About the Authors

LYNNE GRAHAM was born in Northern Ireland and has been a keen romance reader since her teens. She is very happily married to an understanding husband who has learned to cook since she started to write! Her five children keep her on her toes. She has a very large dog who knocks everything over, a very small terrier who barks a lot, and two cats. When time allows, Lynne is a keen gardener.

After spending three years as a die-hard New Yorker, KATE HEWITT now lives in a small village in the English Lake District with her husband, their five children and a golden retriever. In addition to writing intensely emotional stories, she loves reading, baking and playing chess with her son—she has yet to win against him, but she continues to try.

Learn more about Kate at kate-hewitt.com.

Award-winning author JENNIFER FAYE pens fun, heartwarming romances. Jennifer has won the RT Book Reviews Reviewers’ Choice Award, is a TOP PICK author, and has been nominated for numerous awards. Now living her dream, she resides with her patient husband, one amazing daughter (the other remarkable daughter is off chasing her own dreams) and two spoiled cats. She’d love to hear from you via her website: JenniferFaye.com

Italian Mavericks: In the Italian’s Bed

Leonetti’s Housekeeper Bride

Lynne Graham

Inherited by Ferranti

Kate Hewitt

Best Man for the Bridesmaid

Jennifer Faye

www.millsandboon.co.uk

ISBN: 978-1-474-09295-1

ITALIAN MAVERICKS: IN THE ITALIAN’S BED

Leonetti’s Housekeeper Bride © 2016 Lynne Graham Inherited by Ferranti © 2016 Kate Hewitt Best Man for the Bridesmaid © 2015 Jennifer Faye

Published in Great Britain 2019

by Mills & Boon, an imprint of HarperCollinsPublishers 1 London Bridge Street, London, SE1 9GF

All rights reserved including the right of reproduction in whole or in part in any form. This edition is published by arrangement with Harlequin Books S.A.

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, places, locations and incidents are purely fictional and bear no relationship to any real life individuals, living or dead, or to any actual places, business establishments, locations, events or incidents. Any resemblance is entirely coincidental.

By payment of the required fees, you are granted the non-exclusive, non-transferable right and licence to download and install this e-book on your personal computer, tablet computer, smart phone or other electronic reading device only (each a “Licensed Device”) and to access, display and read the text of this e-book on-screen on your Licensed Device. Except to the extent any of these acts shall be permitted pursuant to any mandatory provision of applicable law but no further, no part of this e-book or its text or images may be reproduced, transmitted, distributed, translated, converted or adapted for use on another file format, communicated to the public, downloaded, decompiled, reverse engineered, or stored in or introduced into any information storage and retrieval system, in any form or by any means, whether electronic or mechanical, now known or hereinafter invented, without the express written permission of publisher.

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www.millsandboon.co.uk

Table of Contents

Cover

About the Authors

Title Page

Copyright

Leonetti’s Housekeeper Bride

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

Inherited by Ferranti

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

EPILOGUE

Best Man for the Bridesmaid

Dedication

CHAPTER ONE

CHAPTER TWO

CHAPTER THREE

CHAPTER FOUR

CHAPTER FIVE

CHAPTER SIX

CHAPTER SEVEN

CHAPTER EIGHT

CHAPTER NINE

CHAPTER TEN

CHAPTER ELEVEN

CHAPTER TWELVE

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

CHAPTER FIFTEEN

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

CHAPTER SEVENTEEN

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

CHAPTER NINETEEN

EPILOGUE

About the Publisher

Leonetti’s Housekeeper Bride

Lynne Graham

CHAPTER ONE

GAETANO LEONETTI WAS having a very bad day. It had started at dawn, when his phone went off and proceeded to show him a series of photos that enraged him but which he knew would enrage his grandfather and the very conservative board of the Leonetti investment bank even more. Regrettably, sacking the woman responsible for the story in the downmarket tabloid was likely to be the sole satisfaction he could hope to receive.

‘It’s not your fault,’ Tom Sandyford, Gaetano’s middle-aged legal adviser and close friend, told him quietly.

‘Of course it’s my fault,’ Gaetano growled. ‘It was my house, my party and the woman in my bed at the time who organised the damned party—’

‘Celia was that soap star with the cocaine habit you didn’t know about,’ Tom reminisced. ‘Wasn’t she sacked from the show soon after you ditched her?’

Gaetano nodded, his even white teeth gritting harder.

‘It’s a case of bad luck...that’s all,’ Tom opined. ‘You can’t ask your guests to post their credentials beforehand, so you had no way of knowing some of them weren’t tickety-boo.’

‘Tickety-boo?’ Gaetano repeated, his lean, darkly handsome features frowning. Although he was born and raised in England, Italian had been the language of his home and he still occasionally came across English words and phrases that were unfamiliar.

‘Decent upstanding citizens,’ Tom rephrased. ‘So, a handful of them were hookers? Well, in the rarefied and very privileged world you move in, how were you supposed to find that out?’

‘The press found it out,’ Gaetano countered flatly.

‘With the usual silly “Orgy at the Manor” big reveal. It’ll be forgotten in five minutes...although that blonde dancing naked in the fountain out front is rather memorable,’ Tom remarked, scanning the newspaper afresh with lascivious intent.

‘I don’t remember seeing her. I left the party early to fly to New York. Everyone still had their clothes on at that stage,’ Gaetano said drily. ‘I really don’t need another scandal like this.’

‘Scandal does rather seem to follow you around. I suppose the old man and the board at the bank are up in arms as usual,’ Tom commented with sympathy.

Gaetano compressed his wide sensual mouth in silent agreement. In the name of family loyalty and respect, he was paying in the blood of his fierce pride and ambition for the latest scandal. Letting his seventy-four-year-old grandfather Rodolfo carpet him like a badly behaved schoolboy had proved to be a truly toxic experience for a billionaire whose investment advice was sought by governments both in the UK and abroad. And when Rodolfo had settled into his favourite preaching session about Gaetano’s womanising lifestyle, Gaetano had had to breathe in deeply several times and resist the urge to point out to the older man that expectations and values had changed since the nineteen forties for both men and women.

Rodolfo Leonetti had married a humble fisherman’s daughter at the age of twenty-one and during his fifty years of devoted marriage he had never looked at another woman. Ironically, his only child, Gaetano’s father, Rocco, had not taken his father’s advice on the benefits of making an early marriage either. Rocco had been a notorious playboy and an incorrigible gambler. He had married a woman young enough to be his daughter when he was in his fifties, had fathered one son and had expired ten years later after over-exerting himself in another woman’s bed. Gaetano reckoned he had been paying for his father’s sins almost from the hour of his birth. At the age of twenty-nine and one of the world’s leading bankers, he was tired of being continually forced to prove his worth and confine his projects to the narrow expectations of the board. He had made millions for the Leonetti Bank; he deserved to be CEO.

Indeed, Rodolfo’s angry ultimatum that very morning had outraged Gaetano.

‘You will never be the chief executive of this bank until you change your way of life and settle down into being a respectable family man!’ his grandfather had sworn angrily. ‘I will not support your leadership with the board and, no matter how brilliant you are, Gaetano, the board always listens to me... They remember too well how your father almost brought the bank down with his risky ventures!’

Yet what, realistically, did Gaetano’s sex life have to do with his acumen and expertise as a banker? Since when were a wife and children the only measure of a man’s judgement and maturity?

Gaetano had not the slightest interest in getting married. In fact he shuddered at the idea of being anchored to one woman for the rest of his life while living in fear of a divorce that could deprive him of half of his financial portfolio. He was a very hard worker. He had earned his academic qualifications with honours in the most prestigious international institutions and his achievements since then had been immense. Why wasn’t that enough? In comparison his father had been an academically slow and spoiled rich boy who, like Peter Pan, had refused to grow up. Such a comparison was grossly unfair.

Tom dealt Gaetano a rueful appraisal. ‘You didn’t get the old “find an ordinary girl” spiel again, did you?’

‘“An ordinary girl, not a party girl, one who takes pleasure in the simple things of life,”’ Gaetano quoted verbatim because his grandfather’s discourses always ran to the same conclusion: marry, settle down, father children with a home-loving female...and the world would then miraculously become Gaetano’s oyster with little happy unicorns dancing on some misty horizon shaped by a rainbow. His lean bronzed features hardened with grim cynicism. He had seen just how well that fantasy had turned out for once-married and now happily divorced friends.

‘Perhaps you could time travel back to the nineteen fifties to find this ordinary girl,’ Tom quipped, wondering how the era of female liberation and career women had contrived to pass Rodolfo Leonetti by so completely that he still believed such women existed.

‘The best of it is, if I did produce an ordinary girl and announce that I was going to marry her Rodolfo would be appalled,’ Gaetano breathed impatiently. ‘He’s too much of a snob. Unfortunately he’s become so obsessed by his conviction that I need to marry that he’s blocking my progression at the bank.’

His PA entered and extended two envelopes. ‘The termination of contract on the grounds of the confidentiality clause which has been breached and the notice to quit the accommodation that goes with the job,’ she specified. ‘The helicopter is waiting for you on the roof, sir.’

‘What’s going on?’ Tom asked.

‘I’m flying down to Woodfield Hall to sack the housekeeper who handed over those photos to the press.’

‘It was the housekeeper?’ Tom prompted in surprise.

‘She was named in the article. Not the brightest of women,’ Gaetano pointed out drily.

* * *

Poppy leapt off her bike, kicked the support into place and ran into the village shop to buy milk. As usual she was running late but she could not drink coffee without milk and didn’t feel properly awake until she had had at least two cups. Her mane of fiery red-gold curls bounced on her slim black-clad shoulders and her green eyes sparkled.

‘Good morning, Frances,’ she said cheerfully to the rather sour-looking older woman behind the counter as she dug into her purse to pay.

‘I’m surprised you’re so bright this morning,’ the shop owner remarked in a tone laden with suggestive meaning.

‘Why wouldn’t I be?’

The older woman slapped a well-thumbed newspaper down on the counter and helpfully turned it round to enable Poppy to read the headline. Poppy paled with dismay and snatched the publication up, moving on impatiently to the next page only to groan at the familiar photo of the naked blonde cavorting in the fountain. Her brother, Damien, had definitely taken that photo on the night of that infamous party. She knew that because she had caught him showing that particular one off to his mates.

‘Seems your ma has been talking out of turn,’ Frances remarked. ‘Shouldn’t think Mr Leonetti will appreciate that...’

Glancing up to meet the older woman’s avidly curious gaze, Poppy hastily paid for the paper and left the shop. That photo? How on earth had the newspaper got hold of it? And what about the other photos? The heaving, fortunately unidentifiable bodies in one of the bedrooms? When invited to join the party by a drunken guest, had Damien taken other, even more risqué pictures? And her mother...what insanity had persuaded her to risk her job by trashing her employer to a tabloid journalist? Poppy’s soft full mouth down-curved and her shoulders slumped as she climbed back on her bike. Unfortunately Poppy knew exactly why her mother might have been so foolish: Jasmine Arnold was an alcoholic.

Poppy had once got her mother to an AA meeting and it had done her good but she had never managed to get the older woman back to a second. Instead, Jasmine just drank herself insensible every day while Poppy struggled to do her mother’s job for her as well as doing her own. What else could she do when the very roof over their heads was dependent on Jasmine’s continuing employment? And after all, wasn’t it her fault that her mother had sunk so low before Poppy realised how bad things had got in her own home and had finally come back to live with her family again?

It was very fortunate that Gaetano only visited the house once or twice a year. But then Gaetano was a city boy through and through and a beautiful Georgian country house an inconvenient distance from London was of little use or interest to him. Had he been a more regular visitor she would never have been able to conceal her mother’s condition for so long.

Poppy pumped the bike pedals hard to get up the hill before careening at speed into the driveway of Woodfield Hall. The beautiful house had been the Leonetti family home in England since the eighteenth century when the family had first come over from Venice to set up as glorified moneylenders. And if there was one thing that family were good at it, it was making pots and pots of money, Poppy reflected ruefully, shying away from the challenge of thinking about Gaetano in an any more personal way.

She and Gaetano might have virtually grown up in the same household but it would be an outright lie to suggest that they were ever in any way friendly. After all, Gaetano was six years older and had spent most of his time in posh boarding schools.

But Poppy knew that Gaetano would go crazy about the publication of those photos. He was fanatical about his privacy and if his idea of fun was a sex party, she could perfectly understand why! Her spirits sank at the prospect of the trouble looming ahead. No matter how hard she worked life never seemed to get any easier and there always seemed to be another crisis waiting to erupt round the next corner. Yet how could she look after her mother and her brother when their own survival instincts appeared to be so poor?

The Arnold family lived in a flat that had been converted from part of the original stable block at the hall. Jasmine Arnold, a tall skinny redhead in her late forties, was sitting at the kitchen table when her daughter walked in.

Poppy slapped down the paper on the table. ‘Mum? Were you out of your mind when you talked to a journalist about that party?’ she demanded, before opening the back door and yelling her brother’s name at the top of her voice.

Damien emerged from one of the garages, wiping oil stains off his hands with a dirty cloth. ‘Where’s the fire?’ he asked irritably as his sister moved forward to greet him.

‘You gave the photos you took at that party to a journalist?’ his sister challenged in disbelief.

‘No, I didn’t,’ her kid brother countered. ‘Mum knew they were on my phone and she handed them over. She sold them. Got a pile of cash for them and the interview.’

Poppy was even more appalled. She could have excused stupidity or careless speech to the wrong person but she was genuinely shocked that her mother had taken money in return for her disloyalty to her employer.

Damien groaned at the expression on his sister’s face. ‘Poppy...you should know by now that Mum would do anything to get the money to buy her next drink,’ he pointed out heavily. ‘I told her not to hand over the photos or talk to the guy but she wouldn’t listen to me—’

‘Why didn’t you tell me what she’d done?’

‘What could you do about it? I hoped that maybe the photos wouldn’t be used or that, if they were, nobody of any importance would see them,’ Damien admitted. ‘I doubt if Gaetano sits down to read every silly story that’s written about him... I mean, he’s never out of the papers!’

‘But if you’re wrong, Mum will be sacked and we’ll be kicked out of the flat.’

Damien wasn’t the type to worry about what might never happen and he said wryly, ‘Let’s hope I’m not wrong.’

But Poppy took after her late father and she was a worrier. It was hard to credit that it was only a few years since the Arnolds had been a secure and happy family of four. Her father had been the gardener at Woodfield Hall and her mother the housekeeper. At twenty years of age, Poppy had been two years into her training at nursing school and Damien had just completed his apprenticeship as a car mechanic. And then without any warning at all their much-loved father had dropped dead and all their lives had been shattered by that cruelly sudden bereavement.

Poppy had taken time out from her course to try and help her mother through the worst of her grief and then she had returned to her studies. Unhappily and without her knowledge, things had gone badly wrong at that point. Her mother had gone off the rails and Damien had been unable to cope with what was happening in his home. Her brother had then got in with the wrong crowd and had ended up in prison. That was when Poppy had finally come home to find her mother sunk in depression and drinking heavily. Poppy had taken a leave of absence from her course, hoping, indeed expecting, that her mother would soon pull round again. Unfortunately that hadn’t happened. Although Jasmine was still drinking, Poppy’s one consolation was that, after earning early release from prison with his good behaviour, her little brother had got his act together again. Sadly, however, Damien’s criminal record had made it impossible for him to get a job.

Poppy still felt horribly guilty about the fact that she had left her kid brother to deal with her deeply troubled mother. Intent on pursuing her chosen career and being the first Arnold female in generations not to earn her living by serving the Leonettis, she had been selfish and thoughtless and she had been trying to make up for that mistake ever since.

When she returned to the flat her mother had locked herself in her bedroom. Poppy suppressed a sigh and dug out her work kit and rubber gloves to cross the courtyard and enter the hall. She turned out different rooms of the big house every week, dusting and vacuuming and scrubbing. It was deeply ironic that she had been so set against working for the Leonettis when she was a teenager but had ended up doing it anyway even if it was unofficial. Evenings she served drinks in the local pub. There wasn’t time in her life for agonising when there was always a job needing to be done.

Disturbingly however she couldn’t get Gaetano Leonetti out of her mind. He was the one and only boy she had ever hated but also the only one she had ever loved. What did that say about her? Self-evidently, that at the age of sixteen she had been really stupid to imagine for one moment that she could ever have any kind of a personal relationship with the posh, privileged scion of the Leonetti family. The wounding demeaning words that Gaetano had shot at her then were still burned into her bones like the scars of an old breakage.

‘I don’t mess around with staff,’ he had said, emphasising the fact that they were not equals and that he would always inhabit a different stratum of society.

‘Stop coming on to me, Poppy. You’re acting like a slapper.’ Oh, how she had cringed at that reading of her behaviour when in truth she had merely been too young and inexperienced to know how to be subtle about spelling out the fact that should he be interested, she was available.

‘You’re a short, curvy redhead. You could never be my type.’

It was seven years since that humiliating exchange had taken place and apart from one final demeaning encounter she had not seen Gaetano since, having always gone out of her way to avoid him whenever he was expected at the hall. So, he didn’t know that she had slimmed down and shot up inches in height, wouldn’t much care either, she reckoned with wry amusement. After all, Gaetano went for very beautiful and sophisticated ladies in designer clothes. Although the one who had thrown that shockingly wild party had not been much of a lady in the original sense of the word.

Having put in her hours at the hall in the ongoing challenge to ensure that it was always well prepared for a visit that could come at very short notice, Poppy went back home to get changed for her bar work. Jasmine was out for the count on her bed, an empty bottle of cheap wine lying beside her. Studying her slumped figure, Poppy suppressed a sigh, recalling the busy, lively and caring woman her mother had once been. Alcohol had stolen all that from her. Jasmine needed specialised help and rehabilitation but there wasn’t even counselling available locally and Poppy had no hope of ever acquiring sufficient cash to pay for private treatment for the older woman.

Poppy put on the Goth clothes that she had first donned like a mask to hide behind when she was a bullied teenager. She had been picked on in school for being a little overweight and red-haired. Heck, she had even been bullied for being ‘posh’ although her family lived in the hall’s servant accommodation. Since then, although she no longer dyed her hair or painted her nails black, she had come to enjoy a touch of individuality in her wardrobe and had maintained the basic style. She had lost a lot of weight since she started working two jobs and she was convinced that her Goth-style clothes did a good job of disguising her skinniness. For work she had teamed a dark red net flirty skirt with a fitted black jersey rock print top. The outfit hugged her small full breasts, enhanced her waist and accentuated the length of her legs.

At the end of her shift in the busy bar that was paired with a popular restaurant, Poppy pulled on her coat and waited outside for Damien to show up on his motorbike.

‘Gaetano Leonetti arrived in a helicopter this evening,’ her brother delivered curtly. ‘He demanded to see Mum but she was out of it and I had to pretend she was sick. He handed over these envelopes for her and I opened them once he’d gone. Mum’s being sacked and we have a month’s notice to move out of the flat.’

An anguished moan of dismay at those twin blows parted Poppy’s lips.

‘I guess he did see that newspaper.’ Damien grimaced. ‘He certainly hasn’t wasted any time booting us out.’

‘Can we blame him for that?’ Poppy asked even though her heart was sinking to the soles of her shoes. Where would they go? How would they live? They had no rainy-day account for emergencies. Her mother drank her salary and Damien was on benefits.

But Poppy was a fighter, always had been, always would be. She took after her father more than her mother. She was good at picking herself up when things went wrong. Her mother, however, had never fully recovered from the stillbirth she had suffered the year before Poppy’s father had died. Those two terrible calamities coming so close together had knocked her mother’s feet from under her and she had never really got up again. Poppy swallowed hard as she climbed onto the bike and gripped her brother’s waist. She could still remember her mother’s absolute joy at that unexpected late pregnancy, which in the end had become a source of so much grief and loss.

As the bike rolled past the hall Poppy saw the light showing through the front window of the library and tensed. Gaetano was staying over for the night?

‘Yeah, he’s still here,’ Damien confirmed as he put his bike away. ‘So what?’

‘I’m going to speak to him—’

‘What’s the point?’ her brother asked in a tone of defeat. ‘Why should he care?’

But Gaetano did have a heart, Poppy thought in desperation. At least he had had a heart at the age of thirteen when his father had run over his dog and killed it. She had seen the tears in Gaetano’s eyes and she had been crying too. Dino had been as much her dog as his because Dino had hung around with her when Gaetano was away at school, not that he had probably ever realised that. Dino had never been replaced and when she had asked why not in the innocent way of a child, Gaetano had simply said flatly, ‘Dogs die.’

And she had been too young to really understand that outlook, that raising of the barriers against the threat of being hurt again. She had seen no tears in his remarkable eyes at his father’s funeral but he had been almost as devastated as his grandfather when his grandmother passed away. But then the older couple had been more his parents than his real parents had. Within a year of becoming a widow, his mother had remarried and moved to Florida without her son.

Poppy breathed in deep as she marched round the side of the big house with Damien chasing in her wake.

‘It’s almost midnight!’ he hissed. ‘You can’t go calling on him now!’

‘If I wait until tomorrow I’ll lose my nerve,’ she said truthfully.

Damien hung back in the shadows, watching as she rang the doorbell and waited, her hands dug in the pockets of her faux-leather flying jacket. A voice sounded somewhere close by and she flinched in surprise, turning her head as a man in a suit talking into a mobile phone walked towards her in the moonlight.

‘I’m security, Miss Arnold,’ he said quietly. ‘I was telling Mr Leonetti who was at the door.’

Poppy suppressed a rude word. She had forgotten the tight security with which the Leonetti family surrounded themselves. Of course, calling in on Gaetano late at night wouldn’t go unquestioned.

‘I want to see your boss,’ she declared.

The security man was talking Italian into the phone and she couldn’t follow a word of what he was saying. When the man frowned, she knew he was about to deliver a negative and she moved off the step and snapped, ‘I have to see Gaetano! It’s really important.’

Somewhere someone made a decision and a moment later there was the sound of heavy bolts being drawn back to open the massive front door. Another security man nodded acknowledgement and stood back for her entrance into the marble-floored hall with its perfect proportions and priceless paintings. A trickle of perspiration ran down between her taut shoulder blades and she straightened her spine in defiance of it although she was already shrinking at the challenge of what she would have to tell Gaetano. At this juncture, coming clean was her sole option.

* * *

Poppy Arnold? Gaetano’s brain had conjured up several time-faded images. Poppy as a little girl paddling at the lake edge in spite of his warnings; Poppy sobbing over Dino with all the drama of her class and no thought of restraint; Poppy looking at him as if he might imminently walk on water when she was about fifteen, a scrutiny that had become considerably less innocent and entertaining a year later. And finally, Poppy, a taunting sensual smile tilting her lips as she sidled out of the shrubbery closely followed by a young estate worker, both of them engaged in righting their rumpled, grass-stained clothing.

Bearing in mind the number of years the Arnold family had worked for his own, he felt that it was only fair that he at least saw Poppy and listened to what she had to say in her mother’s defence. He hadn’t, however, thought about Poppy in years. Did she still live with her family? He was surprised, having always assumed Poppy would flee country life and the type of employment she had soundly trounced as being next door to indentured servitude in the modern world. Touching a respectful forelock had held no appeal whatsoever for outspoken, rebellious Poppy, he acknowledged wryly. How much had she changed? Was she working for him now somewhere on the pay roll? His ebony brows drew together in a frown at his ignorance as he lounged back against the edge of the library desk and awaited her appearance.

The tap-tap of high heels sounded in the corridor and the door opened to reveal legs that could have rivalled a Vegas showgirl’s toned and perfect pins. Disconcerted by that startlingly unexpected and carnal thought, Gaetano ripped his attention from those incredibly long shapely legs and whipped it up to her face, only to receive another jolt. Time had transformed Poppy Arnold into a tall, dazzling redhead. He was staring but he couldn’t help it while his shrewd brain was engaged in ticking off familiarities and changes. The bright green eyes were unaltered but the rounded face had fined down to an exquisite heart shape to frame slanting cheekbones, a dainty little nose and a mouth lush and pink enough to star in any male fantasy. The pulse at Gaetano’s groin throbbed and he straightened, flicking his jacket closed to conceal his physical reaction while thinking that Poppy might well get the last laugh after all because the ugly duckling he had once rejected had become a swan.

‘Mr Leonetti,’ she said as politely as though they had never met before.

‘Gaetano, please,’ he countered wryly, seeing no reason to stand on ceremony with her. ‘We have known each other since childhood.’

‘I don’t think I ever knew you,’ Poppy said frankly, studying him with bemused concentration.

She had expected to notice unappetising changes in Gaetano. After all, he was almost thirty years old now and lived a deskbound, self-indulgent and, by all accounts, decadent life. By this stage he should have been showing some physical fallout from that lifestyle. But there was no hint of portliness in his very tall, powerfully built frame and certainly no jowls to mar the perfection of his strong, stubbled jaw line. And his dense blue-black curly hair was as plentiful as ever.

An electrifying silence enclosed them and Poppy stepped restively off one foot onto the other, her slender figure tense as a drawn bow string while she studied him. Taller and broader than he had been, he was even more gorgeous than he had been seven years earlier when she had fallen for him like a ton of bricks. Silly, silly girl that she had been, she conceded ruefully, but there was no denying that even then she had had good taste because Gaetano was stunning in the way so very few men were. A tiny flicker in her pelvis made her press her thighs together, warmth flushing over her skin. His dark eyes, set below black straight brows, were locked to her with an intensity that made her inwardly squirm. He had eyes with incredibly long thick lashes, she was recalling dizzily, so dark and noticeable in their volume that she had once suspected him of wearing guy liner like some of the boys she had known back then.

‘Do you still live here with your mother and brother?’ Gaetano enquired.

‘Yes,’ Poppy admitted, fighting to banish the fog that had briefly closed round her brain. ‘You’re probably wondering why I’ve come to see you at this hour. I’m a bartender at the Flying Horseman down the road and I’ve only just finished my shift.’

Gaetano was pleasantly surprised that she had contrived to speak two entire sentences without spluttering the profanities which had laced her speech seven years earlier. Of course, right now she was probably watching her every word with him, he reasoned. A bartender? He supposed it explained the outfit, which looked as though it would be more at home in a nightclub.

‘I saw the newspaper article,’ she added. ‘Obviously you want to sack my mother for talking about the party and selling those photos. I’m not denying that you have good reason to do that.’

‘Where did the photos come from?’ Gaetano asked curiously. ‘Who took them?’

Poppy winced. ‘One of the guests invited my brother to join the party when she saw him outside directing cars. He did what I imagine most young men would do when they see half-naked women—he took pictures on his phone. I’m not excusing him but he didn’t sell those photos... It was my mother who took his phone and did that—’

‘I assume I’ll see your mother in person tomorrow before I leave. But I’ll ask you now. My family has always treated your mother well. Why did she do it?’

Poppy breathed in deep and lifted her chin, bracing herself for what she had to say. ‘My mother’s an alcoholic, Gaetano. They offered her money and that was all it took. All she was thinking about was probably how she would buy her next bottle of booze. I’m afraid she can’t see beyond that right now.’

Taken aback, Gaetano frowned. He had not been prepared for that revelation. It did not make a difference to his attitude though. Disloyalty was not a trait he could overlook in an employee. ‘Your mother must be a functioning alcoholic, then,’ he assumed. ‘Because the house appears to be in good order.’

‘No, she’s not functioning.’ Poppy sighed, her soft mouth tightening. ‘I’ve been covering up for her for more than a year. I’ve been looking after this place.’

His lean, darkly handsome features tightened. ‘In other words there has been a concentrated campaign to deceive me as to what was going on here,’ he condemned with a sudden harshness that dismayed her. ‘At any time you could have approached me and asked for my understanding and even my help—yet you chose not to do so. I have no tolerance for deception, Poppy. This meeting is at an end.’

A hundred different thoughts flashing through her mind, Poppy stared at him, her heart beating very fast with nerves and consternation. ‘But—’

‘No extenuating circumstances allowed or invited,’ Gaetano cut in with derision. ‘I have heard all I need to hear from you and there is nothing more to say. Leave.’

CHAPTER TWO

POPPY TOOK A sudden step forward. ‘Don’t speak to me like that!’ she warned Gaetano angrily.

‘I can speak to you whatever way I like. I’m in my own home and it seems that you are one of my employees.’

‘No, I’m not!’ Poppy contradicted with unashamed satisfaction. ‘I donated my services free for my mother’s sake!’

‘Let’s not make it sound as if you dug ditches,’ Gaetano fired back impatiently. ‘As I’m so rarely here there can’t be that much work concerned in keeping the house presentable.’

‘I think you’d be surprised by how much work is involved in a place this size!’ Poppy snapped back firely.

Anger made her green eyes shine blue-green like a peacock feather, Gaetano noted. ‘I’m really not interested,’ he said drily. ‘And if you donated your services free that was downright stupid, not praiseworthy.’

Poppy almost stamped an enraged foot. ‘I’m not stupid. How dare you say that? I could hardly charge you for the work my mother was already being paid to do, could I?’

Gaetano shrugged a broad shoulder, watching her tongue flick out to moisten her red-lipsticked mouth, imagining her doing other much dirtier things with it and then tensing with exquisite discomfort as arousal coursed feverishly through his lower body. She was sexy, smoulderingly so, he acknowledged grimly. ‘I’m sure you’re versatile enough to have found some way round that problem.’

‘But not dishonest enough to do so,’ Poppy proclaimed with pride. ‘Mum was being paid for the job and it was done, so on that score you have no grounds for complaint.’

‘I don’t?’ An ebony brow lifted in challenge. ‘An alcoholic has been left in charge of the household accounts?’

‘Oh, no, that’s not been happening,’ Poppy hastened to reassure him. ‘Mum no longer has access to the household cash. I made sure of that early on.’

‘Then how have the bills been paid?’

Poppy compressed her lips as she registered that he truly did not have a clue how his own household had worked for years. ‘I paid them. I’ve been taking care of the accounts here since Dad died.’

‘But you’re not authorised!’ Gaetano slammed back at her distrustfully.

‘Neither was my father but he took care of them for a long time.’

Gaetano’s frown grew even darker. ‘Your father had access as well? What the hell?’

‘Oh, for goodness’ sake, are you always this rigid?’ Poppy groaned in disbelief. ‘Mum never had a head for figures. Dad always did the accounts for her. Your grandmother knew. Whenever your grandmother had a query about the accounts she had to wait until Mum had asked Dad for the answer. It wasn’t a secret back then.’

‘And how am I supposed to trust you with substantial sums of money when your brother was recently in prison for theft?’ Gaetano demanded sharply. ‘My accountants will check the accounts and, believe me, if there are any discrepancies I will be bringing in the police.’

Having paled when he threw his knowledge of Damien’s conviction at her, Poppy stood very straight and still, her facial muscles tight with self-control. ‘Damien got involved with a gang of car thieves but he didn’t actually steal any of the cars. He’s the mechanic who worked on the stolen vehicles before they were shipped abroad to be sold.’

‘What a very fine distinction!’ Gaetano derided, unimpressed.

Poppy raised her head high, green eyes flashing defiance like sparks. ‘You get your accountants in to check the books. There won’t be any discrepancies,’ she fired back with pride. ‘And don’t be snide about my brother.’

‘I wasn’t being snide.’

‘You were being snide from the pinnacle of your rich, privileged, feather-bedded life. Damien broke the law and he was punished for it,’ Poppy told him. ‘He’s paid his dues and he’s learned his lesson. Maybe you’ve never made any mistakes, Gaetano?’

‘My mistake was in allowing that party to be held here!’ Gaetano slung back at her grittily. ‘And don’t drag my background or my wealth into this conversation. It’s unfair—’

‘Then don’t be so superior!’ Poppy advised. ‘But maybe you can’t help being the way you are.’

‘Do you really think hurling insults at me is likely to further your cause?’

‘You haven’t even given me the chance to tell you what my cause is,’ she pointed out. ‘You’re so argumentative, Gaetano!’

‘I’m...argumentative?’ Gaetano carolled in disbelief.

‘I want you to give Mum another chance,’ Poppy admitted doggedly. ‘I know you’re not feeling very generous. I know that having your kinky party preferences splashed all over the media has to have been embarrassing for you—’

‘I do not have kinky preferences—’

‘It’s none of my business whether you do or not!’ Poppy riposted. ‘I’m not being judgemental.’

‘How very generous of you in the circumstances,’ Gaetano murmured icily.

‘And if you’re not being argumentative, you’re being sarcastic!’ Poppy flared back at him with raw resentment. ‘Can you even try listening to me?’

‘If you could try to refrain from commenting about my preferences, kinky or otherwise,’ Gaetano advised flatly.

‘May I take my shoes off?’ she asked him abruptly. ‘I’ve been standing all night and my feet are killing me!’

Gaetano shifted an impatient hand. ‘Take them off. Say what you have to say and then go. I’m bored with this.’

‘You’re so kind and encouraging,’ Poppy replied in a honeyed tone of stinging sweetness as she removed her shoes and dropped several crucial inches in height, unsettled by the reality that, although she was five feet eight inches tall, he had a good six inches on her and now towered over her in a manner she instinctively disliked.

As she flexed those incredible long legs sheathed in black lace, Gaetano watched, admiring her long toned calves, neat little knees and long slender thighs. A flash of white inner thigh as she bent in that short skirt and her small full breasts shifting unbound below the clinging top sent his temperature rocketing and made his teeth grit. Was she teasing him deliberately? Was the provocative outfit a considered invitation? What woman dressed like that came to see a man at midnight with clean intentions?

‘Talk, Poppy,’ he urged very drily, infuriated at the way his brain was rebelling against his usual rational control and concentration to stray in directions he was determined not to travel.

‘Mum has had it tough the last few years—’

Gaetano held up a silencing hand. ‘I know about the stillbirth and of course your father’s death and I’m heartily sorry for the woman, but those misfortunes don’t excuse what’s been happening here.’

‘Mum needs help, not judgement, Gaetano,’ Poppy argued shakily.

‘I’m her employer, not her family and not a therapist,’ Gaetano pointed out calmly. ‘She’s not my responsibility.’

In a more hesitant voice, Poppy added, ‘Your grandfather always said we were one big family here.’

‘Please don’t tell me that you fell for that old chestnut. My grandfather is an old-fashioned man who likes the sound of such sentiments but somehow I don’t think he’d be any more compassionate than I am when it comes to the security of his home. Leaving an untrustworthy and unstable alcoholic in charge here would be complete madness,’ he stated coolly.

‘Yes, but...you could give Mum’s job to me,’ Poppy reasoned in a desperate rush. ‘I’ve been doing it to your satisfaction for months, so you’ve actually had a free trial. That way we could stay on in the flat and you wouldn’t have to look for someone new.’

Discomfiture made Gaetano tense. ‘You never wanted to do domestic work... I’m well aware of that.’

‘We all have to do things we don’t want to do, particularly when it comes to looking out for family,’ Poppy argued with feeling. ‘After Dad died I went back to my nursing course and left Damien looking after Mum. He couldn’t cope. He didn’t tell me how bad things had got here and because of that he got into trouble. Mum is my responsibility and I turned my back on her when she needed me most.’

Gaetano, who was unsurprised that she had sought a career outside domestic service, thought she had a ridiculously overactive conscience. ‘It wouldn’t work, Poppy. I’m sorry. I wish you well and I’m sorry I can’t help.’

‘Won’t help,’ she slotted in curtly.

‘You’re not my idea of a housekeeper. It’s best that you make a new start somewhere else with your family,’ he declared.

No, he definitely didn’t want Poppy with her incredibly alluring legs in his house, even though he didn’t visit it very often. She would be a dangerous temptation and he was determined that he would never go there. Never muck around with staff was a maxim etched in stone in Gaetano’s personal commandments. When a former PA had thrown herself at him one evening early in his career he had slept with her. For him it had been a one-night stand on a business trip and nothing more, but she had been far more ambitious and it had ended messily, teaching him that professional relationships should never cross the boundaries into intimacy.

‘It’s not that easy to make a new start,’ Poppy told him tightly. ‘I’m the only one out of the three of us with a job and if I have to move I’ll lose that.’

Gaetano expelled his breath on an impatient hiss. ‘Poppy... I am not going to apologise for the fact that your mother breached her employment contract and plunged me into a scandal. You cannot lay her problems at my door. I have every sympathy for your position and, out of consideration for the years that your family worked here and did an excellent job, I will make a substantial final payment—’

‘Oh, keep your blasted conscience money!’ Poppy flung at him, suddenly losing her temper, her fierce pride stung by his attitude. He thought that she and her mother and her brother were a sad bunch of losers and he was so keen to get them off his property that he was prepared to pay more for the privilege. ‘I don’t want anything from you. I won’t take anything more from you!’

‘Losing your temper is a very bad idea in a situation like this,’ he breathed irritably as she bent down to scoop up her shoes and turned on her heel, her short skirt flaring round her pert behind.

Poppy turned her head, green eyes gleaming like polished jewels. ‘It’s the only thing I’ve got left to lose,’ she contradicted squarely.

Gaetano threw up his hands in a gesture of frustration. ‘Then why the hell are you doing it? Put yourself first and leave your family to sort out their own problems!’

‘Is that what the ruthless, callous banker would do to save his own skin?’ Poppy asked scornfully as she reached the door. ‘Mum and Damien are my family and, yes, they’re very different from me. I take after Dad and I’m strong. They’re not. They crumble in a crisis. Does that mean I love them any less? No, it doesn’t. In fact it probably means I love them more. I love them warts and all and as long as there’s breath in my body I’ll look after them to the best of my ability.’

Gaetano was stunned into silence by her emotive words. He couldn’t imagine loving anyone like that. His parents had been both been weak and fallible in their different ways. His father had chased thrills and his mother had chased money and Gaetano had only learned to despise them for their shallow characters. His parents had not had the capacity to love him and once he had got old enough to understand that he had stopped loving them, ultimately recognising that only his grandparents genuinely cared about him and his well-being. For that reason, the concept of continuing to blindly love seriously flawed personalities and still feel a duty of care towards them genuinely shocked Gaetano, who was infinitely more discerning and demanding of those closest to him. He had seen Poppy Arnold’s strength and he admired it, but he thought she was a complete fool to allow her wants and wishes to be handicapped by the double burden of a drunken mother and a pretty useless kid brother.

He went for a shower, still mulling over the encounter with a feeling of amazement that grew rather than dwindled. Rodolfo Leonetti would have been hugely impressed by Poppy’s speech, he acknowledged grimly. His grandfather, after all, had wasted years striving to advise and support his feckless son and his frivolous daughter-in-law. Rodolfo had overlooked their faults and had compassionately made the best of a bad situation. Gaetano, however, was much tougher than the older man, less patient, less forgiving, less sympathetic. Was that a flaw in him? he wondered for the very first time.

Thinking of how much Rodolfo would have applauded Poppy’s family loyalty, Gaetano reflected equally on her flaws that Rodolfo would have cringed from. Her background was dreadful, the family unpalatable. Mother an alcoholic? Brother a convicted criminal? Poppy’s provocative clothing and use of bad language? And yet wasn’t Poppy Arnold an ordinary girl of the type Rodolfo had always contended would make his grandson a perfect wife?

Having towelled himself dry, Gaetano got into bed naked and lay there, lost in thought. A sudden laugh escaped him as he momentarily allowed himself to imagine his grandfather’s horror if he were to produce a young woman like Poppy as his future wife. Rodolfo was much more of a snob than he would ever be prepared to admit and it was hardly surprising that he should be for the Leonettis had been a family of great wealth and power for hundreds of years. Yet the same man had risked disinheritance when he had married a fisherman’s daughter against his family’s wishes. Gaetano couldn’t imagine that kind of love. He felt no need for that sort of excessive emotion in his life. In fact the very idea of it terrified him and always had.

He didn’t want to get married. Maybe by the time he was in his forties he would have mellowed a little and would feel the need to settle down with a companion. At some point too he should have a child to continue the family line. He flinched from the concept, remembering his father’s temper tantrums and his mother’s tears and nagging whines. Marriage had a bad image with him. Why couldn’t Rodolfo understand and accept that reality? He was just too young for settling down but not too young to take over as CEO of the bank.

The germ of an idea occurred to Gaetano and struck him as weird, so he discarded it, only to take it out again a few minutes later and examine it in greater depth. Suppose he quite deliberately produced a fiancée whom his grandfather would deem wrong for him? In that scenario nobody would be the slightest bit surprised when the engagement was broken off again and Rodolfo would be relieved rather than disappointed. He would see that Gaetano had made an effort to commit to a woman and honour that change accordingly by giving his grandson breathing space for quite some time afterwards. A fake incompatible fiancée could get him off the hook...

In the moonlight piercing the curtains, Gaetano’s lean, darkly handsome features were beginning to form a shadowy smile. Pick an ordinary girl and she would naturally have to be beautiful if his grandfather was to be convinced that his fastidious grandson had fallen for her. Pick a beautiful ordinary girl guaranteed to be an embarrassment in public. Poppy could drop all the profanities she liked, dress like a hooker and tell everybody about her sordid family problems. He wouldn’t even have to prime her to fail in his exclusive world. It was a given that she would be so out of her depth that she would automatically do so.

A sliver of the conscience that Gaetano rarely listened to slunk out to suggest that it would be a little cruel to subject Poppy to such an ordeal merely for the sake of initially satisfying and then hopefully changing his grandfather’s expectations. But then it wouldn’t be a real engagement. She would know from the outset that she was faking it and she would be handsomely paid for her role. Nor would she need to know that he was expecting, no, depending on her to be a social embarrassment to get him out of the engagement again. It would sort of be like Pygmalion in reverse, he reasoned with quiet satisfaction. Pick an ordinary girl, who was an extraordinary beauty and extremely outspoken and hot-tempered... She would be absolutely perfect for his purposes because she would be an accident waiting to happen.

* * *

Poppy barely slept that night. Gaetano had said and done nothing unexpected. Of course he wanted them off his fancy property, out of sight and out of mind! His incredulous attitude to her attachment to her family had appalled her though. And where were they going to go? And how would they live when they got there? She would have to throw them on the tender mercies of the social services. My goodness, would they end up living in one of those homeless hostels? Eating out of a food bank?

She got up early as usual, relishing that quiet time of day before her mother or her brother stirred. Even better it was a sunny morning and she took her coffee out to the tiny square of garden at the back of the building that was her favourite place in the world. Making plants flourish, simply growing things, gave her great pleasure.

A riot of flowers in pots ornamented the tiny paved area with its home-made bench seat that was more than a little rickety. However, her Dad had made that bench and she would never part with it. With the clear blue sky above and birds singing in the trees nearby, she felt guilty for feeling so stressed and unhappy. When she had been a little girl working by her father’s side she had wanted to be a gardener. Assuming that that would inevitably mean one day working for the Leonettis, she had changed her mind, ignorant of the reality that there were a host of training courses and jobs in the horticultural world far from Woodfield Hall that she could have aspired to. Well, so much for her planned escape, she thought heavily. Now that they were being evicted, she didn’t want to leave.

‘Miss Arnold?’ One of Gaetano’s security men looked over the fence at her. ‘Mr Leonetti wants to see you.’

Poppy leapt upright. Had he had second thoughts about his decision? She smoothed down the thin jacket she wore over a black gothic dress. She had expected Gaetano to demand to see her mother again and she had dressed up in her equivalent of armour to tell him that her mother would be incapable of even speaking to him until midday. She walked round the side of the building and headed towards the house.

‘Mr Leonetti is waiting for you at the helicopter.’

So, he was planning to toss a two-minute speech at her and depart, Poppy gathered ruefully. It didn’t sound as though he’d had a change of heart, did it? She followed the path to the helipad at the far side of the hall, identifying Gaetano as the taller man in the small clump of waiting males who included the pilot and Gaetano’s security staff. In a pale grey exquisitely tailored designer suit, his arrogant dark head held high, Gaetano looked like a king, and as she moved towards him he stood there much like a king waiting for her to come to him. So, what was new? Gaetano Leonetti didn’t have a humble bone in his magnificent body. No, no, less of the magnificent, she scolded herself angrily. No way was she going to look admiringly at the male making her and her family homeless, even if he did have just cause!

‘Good morning, Poppy,’ Gaetano drawled, smooth as glass, scanning her appearance in the form-fitting black dress that brushed her knees and what appeared to be combat boots with keen appreciation. The jacket looked as if it belonged to a circus ringmaster and he almost smiled at the prospect of his grandfather’s disquiet. Clearly, Poppy always dressed strangely and he could certainly work with that eccentricity. In fact the more eccentricities, the better. And she looked amazingly well in that weird outfit with her freckle-free skin like whipped cream and her hair tumbling in silky bronzed ringlets round her slight shoulders, highlighting her alluring face.

He was not attracted to her, he told himself resolutely. He could appreciate a woman’s looks without wanting to bed her. He wasn’t that basic in his tastes, was he? The incipient throb of a hard-on, however, hinted that he might be a great deal more basic than he wanted to believe. Of course that was acceptable too, Gaetano conceded shrewdly. Rodolfo was no fool and would soon notice any apparent lack of sexual chemistry.

Poppy thought about faking a posh accent like his and abandoned the idea because Gaetano would be slow to see the joke, if he saw one at all. ‘Morning,’ she said lazily in her usual abbreviated style.

‘We’re going out for breakfast since there’s no food in the house,’ Gaetano murmured huskily.

Poppy blinked, catching the flick of censure but too caught up in the positive purr of his deep, slightly accented drawl, which was sending a peculiar little shiver down her taut spine. ‘We?’ she queried belatedly, green eyes opening very wide.

Gaetano noted that her pupils were surrounded by a ring of tawny brown that merely emphasised the bright green of her eyes and said quietly, ‘I have a proposition I want to discuss with you.’

‘A proposition?’ she questioned with a frown.

‘Breakfast,’ Gaetano reminded her and he bent to plant his hands to her hips and swing her up into the helicopter before she could even guess his intention.

‘For breakfast we get into a helicopter?’ Poppy framed in bewilderment.

‘We’re going to a hotel.’

A proposition? Her mind was blank as to what possible suggestions he might be able to put to her in her family’s current predicament and, although she was far from entertained by his virtual kidnapping, she knew she was in no position to tell him to get lost. Even so, Poppy would very much have enjoyed telling Gaetano to get lost. His innate dominant traits set her teeth on edge, not to mention the manner in which he simply assumed that everyone around him would jump to do his bidding without argument. And he was probably right in that assumption, she thought resentfully. He had money, power and influence and she had none of those things.

The craft was so noisy that there was no possibility of conversation during the short flight. Poppy peered down without surprise as the biggest, flashiest country-house hotel in the area appeared below them. Only the very best would do for Gaetano, she thought in exasperation, wishing she’d had some warning of his plan. She had no make-up on and not even a comb with her and wasn’t best pleased to find herself about to enter a very snooty five-star establishment where everyone else, including her host, would be groomed to perfection. And here she was wearing combat boots ready to cycle to the shop for a newspaper.

Deliberately avoiding Gaetano’s extended arms, Poppy jumped down onto the grass. ‘You could’ve warned me about where we were going... I’m not dressed—’

Gaetano dealt her a slow-burning smile, dark golden eyes brilliant in the sunshine. ‘You look fabulous.’

Her mouth ran dry and suddenly she needed a deep breath but somehow couldn’t get sufficient oxygen into her lungs. That shockingly appealing smile...when he had never smiled at her before. Gaetano was as stingy as a miser with his smiles. Why was he suddenly smiling at her? What did he want? What had changed? And why was he telling her that she looked fabulous? Especially when his raised-brow appraisal as she’d approached him at the helipad had told her that he knew about as much about her style as she knew about high finance.

At the door of the hotel they were greeted by the manager as though they were royalty and ushered to the ‘Orangery’ where Gaetano was assured that they would not be disturbed. Had there been a chaise longue, Poppy would have flopped down on it like a Victorian maiden and would have asked Gaetano if he was planning a seduction just to annoy him. But if he had a proposition that might ease her family’s current situation she was more than willing to listen without making cheeky comments, she told herself. Unfortunately, her tongue often ran ahead of her brain, especially around Gaetano, who didn’t have to do much to infuriate her.

CHAPTER THREE

‘THAT...ER...’ POPPY hastily revised the word she had been about to employ for a more tactful one. ‘That remark you made about there being no food in the house... We didn’t know you were coming to the hall,’ she reminded him.

Gaetano watched a waiter pull out a chair for Poppy before taking his own seat. Sunshine was cascading through the windows, transforming her bright hair into a fiery halo. She clutched her menu and ordered chocolate cereal and a hot-chocolate drink. He was astonished that the vast number of menu options had not tempted her into a more adventurous order.

‘The hall is supposed to be kept fully stocked at all times,’ Gaetano reminded her, having ordered.

Poppy shifted in her seat. ‘But this way is much more cost-effective, Gaetano. When I took over from Mum I was chucking out loads of fresh food every week and it hurt me to do it when there are people starving in this world. Until yesterday, someone always phoned to say you’d be visiting, so I cancelled the food deliveries... Oh, yes, and the flowers as well. I’m not into weekly flower arranging. I’ve saved you so much money,’ she told him with pride.

‘I don’t need to save money. I expect the house to always be ready for use,’ Gaetano countered drily.

Poppy gave him a pained look. ‘But it’s so wasteful...’

Gaetano shrugged. He had never thought about that aspect and did not see why he should consider it when he gave millions to charitable causes every year. Convenience and the ability to do as he liked, when he liked, and at short notice, were very important to him, because he rarely took time away from work. ‘I’m not tight with cash,’ he said wryly. ‘If the house isn’t prepared for immediate use, I can’t visit whenever I take the notion.’

Poppy ripped open her small packet of cereal and poured it into the bowl provided. Ignoring the milk on offer, she began to eat the cereal dry with her fingers the way she always ate it. For a split second, Gaetano stared but said nothing. For that same split second she had felt slightly afraid that he might give her a slap across the knuckles for what he deemed to be poor table manners and she flushed pink with chagrin, determined not to alter her behaviour to kowtow to his different expectations. The rich were definitely different, she conceded ruefully.

‘I will eat chocolate any way I can get it,’ she confided nonetheless in partial apology. ‘I don’t like my cereal soggy. Now this proposition you mentioned...’

‘My grandfather wants me to get married before I can become Chief Executive of the Leonetti Bank. As I don’t want to get married, I believe a fake engagement would keep him happy in the short term. It will convince Rodolfo that I am moving in the right direction and assuage his fear that I’m incapable of settling down.’

‘So, why are you telling me this?’ Poppy asked him blankly.

‘I want you to partner me in the fake engagement.’ Gaetano lounged lithely back in his seat to study her reaction.

‘You and me?’ A peal of startled laughter erupted from Poppy’s lush pink mouth beneath Gaetano’s disconcerted gaze. ‘You’ve got to be kidding. No one, but no one, would credit you and me as a couple!’

‘Funny, you didn’t see it as being that amusing when you were a teenager,’ Gaetano derided softly.

‘You are such a bastard!’ Poppy sprang out of her chair, all pretence of cool abandoned as she stalked away from the table. She had never quite contrived to lose that tender, stinging sense of rejection and humiliation even though she knew she was being ridiculous. After all, she had been far too young and naïve for him as well as being the daughter of an employee, and for him to respond in any way, even had he wanted to, would have been inappropriate. But while her brain assured her of those facts, her visceral reaction was at another level.

A few weeks after his rebuff, the annual hall summer picnic had been held and Gaetano had put in his appearance with a girlfriend. Poppy had felt sick when she’d seen that shiny, beautifully dressed and classy girl who might have stepped straight out of a glossy modelling advertisement. She had seen how pathetic it had been to harbour even the smallest hope of ever attracting Gaetano’s interest and as a result of that distress, that horrid feeling of unworthiness and mortification, she had plunged herself into a very unwise situation.

‘Poppy...’ Gaetano murmured wryly, wishing he had left that reminder of the past decently buried.

Poppy spun back to him, eyes wide and accusing. ‘I was sixteen years old, for goodness’ sake, and you were the only fanciable guy in my radius, so it’s hardly surprising that I got a crush on you. It was hormones, nothing else. I wasn’t mature enough to recognise that you were totally the wrong kind of guy for me—’

‘Why?’ Gaetano heard himself demand baldly, although no sooner had he asked than he was questioning why he had.

Poppy was equally surprised by that question. Her colour high, she stared at him, her clear green eyes luminescent in the sunlight. ‘Why? Well, I’ve no doubt you’re a great catch, being both rich and ridiculously good-looking,’ she told him bluntly. ‘You’re a fiercely ambitious high achiever but you don’t have heart. You’re deadly serious and conventional too. We’re complete opposites. People would only pair the two of us together in a comic book. Sorry, I hope I haven’t insulted you in any way. That wasn’t my intention.’

An almost imperceptible line of colour had fired along the exotic slant of Gaetano’s spectacular cheekbones. He felt oddly as though he had been cut down to size and yet he couldn’t fault what she had said because it was all true. There was an electric little silence. He glanced up from below his lashes and saw her standing there in the bright sunshine, her hair a blazing nimbus of red, bronze and gold in the light to give her the look of a fiery angel. Or in that severe black dress, a gothic angel of death? But it didn’t matter because in that strange little instant when time stopped dead, Gaetano, rigid with raw arousal, wanted Poppy Arnold more than he had ever wanted any woman in his life and it gave him the chills like the scent of a good deal going bad. He breathed in slow and deep and looked away from her, battling to regain his logic and cool.

‘I still want you to take on the role of playing my fake fiancée,’ he breathed in a roughened undertone because just looking at her, drinking in that clear creamy skin, those luminous green eyes and that pink succulent mouth, was only making him harder than ever. ‘Rodolfo always wanted me to choose an ordinary girl and you are the only one I know likely to fit the bill.’

Something in the way he was studying her made Poppy’s mouth run dry and her breath hitch in her throat. She was suddenly aware of her body in a way she hadn’t been aware of it in years. In fact, her physical reactions were knocking her right back to the discomfiting level of the infatuated teenager she had once been and that galled her, but the tight, prickling sensation in her breasts and the dampness between her thighs were uniquely memorable testaments to the temptation Gaetano provided. Falling for a very good-looking guy at sixteen and comparing every other man she had met afterwards to his detriment was not to be recommended as a life plan for any sensible woman, she reflected ruefully, ashamed of the fact that she couldn’t treat Gaetano as casually as she treated other men.

‘An ordinary girl?’ she questioned with pleated brows, returning to the table to succumb to the allure of the melted marshmallows topping her hot chocolate. While she sipped, Gaetano filled her in on his grandfather’s fond hopes for his future.

Poppy almost found herself laughing again. Gaetano would never genuinely want an ordinary girl and no ordinary girl would be able to cope with his essentially cold heart.

‘So, why me?’ she pressed.

‘You’re beautiful enough to convince him that I could be tempted by you—’

Guileless green eyes assailed his. ‘Am I?’

‘Yes, you’re beautiful but, no, I’m not tempted,’ Gaetano declared with stubborn conviction. ‘When I say fake engagement I mean fake in every way. I will not be touching you.’

Poppy rolled her eyes. ‘I wouldn’t let you. I’m very, very picky, Gaetano.’

Gaetano resisted the urge to toss up the name of that young estate worker she had entertained in the shrubbery. Odd how he had never forgotten those details, he conceded, while recognising that such a crack would be cruelly inappropriate because she was as entitled to have enjoyed sex as any other woman. His perfect white teeth clenched together. He loathed the way Poppy somehow knocked him off-balance, tripping his mind into random thoughts, persuading his usually controlled tongue into making ill-advised remarks, turning him on when he didn’t want to be turned on. Each and every one of those reactions offended Gaetano’s pride in his strength of will.

‘You’ve got to be wondering what would be in this arrangement for you,’ Gaetano intoned quietly. ‘Everything you want and need at present. Rehabilitation treatment for your mother, a fresh start somewhere, a new home for you all as security. I’ll cover the cost of it all if you do this for me, bella mia.’

Straight off, Poppy saw that he was throwing her and her family a lifebelt when they were drowning and for that reason she didn’t voice the refusal already brimming on her lips. Treatment for her mother. You couldn’t put a price on such an offer. It was what she had dreamt about but knew she would never be able to afford.

‘You’ve got to have a selfish bone somewhere in your body,’ Gaetano declared. ‘If you get your mother sorted out you can get your own life back and complete your nursing training, if that is still what you want to do.’

‘I’m not sure I could be convincing as your ordinary-girl fiancée—’

‘We’ll cover that. Leave the worrying to me. I’m a skilled strategist,’ Gaetano murmured, lush black lashes low over his beautiful dark golden eyes.

Her chest swelled as she dragged in a deep breath because really there was no decision to be made. Any attempt to sort out the mess her mother’s life had become was worth a try. ‘Then...where do I sign up?’

She had agreed. Having recognised that Poppy was pretty much between a rock and a hard place, Gaetano was not surprised by her immediate agreement. In his opinion she had much to gain and nothing at all to lose.

‘So...er...’ Poppy began uncertainly. ‘You’ll want me to dress up more...?’

A sudden wolfish smile flashed across Gaetano’s lean, darkly handsome features. ‘No, that’s exactly what I don’t want,’ he assured her. ‘Rodolfo would see straight through you trying to pretend to be something you’re not. I don’t want you to feel the need to change anything—just be yourself.’

‘Myself...’ Poppy repeated a tad dizzily as she collided with shimmering dark golden eyes fringed by those glorious spiky black lashes of his.

‘Be yourself,’ Gaetano stressed, severely disconcerting her because she had expected him to want to change everything about her. ‘My grandfather, like me, respects individuality.’

Poppy wondered how it was then that, even in recent years, she had noticed from reading the papers, and catching a glimpse or two of past companions at the hall, Gaetano’s women all seemed to be formed from the same identikit model. All were small, blonde and blue-eyed arm-clingers, who appeared to have no personality at all in his presence. The sort of women who simpered, hung on his every word and acted super-attentive to their man. No, Gaetano had definitely never struck her as a male likely to appreciate individuality.

‘I would have another request,’ she said daringly. ‘My brother’s a fully qualified mechanic. Find him a job.’

Gaetano frowned. ‘He’s an—’

‘An ex-con. Yes, we are well aware of that, but he needs a proper job before he can hope to rebuild his life,’ she pointed out. ‘I’d be very grateful if there was anything you could do to help Damien.’

Gaetano’s beautifully shaped mouth tightened. ‘You drive a hard bargain. I’ll make enquiries.’

* * *

Almost a full month after that breakfast, Poppy was sitting in the kitchen with her mother. Jasmine was studying her daughter and looking troubled, an expression that had become increasingly frequent on her face as she slowly emerged from the shrouding fog of alcoholic dependency and realised what had been happening in the world around her. Initial assessment followed by several sessions with trained counsellors and medication for her depression had brought about an improvement in Jasmine’s state of mind. The older woman was trying not to drink, not doing very well so far but at least trying, something she had not even been prepared to contemplate just weeks earlier. This very afternoon Poppy and her mother were heading to London where Poppy would join Gaetano and take up her role as a fake fiancée while Jasmine embarked on a residential stay in a top-flight private clinic renowned for its success with patients.

‘I just don’t want to see you get hurt,’ the older woman repeated, squeezing her daughter’s hand. ‘Gaetano is a real box of tricks. I appreciate his help, but I would never fully trust him. He’s too clever and he hasn’t got his granddad’s humanity. I can’t understand what’s in this masquerade for Gaetano—’

‘Climbing the career ladder at the bank—promotion. Seems that Rodolfo Leonetti is a real stick-in-the-mud about Gaetano still being single.’ Poppy sighed, having already been through this dialogue several times with her mother and wishing the subject could simply be dropped.

‘Yes, but how will it benefit Gaetano when your engagement is broken off again?’ Jasmine prompted. ‘That’s the bit I don’t get.’

Poppy didn’t really get it either but kept that to herself. How was she supposed to know what went on in Gaetano’s multifaceted brain? Apart from anything else she’d had hardly any contact with him since that hotel breakfast they’d shared. He had phoned her with instructions and information about arrangements for her mother and travel plans, but he had not returned to the hall. In the meantime, a new housekeeper had moved into Woodfield Hall and Poppy assumed that the giant refrigerator was being kept fully stocked and vases of flowers were now once again decorating the mansion for the owner who never visited. Gaetano had dismissed Poppy’s opinions with an assurance that made it clear that his household arrangements were not and never would be any of her business.

The helicopter picked them up at two in the afternoon. Poppy had packed for both her and her mother, who was being taken to the clinic. Jasmine was nervous and not entirely sober when they boarded and fairly shaky on her legs by the time they landed in London, leaning on her daughter’s arm for support.

Gaetano, however, didn’t even notice Jasmine Arnold. He was too busy watching Poppy stroll towards him with that lithe, lazy walk of hers. She wore black and red plaid leggings and a black tee, her hair falling in wind-tousled curls round her heart-shaped face. He saw other men taking a second glance at her and it annoyed him. She was unusual and it gave her a distinction that he couldn’t quite put a label on but one quality she had in spades and that was sex appeal, he acknowledged grimly, struggling to maintain control of what lay south of his belt. He would get accustomed to her and that response would fade because nothing, not one single intimate thing, was going to take place between them. This was business and he was no soft touch.

The staff member from the clinic designated to pick up Jasmine intercepted Poppy and her mother. The women parted with a hug and tears in their eyes, for the guidelines of Jasmine’s treatment plan had warned that the clinic preferred there to be no contact between their patients and families during the first few weeks of treatment. That was why Poppy’s first view of Gaetano was blurred because she had been watching her mother nervously walk away and, while knowing that she was doing the best thing possible for her troubled parent, she still felt horribly guilty about it.

‘Poppy...’ Gaetano murmured, one of his security men taking immediate charge of her luggage trolley.

His lean, darkly handsome features swam through the glimmer of tears in her wide eyes and sliced right through her detachment. He looked utterly gorgeous, sheathed in designer jeans and a casual white and blue striped shirt that accentuated the glow of his bronzed skin colour. For a split second, Poppy simply stared in search of a flaw in his classically beautiful face. At some stage she stopped breathing without realising it and, connecting with dark golden eyes the same shade as melting honey, she suddenly felt so hot she was vaguely surprised that people didn’t rush up with fire extinguishers to put out the blaze. Her heartbeat thumped as the noise of their surroundings inexplicably ebbed. A little tweaking sensation in her pelvis caused her to shift her feet while her nipples pinched full and tight below her tee.

‘G-Gaetano...’ she stammered, barely able to find her voice as she fought a desperate rearguard reaction to what she belatedly realised was a very dangerous susceptibility to Gaetano’s magnetic attraction.

Gaetano was taking in the tenting prominence of her nipples below her top and idly wondering what colour they were, arousal moving thickly and hungrily through his blood as he studied her lush pink mouth. ‘We’re going straight back to my house,’ he told her brusquely, snapping back to full attention. ‘You’ve got work to do this evening.’

‘Work?’ Poppy parroted in surprise as she fell into step by his side.

‘I’ve made up some prompt sheets for you to cover the sort of details you would be expected to know about me if we were in a genuine relationship,’ he explained. ‘Once you memorise all that we’ll be ready to go tomorrow.’

‘Tomorrow?’ She gasped in dismay because seemingly he wasn’t giving her any time at all to practise her new role or even prepare for it.

‘It’s Rodolfo’s seventy-fifth birthday and he’s throwing an afternoon party. Obviously we will be attending it as an engaged couple,’ Gaetano explained smoothly.

Nerves clenched and twisted in Poppy’s uneasy tummy. She had probably met Rodolfo Leonetti at some stage but she had no memory of the occasion and could only recall seeing him in the distance at the hall when he had still lived there. She had known his late wife, Serafina, well, however, and remembered her clearly. Gaetano’s grandmother had been a lovely woman, who treated everyone the same, be they rich or poor, family or staff. Alongside Jasmine, Serafina had taught Poppy how to bake. Recollecting that, Poppy knew exactly what she would be doing in terms of a gift for the older man’s birthday.

Her cases were stowed in the sleek expensive car Gaetano had brought to the airport. Damien could probably have told her everything about the vehicle because he was a car buff, but Poppy was too busy marvelling that Gaetano had taken the time to come and pick her up personally and that he was actually driving himself.

His phone rang as they left the airport behind. It was in hands-free mode and the voluble burst of Italian that banished the silence in the car only made Poppy feel more out on a limb than ever. She had to toughen up, she told herself firmly, and regain her confidence. Gaetano had given her the equivalent of a high-paid job and she planned to do the best she could to meet his no doubt high expectations but secretly, deep down inside where only she knew how she felt, Poppy was totally terrified of doing something wrong and letting Gaetano down.

Gaetano was so incredibly particular, she reflected absently, recalling the look on his face when she’d eaten her chocolate cereal with her fingers. Even little mistakes would probably irritate Gaetano. He wasn’t tolerant or understanding. No, Poppy knew it wasn’t going to be easy to fake anything to Gaetano’s satisfaction. In fact she reckoned she was in for a long, hard walk down a road strewn with endless obstacles. While the animated dialogue in Italian went on for what seemed a very long time, Poppy looked out at the busy London streets. Once or twice when she glanced in the other direction she noted the aggressive angle of Gaetano’s jaw line that suggested tension and picked up on the hard edge to his dark-timbre drawl and clipped responses.

‘Our goose has been cooked,’ Gaetano breathed curtly when the phone call was over. ‘That was Rodolfo. He wants to meet you now.’

‘Now...like right now, today?’ Poppy exclaimed in dismay.

‘Like right now,’ Gaetano growled. ‘And you’re not ready.’

Poppy’s eyes flashed. ‘And whose fault is that?’

‘What do you mean?’

‘You shouldn’t have waited until the last possible moment to clue me up on what I’m supposed to know about you,’ Poppy pointed out without hesitation. ‘Sensible people prepare for anything important more than one day in advance.’

‘Don’t you dare start criticising me!’ Gaetano erupted, sharply disconcerting her as he flashed a look of angry, flaming censure. ‘It’s more than twenty-four hours since I even slept. We’ve had a crisis deal at the bank and this stupid business was the very last thing on my mind.’

‘If it’s so stupid you can forget about it again.’ Poppy proffered that get-out clause stiffly. ‘Don’t mind me. This was, after all, your idea, all your idea.’

‘I can’t forget about it again when I’ve already told Rodolfo I’m engaged!’ Gaetano launched back at her furiously. ‘Whether I like it or not, I’m stuck with you and faking it!’

‘Oh, goody...aren’t I the lucky girl?’ Poppy murmured in a poisonous undertone intended to sting. ‘You’re such a catch, Gaetano. All that money and success but not a single ounce of charm!’

‘Be quiet!’ Gaetano raked at her with incredulity.

‘Go stuff yourself!’ Poppy tossed back fierily as he shot the car to a halt outside a tall town house in a fancy street embellished with a central garden.

‘And you’re stuck with me,’ Gaetano asserted with grim satisfaction as he closed her wrist in a grip of steel to prevent her leaping out of the car. He flipped open the ring box in his other hand and removed the diamond engagement ring to shove it onto her wedding finger with no ceremony whatsoever.

‘Oh, dear...ugly ring alert,’ Poppy snapped, studying the huge diamond solitaire with unappreciative eyes. ‘Of course, it’s one of those fake diamonds...right?’

‘Of course it’s not a fake!’ Gaetano bit out, what little patience he had decimated by lack of sleep and her unexpectedly challenging behaviour.

‘It’s hard to believe that you can spend that much money and end up with something that looks like it fell out of a Christmas cracker.’ Poppy groaned. ‘I can’t go in there, Gaetano.’

‘Get out of the car,’ he urged, leaning across to open the door for her. ‘Of course you can go in there and wing it. Just look all intoxicated with your ring.’

‘Yes, getting drunk in receipt of this non-example of good taste would certainly be understandable.’

‘You’re supposed to be in love with me!’ Gaetano roared at her.

‘Trouble is, you’re about as loveable as a grizzly bear,’ Poppy opined, walking round the bonnet and up onto the pavement. ‘My acting skills may be poor but yours are a great deal worse.’

‘What the hell are you talking about?’ Gaetano squared up to her, six feet four inches of roaring aggression and impatience. ‘It’s time to stop messing about and start acting.’

Poppy lifted a hand and stabbed his broad muscular chest with a combative forefinger. ‘But you said you wanted me to be myself. What exactly do you want, Gaetano?’

‘Porca miseria! I want you to stop driving me insane!’ Gaetano bit out wrathfully, backing her up against the wing of the car, long powerful thighs entrapping her. ‘I will tell you only once. If you can’t do as you’re told you’re out of here!’

‘I’m only just resisting the urge to use some very rude words,’ Poppy warned him, standing her ground with defiant green eyes. ‘This is all your fault. You’ve dragged me here straight from the airport knowing I’m not remotely prepared for this meeting.’

And for Gaetano, whose aggressive need to dominate had emerged in the nursery when he had systematically bullied his first nanny into letting him do pretty much whatever he wanted, that resistance was like a red rag to a bull. Totally unaware of anything beyond the overwhelming desire to touch her while forcing her to do what he wanted her to do, Gaetano snapped an arm round her and kissed her.

His mouth slammed down on hers and it was as if the world stopped dead and then closed round that moment. She was in such a rage with him, it was a reflex reaction for Poppy to close her teeth together, refusing him entry. He shifted against her, all lean, sinuous, powerful male, and the erection she could feel nudging against her stomach sent the most overwhelming awareness shimmying through her like a dangerous drug. The heat and strength of him against her was even more arousing and she unclamped her teeth for him, helpless in the grip of the driving hunger that had captured her and destroyed her opposition.

With a hungry groan, his tongue eased into her mouth and it was without a doubt the most heart-stopping instant of sensation she had ever experienced as his tongue teased and tangled with hers before plunging deep. An ache she had never felt in a man’s arms before hollowed almost painfully at the heart of her and she was pushing instinctively against him even as he urged her back against the car, so that they were welded together so tight a card couldn’t have slid between them. Her arms went round him, massaging up over his wide shoulders before sliding up to lace into his luxuriant black hair and then raking down again over his muscled arms to spread across his taut masculine ass. It was a mindless, addictive, totally visceral embrace.

In an abrupt movement, Gaetano stepped back from her, his breathing audible, sawing in and out of his big chest as if he had run a marathon. Poppy was all over the place mentally and she blinked, literally struggling to return to the real world while fighting a shocking desire to yank him bodily back to her. He was so hot at kissing she was ready to spontaneously combust. He might not have an ounce of charm but when it came to the sex stuff he was out at the front of the field, she decided, a burning blush warming her face as she too worked to get her breath back.

‘Well...that was interesting,’ she remarked shakily, feeling the need to say something, anything that might suggest that she had regained control when she had not.

Gaetano, who never, ever did PDAs with women, was horribly aware of his bodyguards standing by staring as if a little Martian had taken his place. In short, Gaetano was in shock but he also knew that if he had been parked somewhere private he would have had Poppy spread across the bonnet while he plunged into her lithe body hard and fast and sated the appalling level of hunger coursing through his lower body. He ached; he ached so bad he wanted to groan out loud. Dark colour etched the line of his high cheekbones.

‘Let’s go inside,’ he suggested in a driven undertone. ‘Just take your lead from me, bella mia.’

And won’t doing exactly as Gaetano tells you be fun? a little devil enquired inside Poppy’s bemused head. If it had related to kissing, she would have been queuing up, she conceded numbly. Nobody had ever made her feel so much with one kiss. In fact she hadn’t known it was even possible to be that turned on by a man after just one kiss. Gaetano had hidden depths, dark, sexy depths, but she had not the smallest intention of plumbing those depths...

CHAPTER FOUR

‘I SAW YOU ARRIVE,’ Rodolfo Leonetti volunteered, disconcerting his grandson. ‘It looked as though you were having words.’

Poppy almost froze by Gaetano’s side, her discomfiture sweeping through her like a tidal wave. Gaetano’s grandfather didn’t look his age. With his head of wavy grey hair and the upright stature of a much younger man, not to mention a height not far short of Gaetano’s, he still looked strong and vital. He greeted her with a kiss on both cheeks and smiled warmly at her before unleashing that unsettling comment on Gaetano.

‘We were having a row,’ Poppy was taken aback to hear Gaetano admit. ‘Poppy doesn’t like her engagement ring. Perhaps I should have taken her with me to choose it...’

Rodolfo widened his shrewd dark eyes. ‘My grandson left you out of that selection?’

Pink and flustered by the speed with which Gaetano plotted and reacted in a tight corner, Poppy said, ‘I’m afraid so...’ In an uncertain movement she extended her hand for the older man to study the ring.

‘You could see that diamond from outer space,’ Rodolfo remarked, straight-faced.

‘It’s beautiful,’ Poppy hastened to add.

‘Be honest, you hate it,’ Gaetano encouraged, having told the story, clearly happy to go with the flow.

‘It’s too bling for me,’ she murmured dutifully, sinking down into the comfortable seat Rodolfo had indicated. Her nerves were strung so tight that her very face felt stiff with tension. She barely had the awareness to take in the beautiful big reception room, which strongly resembled the splendour of the reception rooms at Woodfield Hall.

‘I was very sorry to hear about your mother’s problems,’ Gaetano’s grandfather said while Poppy was pouring the tea, having been invited to do the hostess thing for the first time in her life. She almost dropped the teapot at Rodolfo’s quietly offered expression of sympathy. Evidently Gaetano had been honest about her mother’s predicament. ‘I’m sure the clinic will help her.’

‘I hope so.’ Poppy compressed her lips as Rodolfo got to his feet and excused himself. As the door swung in his wake, Poppy groaned out loud. ‘I’m no good at this, Gaetano—’

‘You’ll improve. He must’ve seen us kissing. That will have at least made us look like a proper couple,’ he pointed out soft and low. ‘Sometimes not having a script is better.’

‘I would work better from a script.’ She slanted a glance at him, encountering smouldering dark golden eyes, and pink surged into her cheeks.

Rodolfo reappeared and sank back into his seat. He had a small box in his hand, which he opened. ‘This was your grandmother’s ring. As all her jewellery will go to your wife I thought it would be a good idea to let Poppy have a look at Serafina’s engagement ring now.’

Poppy stared in astonished recognition at the fine diamond and ruby cluster on display. ‘I remember your wife taking it off when she was baking,’ she shared quietly. ‘It’s a fabulous ring.’

‘It belongs to you now,’ Rodolfo said with gentle courtesy and the sadness in his creased eyes made her eyes sting.

‘She was a lovely person,’ Poppy whispered shakily.

Gaetano couldn’t credit what he was seeing. His fake fiancée and Rodolfo were having a mutual love-in, full of exchanged glances and sentimental smiles of understanding. His grandfather was sliding his beloved late wife’s ring onto Poppy’s finger as if she were Cinderella having the glass slipper fitted.

‘I believe she would have been happy for you to wear it,’ the old man said fondly, admiring it on Poppy’s hand, the giant diamond solitaire purchased by Gaetano now abandoned on the coffee table.

‘Thank you very much,’ Poppy responded chokily. ‘It’s gorgeous.’

‘And it comes with a very happy history in its back story,’ Rodolfo shared mistily.

Gaetano wanted to groan out loud. He wanted his grandfather to disapprove of Poppy, not welcome her with open arms and start patting her hand while he talked happily about his late wife, Serafina. Of course, a little initial enthusiasm was to be expected, he reasoned shrewdly, and Rodolfo would hardly feel critical in the first fine flush of his approval of the step that Gaetano had taken.

Afternoon tea stretched into dinner, by which time Gaetano was heartily bored with family stories. With admirable tact and patience, however, Poppy had listened with convincing interest to his grandfather recount Leonetti family history. She had much better manners than Gaetano had expected and her easy relaxation with the older man was even more noteworthy because few people relaxed around Rodolfo, who was considerably more clever and ruthless than he appeared. If Poppy had been his real fiancée, Gaetano would have been ecstatic at the warmth of her reception. Indeed one could have been forgiven for thinking that Rodolfo had waited his entire life praying for the joy of seeing his grandson bring the housekeeper’s daughter home and announce that he was planning to marry her. Only when Poppy began smothering yawns did Gaetano’s torture end.

‘Time for us to leave.’ Gaetano tugged a drooping Poppy out of her seat with a powerful hand.

‘Hope we don’t have to go far,’ she mumbled sleepily.

Encountering the older man’s startled glance at his bride-to-be’s ignorance, Gaetano straightened and smiled. ‘She hasn’t been here before,’ he pointed out. ‘I wanted to surprise her.’

‘What surprise?’ Poppy pressed as he walked her out of the drawing room.

‘Rodolfo had an entire wing of this house converted for me to occupy ten years ago,’ he told her, throwing wide a door at the foot of the corridor. ‘All we have to do is walk through a connecting door and we’re in my space.’

And even drowsy as she was it was very obvious to Poppy that Gaetano’s part of the house was a hugely different space. Rich colours, heavy fabrics and polished antiques were replaced by contemporary stone floors, pale colours and plain furniture. It was as distinct as night was to day from his grandfather’s house. ‘Elegant,’ she commented.

‘I’m glad you think so.’ Gaetano showed her upstairs into the master bedroom. ‘This is where we sleep...’

Poppy froze, her brain snapping into gear again. ‘We?’

‘We can’t stay this close to Rodolfo and pretend to be engaged without sharing a room,’ Gaetano fired back at her impatiently. ‘His staff service this place as well as his.’

‘But you didn’t warn me about this!’ Poppy objected. ‘Naturally I assumed you had an apartment somewhere on your own where I’d have my own room.’

‘Well, you can’t have your own room here,’ Gaetano informed her without apology. ‘Doubtless Rodolfo would like to think you’re the vestal-virgin type, but he wouldn’t find it credible that I had asked you to marry me...’

Poppy studied the huge divan sleigh bed and her soft mouth compressed. ‘For goodness’ sake, there’s only one bed...and I’m not sharing it with you!’

‘You have to sleep in here with me. There’s a downside for both of us in this arrangement,’ Gaetano countered grimly.

‘And what’s your downside?’ Poppy asked with interest.

‘Celibacy,’ Gaetano intoned very drily. ‘I can’t risk being seen or associated with any other woman while I’m supposed to be engaged to you.’

‘Oh, dear...’ Poppy commented without an atom of sympathy. ‘From what I’ve read about your usual pursuits in the press, that will be a character-building challenge for you.’

Exasperation laced Gaetano’s lean, darkly handsome features. He would never ever hurt a woman but there were times when he wanted to plunge Poppy head first into a mud bath. ‘There’s a lot of rubbish talked about my private life in the newspapers.’

‘That line might work with one of your socialites, Gaetano...but not with me. I know that party did take place and what happened at it.’

Gaetano fought the urge to defend himself and collided with her witchy green eyes and momentarily forgot what he had been about to say. ‘I’m going for a shower,’ he said instead and began to undress.

Leonetti flesh alert! screamed a little voice in Poppy’s head as Gaetano shed his shirt without inhibition. And why would he be inhibited when he was unveiling a work of art? He was all sleek muscle from the vee above his lean hips to the corrugated muscular flatness of his abdomen and the swelling power of his pectoral muscles. Her mouth ran dry. She might not be the vestal-virgin type but she was a virgin and she had never shared a room with a half-naked male before. That was not information she planned to share with Gaetano, especially as she pretty much blamed him for the reality that she had yet to take that sexual plunge in adulthood.

At sixteen, after his rejection, she had almost decided to have sex with someone else but had realised what she was doing in time and had called a halt before things got out of hand. She wasn’t proud of that episode, well aware that she had acted like a bit of a tease with the boy concerned. Her real lesson had been grasping that going off to have mindless sex with someone else because Gaetano didn’t want her was pathetic and silly. While she was at college doing her nursing training she had had boyfriends and occasional little moments of temptation but nobody had tempted her as much as Gaetano had once tempted her. And Poppy was stubborn and had decided that she would only sleep with someone when she really, really wanted to. She wasn’t going to have sex just because some man expected it of her, nor was she planning to have sex just for the sake of it.

Poppy opened one of her cases and only then appreciated that her luggage had already been unpacked for her. So this was how the rich lived, she thought ruefully, wondering what she was going to use as pyjamas when she didn’t ever wear them because she preferred to sleep naked. She had nothing big enough to cover her decently in mixed company and she rifled through Gaetano’s drawers to borrow a big white tee shirt that was both large and sexless. He might have forgotten that kiss, that terrifying surge of limitless hunger...but she hadn’t and she had no plans to tempt fate.

* * *

Gaetano was thinking about sex in the shower and wondering if Poppy would consider broadening their agreement. He wanted her and she wanted him. To his outlook that was a simple balanced equation and it made sense that they should make the most of each other for the duration of their relationship. It was the practical solution and Gaetano was always practical, particularly when it came to his high sex drive.

A towel knotted round his lean hips, Gaetano trod back into the bedroom. Poppy took one look at all that bronzed skin still sprinkled with drops of water and realised that she wanted to lick him like a postage stamp. With a stifled groan at her own atrocious weakness, she pushed past him and went into the bathroom to get changed.

Gaetano pulled on boxers on the grounds that it never paid to take anything for granted with women and that doing so only annoyed them. Poppy emerged from the bathroom wearing what could only be one of his tee shirts because it hung off her slender frame in loose folds. Even so, it still couldn’t hide the prominent little peaks of her breasts, the womanly curve of her hips or the perfection of the long shapely legs below the hem.

‘I have a suggestion to make,’ Gaetano murmured huskily.

‘Do I want to hear this?’ Poppy wisecracked, pushing back the bedding and scrambling into the bed, feeling her limbs settle into an incredibly soft and supportive mattress that was a far cry from the ancient lumpy bed of her youth. Wearing only silk boxers Gaetano was an outrageously masculine presence and very hard for Poppy to ignore. She was trying to respect his space by not looking at him and hoping he would award her the same courtesy of acting as though she were still fully clothed.

‘We have to pretend to be lovers,’ Gaetano pointed out.

Wondering in what possible direction that statement could be travelling, Poppy prompted, ‘Yes...so?’

‘Why don’t we make it real?’ Gaetano drawled, smooth as melted honey.

Her vocal cords went into arrest and respecting his space suddenly became much too challenging. ‘Real?’ Poppy exclaimed loudly. ‘What exactly do you mean by real?’

‘You’re not that innocent,’ Gaetano assured her lazily as he sprang into bed beside her.

‘So, you’re suggesting that we have sex because you don’t fancy celibacy?’ Poppy enquired, delicate auburn brows raised in disbelief.

‘We are stuck in this situation,’ Gaetano reminded her.

‘I can live without sex,’ Poppy told him tightly, feeling colour climb hotly towards her hairline because even saying ‘sex’ in Gaetano’s presence made her feel horribly self-conscious.

‘I can as well but not happily,’ Gaetano told her bluntly. ‘We’re very attracted to each other. We might as well make the most of it.’

‘Any port in a storm?’ Poppy remarked without amusement. ‘I’m here in the bed and, as you see it, available, so I should be interested?’

Gaetano leant closer, his stubbled jaw line propped on the heel of his upraised hand as he gazed down at her with absolutely gorgeous dark golden eyes. ‘I’m good, bella mia. You wouldn’t be disappointed.’

Poppy was as frozen with fear as a woman facing a hungry cannibal might be. But insidious heat and dampness were welling in the tender place between her thighs, striving to work their wicked seductive magic on her resistance. In fact she could feel her whole body literally wake up, sit up and take notice of Gaetano’s offer. He was offering her what she had once desperately wanted but on terms she could never accept. ‘I don’t want to be used.’

‘I’m surprised you’re so narrow in your outlook. Wouldn’t you be using me to scratch the same itch?’ Gaetano enquired softly.

Her whole face flamed and she flipped over on her side, turning her narrow back defensively on him. Get thee behind me, Satan, she thought helplessly. ‘No, thanks,’ she said chokily, unsure whether she wanted to laugh or cry at his blunt proposition. ‘If I want meaningless sex I imagine I can get it just about anywhere.’

Gaetano stroked a long brown forefinger down her taut spinal cord. ‘Sex with me wouldn’t be meaningless. It would be amazing. You set me on fire, gioia mia.’

Poppy rolled her eyes. He was so slick and full of confidence but that caressing touch lingered with her, lighting up little pockets of melting willingness inside her treacherous body. ‘I’ll keep it in mind. If my itch has to be scratched I will seriously consider you,’ she lied stonily.

‘What more do you want from me?’ Gaetano asked silkily. ‘I’m honest. I’m clean. I don’t lie or cheat.’

‘It doesn’t stop you from being a four-letter word of a man,’ Poppy told him roundly. ‘I thought Italian lovers were supposed to be the last word in seduction. You just turned me off big time.’

‘I was respecting your intelligence by not shooting you a line,’ Gaetano traded with husky amusement that laced through his dark deep drawl in a sexy, accented purr.

Poppy pictured herself flipping over and slapping him so hard his perfect teeth rattled in his too ingenious head. Her own teeth gritted aggressively. Without warning she was also imagining easing back into the hard, allmale heat of him while his arms closed round her and his hips moved against hers. And that sensual imagery was so energising that she felt boiling hot all over. Her nipples swelled and prickled and the heat in her pelvis mushroomed. Her face burned with shame in the darkness. Wanting was wanting, she reasoned with the sexual side of her nature, but it wasn’t enough on its own. Gaetano wasn’t the man for her, she reminded herself doggedly.

‘You know, if you were a nice guy—’

‘When did I ever say I was a nice guy?’ Gaetano cut in sharply.

‘You didn’t,’ Poppy conceded grudgingly, turning over to pick out the powerful silhouette of his head and shoulders in the dim light. ‘But you shouldn’t be thinking about your sex life. Right now you should be worrying more about how your grandfather is going to feel when this engagement falls through. Because he’s making such an effort to be welcoming and accepting of someone like me, I think he’ll be devastated when our relationship comes to nothing.’

‘Allow me to know my own grandfather better than you.’

‘You’re too focused on your career plan to see beyond it. What I saw today was that Rodolfo was incredibly happy about you getting engaged. How could he be anything other than upset when it breaks down?’

Gaetano grimaced and flung his dark head back against the pillows. She didn’t understand. How could she? He could hardly tell her that she was supposed to bomb as a fiancée so that her disappearance from his life again would be more worthy of celebration than disappointment. Time would take care of that problem. After all, she had most likely been on her very best behaviour at her first meeting with his grandfather and sooner rather than later she would probably let herself down.

‘You used to swear a lot,’ he remarked out of the blue.

‘I picked it up at school because everyone used bad language. For a while I did it deliberately because I was being bullied and I was desperate to fit in,’ she confided.

‘Did it make a difference?’

‘No,’ she admitted with a wry laugh. ‘Nothing I wore or did or said could make me cool. Being plump with red hair and living at Woodfield Hall with “those posh bastards” was a supreme provocation to the other pupils.’

‘What did the bullies do?’

Thinking of her getting bullied, Gaetano was experiencing an extraordinary desire to pull her into his arms and comfort her. But he didn’t do comforting. Indeed he was downright unnerved by that perverse impulse and he actually shifted as far away from her as he could get and still be in the same bed.

‘All the usual. Name calling, tripping me up, nasty rumours and messages and texts,’ she recited wearily. ‘I hated school, couldn’t wait to get out of there. Once I was out, I stopped swearing as soon as I realised it offended people.’

He was tempted to tell her that she had never been plump. She had simply developed her womanly curves before she shot up in height. But right then he didn’t want to talk and he didn’t want to think about curves, womanly or otherwise. His hunger for her was making him uncomfortable and that infuriated him because Gaetano had never hungered that much for one particular woman. Beautiful women had always been pretty much interchangeable for him. It was the challenge, he told himself impatiently. He only wanted her because she was saying no. But that simplistic belief didn’t ease his tension in the slightest. It was, he decided grimly, likely to feel like a very long engagement.

* * *

First thing in the morning, Poppy looked amazing, Gaetano conceded hours later, studying her from across the bedroom. Her red hair streamed like a banner across the pale bedding, framing her delicate face and the rosebud pout of her lips. A narrow shoulder protruded from below his slipped tee shirt and the sheet was pushed back to bare one leg from knee to slender ankle. And that easily, that quickly, Gaetano had a hard-on again and gritted his teeth in annoyance. What the hell was it about her? He felt like a man trying to fight an invisible illness!

‘Poppy...?’

She shifted in the bed, lashes fluttering up on luminous green eyes. ‘Gaetano...?’ she whispered drowsily.

‘I left that prompt sheet I meant you to study last night on the desk in my home office. I’ll see you at Rodolfo’s party at three.’

Poppy sat up in a panic. ‘What will I wear?’

‘Your usual clothes. Be yourself,’ he reminded her as he vanished out of the door.

Poppy scrambled out of bed to follow him. ‘Where are you going?’

Gaetano swung round and sent her a pained appraisal. ‘Work...the bank.’

‘Oh...’ Having asked what appeared to be a stupid question, Poppy ducked hastily back into the bedroom and went for a shower while planning her own day.

First of all she had to go and buy the ingredients for her present for Rodolfo’s seventy-fifth. She could only hope that she wasn’t getting it wrong in the gift department. After that she had a rather more pressing need to attend to: finding work for herself. She had just about enough money in her purse to make Rodolfo’s cake but she had nothing more and no savings to fall back on.

The sleek granite-topped kitchen had a fridge packed with food and a very large selection of chocolate cereals that made her smile. Gaetano had remembered her preference. She ate while she studied the prompt sheets he had mentioned. It was like a CV written for a job: qualifications listed, sports pursuits outlined, not a single reference to any memorable moments. He just had no idea of the sort of things that a woman in love would want to know about him, Poppy reflected ruefully. When was his birthday? What was his favourite colour?

She texted him to ask.

Gaetano suppressed a groan when his phone buzzed yet again and lifted it to see what the latest irrelevant question was.

Who was the first woman you fell in love with?

He had never been in love and he was proud of it.

What do you value most in a woman?

Independence, he texted back.

As Poppy walked round the supermarket with her shopping list she raised her brows. If he liked independent women why did he always date clingy airheads? So, she asked that too and they began to argue by text until she was laughing. Gaetano had an image of himself that did not always match reality. She could have told him that he dated clingy airheads because they did as they were told, accepted his workaholic schedule and made few demands.

Noticing a ‘help wanted’ sign in the window of a café she called in, enjoyed an interview on the spot and was hired to work a shift that very evening. Relieved to have solved the problem of being broke, she returned to the town house by the separate entrance at the side and proceeded to mess up Gaetano’s basically unused kitchen with her baking session. She settled the cake into the cake carrier she had bought for the purpose and set the birthday card on top of it before going to get changed.

She wore a tartan skirt with black lace stockings and high heels. Gaetano wolf-whistled the instant he saw her. ‘Wow...’ he breathed with quiet masculine appreciation. ‘Your legs are to die for...’

‘Really?’ Poppy grinned and then frowned doubtfully. ‘Is this phase one of the Italian seduction routine?’

‘You’re very suspicious.’

‘I don’t trust you,’ Poppy told him truthfully. ‘I think being sneaky would come naturally to you.’

‘I’ve never had to be sneaky with women,’ Gaetano told her truthfully.

* * *

The drawing room was crowded with guests when they arrived. The instant Poppy saw the fancy cocktail-type frocks and delicate jewellery that the other women sported and the stares that her informal outfit attracted, she paled in dismay. She stuck out like a sore thumb and hated the feeling, squirming discomfiture taking her by storm and reminding her of her days at school when no matter how hard she’d tried she had always failed to fit in. Remembering that Gaetano had urged her to be herself was not a consolation because her unconventional appearance had to be an embarrassment to him. How could it be anything else?

Gaetano’s grandfather made a major production out of welcoming them and announcing their engagement. Poppy’s guilt over their deception sent colour flying into her cheeks but she saw only satisfaction in Gaetano’s brilliant smile and from it she deduced that everything was going the way he had planned.

But Poppy was wrong in that assumption. She served Rodolfo with the strawberry layer cake with mascarpone-cheese icing that was his favourite and which she had learned to bake at his wife’s side. His eyes went all watery and he gave her an almost boyish grin as he took up the cake knife she passed him and cut himself a large helping.

‘So, when’s the big day?’ he asked Poppy within Gaetano’s hearing.

Gaetano tensed. ‘We haven’t set a date as yet...’

‘You don’t want to risk a treasure like Poppy getting away,’ his grandfather warned him softly, shrewd eyes resting on his grandson’s lean, darkly handsome face. ‘I don’t believe in long engagements.’

‘We don’t want to rush in either,’ Poppy remarked carefully, instinct sending her to Gaetano’s rescue.

‘Next month would be a good time for me before I head off to Italy for the summer,’ Rodolfo pointed out calmly.

‘We’ll talk it over,’ Gaetano fielded smoothly.

‘And when you get back from your honeymoon,’ the old man delivered cheerfully, ‘it will be as CEO.’

Gaetano nodded, thoroughly disconcerted and fighting not to betray the fact that he knew that his promotion was now a marriage step away from him. He studied Poppy from below his black lashes. Against all the odds, Rodolfo adored her. Trust Poppy to bake his grandmother’s signature cake. She couldn’t have done anything more likely to please and impress. She had ticked his grandfather’s every box. Not only was she beautiful, kind and thoughtful, she could actually cook. Gaetano experienced a hideous ‘hoist with his own petard’ sensation and wondered how the hell he was going to climb back out of the hole he had dug.

CHAPTER FIVE

‘WHY ARE YOU in such a hurry?’ Gaetano frowned as Poppy sped away from him towards the bedroom. His grandfather had outmanoeuvred him and he needed to have a serious conversation with his fake fiancée.

‘I have to get changed and get out in the next...er...ten minutes!’ she exclaimed in dismay, hastening her step after checking her watch.

Gaetano took his time about strolling down to the bedroom where Poppy was engaged in pulling on a pair of jeans, lithe long legs topped by a pair of bright red knickers on display. Her face flushing, she half turned away, wriggling her shapely hips to ease up the jeans. The enthusiastic stirring at his groin was uniquely unwelcome to Gaetano at that moment. ‘Where do you have to be in ten minutes?’ he asked quietly.

‘Work. I picked up a waitressing shift at the café round the corner. I’ll be back by midnight,’ she told him chirpily.

In the doorway, Gaetano went rigid, convinced that he could not have heard her correctly. ‘You applied for a job as a waitress...’ his dark deep drawl climbed tellingly in volume and emphasis as he spoke that word ‘...while you’re pretending to be engaged to me?’

‘Why not? Bartending is better paid but the café was closer and the hours are casual and flexible and that would probably suit you better.’

Brilliant dark eyes landed on her with the chilling effect of an ice bath. ‘You working as a waitress doesn’t suit me in any way.’

‘I don’t see why you should object,’ Poppy reasoned, thrusting her feet into her comfy ankle boots. ‘I mean, you’re still working and what am I supposed to do with myself while you’re busy all day? It’s not even as if pretending to be your fiancée is a full-time job.’

‘As far as I’m concerned, it is full-time and you will go to the café now and tell them that you’re sorry but you won’t be working there tonight,’ Gaetano told her with raking impatience. ‘Diavelos! Do I have to spell every little thing out to you? I’m a billionaire banker. You can’t work in a café or a bar for peanuts while you’re purportedly engaged to me!’

An angry flush had lit up Poppy’s cheeks. ‘Then what am I supposed to do for money?’

‘If you need money, I’ll give it to you,’ Gaetano declared, pulling out his wallet, relieved that the problem could be so easily fixed. But seriously, where was her brain? Working as a waitress while living in a mansion?

Poppy backed away a step and then snaked past him in the doorway to trudge down to the hall. ‘I don’t want your money, Gaetano. I work for my money. I don’t take handouts from anyone.’

‘But I’m the exception to that rule,’ Gaetano slotted in grimly as he followed her with tenacious resolve. ‘While you are engaged to me, you are not allowed to embarrass me by working in a low-paid menial job.’

Outraged by that decree, Poppy whirled round to face him again, the hank of hair from her ponytail falling over her shoulder in a bright colourful stream. ‘Is that a fact?’ she prompted. ‘Well, I’m sorry, you’re out of luck on this one. As far as I’m concerned, any kind of honest work is preferable to living off charity and I don’t care if you think waitressing is menial—’

‘We have a deal!’ Gaetano raked at her with raw bite. ‘You’re breaking it!’

‘At no stage did you ever mention that I would not be able to take paid work,’ Poppy flung back at him in furious denial. ‘So, don’t try to deviously change the rules to suit yourself. I’m sorry if you see me working as a waitress at Carrie’s coffee shop as a major embarrassment. Don’t you have enough status on your own account? Does it really matter what I do? I would remind you that I am an ordinary girl who needs to work to live and that’s not about to change for you or anyone else!’

‘It’s totally unnecessary for you to work...in fact it’s preposterous!’ Gaetano slammed back at her loudly, dark eyes flaring as golden as the heart of a fire now, his anger unconcealed. ‘Particularly when I have already assured you that I will cover your every expense while you are staying in London.’

‘Just as I’ve already told you,’ Poppy proclaimed heatedly, ‘I will not accept money from you. I’m an independent woman and I have my pride. If our positions were reversed, would you want me keeping you?’

‘Don’t be ridiculous!’ Gaetano roared back, all control of his temper abandoned in the face of her continuing refusal to listen to him and respect his opinion. Never before in his life had a woman opposed him in such a way.

More intimidated than she was prepared to admit or show by the depth of his anger and the sheer size of him towering over her while he gave forth as if he were voicing the Ten Commandments, Poppy brought up her chin. ‘I’m not being ridiculous,’ she countered obstinately. ‘I’m standing up for what I believe in. I don’t want your money. I want my own. And as only a few people know I’m engaged to you, I don’t see how it’s going to embarrass you. Especially as you don’t embarrass that easily.’

‘And what’s that supposed to mean?’ he demanded.

Poppy dealt him an accusing look. ‘You should’ve given me some pointers on what to wear at the birthday party. Once I saw how the other women were dressed, I felt stupid.’

Gaetano shrugged. ‘It wasn’t important. I want you to be yourself,’ he repeated dismissively. ‘As for the waitress job—’

‘I’m keeping it!’ Poppy incised, lifting her chin combatively because she was needled by his assurance that being the odd one out in the fashion stakes at the party was something she should simply be able to shrug off. Had that been a rap on the knuckles? Was she oversensitive? Too prone to feeling inadequate?

‘And that’s your last word on the subject?’ Gaetano growled as she yanked open the front side door, which serviced his wing of the house.

‘I’m afraid so,’ Poppy declared before she raced off at speed, pulling the door shut behind her.

‘If you don’t watch out, you’ll lose her,’ a voice said from behind Gaetano.

In consternation, he swung round to focus on his grandfather, who was wedged in the doorway communicating between the two properties. ‘How much of that did you hear?’ Gaetano asked tautly.

‘With this door open I couldn’t help overhearing the last part of your argument,’ Rodolfo Leonetti advanced. ‘I’ll admit to hearing enough to appreciate that my grandson is a hopeless snob. She was correct, Gaetano. There can never be shame in honest work. Your grandmother insisted on selling her father’s fish at a stall until the day she married me.’

‘Your wife was raised on a tiny backward island in a different era. Times have changed,’ Gaetano parried thinly.

Rodolfo laughed with sincere appreciation. ‘Women don’t change that much. Poppy’s not interested in your money. Do you realise how very lucky you are to have found such a woman?’

In silence, Gaetano jerked his aggressive chin in acknowledgement. He was still climbing back down from the dizzy heights of the unholy rage Poppy’s defiance had lit inside him, marvelling at how angry she had made him while being disconcerted by his loss of control. His lean hands flexed into fists before slowly loosening again.

‘And as her temper seems to be as hot as your own it may well take some very nifty moves on your part to keep her,’ his grandfather opined with quiet assurance as he strolled back through the communicating door.

Gaetano struck the wall with a knotted fist and swore long and low beneath his breath. Poppy set his temper off like a rocket, not a problem he had ever had with a woman before. That’s because you date ‘clingy airheads’, a voice chimed in the back of his mind, an exact quote of Poppy’s text that sounded remarkably like her. He gritted his teeth, tension pulling like tight strings in his lean, powerful body to tauten every muscle group. It was stress caused by the lack of sex, he decided abruptly. A wave of relief for that rational explanation for his recent irrational behaviour engulfed him. Gaetano didn’t like anything that he couldn’t understand. Yet Poppy fell into that category and he knew he didn’t dislike her.

* * *

Poppy worked her shift in the café, her mind buzzing like a busy bee throughout. Had she been too hard on Gaetano? It was true that he was a snob but what else could he be after the over-privileged life he had led since birth? But Rodolfo’s clear desire to rush his grandson into marriage had shocked Gaetano and naturally that had put him in a bad mood, she conceded ruefully. Evidently when Gaetano had suggested their fake engagement he had seriously underestimated the extent of his grandfather’s enthusiasm for marrying him off. Only an actual wedding was going to satisfy Rodolfo Leonetti and move Gaetano up the last crucial step of his career ladder. An engagement wasn’t going to achieve that for him, which pretty much meant that everything Gaetano had so far done had been for nothing.

When Poppy finished work, she was astonished to glance out of the window and see Gaetano waiting outside for her. Street light fell on his defined cheekbones, strong nose and stubbled jaw line. One glance at his undeniable hotness and he took her breath away. Why had he come to meet her? Colour washing her face, she pulled her coat out of the back room and waited for the manager to unlock the door for her exit. Gaetano’s gaze, dark, deep-set and pure gold, flamed and he moved forward.

‘What are you doing here?’ she asked to fill the tense silence.

‘You can’t walk back to the house on your own at this time of night,’ Gaetano told her.

‘Well, I suppose you would think that way,’ Poppy remarked, inclining her head to acknowledge his bodyguards ranged across the pavement mere yards from them. Gaetano was never ever alone in the way that other ordinary people were alone. ‘Why didn’t you just send one of them to look out for me?’

‘I owed you,’ Gaetano breathed, unlocking the sleek sports car by the kerb. ‘I was out of line earlier.’

‘You get out of line a lot...but that’s the first time you’ve admitted it,’ Poppy said uncertainly.

Gaetano swung in beside her and in the confined space she stared at him, her breath hitching in her throat, heartbeat thumping very loudly in her eardrums. Black-lashed eyes assailed hers and she fell still, her mouth running dry. He lifted a hand, framed her face with spread fingers and kissed her. Her hand braced on a strong masculine thigh as she leant closer, helplessly hungry for that connection and the heat and pressure of his strong sensual mouth on hers. Her body went haywire, all liquid heat and response as his tongue delved and tangled with hers, and a deep quiver thrummed through her slender length. The wanting gripping her was all powerful, racing through her to swell her breasts and ignite a feverish damp heat between her thighs. In a harried movement, Poppy yanked her head back and forced her trembling body back into the passenger seat. ‘What was that for?’ she asked shakily.

‘I have no excuse or reason. I can’t stop wanting to touch you.’

‘It wasn’t supposed to be like this...with us,’ she mumbled accusingly through her swollen lips.

Long brown fingers circled over the top of her knee and roved lazily higher, skating up her inner thigh. ‘Tell me, no,’ Gaetano urged in a harsh undertone.

‘No,’ she framed without conviction, legs involuntarily parting because with every fibre of her being she craved his touch.

‘You’re pushing me off the edge of sanity,’ Gaetano growled, shifting position to claim her mouth again. With little passionate nips and licks and bites he took her mouth in a way it had never been taken and sent hot rivers of excitement rolling into her pelvis.

Long fingers stroked over the taut triangle of fabric stretched tight between her thighs, lingering to circle over her core. A warm tingling sensation of almost unbearable excitement gripped her and she bucked beneath his hand, helplessly, wantonly inviting more. Give me more, her body was screaming, shameless in the grip of that need. The fabric that separated her most sensitive flesh from him was a torment but he made no attempt to remove or circumvent its presence. She ground her hips down on the seat, nipples straining and stiff and prickling, the hunger like a voracious animal clawing for more inside her. That hunger was so terrifyingly strong and her brain felt so befogged with it she shivered, suddenly cold and scared of being overwhelmed.

‘This is not cool,’ Gaetano whispered against her lips. ‘We’re in a car in a public street. This is not cool at all, bella mia.’

‘It’s just lust,’ she tried to say lightly, dismissively, and she tried to summon a laugh but found she couldn’t because there was nothing funny about the power of the physical urges engulfing her or the nasty draining aftermath of blocking and denying those urges.

‘Lust has never made me behave like a randy teenager before,’ Gaetano growled. ‘Around you I have a constant hard-on.’

‘Stop it...stop talking about it!’ Poppy snapped, ramming her trembling hands into the pockets of her flying jacket.

‘That’s impossible when it’s all I can think about.’ With a stifled curse he fired the engine of the car. ‘But we have more important things to discuss.’

‘Yes. Rodolfo called your bluff,’ she breathed heavily, struggling to return to the real world again.

‘That’s not how I would describe what he did. I’ve been mulling it over all evening,’ Gaetano admitted grittily. ‘I’m afraid you hit the target last night when you accused me of ignoring the human dimension. I’m great with figures and strategy, not so good with people. But this afternoon looking at Rodolfo and listening to him talk I saw a man aware of his years and afraid he wouldn’t live long enough to see the next generation. All my adult life I’ve read him wrong. I thought all I had to do to please him was to become a success and be everything my father wasn’t but it wasn’t enough.’

‘How wasn’t it enough?’

‘Rodolfo would have been a much happier man if I’d married straight out of university and given him grandchildren,’ Gaetano breathed wryly.

‘Why regret what you can’t change? Obviously you didn’t meet anyone you wanted to marry.’

‘No, I didn’t want to get married,’ Gaetano contradicted drily. ‘I’ve seen too many of my friends’ marriages failing and my own parents fought like cat and dog.’

Poppy grimaced and said nothing. Gaetano was very literal, very black and white and uncompromising in his outlook. He had probably decided as a teenager that he would not get married and had never revisited the decision. But it did go some way towards explaining why he never seemed to stay very long with any woman because clearly none of his relationships had had the option of a future.

‘At some stage you must have met at least one woman who stood out from the rest?’ she commented.

‘I did...when I was at university. Serena ended up marrying a friend and I was their best man. They divorced last year,’ Gaetano volunteered with rich scorn. ‘When I heard about that, I was relieved I had backed off from her.’

‘That’s very cold and cynical. For all you know you and she could have made a success of marriage,’ Poppy commented tongue in cheek, mad with curiosity to know who Serena had been and whether he still had feelings for her now that she was free. Her face burned because she was so grateful he had not persevered with the wretched woman. She was just then discovering in consternation that she couldn’t bear to think of Gaetano with any other woman, let alone married to one. When had she become that sensitive, that possessive of him? She had no right to feel that way and that she did mortified her. Was this some pitiful hangover from her infatuation with him as a teenager?

As she walked into the hall Gaetano pushed the door open into a dimly lit reception room. ‘Before I went out I ordered supper for us. I thought you’d be hungry because unless you ate while you were working, you missed dinner.’

She was strangely touched that it had even occurred to Gaetano to consider her well-being. But then Poppy wasn’t used to anyone looking out for her. In recent years she had acted as counsellor and carer for her family. Neither her mother nor her brother had ever had the inclination to ask her how she was coping working two jobs or whether she needed anything. Removing her coat, she sank down into a comfy armchair, glancing round at the stylish appointments of the spacious room. An interior designer had probably been employed, she suspected, doubting that such classy chic was attainable in any other way. She poured the tea and filled her plate with sandwiches.

For a few minutes she simply ate to satisfy the gnawing hunger inside her. Only slowly did she let her attention roam back to Gaetano. The black stubble framed his jaw, accentuating the lush curve of his full mouth, and he could work magic with that mouth, she conceded, inwardly squirming at that intimate thought and the longing behind it while ducking her head to evade the cool gold intensity of his gaze. Her body, still taut and tender from feverish arousal, recalled the stroke of his fingers and she tingled, dying inside with chagrin that she had lost her control to that extent.

‘So, what do you want to talk about?’ she prompted in the humming silence.

‘I think you already know,’ Gaetano intoned very drily.

‘You have to decide what to do next,’ Poppy clarified reluctantly, disliking the fact that he read her with such accuracy and refused to allow her to play dumb when it suited her to do so.

After all, so much hung on the coming discussion and it was only natural that she should now be nervous. Of what further use could she be to Gaetano? Their fake engagement was worthless because Rodolfo Leonetti wanted much more than a fake couple could possibly deliver. They couldn’t set a wedding date because they weren’t going to get married. And if she was of no additional value to Gaetano, maybe he wanted her to leave his home and maybe, quite understandably, he would also expect to immediately stop paying the bills for her mother’s treatment at the clinic? A cold trickle of nervous perspiration ran down between Poppy’s breasts and suddenly she was furious with herself for not thinking through what Rodolfo’s declaration would ultimately mean to her and the lives of those who depended on her.

‘I had no problem deciding what to do next. I’m very decisive but unfortunately what I do next is heavily dependent on what you decide to do,’ Gaetano admitted quietly, disconcerting her while his extraordinarily beautiful eyes rested on her full force.

‘What I decide...?’

‘Only a fake fiancée can become a fake bride!’ Gaetano derided, watching her pale.

‘You can’t seriously be suggesting that we carry this masquerade as far as a wedding!’ Poppy exclaimed with a look of disbelief.

‘Rodolfo likes you. He’s really excited and happy about our relationship,’ Gaetano breathed grimly. ‘In fact it’s many years since I saw him this enthusiastic about anything or anyone. I would like to give him what he wants even if it’s not real and even though it can’t last.’

‘You love your grandfather. I understand that you don’t want to disappoint him, but—’

‘We could get married for a couple of years while I continue to pay for your mother’s care.’

Poppy leant forward to say sharply, ‘If Mum does well, she will probably be released from the clinic next month.’

Gaetano shook his handsome dark head slowly as if in wonder at her naivety. ‘Poppy... Jasmine is most probably a long-term rehabilitation project. To stay off alcohol for the foreseeable future she’s going to need regular ongoing professional support.’

It was true, Poppy conceded painfully. What Gaetano was saying was true, horribly true, but until that moment Poppy had not thought that far ahead. Indeed she had dreamt only of the day when she hoped and prayed that her newly sober parent would walk out of the clinic and back into the real world. Sadly, however, the real world offered challenges Jasmine Arnold might struggle to handle. And Poppy already knew that she did not have the power to stop her mother drinking because she had already tried that and had failed abysmally.

‘If you agree to marry me I will faithfully promise to take care of your mother’s needs for however long it takes for her to regain her health and sobriety,’ Gaetano swore. ‘At the same time I will make it possible for you to return to further education. That would mean that by the time we divorce you would be in a position to pursue any career you chose.’

Poppy sucked in a steadying breath because he was offering to deliver momentous benefits and security. But she still didn’t want to sell herself out for the money that would empower her to transform her mother’s life and give them both the best possible chance of a decent future. ‘I can’t take your money or your support. It’s immoral,’ she argued jaggedly. ‘Stop trying to tempt me into doing what I know would be wrong.’

‘I’m offering you the equivalent of a job. All right...’ Gaetano shifted an expressive bronzed hand in the air with the fluid arrogance that came as naturally as breathing to him. ‘Taking on the role of being my wife would be an unusual job but it’s not a job you want, so why shouldn’t you be paid for sacrificing your freedom? Because make no mistake—you would be giving up your freedom while you were pretending to be my wife.’

‘Fooling your grandfather, faking and pretending. It wouldn’t be right,’ Poppy protested vehemently.

‘If it makes Rodolfo genuinely happy, why is it wrong?’ Gaetano fired back at her in challenge. ‘It’s the best I’ve got to offer him. I can’t give him the real thing. I can’t give him a real marriage when I don’t want one. Marrying you, a woman he has readily accepted and approved, is as good as it’s likely to get from his point of view.’

Poppy was pale and troubled. ‘You’re good in an argument,’ she allowed ruefully. ‘But I’m never going to win a trophy for my acting skills.’

‘You don’t need to act. Rodolfo likes you as you are. Think about what I’m offering you. You can reclaim your life and return to being a carefree student,’ Gaetano pointed out, his persuasion insidious. ‘No more fretting about your mother falling off the wagon again, no more scrubbing floors or serving drinks.’

‘Shut up!’ Poppy told him curtly, leaping to her feet to walk restively round the room while she battled the tempting possibilities he had placed in front of her.

Gaetano studied her from below heavily lashed eyelids. She would surrender, of course she would. She had had a very tough time coping with her mother over the past couple of years and it had stolen her youthful freedom of choice. As a teenager she had been ambitious and he could still see that spirited spark of wanting more than her servant ancestors had ever wanted glowing within her.

‘And how long would this fake marriage have to last to be worthwhile?’ she demanded without warning.

Gaetano almost grinned and punched the air because that was when he knew for sure that he had won. ‘I estimate around two years with three years being the absolute maximum. By that stage both of us will be eager to reclaim our real lives and I would envisage that divorce proceedings would already have begun.’

‘And you think a divorce a couple of years down the road is less of a disappointment for Rodolfo than a broken engagement?’

‘At least he’ll believe I tried.’

‘And of course your ultimate goal is becoming CEO of the Leonetti Bank and marrying me will deliver that,’ Poppy filled in slowly, luminous green eyes skimming to his lean, darkly handsome features in wonderment. ‘I can’t believe how ambitious you are.’

‘The bank is my life, it always has been,’ Gaetano admitted without apology. ‘Nothing gives me as much of a buzz as a profitable deal.’

‘If I were to agree to this...and I’m not saying I am agreeing,’ Poppy warned in a rush, ‘when would the marriage take place?’

‘Next month to suit Rodolfo’s schedule and, for that matter, my own. I won’t be here much over the next few weeks,’ Gaetano explained. ‘I have a lot of pressing business to tie up before I can take the kind of honeymoon which Rodolfo will expect.’

At that disconcerting reference to a honeymoon a tension headache tightened in a band across Poppy’s brow and she lifted her fingers to press against her forehead. ‘I’m very tired. I’ll sleep on this and give you an answer in the morning.’

Gaetano slid fluidly out of his seat and approached her. ‘But you already know the answer.’

Poppy settled angry green eyes on his lean, strong face. ‘Don’t try to railroad me,’ she warned him.

‘You like what I do to you,’ Gaetano husked with blazing confidence, running a teasing forefinger down over her cheek to stroke it along the soft curve of her full lower lip.

In all her life Poppy had never been more aware of anything than she was of that finger caressing the still-swollen surface of her mouth. But then, as she was learning, Gaetano couldn’t touch any part of her body without every nerve ending standing to attention and screaming for more of the same. Her breathing fractured in her throat and sawed heavily in and out of her chest. His fingertip slid into her mouth and before she could even think about what she was doing she laved it with her tongue, sucked it, watched his brilliant eyes smoulder and then his outrageous long black lashes lower over burning glints of gold.

‘Are you offering to let me have you tonight?’ Gaetano enquired, startling and mortifying her with that direct question.

Her luminous eyes flew wide. ‘I can’t believe you just asked me that!’

‘And I can’t believe that you can still try to act the innocent when you’re teasing me,’ Gaetano riposted.

‘You touched me first,’ she reminded him defensively, her cheeks scarlet as she thought of what she had done with his finger and the expectation he had developed as a result. ‘Are you always this blunt?’

‘Pretty much. Sex requires mutual consent and I naturally dislike confusing signals, which could lead to misunderstandings.’

Poppy stared up at him, momentarily lost in the tawny blaze of his hot stare. He wanted her and he was letting her see it. Her whole body seized up in response, her nipples prickling while that painful hollow ached at the heart of her. She tore her gaze from his, dropped her eyes and then, noticing the sizeable bulge in his jeans, felt pure unashamed heat curling up between her thighs.

‘If you’re not going to let me have you, sleep in one of the spare rooms tonight,’ Gaetano instructed. ‘I’m not a masochist, bella mia.’

‘Spare room,’ Poppy framed shakily, the only words she could get past her tight throat because it hurt her that she wanted to say yes so badly. She didn’t want to be used ‘to scratch an itch’, not her first time anyway. Surely some day somewhere some man would want her for more than that? Gaetano only wanted the release of sex and would probably not have wanted her at all had they not been forced into such proximity.

Gaetano let her reach the door. ‘If I marry you, I’ll expect you to share my bed.’

Wide-eyed, Poppy whirled round to gasp, ‘But...’

‘I’m too well-known to get away with sneaking around having affairs for a couple of years,’ Gaetano asserted silkily. ‘If we get married it should look like a happy marriage, at least at the start, and there’s no way I’d be happy in a sex-free marriage. Is that likely to be a deal-breaker?’

‘I’ll think it over.’ Her heart-shaped face expressionless, Poppy studied the polished floor. She wanted to discover sex with Gaetano but she wasn’t about to confess that to him. That was private, strictly private. Her body burned inside her clothing at the thought of that intimacy. Meaningless, sexual intimacy, she reminded herself doggedly. And it disturbed her that even though she knew it would mean nothing to him she still wanted him...

CHAPTER SIX

POPPY SANK INTO the guest-room bed and rolled over to hug a pillow. She was incredibly tired but so wired she was convinced that she would not sleep a wink.

She was going to marry Gaetano Leonetti. Gorgeous, filthy rich, super-successful Gaetano. Who sent her body into spasms of craving with a single kiss. If she was honest with herself, she really hadn’t needed a night to think it over. He would help her protect her mother and he would support her getting back onto a career path. Really, marrying Gaetano would be win-win whichever way she looked at it, wouldn’t it be?

As long as she didn’t get too carried away and start acting as if it were a real marriage. As long as she didn’t fall for Gaetano. Well, she wasn’t about to do that, was she? He was almost thirty years old and had never been in love. The closest he had come to love was with a woman who had married his friend. And he had acted as best man at their wedding, which didn’t suggest to her that it had been very close to love at all. Gaetano might be planning to marry her but he wasn’t going to love her and he wasn’t going to keep her either. It would be a temporary marriage and it would make Rodolfo happy...at least for a while, she thought guiltily, because faking it for the older man’s benefit still troubled her conscience. He was such a kind, genuine sort of man and so unlike Gaetano, who kept the equivalent of a coffin lid slammed down hard on his emotions.

While Poppy was ruminating over her bridegroom’s lack of emotional intelligence, Gaetano was subjecting himself to yet another cold shower. She had to marry him. There was no alternative. Just at that moment in the grip of a raging inferno of frustrated lust he felt as though he would spontaneously combust if he didn’t get Poppy spread across his bed as the perfect wedding gift. The definitive wedding gift, with those ballerina legs in lace stockings, those pert little breasts in satin cups, that voluptuous pink mouth pouting as she looked up at him with those witchy green spellbinding eyes. He groaned out loud. He couldn’t credit that he had barely touched her when he wanted so much more.

But if they married, a few weeks down the matrimonial road he’d be back to normal, he told himself bracingly. The challenge would be gone. The lust would die once he could have her whenever he wanted her. He would soon be himself again, cooler, calmer, back in control, fully focussed on the bank. How was it possible that just the fantasy of sinking into Poppy’s wet, willing body excited him more than he had ever been excited? What was it about her?

Maybe it was the weird clothes, maybe he had a secret Goth fetish. Maybe it was her argumentative nature, because he had always thrilled to a challenge. Maybe it was her cheeky texts that made him laugh. The fact she could still blush? That was strange. Every time he mentioned sex she went red, as if he had said something outrageous. She couldn’t possibly be that innocent, although he was willing to allow that she might well have considerably less experience between the sheets than he had acquired.

Gaetano shook Poppy awake at the ungodly hour of six in the morning, obstinately and cruelly ignoring her heartfelt moans to insist that she join him for breakfast. After a quick shower and the application of a little make-up, Poppy teamed a black dress enlivened with a red rose print with high heels and sauntered down to the dining room. Gaetano was already ensconced with black coffee, a horrendously unhealthy fry-up and the Financial Times.

She was gloriously conscious of his attention as she helped herself to cereal and took a seat at the other end of the table, her ruby cluster ring catching the light. Gaetano put down the newspaper and regarded her levelly, dark golden eyes steady as a rock and full of an impatience he didn’t need to voice.

‘Yes, I’ll marry you,’ Poppy told him straight off.

‘Does that mean I get to share my bed with you tonight?’ was Gaetano’s first telling question.

‘You are incredibly goal-orientated about entirely the wrong things!’ Poppy censured immediately. ‘You can wait until we’re married.’

‘Nobody waits until they’re married these days!’

‘I haven’t had sex before. I want it to feel special,’ she told him stubbornly.

His expressive dark eyes flared with incredulity. ‘I refuse to credit that. I saw you with Toby Styles...’

‘I hate you!’ Poppy launched at him in a sudden tempest of furious embarrassment, her pale skin flushed to her hairline. ‘Of all the moments I don’t want to be reminded of, you have to bring that one up and throw it at me!’

‘Well, it was one of those unforgettable moments that did seem fairly self-explanatory. I saw you sidling out of the shrubbery covered in blushes and grass stains,’ Gaetano commented with grudging amusement. ‘So, why lie about it? This is purely about sex, bella mia, and I’m all for full bedroom equality. Whether or not you’re a virgin or a secret slut matters not a damn to me.’

Poppy compressed her lips. ‘If you must know—although it’s none of your blasted business—I did plan to have sex that day with Toby but I changed my mind because it wasn’t what I really wanted.’ No, what she had really, really wanted that day, she acknowledged belatedly, was to wander off into the shrubbery and be ravished by Gaetano, who had dominated her every juvenile fantasy. Sadly, however, Gaetano hadn’t been an option.

‘Poor Toby...’ Gaetano frowned.

‘He was very decent about it,’ Poppy muttered in mortification. ‘He’s married to one of my friends now.’

‘But there must have been someone since then?’

‘No.’

Gaetano continued to stare at her as if she were a circus freak. ‘But you’re so full of passion...’

Only with you. The words remained unspoken.

Gaetano lifted his coffee with a slightly dazed expression in his shrewd gaze. ‘I’ll be the first...really?’

Poppy shrugged a shoulder. ‘But if you think it’s likely to be a turn-off I can always go and look for a one-night stand.’

‘Don’t even think about it,’ Gaetano growled.

‘That was a joke.’

‘It’s not a turn-off, simply a surprise,’ Gaetano admitted flatly. ‘OK, I’ll wait until we’re married if it’s so significant to you. But I think you’re making an unnecessary production out of it.’

Her body was all he wanted from her, Poppy interpreted painfully. At least if she was his legal wife, it would feel less demeaning, wouldn’t it?

‘I’ll organise a gynae appointment for you,’ Gaetano continued briskly. ‘Reliable birth control is important. We don’t want any slip-ups in that department when we’re not planning to stay together.’

‘Obviously not,’ she agreed, sipping with determination at her hot-chocolate drink while thinking for the very first time in her life about having a baby. She had always liked children, always assumed that she would become a mother one day, but she reckoned that day lay a long way ahead in her future.

‘And whatever you do,’ Gaetano warned with chilling precision, ‘don’t go falling for me.’

‘And why would I do that?’ Poppy demanded baldly, her cheeks hotter than hell in fear of him mentioning that so mortifying teenaged crush again. ‘Having sex with you is not going to make me fall in love with you. I know you think you’re fantastic in bed, Gaetano, but you’re not fantastic enough out of bed.’

Infuriatingly, Gaetano did not react badly to that criticism. ‘That’s good because that’s one complication I can do without. I hate it when women fall for me and make me feel that it’s my fault.’

Well, that was frank, and forewarned was forearmed, Poppy told herself squarely. ‘It’s probably your money they’re falling for,’ she suggested in a tone of saccharine sweetness. ‘You have yet to show me a single loveable trait.’

‘Grazie al cielo...thank goodness,’ Gaetano responded in a tone of galling relief. ‘I don’t want you to get the wrong idea about me or this marriage.’

‘I won’t. This marriage will be like one of those business mergers. You are so safe,’ Poppy declared brightly. ‘You will merely be the first stepping stone on my sexual path.’

Gaetano was taken aback to discover that he didn’t want to think of a string of other men enjoying her along that particular path. In fact it gave him a slightly nauseated sensation in the pit of his stomach. The acknowledgement bemused him and he put it down to the simple fact that as yet he had not enjoyed her either. He was thinking too much about something relatively unimportant, he reflected impatiently. Sex was sex and his wedding night would provide the cure for what was currently afflicting him. Since when had he ever attached so much consequence to sex? Even so, it had been entirely right to have the conversation with Poppy to ensure that they perfectly understood each other’s expectations.

‘I’ll make a start on the wedding arrangements today,’ Gaetano completed smoothly.

* * *

‘You look beautiful,’ Jasmine Arnold told her daughter warmly as she emerged from her bedroom in her wedding dress.

The older woman was attending her daughter’s wedding with a member of the clinic support staff. Although Poppy could see a big improvement in her mother’s appearance and mood, she knew how hard it was for Jasmine to return to Woodfield Hall where she had been so depressed. And while Poppy had asked her mother to walk her down the aisle, her brother was doing it instead because Jasmine could not face being the centre of that much attention.

Poppy quite understood the older woman’s reluctance because hundreds of guests were attending the wedding being staged to celebrate Gaetano’s marriage at Woodfield Hall. The Leonetti men had always got married in the church in the grounds of their ancestral home and neither Rodolfo nor Gaetano had seen any reason to flout tradition. Indeed Gaetano had expected Poppy to move straight into the main house as though she already belonged there but Poppy had returned to the small service flat where she had grown up, determined to move back and forth as required.

‘I’m still hoping that you know what you’re doing,’ Damien muttered in an admission intended only for Poppy’s ears as he emerged from his own room, smartly clad in his hired morning suit. He looked relieved when he registered that his mother and her companion had already left for the church. ‘You’ve always had a thing for Gaetano...’

‘As I’ve already explained, this is only a business arrangement.’

‘Maybe it is...for him.’ Her brother sighed. ‘But if it’s only business why are you always checking your phone and texting him?’

‘He expects regular updates on the wedding arrangements.’

‘Yeah...like his staff can’t do that for him,’ Damien responded, unimpressed.

But it was true, Poppy reflected ruefully. Gaetano was hyper about details and had a surprising number of strong opinions about bridal matters that she had mistakenly assumed he wouldn’t be interested in. Although, as he had warned her, she had barely seen him since the month-long countdown to the wedding had begun, they had stayed in constant contact by phone while Gaetano flew round Europe. Poppy had ignored his opinion of the casual job she had taken and had kept up regular shifts at the café.

Now she climbed into the limousine waiting in the courtyard to collect the bride and her brother. The chapel was barely two hundred yards away and she would have much preferred to walk there but Gaetano had vetoed that option, saying it lacked dignity.

In the same way he had vetoed the flowers she’d wanted to wear in her hair and had had a family diamond tiara delivered to her. He had also picked the bridal colour scheme as green, arguing that that particular shade would match her eyes, which had struck Poppy as ridiculously whimsical for so practical a male. And to crown his interference he had acted as though he were her Prince Charming by buying her wedding shoes the instant he saw them showcased in some high-fashion outlet in Milan. Admittedly they were gorgeous, even if they were over-the-top dramatic—delicate leather sandals ornamented with pearls and opals that glimmered and magically shone in the light. In fact Gaetano had embarrassed his bride with his choice of shoes because her selections had been considerably less fanciful. Her dress was cap-sleeved and fitted to the waist, flaring out over net underskirts to stop above her slender knees. In comparison to the Cinderella shoes, the dress, while being composed of beautiful fabric, was plain and simple in style.

‘Are you nervous?’ Damien prompted.

‘Why would I be? Well, only because the Leonettis have invited hundreds of people,’ she admitted.

‘Including most of the estate staff and locals, so you can’t fault Gaetano there. The rich are going to have to rub shoulders with the ordinary folk.’ Damien laughed.

Poppy smiled because Gaetano had kept the last promise he had made before their engagement. Within a week Damien would be starting work as a mechanic in a London garage staffed by other former offenders. Her brother’s happiness at the prospect of a complete new start somewhere he would no longer be pilloried for his past had lifted her heart. Not that her heart needed lifting, she told herself urgently. If her family was happy, she was happy. In stray moments between the wedding arrangements and spending time with Rodolfo, who got lonely in his big empty mansion, she had started looking into the option of training as a garden designer and that gem of an idea looked promising.

Closing her hand into the crook of her brother’s arm, she looked down the aisle to where Gaetano had turned round to see her arrival and she grinned. My goodness, how ridiculous all this pomp and ceremony were for a couple who weren’t remotely in love, she thought helplessly. But Gaetano certainly looked the part of bridegroom, all tall, dark and handsome, black curls cropped to his head in honour of the wedding, the usual stubble round his jaw line dispensed with, his bronzed, handsome features clean-shaven. His dark eyes glittered gold as precious ingots in the sunlight filtered by the stained-glass window behind him. He looked downright amazing, she conceded with a sunny sensation of absolute contentment.

When Poppy came into view, she took Gaetano’s breath away. Her waist looked tiny enough to be spanned by his hands and, as he had requested, her glorious hair tumbled loose round her shoulders in vibrant contrast to the white dress that displayed her incredible legs. And she was wearing the shoes, the shoes he had bought for her, having known at a glance and feeling slightly smug at the knowledge that they were the sort of theatrical feminine touch the unconventional Poppy would appreciate.

The priest rattled through the ceremony at a fair old pace. Rings were exchanged. Poppy trembled as Gaetano eased the ring down over her knuckle, glancing up to encounter smouldering golden eyes that devoured her. Colour surged into her face as she thought of the night ahead but there was anticipation and excitement laced with that faint sense of apprehension. She had decided that she was glad that Gaetano would become her first lover. Who better than the male she had fallen for as a teenager? After all, no other man had yet managed to wipe out her memory of Gaetano. There would be someone else some day, she told herself bracingly as Gaetano retained her hand and his thumb gently massaged the delicate skin of her inner wrist with the understated sensuality that seemed so much a part of him.

‘You made me wait ten minutes at the altar but you were definitely worth waiting for,’ Gaetano quipped as they walked down the aisle again.

‘I warned you I’d be late,’ Poppy reminded him. ‘Knowing you, you’d have preferred to find me waiting humbly for you.’

‘No, waiting naked would have been sufficient, late or otherwise,’ Gaetano whispered only loud enough for her ears. ‘As for humble—are you kidding? You’ve never been the self-effacing type.’

Rodolfo hugged her outside the chapel, his creased face wrinkled into a huge smile. ‘Welcome to the family,’ he said happily.

A beautiful blonde watched with raised brows of apparent surprise as, urged on by the photographer, Poppy wound her arms round Gaetano’s neck and gazed at him as if he were her sun, her moon and her stars. She was great at faking it, she thought appreciatively as Gaetano smiled down at her with that wonderful, charismatic smile that banished the often forbidding austerity from his lean, darkly handsome features.

‘Congratulations, Gaetano,’ the blonde intercepted them as they made their way to the limo to be wafted back to the hall.

‘Poppy...meet Serena Bellingham. We’ll catch up later, Serena,’ Gaetano drawled.

‘Is she the one you almost married?’ Poppy demanded, craning her neck to look back at the smiling blonde who rejoiced in the height, perfect figure and face of a top model.

‘Oh, don’t do it. Don’t make something out of nothing the way women do!’ Gaetano groaned in exasperation. ‘I didn’t almost marry Serena and, even if I did, what business is it of yours? This isn’t a real wedding.’

The colour ebbed from below Poppy’s skin to leave her pale. She felt oddly as though she had been slapped down and squashed and she felt enormously hurt and humiliated but didn’t understand why. But, unquestionably, he was right. Theirs was not a normal wedding and she was not entitled to ask nosy personal questions about exes.

As if he recognised that he had been rude, Gaetano released his breath in a slow measured hiss. ‘I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have said that.’

‘No, it’s OK. I’m just naturally nosy,’ Poppy muttered in an undertone.

‘Serena is a very talented hedge-fund manager. She may come and work for Leonettis now that she’s single again. Her ex was envious of her success, which is—apparently—the main reason their marriage failed.’

Poppy pictured Serena’s cloyingly bright smile and her tummy performed a warning somersault. It sounded as though Gaetano had spoken to Serena recently to catch up. Confidences had been exchanged and that sent the oddest little current of dismay through Poppy. She suspected that if the beautiful blonde went to work for Gaetano, it wouldn’t entirely be a career move. But even if that was true, what business was it of hers to judge or speculate? She was Gaetano’s wife and soon she would also be Gaetano’s lover yet she had not, it seemed, acquired any relationship rights over Gaetano, which suddenly struck her as a recipe for disaster.

Woodfield Hall was awash with guests and caterers. Jasmine Arnold approached her daughter to ask if it would be all right if she took her leave. Newly sober, Poppy’s mother did not want as yet to be in the vicinity of alcohol. Understanding, Poppy hugged the older woman and they agreed to talk regularly on the phone. As Gaetano joined her Poppy smiled at one of her few school friends, Melanie, who was now married to Toby Styles, the estate gamekeeper.

Overpowered by Gaetano’s presence, the small brunette gushed into speech. ‘You and...er... Mr Leonetti? It’s so romantic, Poppy. You know,’ Melanie said, addressing Gaetano directly, ‘the whole time we were growing up Poppy never had eyes for anyone but you.’

Gaetano responded wittily but Poppy was already trying not to cringe before Toby grinned at her. ‘Nobody knows that better than me,’ he teased.

Kill me now, Poppy thought melodramatically when Gaetano actually laughed out loud and chatted to the couple about their work on the estate as if nothing the slightest bit embarrassing had been shared. And of course, why would it embarrass Gaetano to be reminded of Poppy’s adolescent crush?

As they mingled she noticed Rodolfo chatting to Serena Bellingham. The blonde was wreathed in charming smiles. Poppy scolded herself for thinking bitchy thoughts. And why? Just because Serena had once shared a bed with Gaetano? Just because Serena had the looks, the social background and the education that would have made her the perfect wife for Gaetano? Or because Gaetano had once freely chosen to have a relationship with Serena when he had merely ended up with Poppy by accident and retained her for convenience?

Deliberately catching her eye, Serena strolled over to Poppy’s side. ‘I can see that you’re curious about me,’ she drawled in her cut-glass accent. ‘I’m Gaetano’s only serious ex, so it’s natural...’

‘Possibly,’ Poppy conceded, determined to be very cautious with her words and ashamed of the explosive mixture of inexcusable envy and resentment she was struggling to suppress.

‘We were too young when we first met,’ Serena declared. ‘That’s why we broke up. Gaetano wasn’t ready to commit and I was, so I rushed off and married someone else instead.’

‘Everyone matures at a different rate,’ Poppy remarked non-committally.

‘Maturity is immaterial,’ Serena responded with stinging confidence. ‘You and Gaetano won’t last five minutes. You don’t have anything to offer him.’

Disconcerted by that sudden attack coming at her out of nowhere, Poppy froze. ‘That’s a matter of opinion.’

‘But you’ll do very well for a short-lived first marriage. Gaetano is the last man alive I would expect to stay married to a Goth bride. You don’t fit in and you never will...’

As that bitingly cold forecast hit her Poppy was silenced by Gaetano’s arm closing round her spine. She encountered a suspicious sidewise glance and her temper flared inside her. Evidently, Gaetano was so far removed from the reality of Serena’s barracuda nature that it was Poppy he didn’t trust to behave around Serena. Entrapped there in Gaetano’s controlling hold, Poppy silently seethed and brooded over what Serena had said.

Sadly, the blonde’s assurance that Poppy would never fit in as Gaetano’s wife had cut deep—particularly because Poppy had quite deliberately made conventional choices when it came to what to wear for her wedding day. Why had she done that? she suddenly asked herself angrily. And there it was—the answer she didn’t want. She had done it for Gaetano’s benefit in an effort to please him and make him proud of her, make him appreciate that the housekeeper’s daughter could get it right for a big occasion. Serena’s automatic dismissal of all that Poppy had to offer had seriously hurt and humiliated her.

Fortunately from that point on their wedding day seemed to speed up and race past. Poppy’s throat was sore and she put that down to the amount of talking she had to do. She ate little during the meal even though she was trying to regain the weight she had lost in recent months while she had worked two jobs. Unfortunately her appetite had vanished.

She changed into white cropped trousers and a cool blue chiffon top for their flight to Italy. The luxurious interior of the Leonetti private jet stunned her into silence. She studied the glittering ruby cluster nestling next to the wedding band on her finger and Serena’s wounding forecast of her marriage seemed to reverberate in her ears. You don’t fit in and you never will.

And why should that matter when they didn’t plan to stay married? Poppy asked herself wearily, unsettled by the nagging insecurities tugging at her. Why should she care what Serena thought? Or what Serena truly wanted from Gaetano? She reckoned that Serena was already planning to be Gaetano’s second, rather more permanent wife. So what?

It wasn’t as though she had any feelings for Gaetano beyond tolerance, Poppy reminded herself. Lust was physical, not cerebral.

CHAPTER SEVEN

‘STOP... STOP THE CAR!’ Poppy yelled as the Range Rover wound down the twisting Tuscan country road.

Startled, Gaetano jumped on the brake. He frowned in astonishment as Poppy leapt out of the car at speed and assumed that she felt sick. But to his surprise and that of the security men climbing out of the car behind, Poppy ran back down the road and crouched down.

Bloodstains and dust had smeared her white cropped jeans by the time she stood up again cradling something hairy and still in her arms as tenderly as if it were a baby. ‘It’s a dog...it must’ve been hit by a passing car.’

‘Give it to my security. They’ll deal with this,’ Gaetano advised.

‘No, we will,’ Poppy told him. ‘Where’s the closest veterinary surgery?’

The dog, a terrier mix with a pepper and salt coat and a greying snout, licked weakly at her fingers and whined in pain. Fifteen minutes later they were in the waiting room at the local surgery while Gaetano spoke with the vet in Italian.

‘The situation is this...’ Gaetano informed Poppy. ‘The animal is not microchipped, has no collar and has not been reported missing. Arno can operate and I can obviously afford to cover the cost of the treatment but it may be more practical simply to put the animal to sleep.’

‘Practical?’ Poppy erupted.

‘Rather than put the dog through the trauma of surgery and a prolonged recuperation when the local pound is already full, as is the animal rescue sanctuary. If there is no prospect of the dog going to another home—’

‘I’ll keep him,’ Poppy cut in curtly.

Gaetano groaned. ‘Don’t be a bleeding heart for the sake of it.’

‘I’m not. I want Muffin.’

His gorgeous dark eyes widened in surprise, black lashes sky-high. ‘Muffin?’

‘Ragamuffin... Muffin,’ she explained curtly.

‘But I can buy you a beautiful pedigreed puppy if you want one,’ Gaetano murmured with unconcealed incredulity. ‘Muffin is no oil painting and he’s old.’

‘So? He needs me much more than a beautiful puppy ever would,’ Poppy pointed out defiantly. ‘Think of him as a wedding gift.’

Having made arrangements for Muffin’s care, they drove off again.

‘You’ve become so cold-hearted,’ Poppy whispered ruefully, studying his lean dark classic profile. ‘What happened to you?’

‘I grew up. Don’t be a drama queen,’ Gaetano urged. ‘When you care too much you get hurt. I learned that from a young age.’

‘But you’re shutting yourself off from so many good things in life,’ she argued.

‘Am I? Rodolfo enjoyed a long and happy marriage but he was so wretched after my grandmother passed that he too wanted to die.’

‘That was grief. Think of all the happy years he enjoyed with his wife,’ Poppy urged. ‘Everything has a downside, Gaetano. Love brings its own reward.’

Gaetano voiced a single rude word of disagreement in Italian. ‘It didn’t reward my mother when the husband she once adored ran round snorting cocaine with hookers. It didn’t reward me as her son when her super-rich second husband persuaded her to forget that she had left a child behind in England. But you’ll be glad to know that my mother’s second husband loved her,’ Gaetano continued with raw derision. ‘As she explained when she tried to foolishly mend fences with me a few years ago, Connor loved her so much that he was jealous of her first marriage and the child born from it.’

Poppy had paled. ‘That’s a twisted kind of love.’

‘And there’s a lot of that twisted stuff out there,’ Gaetano completed in a chilling tone of finality. ‘That’s why I never wanted anything to do with that kind of emotion.’

Poppy knew when to keep quiet. Of course, his outlook was coloured by his background, she reflected ruefully. Her parents had been happily married but his had not been. And his mother’s decision to turn her back on her son to please her second husband had done even more damage. Poppy had been surprised that Gaetano’s mother had not been invited to the wedding but Rodolfo had simply shrugged, saying only that his former daughter-in-law rarely returned to England.

Gaetano turned off the winding road onto a lane that threaded through silvery olive groves. Woods lay beyond the groves, occasionally parting to show views of rolling green hills and vineyards and an ancient walled hilltop village. Gaetano indicated another track to the left. ‘That leads down to the guest house where Rodolfo spends his summers.’

‘We’ll have to be careful to stay in role with your grandfather staying so close,’ Poppy remarked.

‘La Fattoria, the main house, is over a mile away. He won’t see us unless we visit. He is very keen not to intrude in any way on what he regards as our honeymoon,’ Gaetano said drily.

‘So this property has belonged to your family for a long time,’ she assumed.

‘Rodolfo bought it before I was born, fondly picturing it as the perfect spot for wholesome family holidays with at least half a dozen children running round.’ Gaetano sounded regretful on the older man’s behalf rather than scornful. ‘Sadly I was an only child and my parents only ever came here with parties of friends. The house was signed over to me about five years ago and I had it fully renovated.’

A magnificent building composed of creamy stone appeared round the next corner. It was larger than Poppy had expected but she was learning to think big or bigger when it came to Leonetti properties, for, while the family might only consist of Rodolfo and his one grandson, the older man did not seem to think in terms of small or convenient. Glorious urns of flowers adorned the terrace and a rotund little woman in an apron, closely followed by a tall lanky man, appeared at the front door.

‘Dolores and Sean look after La Fattoria.’ Gaetano introduced the friendly middle-aged Irish couple and their cases were swept away.

Poppy accepted a glass of wine and sat down on the rear terrace to enjoy the stupendous view and catch her breath in the sweltering heat. She was feeling incredibly tired and had tactfully declined Dolores’s invitation to do an immediate tour of the house. Worse still, she was getting a headache and she had an annoying tickle in her sore throat that had made her cough several times and was giving her voice a rough edge. It was just her luck, she thought ruefully. She was on her honeymoon in Tuscany in the most gorgeous setting, with an even more gorgeous man, and she was developing a galloping bad cold.

* * *

The master bedroom was a huge airy space with a tiled floor and a bed as big as a football pitch. The bathroom was fitted out like a glossy magazine spread and she revelled in the wet room with the complex jet system. Everything bore Gaetano’s contemporary stamp and the extreme shower facilities were not a surprise. She had been feeling very warm and the cold water gushing over her before she managed to work out how to operate the complicated controls cooled her off wonderfully. Clad in a light cotton sundress, she wandered back downstairs.

Black hair curling and still damp from the shower, Gaetano joined her on the terrace to slot another glass of wine into her hand. ‘From our own award-winning winery,’ he told her wryly. ‘Rodolfo takes a personal interest in the vineyard.’

Poppy surveyed him from below her lashes. He was so beautiful, she found it a challenge to look anywhere else. His spectacular black-lashed eyes were reflective as he leant gracefully up against a stone pillar support to survey the panoramic landscape, his lithe, lean, powerful body indolently relaxed. A faint shadow of black stubble roughened his strong jaw line, accentuating the wide sensual curve of his mouth. A tiny nerve snaked tight somewhere in her pelvis as she thought of how long it had been since he kissed her and whether a kiss could possibly be as unbelievably good as she remembered it being. Likely not, she told herself, for she had always been a dreamer. How else could she have imagined even as a teenager that Gaetano Leonetti would ever be seriously interested in her?

And yet, here she was, a little voice whispered seductively, Gaetano’s wedding ring on her finger, and mortifyingly that awareness went to her head like the strongest alcohol. But their marriage still wasn’t real; it was still a fantasy, the same little voice added. She had been a fake fiancée and a fake bride and now she was a fake wife. In fact just about the only thing that wouldn’t be fake between them was their wedding night.

The very blood in her veins seemed to be coursing slowly, heavily. She finished her wine and set down the glass, insanely aware of the tightening prominence of her nipples. She lifted the tiny handwritten menu displayed on the table, glancing with a sinking heart through the several courses that were to be served.

‘You know, I’m not remotely hungry and I don’t think I could eat anything,’ Poppy confided truthfully. ‘I hope that’s not going to offend Dolores...’

Gaetano glanced at her, eyes flaming golden as a lion’s in the sunset lighting up the sky in an awesome display of crimson and peach. Mouth suddenly dry, she stopped breathing, frowning as he strode back into the house and disappeared from view. A few minutes later she heard a noisy little car start up somewhere and drive away. Gaetano reappeared to close a hand over hers and tug her gently back indoors.

‘Do we have to eat in some stuffy dining room?’ She sighed.

‘No, we don’t have to do anything we don’t want to do,’ Gaetano told her, bending down to lift her up into his arms. ‘I’ve sent Sean and Dolores home. We’re on our own until tomorrow and I am much hungrier for you than for food.’

‘You can’t possibly carry me up those stairs!’ Poppy exclaimed.

‘Right at this moment I could carry you up ten flights of stairs, bellezza mia,’ Gaetano admitted, darting his mouth across her collarbone so that her head fell back to expose her slender white throat and her bright hair cascaded over his arm. ‘Congratulations on being the only woman smart enough to make me wait...’

‘Wait for what? Oh...’ Poppy registered with a wealth of meaning in her tone while distinctly revelling in being carried as though she were a little dainty thing, which, in her own opinion, she was not.

Gaetano settled her down on the bed. Helpfully she kicked off her shoes and wished she had taken a painkiller for her sore throat and head. But she couldn’t possibly take the gloss off the evening by admitting that she was feeling under par, could she? And she would have to admit it to get medication because she had packed nothing of that nature, indeed had only brought her contraceptive pills with her. She wasn’t about to make a fuss about a stupid cold, was she?

He ran down the zip on her dress but only after kissing a path across her bare shoulders and lingering at the nape of her neck where her skin proved to be incredibly sensitive and she quivered, her insides turning to liquid heat beneath his attention.

‘I have died and gone to heaven...’ Gaetano intoned thickly as the dress dropped unnoticed to the carpet, exposing his bride in her ice-blue satin corset top and matching knickers.

‘This is your wedding present,’ Poppy announced, stretching back against the smooth white bedding with a confidence that she had never known she could possess.

Of course it would be different once he started removing stuff and nudity got involved, she conceded ruefully. For now, however, having guessed that Gaetano would be the type of male who found sexy lingerie that enhanced a woman’s figure appealing, Poppy felt like a million dollars. Why? Simply because somehow Gaetano always contrived to look at her as if she had the most amazing female body ever and that had done wonders for her self-image.

‘No, you are my wedding present,’ Gaetano told her with conviction. ‘I’ve been counting down the hours until we were together.’

Her luminous green eyes widened in surprise and she bit back the tactless retort that anyone would consider that a romantic comment. After all, Gaetano was fully focused on sex and neither romance nor commitment would play any part in their marriage. And wasn’t that all she was focused on as well? As Gaetano came down on the bed beside her, his shirt hanging loose and unbuttoned to display a sleek, bronzed, muscular six-pack, Poppy was entranced by the view. He was stunning and, for now, he was hers. Why look beyond that? Why try to complicate things?

Loosening the corset one hook at a time, Gaetano ran a long finger down over the delicate spine he had exposed and then put his mouth there, tracing the line below her smooth ivory skin. ‘You are so beautiful, gioia mia.’

Poppy hid a blissed-out smile behind her tumbling hair and closed her eyes as he eased off the light corset and lifted his hands to cup her breasts. Her back arched, her straining nipples pushing against his fingers until he tugged on the tender buds and an audible gasp escaped her.

Gaetano lifted her and turned her round to face him. ‘I want to be your first,’ he breathed in a roughened undertone. ‘It will be my privilege.’

‘Careful, Gaetano...you’re sounding nice.’ Now outrageously aware of her naked breasts, Poppy crossed her arms to hide them.

‘I may be many things, but nice isn’t one of them,’ Gaetano growled, pulling her down on the bed beside him and covering her pouting mouth hungrily with his own. Unbridled pleasure snaked through her as his tongue merged with hers. An electrifying push of hunger gripped her as his hands shifted to toy with her breasts. He pushed her back against the pillows and lowered his mouth to her pouting nipples.

‘Palest pink like pearls,’ Gaetano mused, stroking a tender tip with appreciation as he gazed down at her.’ I wondered what colour they would be...’

Her green eyes widened. ‘Seriously?’ she prompted.

‘And they’re perfect like the rest of you,’ he groaned, lowering his head to lick a distended crest. ‘You were so worth waiting for at the church.’

Poppy wasn’t quite as pleased as she would have assumed she would be by having that much appreciation directed at her physical attributes. Gaetano was interfering with her fantasy, that fantasy that she had not even acknowledged was playing at the back of her mind, the fantasy in which Gaetano loved her and appreciated her for all sorts of other reasons that went beyond lust.

‘And so were you,’ Poppy told Gaetano, deciding to turn the tables as she sat up to dislodge him and pushed him back against the pillows. He studied her with questioning dark golden eyes semi-veiled by black curling lashes. She spread her fingers across his hard pectoral muscles, stroking down over his sleek ribcage to his flat abdomen.

‘Don’t stop now,’ he husked.

Her fingers were clumsy on his belt buckle and the button on the waistband of his trousers, her knuckles nudging against the little furrow of dark hair that disappeared below his clothing. She reached for the zip. Her lack of expertise was obvious to Gaetano and the oddest sensation of tenderness infiltrated him as he noted the tense self-consciousness etched in her flushed face.

‘Why do I get the feeling this is a first for you?’

‘Everyone is a learner at some stage...’ she framed jerkily.

Gaetano yanked down his zip for himself and then tossed her back flat on the bed again while he divested himself of his trousers and his boxers. ‘If you touched me now, it would all be over far too fast,’ he told her thickly. ‘That’s why I’m going to do most of the touching and you will lie back and let me do the work.’

‘If you think of it as work, I don’t think you should bother.’

‘Nothing would stop me now. I can hardly wait to be inside you.’ Gaetano leant over her, his urgent erection pushing against her hip. ‘Having you in my bed has been my fantasy for weeks.’

‘Fantasy never lives up to reality,’ Poppy said nervously. ‘I don’t want to be a fantasy.’

‘Sorry, it’s my fantasy,’ Gaetano traded, stroking a wondering hand down over the slender curve of her hip to the hot, damp secret at the heart of her.

Her hips jerked and her eyes shut as he traced between her thighs. Her breath snarled in her throat. She was so sensitised that she shuddered when he circled her clitoris with his fingertip. Her whole body was climbing of its own volition into a tight, tense spiral of growing need. Even the brush of a finger against her tight entrance was almost too much to bear. Her hips pushed against the mattress, her heart thumping like thunder inside her chest as he shimmied down the bed, fingertips delicately caressing her inner thighs as he pushed her legs back, opening her.

‘No, you can’t do that!’ she gasped in consternation.

‘Stai zitto...’ he told her softly. ‘You don’t get to tell me what to do in bed.’

The flick of his tongue across torturously tender nerve endings deprived her of voice and then of thought. Her head shifted back and forth on the pillows, the thrum of hunger building up through her body to a siren’s scream of need. She gasped, she cried his name, she moaned, she lost control so completely and utterly that when the explosive release of orgasm claimed her it took her by storm. And the world stopped turning for long minutes, her body still quaking with wondrous aftershocks while Gaetano looked down at her with satisfaction.

As Gaetano tilted her back she felt the smooth steel push of him against her still-throbbing core. The tight knot low in her pelvis made its presence felt again, the hollow ache of hunger stirring afresh. He slid against her, easing into her by degrees, straining her delicate sheath.

‘You’re so tight,’ he groaned, pulling back again and then angling his hips for another, more forceful entrance.

The sharp stinging pain made Poppy flinch for a millisecond and then her body was pushing on past that fleeting discomfort to linger on the satisfying stretch and fullness of his invasion. A little moan broke low in her throat and she moved her hips to luxuriate in the throbbing hardness of his bold masculinity.

Gaetano swore in Italian. ‘You feel like heaven,’ he growled in her ear. ‘Am I hurting you now?’

‘Oh, no,’ she told him truthfully.

And then he moved again, withdrawing and spearing deep enough to wring a cry of startled enjoyment from her. From that moment on her eagerness climbed in tune with Gaetano’s every measured thrust. Her heart raced, her legs clamping round his lean hips as she lifted to him, matching his driving rhythm while the electrifying excitement continued to build. And when she reached that peak for the second time she plunged over it in a fevered delirium of intense quivering release and lay adrift in pleasure.

‘That was amazing,’ Gaetano muttered thickly, rolling over onto his back while curving an arm round her trembling body. ‘You were amazing, bella mia.’

Poppy felt totally exhausted and she was content to lie there in the circle of his arms and marvel at the sublime sense of peace she was experiencing. Belatedly, she acknowledged that her throat and head had now become seriously sore. She hoped that Gaetano wouldn’t catch her cold and felt guilty for not warning him.

In fact she was just about to mention her affliction when Gaetano sat up to say quietly, ‘Possibly part of the reason it felt so amazing was that it was the very first time I’ve had sex bareback.’

‘Bareback?’ she queried.

‘I didn’t use protection. I had a health check a couple of weeks ago to ensure that I’m clean and you’re guarded against pregnancy,’ he reminded her. ‘I couldn’t resist the temptation to try it.’

Poppy made no comment because she knew that he would be ultra-careful with her in the protection stakes because to be careless and risk a pregnancy would come at too high a price for either of them.

‘I’m really hungry now...aren’t you?’ Gaetano admitted, thrusting back the sheet and vacating the bed.

‘Not really, no.’ Indeed the thought of forcing food past her aching throat made her wince. ‘But I could murder a cup of tea.’

‘You’ll have to make it for yourself,’ he warned her. ‘I sent the staff home.’

‘I’ve been making tea for myself since I was a child,’ she told him wryly.

‘I forgot.’ Faint colour enhancing the exotic slant of his cheekbones, Gaetano frowned. ‘Your voice sounds funny...’

‘I’m getting a cold.’ Poppy sighed. ‘I hope you don’t get it too.’

‘I never catch colds.’ Gaetano vanished into the bathroom and a moment later she heard the shower running.

Poppy was so exhausted that she really didn’t want to move, but exhaustion was something she had become practised at shaking off and working through in recent months when she had spent all day cleaning Woodfield Hall and then had stood at the bar serving drinks all evening. Sliding out of bed, she went into the dressing room to pick an outfit and padded off to find another bathroom to use.

Gaetano hadn’t hurt her much, she thought tiredly as she dressed. He had been considerate. He had made it incredibly enjoyable. Why did the knowledge that he had learned how to make sex enjoyable with other women stab her like a knife? She blinked, feeling hot and more than a little dizzy. Clearly she had caught an absolute doozy of a cold but she didn’t want to be a burden by admitting to Gaetano that she felt awful. A good night’s sleep would make her feel much better.

Casually clad in cotton palazzo pants and a tee shirt, she went downstairs, located the kitchen and put on the kettle. She heard Gaetano talking to someone and her brow pleated as she walked to the doorway to see who it was. She almost groaned out loud when she finally realised that he was talking into his phone in tones that sounded angry. As his brilliant dark golden eyes landed on her she froze at the chilling light in his gaze.

‘What’s wrong?’ she asked, her voice fracturing into roughness.

Gaetano thrust his phone back in the pocket of his jeans and stared at her angrily, almost as if he’d never seen her before. ‘That was Rodolfo calling to warn me about something some tabloid newspaper plans to print tomorrow. One of his old friends in the press tipped him off...’

‘Oh..?’ Poppy heard the kettle switching off behind her and turned away, desperate to ease her sore throat with a hot drink.

Gaetano bit out a sharp, unamused laugh. ‘When were you planning to tell me that you once worked as a nude model?’

Poppy spun back, wide-eyed with astonishment. ‘What on earth are you talking about?’

‘That filthy rag is going to print photos of you naked tomorrow. My wife naked in a newspaper for the world to see!’ Gaetano launched at her in outrage. ‘Madonna diavolo...how could you cheapen yourself like that?’

‘I’ve never worked as a nude model. There couldn’t possibly be photos of me naked anywhere...’ Poppy protested and then she stilled, literally freezing into place, sudden anxiety filling her eyes.

‘Oh, you’ve just remembered doing it, have you?’ Gaetano derided harshly. ‘Well, thanks for warning me. If I’d known I would’ve bought the photos to keep them off the market.’

‘It’s not like you think,’ Poppy began awkwardly, horrified at the idea that illegal shots might have been taken of her at the photographic studio while she was unaware. But what else could she think?

As something akin to an anxiety attack claimed her already overheated body Poppy found it very hard to catch her breath. She dropped dizzily down into the chair by the scrubbed pine table. ‘I’m not feeling well,’ she mumbled apologetically.

‘If you think that feigning illness is likely to get you out of this particular tight corner, it’s not,’ Gaetano asserted in such a temper that he could hardly keep his voice level and his volume under control.

The mere idea of nude photos of Poppy being splashed all over the media provoked a visceral reaction from Gaetano. It offended him deeply. Poppy was his wife and the secrets of her body were his and not for sharing. He wanted to punch walls and tear things apart. He was ablaze with a dark, violent fury that had very little to do with the fact that another scandal around his name would once again drag the proud name of the Leonetti Bank into disrepute. In fact his whole reaction felt disturbingly personal.

‘Not feigning,’ Poppy framed raggedly, pushing her hands down on the table top to rise again.

‘I want the truth. If you had told me about this, I would never have married you,’ Gaetano fired at her without hesitation.

Poppy flopped back down into the seat because her legs refused to support her. She felt really ill and believed she must have caught the flu. He would never have married her had he known about the photo. Who would ever have thought that Gaetano, the notorious womaniser, would be that narrow-minded? And why should she care? And yet she did care. A lone stinging tear trickled from the corner of her eye and once again she tried to get up and leave but she couldn’t catch her breath. It was as though a giant stone were compressing her lungs. In panic at that air deprivation her hands flailed up to her throat, warding off the darkness that was claiming her.

Gaetano gazed in disbelief at Poppy as she virtually slithered off the chair down onto the floor and lay there unconscious, as pale and still as a corpse. And all of a sudden the publication of nude photos of his wife was no longer his most overriding concern...

CHAPTER EIGHT

‘NO, I DON’T think that my wife has an eating disorder,’ Gaetano bit out between gritted teeth in the waiting room.

‘Signora Leonetti is seriously underweight, dehydrated...in generally poor physical condition,’ the doctor outlined disapprovingly. ‘That is why the bacterial infection has gained such a hold on her and why we are still struggling to get her temperature under control. That she contrived to get through a wedding and travel in such a state has to be a miracle.’

‘A miracle...’ Gaetano whispered, sick to his stomach and, for the very first time in his brilliantly successful, high-achieving life, feeling like a failure.

How else could he feel? Poppy had collapsed. His wife was wearing an oxygen mask in the IC unit, having drugs pumped into her. All right, she hadn’t told him how she was feeling but shouldn’t a normal, decent human being have noticed that something was wrong?

Unfortunately he clearly couldn’t claim to be a normal, decent human being. And his analytical mind left him in no doubt of exactly where he had gone wrong. He had been too busy admiring his bride’s tiny waist to register that she was dangerously thin. He had been too busy dragging her off to bed to register that she was unwell. And when she had tried to tell him, what had he done? Porca miseria, he had shouted at her and accused her of feigning illness!

‘May I see her now?’ he asked thickly.

He stood at the foot of the bed looking at Poppy through fresh eyes, rigorously blocking the sexual allure that screwed with his brain. Ironically she had always impressed him as being so lively, energetic and opinionated that he had instinctively endowed her with a glowing health that she did not possess. Now that she was silent and lying there so still, he could see how vulnerable she really was. It was etched in the fine bones of her face, the slenderness of her arms, the exhaustion he could clearly see in the bluish shadows below her eyes.

And what else would she be but exhausted? he asked himself grimly. For months she had worked two jobs, managing the hall and working at the bar. She had been so busy looking after her mother and her brother that she had forgotten to look after herself. He suspected that she had got out of the habit then of taking regular meals and rest. And even when both food and rest had been on offer in London she had still chosen to work every day at that café. In truth she was as much of a workaholic in her proud and stubborn independence as he was, he acknowledged bleakly. He could only hope that he was correct in believing that she did not suffer from an underlying eating disorder.

‘Your grandfather is waiting outside...’ a nurse informed him.

‘There was no need for you to leave your bed,’ Gaetano scolded the older man. ‘I only texted you so that you would know where I was.’

‘How is she?’ Rodolfo asked worriedly.

And Gaetano told him, withholding nothing. ‘I’ve been a pretty lousy husband so far,’ he breathed in grim conclusion, conceding the point before it could be made for him.

‘You have a steep learning curve in front of you.’ His grandfather sighed. ‘But she’s a wonderful girl and well worth the effort. And it’s not where you start out that matters, Gaetano...it’s where you end up.’

Rodolfo could not have been more wrong in that estimate, Gaetano reflected austerely. Where you started out mattered very much if you had previously blocked the road to journey’s end. His marriage was not a marriage and the relationship was already faltering. He had put up a roadblock with the word divorce on it and used that as an excuse to behave badly. He had screwed up. He had been shockingly selfish and with Poppy of all people, Poppy who had trailed round after him and his dog, Dino, on the estate when they were both kids. And what had she been like then?

Like an irritating little kid sister. Kind, madly affectionate, his biggest fan. He exhaled heavily. He had had more compassion as a boy than he had retained as an adult and he had not lived up to Poppy’s high expectations. Worse still, he had taken advantage of her despair over her family’s predicament. He had forced through the terms he wanted, terms she should have denied for her own sake, terms only a complete selfish bastard would have demanded. But it was a little too late to turn that particular clock back.

Was the selfishness a Leonetti trait? His father had been the ultimate egotist and his mother had never in her life, to his knowledge, put anyone’s needs before her own. Had his dysfunctional parents made him the ruthless predator that he was at heart? Or had wealth and success and boundless ambition irrevocably changed him? Gaetano asked himself grimly.

* * *

Poppy surfaced to appreciate that her head had stopped aching. She discovered that she could swallow again and that her breath was no longer trapped in her chest. She opened her eyes on the unfamiliar room, taking in the hospital bed and the drip attached to her arm before focusing on Gaetano, who was hunched in the chair in the corner.

Gaetano looked as if he had been dragged through hell and far removed from the sophisticated, exquisitely groomed image that was the norm for him. His black curls were tousled, his jaw line heavily stubbled. His jacket was missing. His shirt was open at his brown throat and his sleeves were rolled up. As she stared he lifted his head and she collided with glorious dark golden eyes.

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