying up the chair for you,’ he calmly reminded her. ‘Perfectly natural for me to step into your apartment with it.’

She dropped the carry-case containing her easel. The stool which had been tucked under her arm clattered to the floor. She reached out, grabbed the folded chair from him, and pointedly let it fall on top of the carry-case. Clenched hands planted themselves aggressively on her hips. Her eyes blazed rejection of any excuse he could give for entering her apartment without permission.

‘Now get out!’ she hurled at him.

‘Not until I get satisfaction.’

He pushed the door shut and stood against it, blocking any move she might make to open it again. Dante wondered if she was going to fly at him and try to punch him out. Her eyes were wildly measuring his physique. Maybe she sensed that she’d stirred a dangerous male savagery in him, a savagery that would take pleasure in forcefully restraining any physical attack she made. His own hands were itching to demonstrate some mastery over her. She stepped back from the simmering flashpoint, lifted her chin to a defiant angle and spat out her next line of action.

‘If you don’t go right now, I’ll call the police.’

‘Go ahead. Call them,’ he challenged without a flicker of care, confident of justifying his presence here.

She visibly dithered over the decision.

‘While we’re waiting for them to come, you can do me the courtesy of listening to why your grandfather wants you to visit him.’

She flinched at the mention of Marco, as though the idea of a grandfather wanting her was painful. Dante wished he knew what was going on in her head. He hated dealing blindly. But listening to him was a lot less bother for her than answering to the police, so he expected to win this round.

‘Promise me you’ll leave when you finish talking,’ she demanded, hating him for forcing the choice.

He held up his hand. ‘Word of honour.’ He wasn’t about to finish talking until she agreed to come with him.

She heaved a sigh, then with a much put-upon air, moved into the sitting room and settled herself in a bucket chair, hands folded in her lap, looking at him stony-faced. She reminded Dante of a rebellious student having to endure an unfair lecture from a headmaster before she could escape.

He propped himself on the well-padded armrest of a sofa, commanding the space between her and the door. ‘What did your father tell you about the family rift?’ he asked, wondering if his uncle Antonio had painted Marco in some false light to favour himself.

She shook her head. ‘You talk. I’ll listen.’

He talked, repeating his grandfather’s story of what had led up to Antonio’s banishment, filling in some facts about the rest of the family, the death of his own parents, Marco’s grief at having lost two sons, the cancer that decreed he had only three months left to live—one month already gone—his search for Antonio which had led to Isabella, his wish to see her, get to know her.

He played on gaining her sympathy and was gratified when he saw tears well into her eyes. Sure that he could now clinch her co-operation, he finished with, ‘He’s dying, Isabella. The time is so short. If you can find it in your heart to give …’

‘I can’t!’ she cried, covering her face with her hands as she sobbed, ‘I’m sorry … sorry …’

‘I’ll organise everything, make it easy for you,’ Dante pressed.

‘No … no … you don’t understand,’ she choked out.

‘No, I don’t. Please tell me.’

She dragged her hands down her tear-streaked face, gulped in air, and raised a wet, bleak gaze to his. ‘It’s too late,’ she cried in a grief-stricken voice. ‘Bella died in a car accident six months ago. I thought she had no one. I didn’t think it would matter if I took her identity for a while. I’m sorry … sorry that your grandfather thinks she’s alive. Oh God!’ she shook her head in wretched regret. ‘I didn’t mean to hurt anyone.’

Dante was totally floored. He’d been sent on an impossible mission. Another death. He closed his eyes, shutting out the imposter, thinking of his grandfather who’d been fooled into believing he had another Isabella who might look like his beloved wife. Everything within him railed against delivering such a devastating disappointment.

Anger stirred. Why hadn’t the private investigators picked up the identity swap? How had this woman deceived everyone? No problem now in understanding her responses to him. She’d been scared out of her mind about getting tripped up. He opened his eyes to glare furious hostility at her.

‘Explain to me how you managed to take Isabella’s place without anyone questioning it,’ he commanded, pushing himself upright and walking over to where she sat, standing over her, using deliberate intimidation to draw what he wanted out of her.

She didn’t try to fight him this time. Her connection to his cousin poured from her in a stream of pleading for his understanding … how she’d come to share Isabella’s apartment and use her name to get employment at the forum, the car accident, her friend burnt beyond recognition, her own identification cards destroyed in the fire, the mistake made by the authorities because of a handbag she’d been holding when she’d been thrown clear …

‘I remembered afterwards that was why I’d taken off my seat belt. Bella was driving and she asked me to get a bag of sweets out of her handbag which she’d thrown onto the back seat. I couldn’t reach with my seat belt on, so I unclipped it and leaned through the gap between the front seats, hooked my hand around the shoulder strap and dragged it onto my lap.’

‘Her handbag must have contained her driver’s licence,’ Dante tersely pointed out. ‘The identification photo …’

‘It wasn’t a good one of her. We both had long curly hair, hers darker, but that could have been from bad lighting when the camera shot was taken, and she was smiling so you couldn’t tell her mouth wasn’t as wide as mine. Her eyes were squinted up so their different shape wasn’t so obvious, and I guess my face was bruised and puffy from the accident, making it look rounder. Even so, there was enough doubt about who I was for the police to call in the employment manager from the forum to identify me and because of my working under Bella’s name …’

‘Very convenient for you.’

She flushed at his acid sarcasm. ‘I was in a coma for two weeks after the accident. The identification was made while I was still unconscious. I didn’t know about it until after I woke up, and then all the medical staff was calling me Miss Rossini … and I let them. I let them because I had nowhere else to go and I needed recovery time from my other injuries, and I didn’t think Bella would mind …’

‘How could she?’ Dante savagely mocked. ‘She was dead.’

‘Yes,’ she agreed miserably. ‘I’m sorry. I didn’t know about you. Bella told me she was an orphan like me. No family. I didn’t think it mattered when the police came again after I woke from the coma and I identified the driver as my flatmate, Jenny Kent … a nobody who wasn’t connected to anyone. And that was the end of it.’

‘Not the end. You took over Isabella’s life because she had more than you,’ he accused mercilessly. Money was a prime motivation. It always was. She’d just proved him right again.

‘I only meant to do it for a while. Until I could …’

‘Well, you fooled everyone effectively. You can go on fooling them for another two months.’

He would not fail his grandfather on what was virtually a death-bed request. It didn’t matter who this woman was. She could make up for the deception she had played by being a good and loving grand-daughter to Marco until he died.

She shook her head, pained bewilderment in her eyes. ‘I was going to leave here tonight, become Jenny Kent again. I’m sorry I …’

Ruthless purpose surged in Dante, cutting her plan of escape dead. ‘I will not allow you to destroy the hope that made my grandfather send me on this mission. You will come to Italy with me. You will stay with him in the villa on Capri until he no longer needs you. He will know you as Isabella …’

‘No! No!’ She leapt to her feet in panic, hands wildly gesturing protest. ‘You can’t! I can’t!’

He gripped her flailing arms. His eyes burned through the glaze of horror in hers with unshakeable determination. ‘I can and you will. If you don’t do as I say, I’ll call the police and have you arrested for identity-theft and fraud, and I promise you your term of imprisonment will be a lot longer than two months!’

Shock, fear, despair chased across her face.

‘So what do you want to be, Jenny Kent?’ he mocked. ‘A common criminal rotting in jail or a pampered grand-daughter living in luxury?’

CHAPTER FIVE

Rome

One Week Later

JENNY stood in the bedroom assigned to her in Dante’s palatial apartment and stared at her reflection in the mirror, barely recognising herself. She had been transformed into someone else—the Isabella Dante wanted to present to his grandfather. It was incredible what money could do; incredible, fascinating and frightening. It had the power to make anything possible.

She now had a passport in Isabella’s name, an entire wardrobe of fabulous designer clothes—some acquired in Sydney while they waited for the passport, the rest bought during a stopover in Paris—a face that had been made over by a beautician, her once thickly tangled mass of hair cleverly cut into a tousled cascade of wild sexy curls, newly applied perfect fingernails, polished in a natural tone, plus a whole range of fantastic accessories to complement her new look—belts, bags, shoes, jewellery.

She’d flown halfway around the world in a private jet, been waited upon hand and foot, eaten food she’d never been able to afford, stayed in penthouse suites at the Gondola Hotels, and any minute now Dante would come and collect her for the helicopter flight to Capri. A different life, she thought. A totally different life which still didn’t feel quite real to her.

This image in the mirror was Dante’s puppet, moving and acting to his will. Even how it was dressed …

‘Wear the Sass and Bide outfit,’ he’d instructed. ‘This first lunch at the villa will be informal, and the design is something fresh and individual. Lucia would not have seen it anywhere. She’s not into Australian fashionistas.’

Lucia … Bella’s other cousin.

Every time Dante mentioned her it was with a cynical twist. He didn’t like her. Jenny had the strong impression he wanted his Isabella creation to outshine Marco’s real grand-daughter. Which felt terribly wrong to her, but maybe there was some good reason behind his antipathy towards his cousin. It was not her role to make judgements on the Rossini family. She had to follow Dante’s edicts or … A convulsive shudder ran through her at the thought of imprisonment in a women’s jail.

She couldn’t face it. The rigid discipline of the orphanage still haunted her in nightmares. Being subjected to that kind of uncaring authority again—the unrelenting system of punishment for any infringement of the rules, fighting to survive with some sense of self intact—anything was better than suffering through another soul-destroying environment.

Somehow for the next two months she had to think herself into Bella’s skin, be as true as she could to what her friend had told her about her life. If her presence helped Marco Rossini to die peacefully, maybe the deception wasn’t such a bad thing. Whatever happened, this was Dante’s choice, Dante’s family, so he had to deal with the outcome. Though she was irrevocably tied to it.

No way out, she thought, hating the sense of being trapped, frightened of failing, frightened even more of never regaining her freedom. Two months … two months of a life she knew too little about. Would this incredible makeover Dante had orchestrated really help to blind the Rossini family to seeing she was not one of them?

The Sass and Bide outfit was startling, fascinating in its creative use of fabrics. The patchwork on the blue denim vest was quite wild with bits of lace, decorative buttons, braiding and embroidering. The short-sleeved white T-shirt underneath ended in jagged handkerchief points, just lapping over the matching blue denim hipster jeans which also had embroidery running down the legs, and buttons detailing the short side splits at her ankles.

She wore embroidered rope sandals on her feet, decorated with tiny lacy shells, and a matching rope handbag was slung over her shoulder. But that was where the trendy casual image ended. Dante apparently scorned costume jewellery. Sapphires went with blue denim; sapphire and diamond drop earrings and a gold chain watch with a sapphire face and diamonds marking the hours. In short, she was wearing a fortune, and the woman in the mirror could have stepped out of a magazine featuring incredibly wealthy celebrities.

‘Ready?’

Her heart jerked. He even had a string on that, Jenny thought as she swung around to face the all-powerful puppeteer. She’d left the bedroom door open for his manservant to collect her luggage which was all packed and ready to go. The man moved in behind Dante to do precisely that while his master—her master—strolled towards her, his gaze taking in her appearance from head to toe, making every nerve in her body twang with the need to be approved.

She took a deep breath, stiffened her spine and answered, ‘As ready as I’ll ever be.’

He smiled, apparently satisfied with how she looked, his dark eyes glittering with a sexy appreciation of the woman he’d fashioned to suit what he wanted. ‘You look beautiful, Isabella,’ he purred at her, and her whole body seemed to vibrate with self-awareness.

She’d never bothered much about her appearance. Clean and tidy was all she’d cared about, buying most of her clothes in charity shops, shying away from spending money on non-essentials because she might need it for living. Being dressed like this, being looked at as Dante was looking at her, evoked feelings she’d never felt before and she wasn’t comfortable with them.

‘I guess fine feathers make fine birds,’ she muttered mockingly, thinking he always looked superb. He probably never glanced at a price-tag to see how much anything cost. He hadn’t while shopping with her. No doubt the blue jeans and white sports shirt he wore carried designer labels. They certainly showed off his top-of-the-line physique—mega-male, oozing classy sex appeal.

‘Don’t duck your head,’ he instructed, lifting a hand to her chin, tilting it up, forcing her gaze to meet his. ‘Hold it high. You’re proud to be Isabella Rossini. You’ve led an independent life and you won’t kowtow to anyone. You’re here because your grandfather invited you and that gives you every right to be treated as a respected member of the family, not Cinderella. Understand?’

It was difficult to find breath enough to speak when he was this suffocatingly close. ‘Yes,’ she choked out.

His thumb stroked her cheek. The hard ruthless gleam in his eyes softened to a wry appeal. ‘I may not be allowed to stay at your side. If Nonno wants you to himself … be kind to him, Isabella. Put him at ease with you. I want him to be happy that you’ve come.’

Panic undermined the seductively soothing intent of his caress. Being left alone with Marco Rossini was a terrifying prospect. If Dante wasn’t there to pull the strings … if she made a mistake … if she unwittingly revealed a different person to the one she had to portray …

Dante was frowning at her.

‘I’ll do my best,’ she promised in a rush.

‘There’s nothing to fear,’ he assured her, still frowning, his dark eyes stabbing his own indomitable confidence into hers. ‘I’ve paved the way for this meeting. Nonno will not be testing you about your identity. He’s an old man, facing a painful death, wanting the pleasure of making your acquaintance. All you have to do is respond to him as warmly as you can.’

He made it sound easy. Maybe it was, though the deception still weighed on her mind. She scooped in a deep breath, trying to calm her jangling nerves, and lifted her chin away from his touch, needing to feel some independence. He had taken over her life to such an extent, it was difficult to be confident of standing alone, without his all-pervasive support.

‘I’ll do my best,’ she repeated, and meant it, not wanting to be a source of distress to a dying man.

‘It’s in your best interests to do so,’ he reminded her.

‘Yours, too,’ she said with a flash of resentment at the ruthless power he had wielded.

He smiled, amused by her counter-thrust at him. ‘Yes. We’re in this together, aren’t we? You could say it forms an intimate bond.’

The hand he had dropped from her chin took possession of one of hers, fingers interlacing, gripping hard, enforcing a physical bond that burned like a branding iron, linking her inexorably to him. Jenny’s heart fluttered wildly as the heat from his hand spread through her entire body, igniting a mad desire for an intimate relationship with Dante Rossini that was not based on deception.

‘Time to go,’ he said.

And Jenny went with him, once more a slave to his command, tugged along by his hand while her mind, which he couldn’t completely dominate, was in a helpless whirl over the shocking realisation of finding herself actually wanting him to want her as a woman.

This situation was playing some weird sexual havoc on her. She’d been almost constantly in his company for a week, compelled into his world, and she supposed it was natural enough to have her normal, sensible self seduced by how beautiful and powerful and masterful he was—the kind of man that featured in foolish, romantic dreams, turning a Cinderella into a princess.

But this prince was not being driven by any desire for her.

She knew that.

He was determined on making his plan work, nothing more, nothing less.

It had to be these extraordinary circumstances causing her to be affected like this. They were thrown together by a conspiracy that probably bred a sense of closeness—a very temporary sense, she sternly reminded herself. When Dante no longer had any need for her co-operation, he’d cast her off as quickly and as ruthlessly as he’d picked her up.

To allow any attachment to him to develop was sheer stupidity. She had to keep remembering that Jenny Kent was not and would never be a person of serious interest to Dante Rossini. All he wanted of her was a brief impersonation of his cousin. If she played that role well enough, she’d be free to go at the end of it. That was what she had to aim for. Feeling swamped by this man’s magnetic attraction could only create a problem for her and she had problems enough.

So don’t go there.

Ever.

Dante was sharply aware of steel sliding into Jenny Kent’s backbone as he walked her down to the car that would take them to the heliport. She held her head high, straightened her shoulders and adopted an aloof air, ignoring the fact that he was still holding her hand. He briefly wondered if the idea of having some blackmail power over him was inspiring the change. Or was she simply taking courage from his assurances?

For the most part, she’d given him passive obedience since he’d forced her to take on the role of Isabella. The only rebellion she’d staged was her refusal to talk about her own life, flatly telling him he didn’t need to know. He wanted her to be Isabella and that was his only claim on her.

Oddly enough, it wasn’t easy to shrug off his curiosity about Jenny Kent, probably because most of the women he met were only too eager to tell him about themselves, courting his interest, wanting him to know them. Of course, none of them had been an unwilling captive in his company, but he was willing to bet that a week of being pampered with luxury, beautified, outfitted with ‘fine feathers’ would normally thaw any resistance they might have to giving him whatever he wanted.

Not his manufactured cousin.

She didn’t even speak unless spoken to. She soaked up what he told her about the Rossini family and offered nothing about herself. He wished there’d been time to have Jenny Kent investigated. He was taking a risk in trusting her to fulfil the role he’d insisted upon, trusting her fear of the alternative. His gut instinct told him she would deliver, which was all he should care about, yet it was definitely tantalising that she held herself so rigidly apart from any personal connection to him.

It gave him a perverse kind of pleasure to take possession of her hand. The urge to break her passivity kept niggling at him. But she didn’t fight the contact, didn’t respond to it in any way, just waited until he released it when she was stepping into the car, then sat with both her hands linked on her lap—a pointed picture of self-containment.

She did not so much as glance his way on the drive to the heliport, staring out the side window, apparently immersed in the sights and sounds of the streets they travelled. Dante felt himself challenged by her silence, by her stubborn determination to ignore him.

‘What do you think of Rome?’ he asked.

‘It doesn’t matter what I think,’ she said dismissively, still not turning her head towards him.

‘Nonno will ask. You might as well practice a reply.’

‘Then I’d sound rehearsed. Better that I don’t.’

‘I’ve been rehearsing you all week. Why stop now?’

‘Because time’s up. I’m about to go on stage and stuffing any more into my head at this point will only make me more anxious about my performance.’

It was a fair argument so he let his frustration with her slide. Whoever Jenny Kent was, she was far from stupid. Not only did she have street smarts, but also quite an impressive natural intelligence, making his task of coaching her into meeting any expectation of Isabella a relatively easy one. Her life experience was obviously a far cry from his, yet he was confident she could now fit in to the family without feeling too much like a fish out of water.

In fact, she wouldn’t just fit in, she’d shine. He’d been right about how she could look. Nonno was going to be proud to own her as his grand-daughter. She was beautiful. Quite enticingly beautiful. But he couldn’t afford to think of her like that. Nonno might see it in his eyes. Just one slip—revealing that she stirred a devilish desire in him—and the deception might unravel.

They arrived at the heliport. As Dante escorted his newly found cousin across the tarmac he watched his pilot’s reaction to her. Pierro was standing by the opened door of the helicopter, waiting to greet them and help them to their seats. He’d seen Dante with many beautiful women in tow. ‘Isabella’ lit up his eyes with a look that said ‘Wow! Knockout!’ in no uncertain terms.

Pierro couldn’t do enough for her, fussing over getting her comfortably settled in the helicopter. It won him a smile and sweetly appreciative words, neither of which had come Dante’s way all week. It was absurd to feel a twinge of jealousy, but damn it! He’d done a hell of a lot for her and she was barely civil to him.

You’ve done it to her, not for her, he reminded himself, but he was still piqued that with him she wrapped herself in a cool dignity he couldn’t penetrate. But he would. It was only a matter of time, and he’d make sure he had plenty of that with her while she was on Capri.

They landed at the villa just before noon.

Lucia, of course, was hot to meet her Australian cousin and size her up, actually coming down to the helipad instead of waiting in the shade of the colonnaded walkway. Dante felt the rush of adrenaline that always fired him up for critical meetings.

Game on! he thought, and hoped ‘Isabella’ was up to it.

‘Your cousin, Lucia,’ Dante murmured as he took Jenny’s arm, holding her steady for the high step down from the helicopter.

Jenny had already mentally identified her. Due to the shopping experience with Dante in Paris, she instantly recognised French chic. Lucia Rossini personified it: short black hair artfully cut in an asymmetrical bob; a gorgeous scarlet-and-white dress that skimmed her slim, petite figure; elegant white sandals with intricate straps around her ankles. She also carried herself with the same arrogant confidence that Jenny now associated with great wealth.

Without Dante’s intervention in dolling her up, she would have felt like dirt beneath the other woman’s feet. The style he’d chosen for her was very different, but it had more than enough unique class to make Lucia look quite miffed as she eyed her newly arrived cousin. It made her wary as Dante moved her forward for introductions.

‘Lucia, how sweet of you to welcome Isabella so eagerly!’ he drawled, his lightly mocking tone putting Jenny even more on guard.

‘Well, naturally I’m curious about a cousin I’ve never known, Dante,’ she tossed back at him, a flash of venom in her dark eyes.

Certainly no love lost between these two, Jenny thought.

‘You’ve had her to yourself for a whole week. Now it’s my turn,’ Lucia said, re-arranging her expression into a smile which didn’t quite reach her eyes. ‘Welcome to Capri, Isabella. I aim to make you feel at home here very quickly.’

She stepped forward, put her hands on Jenny’s shoulders and air-kissed both cheeks. Jenny instinctively reared back, not used to people invading her personal space and not liking the over-familiarity, particularly since she felt no warmth coming from this cousin.

‘Thank you,’ she muttered. ‘Very kind.’

‘Isabella is Australian, Lucia,’ Dante dryly reminded her. ‘She’s not accustomed to the Italian style of greeting. A hand-shake is more their style.’

‘Oh! How stand-offish!’ Lucia shrugged. ‘I thought Australians were known for their open friendliness.’

Jenny flushed at the implied criticism. ‘I’m sorry. I guess I’m feeling a bit strange at the moment. All this is very new to me.’

‘Well, you’ll have to learn to be Italian, too, if you want to fit into this family.’

The sheer arrogance of that statement stung Jenny’s deep resentment at being forced into this situation. ‘Maybe I won’t want to fit in.’ The words were out in a flash and she didn’t regret them. In fact, it gave her a fine satisfaction to see Lucia’s eyebrows shoot up in unplanned astonishment, as though being in the Rossini family was the most desirable thing in the world. It wasn’t, as far as Jenny was concerned. ‘I didn’t ask to come here,’ she added for good measure.

Lucia turned an arch look to Dante, her eyes glinting with malicious glee. ‘This must be a first for you,’ she drawled, ‘running into resistance from a woman, not having her falling on her knees to please you. Nonno should have sent me to collect Isabella. I would have done a better job of it.’

‘I doubt your brand of sly sniping would have achieved anything,’ he replied sardonically. ‘But then you wouldn’t have wanted to, would you, Lucia? Isabella is too much a wild card for your liking, coming in at the death, so to speak.’

‘Oh!’ She feigned hurt shock. ‘That’s such a mean thing to say! Don’t take any notice of him, Isabella.’ A cajoling smile was directed at her. ‘That’s just a payback for being teased about his famous charm. I’m delighted that you’re here for Nonno.’ She waved an open invitation. ‘Now do let’s go up to the villa. It’s so hot out here.’

Jenny glanced back at the helicopter, wishing she had never set foot in this place.

‘Pierro will bring in our luggage,’ Dante quickly assured her, taking her hand again, pressing it hard to remind her there was no escape, not until he allowed it, and that would be no time soon.

She hated him in that moment, hated having no choice, hated being thrust into such foreign territory, hostile territory if Lucia’s attitude was anything to go by.

Capri was supposed to be a romantic place, a paradise for lovers. As they moved from the open heat to the shade of a colonnaded walkway, Jenny couldn’t help thinking there was at least one serpent in this Eden.

How many more would she have to meet?

She was imprisoned on this island as surely as she would have been in a women’s jail, having to work out how to deal with the other inmates and survive. The luxury of it was supposed to sweeten her term here, but wasn’t there a saying—wealth is the root of all evil?

She yearned for her own simple life.

And hated Dante for forcing her into his.

CHAPTER SIX

THE colonnaded walkway was beautiful, shaded by pine trees and masses of brilliant bougainvillea. Jenny could imagine a Roman emperor with a string of courtiers strolling along it, sandals slapping on the flagstones. She wondered if Marco Rossini presided over his family like an emperor, parcelling out power to those who pleased him. Like Dante.

‘I’ve had the blue suite in the guest wing made ready for you,’ Lucia cooed at her. ‘I’m sure you’ll enjoy staying there. It has a lovely view of …’

‘I don’t think so,’ Dante cut in with an air of haughty command. ‘Isabella will feel much more comfortable in the suite adjoining mine. Makes it easier for her to come to me if she has a problem. I did promise her my protection on this journey.’

It was the first Jenny had heard of his promised protection, but she didn’t contradict him, thinking she might need it if Lucia was planning to sink her snaky fangs into her. Putting her in the guest wing, away from the puppeteer’s support, was probably a ploy to make her more accessible to hostile action, as well as making her feel like an outsider, which she was, but she wasn’t supposed to be.

‘But Isabella is safely here,’ Lucia argued. ‘What possible problem could she have now?’

‘Do as I say, Lucia.’ No moving him on that point.

‘It can’t be done,’ she said with a much put-upon sigh and a smug look at Dante. ‘Anya Michaelson is already in the suite adjoining yours. Which is where you wanted her on previous visits.’

Dante’s grip on Jenny’s hand tightened, revealing a rise in tension. She glanced at his face. Displeasure was written all over it. ‘Anya came here uninvited?’ he bit out in cold anger.

If Anya was his current girlfriend, she’d just made a bad move, Jenny thought. Dante Rossini liked to order things his way, and not even the lure of sexual pleasure right next door changed that aspect of his character.

‘No, no. I invited her,’ Lucia replied, still smug about her initiative. ‘I flew over to Rome to do some shopping and ran into her on the Spanish Steps. She was most upset about your leaving so abruptly, without a word to her, so I explained about Nonno sending you off to fetch Isabella, and then I thought you’d like some relaxation with Anya after such an arduous trip….’

‘In short, you interfered with what was none of your business.’

His tone would have made most people shrivel, but Lucia obviously thrived on his anger, positively enjoying herself.

‘You should be more caring of your women, Dante,’ she trilled back at him. ‘I was simply saving you from a nasty scene with Anya when you finally caught up with her again. I’m sure she’ll now be ever so sweet to you, all primed to smooth away your travel fatigue.’

Jenny felt a strong distaste for this conversation. She looked at the pots of flowers spaced between the columns, pretending total disinterest in Dante’s sex life, trying to keep herself emotionally separated from affairs that had nothing to do with her. Absolutely nothing.

Of course he would have a woman. What man like Dante Rossini wouldn’t? And no doubt Anya was beautiful and very beddable. Despite his annoyance at Lucia’s interference, Jenny expected him to choose the ready pleasures of a lover, especially since the arrangement was already in place. The potted flowers were lovely; geraniums, petunias, impatiens …

‘Bad judgement, Lucia,’ he said contemptuously. ‘Family takes priority at a time like this. You can deal with moving Anya out while I’m introducing Isabella to Nonno.’

A huge tide of relief swept through Jenny. His connection with her remained firm. She was more important to him than anything else. No, the deception was, she quickly corrected herself. He wasn’t about to abandon her during this testing time, not when his grandfather’s peace of mind was at stake. That came first. She kept her gaze trained on the flowers, but she heard real shock in Lucia’s response.

‘Don’t be so unreasonable!’ she snapped. ‘It’s not going to hurt Isabella …’

‘This is not open to argument, Lucia. You chose to invite Anya. She’s your responsibility. Do whatever you like with her, but Isabella is to occupy the suite next to mine. Make no mistake about that,’ he said with steely authority.

‘Anya won’t like it!’

‘Anya should have waited for me to contact her. If I wanted to.’

‘How can you be so cruel! She loves you.’

‘Since when have you become an authority on love?’ he mocked.

‘The two of you have been an item all this year.’

‘Don’t play games with me, Lucia. You’ll lose. Every time.’

His tone had moved to studied boredom. Jenny had no doubt that for him the issue was closed. She could feel Lucia seething with frustration, but had no sympathy for her. To her mind, people who set out to make mischief should be caught in their own net and made to pay.

‘One day your insufferable ego will be your undoing, Dante,’ Lucia warned venomously.

A little shiver of apprehension ran down Jenny’s spine. It was probably Dante’s ego that refused to accept failure, forcing her into this false identity. If Lucia somehow uncovered the deception …

‘Don’t hold your breath waiting for that day, Lucia,’ he drawled, emitting a confidence that eased Jenny’s spurt of fear, though didn’t completely eliminate it. Two months was a long time to be under the gun from this ‘cousin.’

‘Anyway, I can’t deal with Anya now. Nonno is waiting for us on the terrace.’

‘He’s not waiting for you,’ Dante coldly corrected her.

‘I won’t be shut out of Nonno’s first meeting with Isabella. He expects us to be all together.’

‘I’ll tell him you’ve already met Isabella. I doubt you’ll be missed. Nonno will want to focus all his attention on the grand-daughter he doesn’t know yet.’

‘It’s a point of hospitality, Dante,’ she grated out angrily.

‘If you insist on accompanying us, I’ll let him know just how inhospitable you’ve been, putting your guest ahead of the very special family member Nonno wants to feel welcomed here.’

‘There’s nothing wrong with the Blue Suite! Isabella, I promise you it’s beautiful.’

Jenny didn’t want to be dragged into the argument, but the direct appeal to her couldn’t be ignored. The colonnaded walkway had led into a fantastic atrium where they had come to a halt while the conflict was settled. It had a central water feature—a pool covered with gorgeous water-lilies—and she reluctantly lifted her gaze from these to look at Lucia.

Her younger ‘cousin’s’ dark eyes burned with the demand that she fall in with her plan, woman to woman against the man who divided them. For a moment Jenny was almost tempted, just to rattle Dante’s overbearing power, but the situation was too tricky for her to negotiate alone.

‘I’m sorry you’re being put to so much trouble on my account, Lucia,’ she said as calmly as she could, trying to maintain a composure that hid a growing mountain of nervous tension. ‘It is difficult, being a stranger to all this.’ She gestured to the exotic surroundings. ‘Dante has shepherded me around all week. Having him close by will make it easier for me.’

The hand holding hers squeezed approval, making her feel too connected to him again, too aware of him in a way that would not lead to anything good for her. He was her captor, her jailor, and while he probably meant to give her a sense of safety, he kept shaking her up with an attraction she knew was treacherous. Having him in the suite next to hers was not going to make life here easier for her, yet being separated from him was too scary to contemplate.

‘A fine start, Lucia,’ Dante mocked. ‘You’ve had Isabella apologising twice to you in the past ten minutes, making her feel uncomfortable.’

‘I didn’t mean to,’ she flared at him, furious at being out-manoeuvred.

‘Then you can demonstrate a kinder nature by making instant amends.’ He waved her towards one of the wide hallways which ran off from the atrium. ‘I’ll make your excuses to Nonno.’

Her jaw clenched. Every atom of her being exuded hatred of defeat, the knowledge that she was forced to accept it. This time around. Dante had her cornered with no way out. He was very good at that, Jenny thought with black irony.

Lucia managed to stretch her mouth into a smile aimed at her. ‘I truly had no intention of making you feel uncomfortable, Isabella. Please forgive my thoughtlessness.’

‘I don’t mean to be difficult, either,’ she replied with an answering smile. ‘I guess I haven’t yet recovered from the shock of being presented with a family I knew nothing about. I can understand it’s a shock to you, as well.’

Lucia seized the excuse. ‘Yes. Hard to know what to do for the best. I’ll go and fix everything up for you and join you on the terrace as soon as I can.’ With a last challenging glare at Dante, she turned on her heel and walked briskly to the hallway he’d indicated.

‘Well done,’ Dante murmured, his warm breath wafting over Jenny’s ear, making her flinch away from the tingling sensation.

Her head jerked up, her eyes rejecting any form of intimacy with him as they met and held his. ‘Bella might very well have walked away after one day of this rotten family rivalry,’ she said in a fierce whisper. ‘Why don’t I do that, Dante? Remove any danger of being caught out. You got me here, which is all your grandfather asked you to do. Be satisfied with …’

‘No!’ He cut her off, ruthless determination stamping on her rebellion. ‘I’ve paid for the performance. You give it.’

‘One day is enough,’ she argued on a wave of panic.

‘It won’t be for Nonno.’ He released her hand and took hold of her upper arms, forcing her to face him. His dark eyes blazed with relentless purpose. ‘While ever he lives, you stay here, giving him whatever he wants of you.’

She instinctively fought against the overwhelming pressure of his demands, frantically searching for some way out. ‘What if he doesn’t like me?’

‘He will.’

‘Why should he? He doesn’t know me.’

‘Neither do I but I like you, Isabella.’ The tension on his strong face broke into a slow, sensual smile. ‘I’m beginning to like you very much.’

Her heart skittered in wild alarm as she felt her resistance melting. Her mind screamed that he had a woman and she must not allow his famous ‘charm’ to get to her. ‘I haven’t given you any reason to,’ she snapped.

He laughed, effectively zooming up his attraction quotient which was already far too discomforting for Jenny. Her head whirled with the need to block it out, stay indifferent to him.

‘All this time we’ve spent together, not once have you whined or wailed or wept about your fate.’

‘There was no point in kicking and screaming over what I can’t change.’

‘Exactly. Which is a surprisingly intelligent response from a woman.’

‘Then you can’t know many intelligent women.’

‘Or you’re not practised in using feminine wiles to win what you want.’

He was right. She’d never learnt to use feminine wiles, never been in the kind of environment where they might have been of use. In any event, if she read his character correctly, they would have been futile weapons in this situation.

‘Would they have worked on you?’ she asked, showing her scepticism.

‘No. But that wouldn’t have stopped most women from using them.’

‘Waste of time and energy,’ she muttered.

‘True. And I appreciate your pragmatic attitude. Needs must to get the job done. You’ve actually given me many reasons to like you, Isabella. Not least of which was the deft way you handled Lucia.’

‘As you said, you’ve paid for the performance. I was simply following your lead.’

‘With a nice little embellishment of your own at the end.’ He smiled again as he lifted a hand to touch her cheek in an admiring salute. ‘I’m sure you’ll handle the meeting with Nonno just as well.’

Her skin burned under the light caress. Her eyes burned with resentment over the cavalier way he touched her as he liked, always reinforcing the inescapable link between them. An increasingly dangerous link in Jenny’s mind.

‘Let’s get on with it,’ she said tersely.

‘It will go better if you relax.’

‘I’ll relax more quickly if you get your hands off me.’

He raised his eyebrows at the too-revealing comment and Jenny cursed herself for letting it slip. He lifted his hands out in a gesture of meaning no offence, and she felt herself flushing as she rushed into answering the heart-pumping speculation in his eyes.

‘You might own me in one sense, Dante Rossini, but there are some liberties you have no right to take.’

He nodded but the speculation didn’t go away and she inwardly squirmed under it, knowing she had just shown a vulnerability that completely undermined any pose of indifference.

‘Another first,’ he murmured in dry amusement. ‘No woman has ever objected to my touch before.’

‘I’m your cousin,’ she fiercely reminded him. ‘And don’t you forget it.’

‘Cousins can and do show physical affection.’

‘I can do without Lucia’s brand of affection. And yours.’

He cocked his head musingly. ‘Nonno will like your feisty sense of independence. I think you’re ready to meet him now.’

‘Do I have a choice?’

‘No.’

‘I didn’t think so.’ She waved a careless hand, doing her utmost to appear relaxed. ‘Lead on. I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.’

Out of the corner of her eye she could see him smiling as he ushered her over to a set of double glass doors which opened to a terrace overlooking the sea they had flown over only a short while ago. The old saying—’caught between the devil and the deep blue sea’—slid into her mind. It was precisely how she felt.

Focus on what Bella would be feeling, she swiftly told herself. Here she was, meeting her grandfather for the first time, a man who’d wanted nothing to do with her family until now. Any sense of affection was impossible. Curiosity, yes. Perhaps resentment, too, at being called in so late in the day, too late for her own father who’d died in exile, never knowing any forgiveness for his grave teenage sin.

She mentally blocked out Dante, training her gaze on the old man being helped up from a sun-lounge by a woman caregiver. He still had a full head of thick wavy hair, shockingly snow-white, framing a face that seemed all bones, the flesh obviously wasted by the cancer that was eating him from the inside. His skin was tanned from lying in the sun, possibly in an attempt to look healthier than he was. He wore a loose white tunic over baggy white trousers. Neither hid the frailty of a body which had probably once been as big and strong as Dante’s.

He was a dying man, maybe in considerable pain, warranting some sympathy despite the other circumstances that had brought her here. It was clearly an effort for him to stand straight and tall, determined on meeting her with dignity. Pride doesn’t die, Jenny thought, and Bella might well be prickly with pride, too, the outcast who hadn’t asked to be rejoined to this Rossini family and had no reason to bow to this patriarch.

Hold your head high, Dante had instructed.

She did.

And met Marco Rossini’s penetrating dark gaze with determined steadiness.

I am Bella. You are my grandfather and you don’t know me. This is not just a test for me. It’s a test for you, too.

CHAPTER SEVEN

THEY stood, face-to-face, studying each other in a silence that stretched Jenny’s nerves so far she could feel them twanging with tension. Marco Rossini was taking in every feature of her face as though trying to match them against some picture in his mind, and fear squeezed her heart as she read disappointment in them. Inevitable, she knew, because she had no Rossini genes, though maybe his disappointment was good for her. He mightn’t want to keep her here, since she didn’t look like the son he had banished.

His mouth finally broke into a wry little smile. ‘Thank you for coming,’ he said, his voice furred with emotion.

‘I’m sorry it was too late for … for my father.’ She hated speaking the deception that had to be carried through, but the sentiment was right if she’d been Bella.

‘So am I, my dear. So am I,’ he repeated sadly.

And her heart went out to him. It was sad, sadder than he knew with his grand-daughter gone, too. Tears welled into her eyes, remembering Bella’s dreadful death, and Marco Rossini reached out and took one of her hands in both of his, patting it comfortingly.

‘Your loss is even more grievous with both parents gone,’ he said in gentle sympathy. ‘I hope I can make up in some way for not being there for you.’

The tears overflowed, spilling down her cheeks. It was awful, pretending to be someone she wasn’t. This should be happening to Bella, getting a grandfather who would care for her. She shook her head, bit her lip, swallowed hard, desperate to regain some control. ‘I’m sorry,’ she choked out. ‘I didn’t mean to …’

‘It’s okay, Isabella,’ Dante soothed, quickly stepping over to a small table beside the sun-lounge, pulling some tissues out of a box and thrusting them into her hand. ‘I’m sure Nonno understands this meeting isn’t easy for you.’

‘Come and sit down, my dear,’ the old man invited, drawing her over to a bigger table shaded by a large umbrella. ‘Pour her a drink, Dante.’

The table was round, the chairs well-cushioned. Marco dismissed his caregiver as Dante poured the three of them drinks from a jug of fruit-juice, adding ice from a more expensive version of an esky. The men sat on either side of her and Jenny did her best to regain some composure, mopping her cheeks, hoping the eye-makeup she’d been taught to apply wasn’t completely messed up, taking several deep breaths to ease the tightness in her chest.

‘Where is Lucia?’ Marco asked his grandson, diverting attention from her while she recovered from her distress.

‘Re-arranging accommodation for Isabella. She had designated the furthermost suite in the guest wing for her, which I didn’t consider appropriate.’

‘Ah! So typical!’ the old man remarked ruefully. ‘I should have directed the choice.’

‘Lucia is used to being your only grand-daughter, Nonno.’ He nodded towards Jenny, a silent warning that his cousin could be spiteful towards her.

‘I’ll take that into account. But for the most part, you’ll have to be my watchdog, my boy.’ It was a reluctant admission of weakness.

‘I will,’ Dante assured him.

‘Put all business on hold. I want you here now. It won’t be for long.’

‘I’ve already done that, Nonno. I want to spend this time with you.’

The old man heaved a weary sigh. ‘I don’t have much energy these days. Thank you for bringing Isabella to me, Dante. She should not have been left alone.’

‘I’ll see that she is never without family support again.’

Jenny couldn’t let that pass. ‘I’m all right. I don’t need anything from you,’ she declared, shooting a frown at both Dante and Marco. ‘I didn’t come to get your family support. I can look after myself.’

The old man eyed her quizzically. ‘Why did you come, Isabella?’

‘Because …’ He forced me to, but she couldn’t say that. ‘Because I wanted to know where my father had come from. Dante told me why you banished him, but you know, it must have been terrible for him, too, knowing he caused his mother’s death. I think now he punished himself, taking on the hardships of living and working in the Outback. It’s a very isolated life. But he was a good man, a good husband, a good father. You could have been proud of what he made of himself.’

She barely knew where the words came from—stories Bella had told about her growing-up years on the cattle station in far west Queensland, her own instinctive spin on the tragedy that had led to Antonio Rossini’s exile, a need to resolve the bad feelings that Dante wanted resolved because that would free her in the end.

Her earnest outburst seemed to drive Marco back inside himself. He closed his eyes. His face sagged. His skin took on a greyish tinge.

Dante leaned forward, anxiously touching his arm. ‘Nonno, Isabella didn’t mean to be accusing.’

The heavy lids slowly lifted. ‘My boy, I’ve been saying the very same things to myself, ever since I read the investigator’s report.’ He turned deeply regretful eyes to Jenny. ‘What was done was done in anger and grief. I loved my wife very much. And I believe what you tell me. Antonio loved his mother very much. He gave you her name.’

Dante hadn’t mentioned that to her. It made more poignant sense of Marco’s disappointment. ‘You wanted to see her in me.’

‘Yes. Antonio looked very like her. I thought …’ He made an apologetic grimace.

‘It’s Isabella on my birth certificate but I’ve always been called Bella,’ Jenny said defensively, shying from being linked to the woman whom Marco had loved and lost. It made her feel even more of a fraud.

‘Bella …’ he repeated softly. ‘A fitting name. You’re a beautiful young woman. Your mother must have been beautiful, too.’

Jenny flushed at the compliment, knowing it wasn’t really deserved since her ‘beauty’ had been engineered by Dante. ‘I thought so,’ she answered stiffly, judging it to be the safest reply.

‘Do you have photographs of your parents you can show me?’

Jenny shook her head, answering with Bella’s own words explaining why she had none of the usual mementoes of her family. ‘The old homestead on the station burnt down when I was eighteen and in my last year at boarding school. My parents were away at the cattle sales. Nothing was saved.’

‘Another loss for you,’ Marco murmured sympathetically.

‘And you.’ Her eyes flashed understanding of his desire to see a pictorial record of the son who had lived out his life on the other side of the world.

‘Yes. But I chose to bring my loss upon myself. You didn’t.’

It was fair comment and she nodded her appreciation of it. She was beginning to like Marco Rossini. He didn’t come over as a cruel tyrant, ruthlessly wielding his wealth and power to punish or reward, more a man in the winter of his life, regretting mistakes he could not re-write.

She picked up the drink Dante had poured for her and sipped the fruit-juice, grateful for the cool moisture sliding down her throat. It tasted of pineapple and oranges. She needed the refreshment for the next round of questions.

A glance at Dante showed him watching her with an air of curious respect, as though she’d met more than his expectation in her performance so far. Which was a huge relief, since she’d been winging it with a mish-mash of her own feelings and what she’d imagined Bella’s would be.

‘Since you chose to live at the Venetian Forum, I thought Antonio must have told you some of his family history,’ Marco put to her. ‘Yet you said you knew nothing of us.’

‘He never spoke of you,’ she answered, though she had no idea of whether that was true or not. The question of why Bella had bought an apartment at the Venetian Forum had been tormenting her ever since Dante had brought it up. She had to produce a logical reason for it.

‘We had an Italian name. I asked my father where it had come from. He told me it was an old Venetian name. His family had lived there but when he’d lost them he’d emigrated to Australia, and Venice was a place in the past for him. He said I should only think about being an Australian.’ She lifted her chin proudly. ‘Which is what I am.’

The old man nodded. ‘It’s a fine country. I spent some time in Sydney, purchasing suitable property for our hotel and the forum. It’s a beautiful city.’

‘Yes. I love it,’ Jenny said strongly, wanting him to know she had no desire to leave her life for anything he could offer. Bella might have made that change but Jenny Kent couldn’t.

‘A big change for you from life in The Outback,’ he remarked, possibly thinking if she could adapt to that, she could adapt to moving to another country.

‘I had no heart for trying to run the cattle station after my parents died. There was a large mortgage on it because of the drought and …’

‘Too difficult for you in every respect,’ Marco murmured sympathetically.

‘Yes.’ She sighed over the immediate difficulty of trying to relive Bella’s life. ‘After everything was settled up, I wasn’t sure what I wanted to do, so I went on what you might call a journey of discovery, travelling around until I found a place that appealed to me. When I came to Sydney, I found the Venetian Forum and …’

‘And you remembered your father was originally from Venice,’ Marco supplied helpfully.

‘It felt right. Like a sense of belonging. I loved the artiness of it, the colours of the apartments, the markets around the canal. I’ve always loved drawing and I thought about signing up for an art course but I had to wait until the beginning of the new year to do that. I made a good friend who was also into art and asked her to share my apartment so I wasn’t alone. She didn’t have any family, either. We were like sisters.’

Jenny desperately hoped that covered everything. ‘But then I lost her, too,’ she finished off, her voice losing traction under the dampening weight of sorrow that Bella’s death always evoked in her.

She closed her eyes and ducked her head, fighting another rush of tears. Bella should be here, not her. Jenny Kent had no one to care if she was dead or not. And Bella had been so kind to her, so generous in her sharing, so good to be with. She had deserved more from life, and maybe she had secretly yearned for this reunion with the Rossini family.

Jenny wept for her in her mind …. I can’t do this for you. I’m not you. Yet to survive she had to take Bella’s place for Marco Rossini. Dante would not let her go until the performance was no longer needed for his grandfather.

‘You have us now, Bella,’ the old man assured her quietly.

She shook her head and lifted a bleak gaze to the man she had to satisfy. ‘You don’t feel real to me, Mr Rossini. None of this feels real. I’m apart from it.’ That was the truth.

‘Give it time, my dear. I know about the accident that killed your friend. You’ve suffered one tragedy after another and it’s taken a good part of this year for you to recover from your own injuries, delaying the career plan you’d decided upon. Let this visit to Capri be a healing time for you, in many respects. We’ll get to know each other …’

Panic churned through her again at the thought of keeping up this deception every day for months. She couldn’t do it, couldn’t … ‘But you’re going to die, too,’ she blurted out, wildly hoping he would understand she couldn’t bear it. ‘Dante wouldn’t take no for an answer, so I came to see you, but …’

There was an instant hiss of indrawn breath from Dante, a tense leaning forward.

Jenny was too scared to look at him, too scared to utter another word. Her eyes frantically pleaded with his grandfather to let her off the hook.

The old man raised a commanding hand to his grandson. ‘There’s no need to be protective of me, Dante. Why should Bella risk growing fond of a man she knows is dying?’

‘You’re her grandfather,’ he answered vehemently.

Jenny trembled at the sound of his displeasure.

‘Who has never played any part in her life, never done anything for her,’ Marco replied reasonably. With an air of sympathetic understanding, he turned to Jenny, addressing her kindly. ‘My dear, I have no doubt Dante did everything in his power to steam-roll you into this visit. I’m sure he would have played upon your natural urge to see where your father came from.’

She flushed, ashamed of the lie.

‘Antonio was my son for eighteen years,’ he went on in a tone of sad yearning. ‘He was a boy of great promise. One thing I can do is fill in those years for you, if you’ll allow me.’

Her heart sank. Bella would have wanted that. Any daughter who’d loved her father would. She could feel Dante fiercely willing her to agree, hanging the threat of prison over her head if she didn’t. There was no way out.

‘I have very little time left, Bella,’ Marco added softly. ‘Will you help me to spend it well, correcting a wrong that weighs heavily on my heart? Think of me, if you will, as a treasure chest of memories you can open now, but will be forever closed once I’m gone.’

It was too persuasive an appeal to deny. ‘All right. I’ll try it,’ she conceded, surrendering to the inevitable once again. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have thrown your … your failing health in your face. It just seems that …’

‘Death keeps cutting through your life?’

She nodded, feeling too uncomfortable to say anything more.

‘It’s different with me, Bella. My journey is simply drawing to a close. Only this business with you remains undone.’ He smiled encouragement at her. ‘Let’s finish it together.’

She managed a wobbly smile back. ‘I hope it will be good for you, Mr Rossini.’

‘Good for you, too, my dear.’

Not in a million years, Jenny thought darkly.

She threw a defiant look at Dante, not really caring about his reaction to her performance since Marco was satisfied with the end result. Besides, she was too drained of feeling by this traumatic meeting to worry about him at this point.

‘It will be all right, Isabella. I promise you,’ he said quickly, determined on soothing her fears.

He’d stand between her and any trouble. Jenny had no doubt about that. But he couldn’t promise it would be all right for her. It never could be. The deception was tearing her apart. The bitter irony was she had thought surviving a term in a women’s prison would be harder.

Bad choice.

Bad, bad choice.

Jenny Kent was more in danger of losing herself here than anywhere else.

CHAPTER EIGHT

‘YOU like living dangerously?’

The angry threat in Dante’s voice was like a hammer beating on Jenny’s head, which was already aching from the stress of the meeting on the terrace. Lucia had joined them there. Lucia had shown her to this suite so her new cousin could freshen up before lunch. Dante, of course, had tagged along to ensure everything was ‘all right,’ and once they had entered the appointed room, he’d very purposefully ushered Lucia out, closing the door firmly behind her, intent on securing a private tête-à-tête with the puppet who’d done her own little dance with his grandfather.

Jenny gritted her teeth and turned to face him, determined on standing the ground she had just established with Marco Rossini—an independent person who’d make her own choices. Trapped here she might be, but she wasn’t going to bend to Dante’s will anymore. She met his blazing gaze with stubborn defiance.

‘I adapted to circumstances. Isn’t that what you wanted of me?’

‘You saw a chance to extract yourself from the situation and you took it,’ he fired at her.

‘I’m not what he wanted,’ she retorted fiercely. ‘I couldn’t be, could I? You should have foreseen that, Dante. You disappointed him.’

‘No. I have never disappointed my grandfather,’ he declared with vehement conviction. ‘One of his wishes didn’t come true. You don’t look like Antonio. That was unavoidable, but you can and will supply everything else he needs from you.’

‘I said I’d try.’

He crossed the room to where she stood at the foot of the bed, towering over her with intimidating power. ‘You were trying to twist your way out of this. Don’t try it again or I’ll make you pay for it.’ His eyes bored into hers. ‘Believe me, I’ll make you pay for it.’

She believed him.

He was as much tied to this deception as she was, and failure was unacceptable.

Dante Rossini didn’t fail.

The force of the man in such close proximity made her quake inside. It was like being blasted by an electric energy that jangled her nerves, kicked her heart into a faster beat, tore at her muscles, leaving them quivering. She stared back at him, refusing to let him see any weakness in her, silently fighting her lonely fight to survive him as well as everything else.

‘Nothing more to say?’ he mocked.

She swallowed convulsively, trying to get some control over her throat muscles. Her mouth was as dry as the Sahara Desert, making it impossible to speak, so she simply shook her head. He didn’t want to hear anything she might say, anyway.

The threatening tension on his face slowly relaxed. The laser-like heat in his eyes simmered down. His mouth actually quirked into an ironic little smile.

‘On the whole, you did quite well out there. Not the warm response I told you to give, but the emotional tears were good. Nonno was moved by them. He liked your independent stance, too.’

The approval, coming straight on the heels of his attack, turned Jenny’s mind to mush.

‘Just don’t hold that line too hard,’ he went on. ‘You’ve made your point. You’re not about to suck up to a grandfather who hasn’t been a grandfather to you. That’s okay. It’s an attitude he respects, but soften it with kindness. And courtesy.’

She nodded.

He huffed an exasperated sigh. His eyes snapped with annoyance. ‘We’re back to the silent treatment, are we?’

It goaded her into a challenging glare and reactivated her vocal chords. ‘Less grief for me if I remain a submissive doll who doesn’t buck your authority.’

‘Huh!’ he scoffed. ‘Submissive is the last word I’d apply to you! I’m not fool enough to believe something meek and mild resides in the fortress you’ve built around yourself. You can fly the white flag as much as you like but I know …’

He stepped closer, raising her tension level to screaming point. His hand gripped her chin, fingers pressing into the curve of her cheek, and his eyes were glittering with heat again, not angry heat, not threatening heat, more a very male sexual heat wanting supremacy over a woman. He was touching her, touching her aggressively, and she was paralysed with panic.

‘I know rebellion is seething behind it,’ he said with arrogant certainty. ‘And maybe the best way to quell it is to storm your defences and seduce you into wanting to stick with me.’

His fingers slid into her hair. His other arm scooped her body hard against his. She had no time to react with any physical or vocal protest. His mouth covered hers, and the shock of his kiss, of being enveloped by the heat and strength of his powerful body, completely robbed her of any resistance. He invaded her mind, possessed it with a host of sensations.

She’d never been kissed like this before, never been held by a man like him, never experienced such an explosion of excitement. His mouth ravished hers, his tongue sweeping over her palate, making it tingle with intense pleasure, driving her own tongue into a duelling response. He had read her character rightly. Submission was not in her nature. Every primitive instinct she had was suddenly triggered, dictating a need to fight back, to do to him what he was doing to her.

The self-discipline that had ruled her life for so long broke into an angry passion. He held her body by force. She flung her arms around his head, hands burrowing fiercely into his thick hair, holding him just as forcefully. Her lower body ground against his. Her breasts thrashed his chest. No control. Every action was driven by a wild urge to assert herself, not surrender to his dominance, make him feel what he was making her feel.

The arm around her back tightened, his hand pressing down, grasping the fleshy curve of her bottom, lifting her into intimate contact with the erection she had aroused. Part of her mind registered danger. The rest of it revelled in her power to seduce him out of his formidable control.

He’d taken her out of the life she knew. She wanted him to pay for that, screw up his puppet plan, storm him with crashing waves of feeling, drag the devil into the deep blue sea he’d plunged her into. Awash with incoherent emotion, she was barely aware of him moving, carrying her with him. His mouth was locked on hers, kissing with ravaging intensity. Only when he’d tumbled her backwards onto the bed, did it break away.

Her eyes snapped open. He was kneeling over her, breathing hard, a dark confusion on his face. Words flew off her tongue in a silky taunt. ‘Not what you wanted, Dante?’

His eyes blazed with the desire to crush her spirit, grind it so far down she’d be enslaved to his will. Never, she silently shot at him, exhilarated by the contest between them.

A knock on the door startled them out of the intense connection with each other. Dante cursed under his breath, backed off the bed, hauled her to her feet. ‘This will keep,’ he muttered savagely, releasing her to head for the door, putting respectable distance between them.

Jenny’s legs were too tremulous to walk anywhere. She sucked in air to get a blast of oxygen through her scattered brain and sat back down on the bed, needing recovery time and wanting to hide any crumpling of the duvet where she had lain on it. Her heart was pumping with horror at what she had almost done with Dante Rossini, horror at her own mad elation over it.

They were supposed to be cousins. She bit down on a bubble of hysterical laughter. If this deception fell apart it would be his fault. He’d started it. He’d forced it. And be damned if she’d take the blame for it!

Another knock on the door.

He opened it. ‘Anya?’ he said in a tone so cold, it automatically denied there’d been any boiling heat in this room.

Anya … the woman he usually housed in this suite for his sexual convenience … here to smooth away his travel fatigue.

The hysterical laughter bubbled up again and Jenny clamped down on it, pride insisting on an appearance of absolute decorum. She sat up straight, hands in her lap, her mind seething with curiosity over how Dante was going to handle this deception, dealing with his current girlfriend after he’d just been conducting a sexual assault on his cousin. Was he incredibly adept at switching himself on and off?

She was curious, too, about the type of woman who usually attracted him. No doubt someone as fabulous as him in the looks department, she thought cynically, determined not to feel in any way jealous. This was not her world and she wasn’t about to forget that reality.

‘Excuse me, Dante,’ Anya pleaded in a honeyed voice. ‘Some of my toiletries were left in the bathroom. I’ve come to collect them.’

She didn’t give him the chance to deny her entry, sliding into the room as she spoke, obviously keen to get a look at the cousin for whom she had been evicted from this suite. Anya Michaelson was a honey all over. Men probably flocked to her like bees. She had a glorious mass of silky blonde hair. Her figure was sensational, voluptuous curves barely encased in a bright yellow mini-dress. Perfect long legs gleamed as though they’d just been rubbed with scented oil. And the face she turned to Jenny was strikingly beautiful: flawless skin, stunning blue eyes, a full-lipped mouth with a very sexy pout.

‘Sorry to break in on you like this,’ she directed at Jenny, the blue eyes gobbling up every detail of her appearance, sharply assessing the attraction of the woman Dante was supposedly protecting. ‘I’ll only be a minute.’

She was already crossing the room, heading for a door which had to lead to an ensuite bathroom.

‘Say hello to Isabella, Anya.’

The whip-like command from Dante stopped her in her tracks. ‘Oh!’ she exclaimed apologetically. ‘I didn’t mean to be rude.’ A row of perfect white teeth was flashed at Jenny. ‘Hello, Isabella. Don’t you love Capri?’

‘Not particularly,’ Jenny answered, bridling at the condescending tone.

‘Well, you’ve just arrived. I’m sure it will grow on you. Excuse me while I remove my things, won’t you? I expect we’ll be meeting properly over lunch.’ She threw an appeasing smile at Dante. ‘Pardon me, caro. A careless oversight by one of the servants, not being thorough in checking what might have been missed.’

‘Make sure you collect everything, Anya. I don’t want you returning,’ he said balefully.

She kissed her fingertips and tossed it at him, sashayed into the bathroom, leaving the door open behind her, not so much for an easy exit, Jenny thought, but to eavesdrop on any conversation in the bedroom.

No satisfaction for Anya on that score.

Jenny didn’t even look at Dante, let alone speak to him. She rose from the bed and, finding her legs much steadier now, strolled over to the glass doors on the other side of the room to him. Outside was another colonnaded walkway, shading the area between this wing of the villa and the stone wall running along the cliff edge, beyond it the sea. She pretended to take in the view, her mind ferociously engaged on far more internal territory.

The sexuality Dante had aroused in her was still tingling through her body, making it feel vibrantly alive. Part of her wanted to pursue this experience with him, but what self-respect was there in that? The blonde bombshell in the bathroom represented his world—the beautiful people with money to burn. No doubt he’d poured out his famous charm to acquire her.

No charm for Jenny Kent. He was knowingly using his mega-strong physical attraction to get what he wanted from her. He’d probably been doing that with women all his life, given the male assets he’d been born with. Did she really want to fall victim to a cynical sexual play?

No.

It would be totally stupid of her.

Getting more deeply involved with Dante Rossini would only muddy what was already dangerous waters. She had to keep a clear head, not get distracted from what she had to do to earn her freedom.

‘Got them,’ Anya trilled, as though it had been a triumphant feat of discovery.

It struck a false note in the loaded silence.

Jenny turned to acknowledge her presence but didn’t get a glance from the other woman. Anya’s gaze was concentrated on Dante, who had remained by the opened bedroom door, pointedly waiting for her to depart.

‘Then there’s nothing to stop you from speeding on your way,’ he drawled, dark eyes glittering impatience.

She flounced over to him, pausing to tilt up her beautiful face, pout her sexy mouth and say, ‘I did apologise for the intrusion.’

‘Curiosity killed the cat, Anya.’ It was a cold indictment of her behaviour.

‘I just wanted …’

‘You’ve got what you came for. Go!’

His stony face did not invite argument. She left. He closed the door. Jenny steeled herself to rebuff any continuance of the scene Anya had interrupted. Dante turned to face her, his dark gaze skating over her stiff stance, his mouth curling into a twist of irony at the defensive wall so firmly back in place.

‘Why don’t you follow her?’ Jenny flung at him. ‘I don’t need you to help me settle in here, and since you’re obviously feeling some frustration, I’m sure your girlfriend would welcome the chance to ease it for you.’

‘Ah, but I wouldn’t welcome her efforts.’

Her heart skipped at the change of tone from icy distaste to seductive sensuality. It raced into a gallop as he started strolling towards her, his eyes mocking her attempt to reject what had happened between them.

‘I don’t welcome yours,’ she stated vehemently. ‘Your Casanova mentality doesn’t appeal to me one bit.’

Her jeering contempt did not hold him back. He shrugged it off and kept on coming. ‘Casanova romps are not my style. I’d decided to end my relationship with Anya before I flew to Australia for you.’

‘She can’t know that or she wouldn’t be here.’

‘Anya only listens to what she wants. Apparently my suggestion that she move on to another man made her think she’d better work harder to keep me, and she seized the opportunity Lucia held out to her.’

‘Then let her work hard.’ Anything to keep herself safe from what he could do to her!

He shook his head. ‘I don’t want her anymore.’

His eyes told her very graphically that she was now the object of desire. Jenny was hopelessly torn between her own secret desire for him to want her and the certain knowledge he intended to use sex to keep her in line with him. He wanted abject surrender from her, not a relationship that carried caring with it. He had no reason to care for her, never would.

‘Don’t look at me like that!’ she cried. ‘I’ve just seen the type of woman who attracts you and I’m not it. If you think you can fool me, think again!’

Dante did pause to think again. The fierce antagonism flowing from her would only deepen if he physically forced the issue. Persuasion was now the tactic to use to get her back to where he wanted her. And he did want her. The desire still surging through him was stronger than any he’d felt in a long time. Anya’s sexual expertise was a tame thing compared to the powerhouse of passion he’d found in this woman.

He had to move Anya out of this villa, off Capri, get rid of that bone of contention before attempting another seduction, which would have to be carefully planned, given the level of resistance Anya’s intrusion had forged.

‘And get this straight,’ the little spitfire hurled at him. ‘I’ll be Isabella for your grandfather whenever he wants my company, but I don’t like Lucia and Anya and I’m not going to mix with them when he’s not there.’

‘Anya will be gone before lunch.’

‘Fine! Then you can lunch with your real cousin by yourself. Tell her I have a headache. Tell her I’m still suffering jetlag. Tell her anything you like to excuse me from having to put up with more stress, because I’m going to rest in this room all afternoon. By myself. Or I won’t answer to how I conduct myself with your grandfather over dinner tonight,’ she finished with threatening defiance.

‘Good idea!’ he approved, which instantly took the wind out of her battle sails. ‘I’ll have one of the maids bring you a tray of refreshments. Would you like headache pills, as well?’

She lifted a hand to push at her forehead. ‘Yes, I would. Thank you,’ she muttered, visibly sagging with relief at his response.

‘Lucia can be a trial, but it will be impossible to completely avoid her,’ he warned. ‘I’ll do my best to keep you apart. Okay?’

She nodded, looking too drained of energy to argue anymore.

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